Feast Of The Holy Cross

Crucifixion, (Corpus Hypercubus) (1954) by Salvador Dali - Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Readings:

Psalm 98 or 98:1-4;
Isaiah 45:21-25
Philippians 2:5-11 or Galatians 6:14-18
John 12:31-36a

I'm going to do something that I don't often do. I'm linking to enemy territory - Of Course I Could Be Wrong - where the English MadPriest has a sermon at his site for the feast day. Credit where credit is due. It's a fine sermon.

But first we must ask ourselves, “What is this cross that we celebrate today?”

Well for a start it must not be the empty cross because an empty cross is a worthless cross. It is merely an instrument of torture invented by human minds sick with sin. Any celebration of this would be idolatry. The worship, not of God, but of a human design, a design from the darkest depths of our humanity.
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The True Cross, the Cross that we should rightly venerate, the Cross that we should creep to in grovelling humility, is the Cross that has our Lord nailed upon it. Because it is only when our Lord Jesus Christ is united with that terrible thing of death, that it becomes truly holy. When the ironic takes control of the destiny of the world. When something so base becomes in stead the means of the triumph of good over evil, the triumph of the Cross. It is only when Jesus and the Cross are united by the nails piercing his body, crushing him upon the wood, that the Cross becomes an effectual part of our salvation. It is the passion of Jesus upon the Cross that saves us, not a bit of wood. It is this image of the crucifix, rather than the image of an empty cross, that dominates today's reading Saint John's gospel and, in fact, dominates the whole of John's account of the life of Christ..
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People may disagree over when our salvation was achieved. Was it at the Incarnation? Was it on the Cross? Was it at the Resurrection? I would say that it was in all of these events. John certainly believed that the Crucifixion was an effectual act, that Christ’s death changed the world. Earlier in his Gospel he writes

"It is the upward swing of the great pendulum of the incarnation corresponding to the descent of the Word which became flesh.”.

These are a few snippets from the sermon, but I urge you to go there and read the whole thing. I think you won't be sorry.

PRAYER

Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ was lifted high upon the cross that he might draw the whole world to himself: Mercifully grant that we, who glory in the mystery of our redemption, may have grace to take up our cross and follow him; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting.