The Holy Cross

Coming from a fundamentalist-evangelical Christian background, I find lots of the things I do now as a Byzantine Catholic Christian pretty weird.

Like today, for example, in the Byzantine East as well as the Latin West, we commemorated this weird event from 1700 years ago that is shrouded in legend. It’s the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the day the universal Church remembers when St Helena (died AD 330), the mother of the Emperor St Constantine, unearthed three crosses in Jerusalem, one of which was miraculously revealed to be the very Cross on which Jesus of Nazareth, God in the flesh, died. Apparently, at this event, jubilant veneration of this immeasurably precious relic, and worship, of course, of the God Who died thereon, followed, and has never ceased to this day, with pieces of the True Cross venerated in houses of worship throughout the Christian world, Orthodox and Catholic.

“Why all this fuss about such an obscure happening?” my former Protestant self protests. “Isn’t the simple fact that Jesus died on the Cross enough for Christian contemplation? Why have a major feast day (which is also a major holiday in many historically Christian countries) to celebrate this obviously secondary event?”

The simple answer is that the singularity of Jesus’ death on the Cross really is enough for Christian contemplation. It is so infinitely and overabundantly enough (!) that the Church is thrilled to have her children turn their thoughts and hearts toward it on another day of the year, besides Good Friday.

You see, the Catholic Church sees endless value in the image of the Christian at prayer before the fact of Jesus’ death. St Paul of the Cross (1694-1775) said, “When you are alone in your room, take your crucifix, kiss its five wounds reverently, tell it to preach to you a little sermon, and then listen to the words of eternal life that it speaks to your heart; listen to the pleading of the thorns, the nails, the precious Blood. Oh, what an eloquent sermon!”

But the Church also, in her wisdom as a good mother, realizes that the average believer isn’t gonna just sit there and think about the Cross endlessly, no matter how much he or she sees the idea of doing that as a good thing. Most people are just too busy with kids and jobs to hold Christ’s life-giving sacrifice constantly before their minds.

Yet that is exactly what we need to do. Even in the midst of our daily activities, we need to remain at prayer before the God on the Cross, the God who picks up the shattered pieces of our lives and makes them whole again, more beautiful than before. We need his love and healing to radiate to us from those pierced hands, that side rent open for us, from His sorrowful and loving eyes that, even in the midst of greatest agony, radiate supernatural mercy and compassion. For Christ is risen, and the empty tomb proves that His Cross is the moment of ultimate victory! It is the place of triumph where “steadfast love and faithfulness meet; righteousness and peace kiss each other” (Psalm 85:10), where our broken hearts are made new.

And so, the Church places around her children a hedge of sorts, a liturgical milieu of feasts and fasts, icons and smells, hymns and prayers that call us constantly to the amazing, incredible, unimaginably wonderful fact of our salvation in Christ Jesus. That is why we remember St Helena’s discovery today. It’s another occasion to shout for joy to the God of our salvation, the God who died on a Cross to save us, Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.

So, even if it is weird to me, I guess it’s not a weird thing to do at all. In fact, like all things Catholic, it is a rather wonderful way to draw ever nearer to the heart of Christ.

Let us celebrate today, with all the angels and saints, the holy, precious, life-giving wood of the Cross!

+peace to all+