V. Adoramus te Christe et benedicimus tibi (We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee)
R. Quia per Crucem tuam redemisti mundum (For by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.)
“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46).
“It is finished” (Jn 19:30).
These are two of the words we hear from the mouth of Jesus before He expired, according to the testimony of the Gospels.
‘In my love, I have taken possession of you. You are mine!’ (Inner Word).
We know a similar phrase in Sacred Scripture: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine” (Is 43:1). And St Paul exclaims: “Nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:39).
V. Adoramus te Christe et benedicimus tibi (We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee)
R. Quia per Crucem tuam redemisti mundum (For by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.)
The Lord’s suffering becomes increasingly acute. He has already walked the way that led Him to Calvary, accompanied by mockery and insults, but also by the compassion and consolation He experienced in the encounter with His Mother, with Veronica and with the women of Jerusalem.
His executioners, however, feel no compassion and carry out their task with cruelty. Now they nail Jesus to the cross, like a lamb led to the slaughter (cf. Is 53:7). Defenseless, they drive the nails through Him. The pain increases more and more.
“Never lose heart. God is with you and will never leave you” (Inner Word).
There is no doubt that we Christians are called to fight a battle, and it is coming to a head in an increasingly anti-Christian world, with its politics and mentality. But it is not only visible tribulations that we face. As St Paul tells us, our struggle is against “the principalities and powers” (Eph 6:12), that is, against the spirits of evil, the fallen angels, whom we must fight with the power of the Lord. To this battle are added various inner afflictions that come from our soul, as well as the experience of our own weakness and all kinds of limitations and trials.
V. Adoramus te Christe et benedicimus tibi (We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee)
R. Quia per Crucem tuam redemisti mundum (For by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.)
It was not enough for the executioners charged with killing Jesus to crucify Him. They wanted to humiliate Him even more by stripping Him of His clothes.
We men are stripped of our dignity when we sin. While grace envelops us with God’s light and transforms us with divine life, sin tears the robe of grace and dishonours us, so that we are left naked and unprotected, endangering our dignity.
‘Never let yourself be confused and keep your heart anchored in me’ (inner word).
Often the attacks of the evil one want to lead us away from the right path. But as we know, God uses all his machinations to anchor us even more deeply in Himself.
“I understand that someone suffers or is afflicted, but why worry if God is there?” (Venerable Anne de Guigné).
These words come from the mouth of a very young saint. It was Anne de Guigné herself who said: “Nothing is difficult if you love God”. Here we find a saintly simplicity that just assimilated the teachings of the Lord and allowed them to penetrate her soul. In this way they became a natural reality for Anne.
V. Adoramus te Christe et benedicimus tibi (We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee)
R. Quia per Crucem tuam redemisti mundum (For by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.)
Everything has to be consummated. From this perspective we can also understand the threefold fall of Jesus. The imperfect and sinful world was to be redeemed in its entirety.
The threefold fall of Jesus reminds us of the threefold denial of His beloved disciple Peter.
‘My God, Most Holy Trinity, be my dwelling place and my refuge; the Father’s house I never want to leave’ (St. Elizabeth of the Most Holy Trinity).
A soul in love with God expresses in her letters what the Heavenly Father offers us again and again in the message to Mother Eugenia: the most intimate relationship of the soul with her Creator and Saviour. All the books in the world cannot fully describe this love. We need to read more in that book of which Saint Joan of Arc spoke: to listen attentively to the Heart of God and to know our Father as He is.
V. Adoramus te Christe et benedicimus tibi (We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee)
R. Quia per Crucem tuam redemisti mundum (For by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.)
Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem. They remained faithful to Him. Their hearts are aching, because they see the Son of God suffering on the way to the crucifixion, suffering for humanity. So we see that there were also those who did not close their hearts to the Lord.
Perhaps they did not yet understand the full extent of the events, but they have compassion for Jesus. He sees their compassion and accepts their weeping. However, He announces to them the true grief that awaits them. His death will not be final, for He will soon rise again. Then His suffering will be over.
