Fr. Thomas M. Pastorius
March 12, 2017
Spiritual Ponderings
7 Last Words of Christ
 
According to St. Augustine the Cross can be described as “The death of the Lord our God should not be a cause of shame for us; rather, it should be our greatest hope, our greatest glory. In taking upon himself the death that he found in us, he has most faithfully promised to give us life in him, such as we cannot have of ourselves.”  Therefore, as we continue to dive deeper into the lessons that the Cross is trying to teach us let us ask God for the gift of wisdom. 
 
3.            When Jesus saw his mother  and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.” John 19:26-27. 
 
One of my favorite spiritual heroes is Cardinal Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan.  He was a Vietnamese bishop during the Vietnam War.  As part of the North’s victory, Cardinal Van Thuan was arrested and placed in a concentration camp where the communist tortured him in some of the most inhumane ways possible.  Eventually the communists grew frustrated with him and placed him under house arrest in North Vietnam.  During this time the Vatican and the rest of the world assumed that he was dead.  While under house arrest, he wrote a book called The Road of Hope: a Gospel from Prison.  The book, which was written on the back of old calendars, contained spiritual statements that were meant to strengthen the people of Vietnam.  Eventually the Vatican negotiated his release and he was exiled from Vietnam.  Pope John Paul II made him the head of the Peace and Justice office in the Vatican and invited the Cardinal to preach the Lenten retreat in the year 2000. 
 
Cardinal Thuan wrote this about the gift of Mary: “’Here is your Mother’ (Jn 19:27).  After the institution of the Blessed Eucharist, the Lord could not have left us anything greater than Mary.  She has crushed the head of the serpent.  She will help you to conquer the devil, “the flesh” and “the world.”  She will obtain for you the graces to hold firm to the noble ideal which the Lord has placed in your heart.”
 
Sometimes, the greatest part of suffering is not the pain one feels but seeing others suffer because of our suffering.  I can only imagine how Jesus felt, hanging there on the cross seeing his mother suffer.  In a way though it was her love and support that helped Him stay the path that the Father had laid out before Him.  When we are sick or ill, we must be willing to allow people to help and support us.  We should not hold onto stubborn pride.  We should also
 
4.            And about three o’clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” *  which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Mathew 27:46
 
When we first hear this passage, we can think of it as a prayer of despair but Jesus is actually reciting Psalm 22.  The psalm can be summarized in three parts.  It starts off listing all the miseries the psalm writer is going through.  The second part is where the author promises to remain faithful to God and finally the person declares his trust in God and knows that God will bring out good from the situation.  Far from being a rejection of God this is a moment of recommitting himself to the Father.  During our time of suffering, do we take the time to recommit ourselves to the Lord.  One way in which the psalmist does it is by reminding himself of God’s faithfulness in the past.  When you feel abandon do you take the time to think about all the things God has done for us in the past. 
 
Here is one last quote from Cardinal Thuan: “You suffer most when you suffer at the hands of those who should understand and sympathize with you, indeed those who have the obligation to defend you.  Unite yourself with Jesus who hung on the cross and cried: “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46).”