Our Good Friday liturgy is
very simple and very somber and very realistic because it touches something
that is so deep in each and every one of us.
Isaiah in the first reading reminded us that Jesus is that suffering
servant that took upon Himself all the pains and the hardships and because He
learned obedience, as Hebrews in the second reading reminded us. Because Jesus trusted that the Father’s love
was far bigger and more powerful than any sin and hardship and pain.
On Good Friday, it happened
the first on, 2000 years ago, and what we are about tonight is to remember
that, and not just to remember it, but to allow it to come into our hearts and
lives this evening and to realize that, yes, it is the Risen Jesus who is with
us here tonight, but that the love and the trust that He had over 2000 years
ago is present to you and to me tonight.
Jesus doesn’t die
again. He is the Risen Lord. But Good Friday reminds us that He did, and
that He still does in each of our lives today.
Jesus took evil, He held it, He transformed it, and He gave back
God. Jesus took sin, He held it, He
transformed it, and He gave back forgiveness. Jesus took hatred, He held it, He
transformed it and He gave back love.
And Jesus took death, He held it, He transformed it, and He gave back
eternal life.
This Jesus is with you and
me here this evening. And what you and I
must do is to take our crosses, our hatred, our evil, our sin, our pain, our
disappointments, our frustrations, our agonies and put them on the cross of
Christ. And like Jesus, who stretched
out His arms and let go, and allowed the Father’s love to hold Him and to
transform Him so you and I are called to do the same.
So tonight when you and I
venerate this cross on which there is no figure, put yourself on that cross and
all the anxieties and hurts, pains, deaths and sufferings, we put them on the
cross of Christ and we allow Jesus to hold us, to transform us and to give us
Himself.