What Now...?

Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Lord of the Universe, is dead and laid in the tomb. Imagine that you are one of his disciples. Yesterday Jesus was beaten, scorned, insulted, gored, and hung on a cross to die naked in front a crowd of those who hated him and celebrated his demise. And what did you do? Maybe you ran. Maybe you hid. Were you afraid for your own life? Did you think, maybe they would do the same to you if they found you? How do you feel today, Saturday? What do you do when the man you gave everything for is gone?

Scripture doesn't really tell us much about what the apostles did on Holy Saturday. We know from Luke (23:56) that they rested according to the Sabbath. Did they go to the temple? If they did, they must have tried to remain inconspicuous. The voice of Jesus must have still been ringing in their ears when he said, "No slave is greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you... they will do these things to you on account of my name" (John 15:20-21).

The Apostles together on Holy Saturday

They must have felt lost. They must have thought to themselves, "what now?". Maybe the words of Peter came to mind. "Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." (John 6:68). Imagine the quiet emptiness that they must have felt. Imagine the feelings of abandonment. Imagine what it must have felt like to give three years of your life to a man and his cause, only to see him die. Not only that, but to know that you just ran away; to know that you valued your own life so much that you weren't even there to comfort him. I'm sure that Peter is not the only one who denied knowing Jesus that day.

We do know some things, however. We know that they returned to the upper room and stayed together. Indeed, on Easter Sunday, Jesus finds them there together (Jn 20: 19, 26). They were supporting and consoling each other. They must have been praying for a next step. We know that Mary of Magdala was there. When they saw Jesus, it says they returned to the upper room to tell the apostles (Jn 20:1-2; Mt 27:7-8; Mk 16:7; Lk 24: 7-8).

We can also assume that Mary was with them. John took her into his home (Jn 19:27), and as they were all together, she must have been there too. Imagine the comfort she must have been to them. She had a faith that surpassed all of them. She knew from the moment she gave her 'yes' to the angel (Lk 1:38), and from her encounter with Simeon in the temple those many years before (Lk 2:34-35), that this day was coming. She was their mother now (Jn 19:26). Yes, she was mourning  Yes, she must have been in more pain then any of them, but she knew that her son would come through. She believed.

Mary the Comforter

So, on this day of quiet contemplation, on this day of quiet desolation as our Lord rests in the tomb, I encourage you to be seek comfort in the arms of Mary, our mother. She is a model of faith. She is a model of patient perseverance. As we entered the tomb with Christ last night and stay there today, ask Mary to pray for you. Ask her to dry your tears and lead your prayers. Let yourself be buried in her embrace and allow her to bring you deeper into the Paschal Mystery. That way, when the bells ring tonight at the first Easter mass of the year, we can truly experience the joy of the Risen Lord as Mary and the apostles do.

Mary, mother of the Church, pray for us
God, Father in Heaven, bless us

That Good Friday

The Passion of our Lord : Mt 27; Mk 15; Lk 23; Jn 19

After a night in jail, Jesus is bound and led to the palace of Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of the province. The Jews themselves have no power to execute criminals. That is a power held only by the Romans. So, they gather outside of Pilate residence and call for him to executeJesus on the charge of heresy.

Pilate is a man who is careful in his actions. He has political ambitions that go beyond the outpost in Jerusalem, and he doesn't want to do anything that might hinder his upward mobility. He is also a just man who doesn't want any unnecessary blood on his hands. So, when they bring this man, this Jesus, bound and beaten into his presence, he is curious. They say that he calls himself a king. They say that he has made himself the Son of God. Pilate takes Jesus into the praetorium to question him.

Pilate asks repeatedly whether or not Jesus is a king, and Jesus refuses to give him a straight answer. Finally, Jesus says, "my kingdom is not of this world." (Jn 18:36). Pilate walks out and addresses the crowd that welcomed Jesus as the Messiah a few short days ago. He does not find any guilt in Jesus. The crowds call loudly for his crucifixion. In order to placate them, and to possibly save this innocent man's life, Pilate offers to give the Jews a choice of which prisoner to release, and which to execute. He can either release Jesus, or he can release Barabbas, a revolutionary and a murderer. To Pilate surprise, they call for Barabbas. In Hebrew, Bar-abbas means "Son of the Father". In this way, the true Son is handed over to death while an impostor is released.

Pilate still refuses to execute Jesus. Instead he says that he will have him scourged and then release him. The whips used to scourge prisoners had nine straps, all attached to bones, glass, hooks, and metal pieces that were meant to tear the flesh from the bones. By the time Jesus is brought back, he would have been unrecognizable. He would have been a bloody mess. After he is scourged, the guards weave a crown out of thorns and place it on his head. They place a reed in his hand and a purple robe on his back. He is dressed as a makeshift king, and on his head are the same thorns that Adam was cursed to pull forth from the ground (Gen 3: 18). The new Adam is crowned with the fruit of Adams sin.

Jesus is brought back before the Jews, and they still call for his crucifixion. Pilate tries to intercede for him. He tries to release him, but the Jews call out, "If you release him, you are not a friend of Caesar." (Jn 19:12). So, under the weight of public pressure, Pilate allows them to take Jesus to crucify him.

The cross is laid on the back of Jesus. He is made to walk it along with two criminals. The walk itself is about a mile long, first through the hot, winding streets of Jerusalem, then out of the city to the place of the skull, in Hebrew, Golgotha. Along the way, the same people who called him the Son of David now mock him and jeer at him. He is beaten and spit upon. People cry out to him and curse him. Jesus knows every single one of them. He knows their hearts. He knew them when they were conceived and he knows their every joy and hurt. He loves them. He weeps for them. These are the people who he is dying for. These are those for whom he has chosen to give everything.

He falls over and over. The weight of the cross is simply too much for his battered frame to handle. So, in order to keep him alive until they reach Golgotha, the guards pull Simon, a Cyrenian, of the crowd and press him into service. Simon puts his arm over the blood soaked cross. He likely doesn't realize that a single drop of that blood could save all of humanity. Jesus must have looked at him. What were those eyes like? The holiness and the love, still visible through the blood and tears, was enough to draw Simon in. It was enough to make him help this man he never knew.

Jesus is walked up to the hill, and there he is crucified. They lay him on the wood of the cross, and the drive nails through his wrists and through his ankles. The nails they used were comparable in size to railroad spikes, and the sound they made as they were pounded repeatedly through flesh and bone must have been nauseating. Jesus is crucified and the cross is placed in the ground. There he hung as people mocked him, spit upon him, and cursed his name. The tempted him to prove his power by coming down. Even one of the other men crucified called for him to step down from the cross. But he stays on the cross. He stays immersed in suffering because he knew that we would not have a choice to come down from our own crosses.

His last action is to call forth John, and disciple that he loved, and his mother, Mary. To John he says,"Behold, your mother", and to Mary, "Behold, your son." (Jn 19:26-27). The last thing he has on earth, his relationship with his mother, he relinquishes for our good. He makes sure that there is no relationship and no thing that he still possesses at the end. He gives everything there is to give, and after three hours of torture, he gives up his spirit.

What relief to be finished. To be taken off the cross and to be laid in a tomb. What sorrow and abandonment must the disciples have felt. Did we run like they did? Did we follow behind and curse him or deny that we knew him? Did we try to help like Simon? Today, we enter into the tomb with our Lord. We feel his absence. We know the reality of his death. Today, mourn the loss of our God, but remain hopeful. We will see that we cannot have a cross without a resurrection. We cannot have a Good Friday without an Easter Sunday.

Joseph, model of manhood, pray for us
God, Father in heaven, bless us

Morality is for Real... Suck it Up

Look, I've already reconciled with the fact that, when it comes to my sociology classes, I am The Enemy. I am a Catholic, conservative, middle class, white, straight, male. According to my classes and classmates, this means that all "inequality" that has been "suffered" by women, minorities, the poor, and those with same-sex attractions throughout the centuries is not only caused, but is maintained by me and my ilk.

How do we evil men do it? We apply gender roles and arbitrary morals on people throughout their lives in order to keep everyone stuck in mud along with us. We obviously refuse to think or to "open our minds". It goes without saying that we hate everyone who disagrees with us. "Why can't we all just get along?", you ask, and we simply respond by punching people in the face and imposing our morality on the poor, oppressed masses.

If you think this is who I am or what the Catholic Church is, I ask you gently turn off your computer and slam your head forcefully and repeatedly into the nearest wall for all the good you bring to this discussion. I'm only going to say this once: The norms that we have and the morals that have been passed down by the Church through the millennia are not an imposition or an effort to keep everyone else from having fun or "being who they are" (hippies). They are objective reality and truth that has been tested and refined over the course of HUNDREDS of years by some of the most intelligent and enlightened men ever to grace this planet. Simply because you don't like it doesn't mean it's wrong. Simply because it calls you to change does not mean its an imposition.

Stacks upon stacks of wisdom

Right and wrong are concrete objective states. Just because it challenges you doesn't mean you have ability to define you own morality. The second you start to say that what's right "for you" is different than what's right "for me" you should return to slamming your head into that good ol' wall. You see, the danger in trying to define your own morality is that you make yourself the author of right and wrong. What arrogance! What self-aggrandizement! The danger in saying "why can't we just let everyone do their own thing" means that you're still limiting those who disagree with you.

For instance, in the debate over same-sex marriages, people keep coming back to the idea that everyone should just allow everyone to do what makes them happy. Everyone should just be allowed to marry whoever they want and practice marriage however they want. Well, say that your right and marriage is allowed to be redefined. All of a sudden, the largest organization of people in the world, the Catholic Church, is forced to betray their morals. Why can't they be allowed to practice and defend what they believe? Is it because you simply don't like it?

Relative thinking in terms of morality always falls apart because it doesn't work in reality  One morality always needs to be placed above the others. To fall into a groove of right and wrong, whether you define your own or not, means that someone else is indeed WRONG. So the question becomes, what makes your morality (or lack thereof) so much better than mine? Your degree? The Catholic Church is and always has been the center of thought and education the world over. Is it your life experience? The Church has existed for 2000+ years and has experienced all manner of life over that course of time. Is it your novelty of insight? Well why would novelty in morality be appealing to being with? In the chaotic nature of the world we live in, why would I want to follow an unproven system of morality? The Church understands the human person, and the morals and doctrines that are passed down come from the fundamental knowledge of the wants and needs of the human person.

Here's a new thought, your "enlightened" thinking has bound you. You are a slave to the shifting trends and fashions of thought that go by the wayside when a new philosophy presents itself. History is full of examples. The sexual revolution and the rise of contraception, which was supposed to free women, has resulted in a 50% divorce rate, higher rates of domestic violence, and the abortion of 1/4 children who are conceived. Is that freedom? The enlightenment of the 18th century was supposed to result in peace and equality for all, but it resulted in the French Revolution and the widespread use of the guillotine. The spread of communism was supposed to put everyone on equal footing and ensure the happiness of all citizens. In the Soviet Union alone, it resulted in the death of millions of innocent people.

The morals that the Church puts forward are concrete and are proven. They are not a list of legalistic rules that need to be followed for their own sake. They are invitations to freedom! Think of it like this. Your life is a high plateau with a sheer 200 ft drop on all sides. The doctrines of the Church are the fence that keep you safe and free. You can do anything you want within the fence. You're also free t jump the fence, but this comes with the unfortunate consequence of a 200 ft fall to your death. You are not limited by the fence. It doesn't ruin your happiness. On the contrary, this absolute and concrete set of posts and pickets keeps you alive and allows you to experience life to its fullest.

Cartoons teach us so much!

Every "thou shalt not" comes with a "thou shall". Every "you cannot" comes with a "you can". The Church, in her infinite and proven wisdom is inviting all of us to truly live life to the full. We cannot do that with a relative idea of what is right and wrong. If nothing is wrong, then nothing is right. The rules come not from hate but from a loving understanding of who we are as human beings. Nobody faults a parent for the rules that they lay out for their children. They simply know their children and what they need. The Church is the same way. Let go of your pride! Accept that you don't know everything and allow yourself to learn! Stop trying to make the world in your own image. It is only when we let go that we can truly begin to make sense of things. So yes, morality is concrete, objective, and real. Suck it up and enjoy your life for once!

Joseph, model of manliness, pray for us
God, Father in heaven, bless us.