A reading of the holy gospel according to John. Jesus said to Nicodemus, no one has gone up to heaven except the one who came down from heaven, the son of man. Now just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the son of man be lifted up that all who believe may have eternal life in him. Yes, god so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him may not die but may have eternal life. God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.
And this is the gospel of the lord on this feast of the triumph of the cross. In the name of the father and of the son and the holy spirit. Amen. I often wondered why among some of our separated brethren and among eastern churches, they objected to having Christ on the cross, figure of Christ on the cross, and insisted on having just a cross without the corpus, as we say, without the body of Christ on it. I don't know what the whole explanation is and I don't pretend to offer it.
But I did hear very recently one explanation of it. It was in the in this little book I read which is a dynamite, which is dynamite, which Catherine Dahek Doherty, she called it fragments of my life. And of course, she came from Russia. And as far as I can figure, was never a Orthodox Greek Catholic, but she came from a family that was Orthodox Greek. And her whole her whole idea of sanctity, of asceticism is very Easter, very Easter.
Now, if I recall correctly, she mentioned in that book that the idea of having the cross empty of the body of Christ is to bring home to us that that's where we go. We put ourselves on Christ's cross. Now, as regards that idea of me putting myself on the cross, the idea of the mystical body of Christ, and of course this is absolutely true. The point is this, if you're only talking about if the cross only means suffering, and all and wonderful heroism on the part of one man giving his life for everybody, and you know you go on and on and on. You know, after all Socrates was a great man too.
He drank the hemlock. If that's what the cross means, remember it. You don't put yourself on it. You're going to get clobbered whether you like it or not. Sooner or later, more or less.
But sooner or later, more or less, we all are are absolutely shoved on the cross. It's just a question of when and how much, and whether or not we like it, there's where we find ourselves, sooner or later to greater or lesser degree. So we're not talking about suffering. We're talking about salvation. When a Christian looks at the cross of Jesus Christ, and whether he sees an empty crucifix or whether he sees himself on it, It is not immaterial.
But what is absolutely essential is that he must realize that that cross doesn't represent suffering, it doesn't represent heroics, it represents the drama or whatever words you want to use of God becoming man and sacrificing himself for me. Notice that pronoun me. Not humanity. There's no such thing as humanity. The only thing that's real are individual human beings, individual human beings.
And it's for each one of them that Christ consummated his salvation, his mission of salvation on earth. Notice I use that word consummate. It was not the whole story. The whole story began long long centuries before. All the way back to the first book of Genesis.
All the way back to where we were promised a messiah. All the way back to where we were promised a savior. And the centuries rolled and rolled and rolled on, and the chosen people came and went, faithful one day and faithless the next. They knew what the cross was. They know what the cross is.
So as regards this feast, the triumph of the cross, think about this. This is a tremendous idea. Suppose if we talked about the triumph of the electric chair. Suppose if we talked about the triumph of the guillotine. Now we would say, how crazy can you get?
We are not magnifying suffering, there's no merit in suffering in itself. There's no merit in mortification. Why should I abuse my body? Now if you I referred yesterday in my absolutely memorable remarks about Saint Peter Claver, Dorothy Day, Peter Moran, Catherine DeHitt Doherty, Mother Teresa. These people represent a solid total giving of themselves, which is not for all of us.
That's the point I made yesterday. They we're not called upon to imitate them. But the thing is, they they cultivated suffering and mortification, and the penitential treatment of their bodies. Saint Peter Claver is repulsive. I mean downright repulsive, even at this stage when you read about it.
So the point, you see we can get so enraptured or be captivated by the insubstantial meaning of the cross. The cross has no meaning for a Christian without Jesus Christ. None. None whatsoever. Down the centuries have been plenty of men and women who have cultivated suffering.
Take the stories. Oh, you could any any place of the world, any time. There are certain people who for I don't know what reason, Jung has some ideas on this matter. Of course Freud had a lot of ideas on it. But the thing is there seems to be some impulse in people to cultivate suffering, mortification, rejection of themselves.
So what? Forget it, unless Christ is in it. We don't cultivate a vacuum. We don't cultivate negation. We don't cultivate privation.
We throw ourselves at the foot of the cross because Jesus Christ, the son of God is on it. And if I see an empty cross, and if it's meant to signify that I must be ready to put myself on it, well please remember you don't go on that cross alone. There are two of you up there, you and your savior, Jesus Christ. In the name of the father, the son, and holy spirit. Amen.