|
Hope in the Cross
Finding strength in Christ’s sacrifice
By Andrew Junker, The Catholic Sun
March 17, 2008
Holy Cross Father Bill Wack ministers to the homeless and the poor every day at André House. He contends with street crime, drug abuse and the general squalor of the area to provide food, clothing and blankets to those in need.
“In the world, there’s so much suffering. No one would deny this, but what about the pool of goodness, of forgiveness and mercy?” Fr. Wack asked. “Our offerings, our sufferings done well and in obedience can add to that pool. We can all play a part of that.”
It’s foolishness to think that small acts of charity and goodness can combat what often seems to be an oppressive and cold world, many would say.
But they wouldn’t be looking at the world through the lens of Christ’s death on the cross, a world infused with hope and redemption.
Fr. Wack told a story of picking up trash outside of André House, a ministry to the homeless and poor populations of the Phoenix area. The day had been tiring and difficult for Fr. Wack, who stood out wearing his Roman collar. He sat down on the curb to hang his head and collect his thoughts.
A homeless person had been watching this scene unfold and, marching directly up to the priest, admonished him for despairing.
“Don’t you know that all of this will end in glory?” the homeless person asked Fr. Wack. “Don’t ever lose that hope because you, chaplain, are hope for all of us.”
Fr. Wack was duly reproved.
“In the end, we’re just trying to help people to cope, to point beyond this life and say that there’s something greater,” he said. “I look at the cross and think, ‘God is here in the midst of our suffering and pain and there’s more to life than what we see.’”
Christ’s perfect, selfless act
As the season of Lent winds down, all eyes turn to Holy Week and the triduum, the three days celebrating the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
“We proclaim Christ crucified,” St. Paul wrote in his first letter to the Corinthians, and then he described the difficulties both the Jews and the Greeks had in accepting the crucified Christ. It was a “stumbling block” to one and “foolishness” to the other.
But “the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom,” St. Paul concluded, “and the weakness of God is greater than human strength.”
Human wisdom has striven for centuries to understand the foolishness of a God who would willingly become a man, suffer indignities, take the sins of all humanity on His shoulders and die.
But nearly two millennia later, the redemptive consequences of Christ’s perfect, selfless act are perhaps more easily and intuitively felt.
“The world is a place where I can be brave,” Gil Berry simply said. “Christ is there for me when I need to be strong.”
Berry is celebrating the 10th anniversary of his conversion to Catholicism this triduum. He went through the RCIA program at St. Francis Xavier Parish and recalled a central fact that he took away from his experience.
“Christ’s death calls me to give of myself for others,” he said. “He gave His all, His life, and He calls us to give ourselves in order to keep His ways of love and peace alive in the world.”
Desiring to emulate Christ’s actions or uniting one’s desires and thoughts to His is putting into practice the lesson Jesus taught the world from the cross, said Fr. John Ehrich, pastor of St. Thomas the Apostle.
“Upon the cross, Christ reveals man to man, the authentic nature of man,” he said.
Because of the fall of Adam, because of the entrance of sin into the world, the nature of things was corrupted. Death, despair, darkness: these are all consequences of sin.
“But Christ’s suffering and death had redemptive effects on all of creation,” Fr. Ehrich said. “So not only are all things redeemed, but our very nature is redeemed.”
In other words, viewed through the lens of the cross, every aspect of human life is changed.
“Suffering and death are no longer the end of the story,” Fr. Ehrich explained. “They have meaning beyond themselves. We can take on Christ’s life in us, and our suffering and sacrifice can have redemptive consequences in our lives and in the lives of others.”
This is why Fr. Wack feels such hope at André House. The suffering and pain and loneliness of today all have meaning beyond themselves.
“Holiness is not just spending hours in the chapel, though it includes that. It includes serving others,” Fr. Wack said.
“Don’t you know this will all end in glory?” the homeless person reminded him as he sat down after cleaning up used syringes from the street.
“I have little crosses and so do you. And some people outside have bigger ones,” Fr. Wack said. “If we help people to cope and to be obedient in carrying their crosses, then we can expect glory for them and for us.”
|
