Holy Week Devotional | Good Friday

The Cross Stands Firm

“Stat crux, dum volvitur orbis.” “While the world spins, the Cross stands firm.” This is the motto of the ancient Carthusian order of monks whose life was described in the great documentary “Into Great Silence.” They spend their lives meditating on the Word of God, and singing the Psalms throughout the day, praying for all of us who seek to serve faithfully as disciples of Jesus in this spinning world.

And it is a world that spins and spins, so often caught up in meaninglessness, and blown about by the winds of futility that arise from the Spirit of the Age, not from the Holy Spirit of God.

So much of that world in which we are called to serve is futile, vanity of vanities, and there is no peace in it, for as Saint Augustine said in his Confessions “you have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”

Yet it is that world into which Our Saviour came, for God so loved that world that he sent his only begotten Son into it to save us.

The second person of the Trinity did not cling to his equality with God, “but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2: 7-8)

The cross stands firm, while the world spins. That is why we call this Friday “Good”: “We adore you O Christ, and we praise you, because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.”

There is no future, and no present either, and nothing but a past to regret, when we chase after the phantom delights of the spinning world. It is in the cross of Christ alone, sign of the compassionate love of Jesus for us all, as he suffered with us and for us, that we find the purpose of our lives as we pass through this valley of tears on our way to the heavenly Jerusalem, seeking to live in the imitation of Christ, and making His love present to others through the way we relate to each person we meet on the journey.

On Good Friday Jesus shows us the way: while the world spins mindlessly, it is the Cross of Christ that stands firm.

Cardinal Thomas Collins

Archbishop of Toronto

Prayer

Lord Jesus, as we pass through this valley of tears on our way to the heavenly Jerusalem, help us live in the imitation of Christ, loving the people in our lives and beyond, the way Jesus loved.

Application

In all situations when you feel the battle of choices – between the spiritual and worldly – seek the Lord’s help to find strength to submit to him in all your ways, so that he will make your paths straight.