T_HE W_AY OF THE C_ROSS   by C_aryll H_ouselander

Chapter 13: JESUS IS TAKEN DOWN FROM THE CROSS

While the soldiers divided Christ's garments among

them and cast lots for His seamless cloak, Mary

His Mother, she who had woven that beautiful cloak

"from the top throughout," came with other holy

women and stood at the foot of the cross. "So it was,

then, that the soldiers occupied themselves; and

meanwhile his mother's sister, Mary the wife of

Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen, had taken their stand

beside the cross of Jesus" (John xix.24-25).

She had followed Him through the narrow streets

of Jerusalem as one of the crowd. He did not speak

to her in the crowd as He did to the women who wept

over Him; neither did He then give her a visible sign

of His love as He did to St. Veronica when He im-

printed her veil with the impression of His beautiful

suffering face. Even now she is mentioned only as

one of a group of women who followed Him, and

there is nothing that she can do to alleviate His

suffering. She is content to suffer with Him; His

passion is hers.

How often before she has been one of the crowd.

On the night of His birth she was one of the crowd

thronging the little city of Bethlehem. When He was

twelve years old she sought for Him, lost, in the

crowded city of Jerusalem, and when she found Him

in the temple she heard that strange, puzzling answer

of His to her question: "My Son, why hast thou

treated us so? Think, what anguish of mind thy

father and I have endured, searching for thee. But

he asked them, What reason had you to search for

me? Could you not tell that I must needs be in the

place which belongs to my Father? These words

which he spoke to them were beyond their under-

standing...." (Luke ii.48-50).

Again Mary His Mother was in the crowd when

her son was preaching, and again what He said would

have baffled any mother whose love was less perfect

than hers, one who had less understanding of her son

than she had of Jesus and who was less identified with

Him in His every desire, in every beat of His heart:

"While he was still speaking to the multitude, it

chanced that his mother and brethren were standing

without, desiring speech with him. And someone told

him, Here are thy mother and thy brethren standing

without, looking for thee. But he made answer to

the man that brought him the news, Who is a mother,

who are brethren, to me? Then he stretched out his

hand towards his disciples, and said, Here are my

mother and my brethren! If anyone does the will of

my Father who is in heaven, he is my brother, and

sister, and mother" (Matt. xii.46-49).

She was surely in the crowd when Christ rode

into Jerusalem on the proud little donkey and the

children cast their garments and the branches from

the trees under its feet; and so soon after, in the

midst of the mob that cried out, "Crucify him"; and

again on the way to Calvary, following Him, longing

to take some of the load of the great cross but by His

own will denied the comfort of helping or comforting

Him, because she was absolutely one with Him and

she only in the whole world could enter into His

passion and suffer everything that He suffered with

Him.

Now at the end she is still in the crowd that mills

around the foot of the cross—the soldiers, the mock-

ers, the curious, and a handful of those who, in spite

of everything, are faithful to Him; and surely a multi-

tude of those who heard His sermon on the mount

and hoped, but who have lost hope now and feel

themselves cheated, those who could not dream of

the glory that is coming to them and to all who will

open their hearts to Him—His resurrection in their

hearts. His rebirth in their souls!

Only Jesus and Mary know how like this night

is to that one in the little city of Bethlehem thirty-

three years ago—that night when she heard the first

cry of her little son. That was a little wail, no stronger

than the bleating of one of the lambs on the hillside,

bleating in the darkness of the night. This cry from

the cross was a loud cry, uttered again in darkness:

"Then Jesus cried out again in a loud voice, and

yielded up his spirit" (Matt. xxvii.50).

Mary remained silent, as so often before she had

remained silent, in the crowd; but now Jesus shared

her silence. Jesus and Mary alone were silent in the

midst of chaos, when the veil of the temple was rent

from top to bottom and the graves were opened. They

alone remained calm when those who a few moments

ago had mocked at Christ, and those who had ham-

mered the nails through His hands and feet, shouting

and laughing to one another, were seized with dread

and confusion of mind.

One of the soldiers came to pierce the heart of

Christ with a spear, and as he drove it into His side

blood and water flowed from it. Mary knew that that

stream of blood was her own blood, emptied at last

from his sacred veins, and she knew that that water

that sprang like the spray of a fountain from His

side was the mysterious breaking of the waters of

birth. It was the birth of Christ in man, her son Christ

who would indwell men until the end of time.

They took His body down from the cross and laid

it in His Mother's arms, and she held it upon her

heart; and in it, all those Christs to come to whom

she was Mother now.

That first birth of Christ in Bethlehem was pain-

less, because Mary His Mother was sinless and He

was the son of God. But this mysterious birth of

Christ on Calvary began in the travail and agony of

the whole world borne by one man and one woman,

God-made-Man and Mary His Mother: because this

was the birth of Christ in us, Christ the redeemer

born in the souls of sinners; and every sinner who

would receive Him in all time became Mary's child,

even her only child; every sinner who would be in-

dwelt by Christ was laid in Mary's arms, and she re-

ceived them all.

Mankind was born again.

Already, even in the agony of that night of sor-

row, Mary, who had shared Christ's passion, shared

His peace. In the consummation of His pain, and her

pain and suffering, she knew the beginning of the joy

that would never end; she knew the birth of life in

the souls of men that would be immortal life, never

ending. She knew the utter joy of experiencing the

consummation of His love for men, and of loving

them with all His love.

She herself was indwelt by Him now as really as

her body had been indwelt by His advent. Now she

who had given Him life would live His life for ever;

her life would be His, her words His words, her acts

His acts; her heart beating, the beating of His heart.

She who had said long ago in Nazareth, "Let it

be unto me according to thy word" was the first of

all human creatures since Christ was conceived to be

one with Him. She gave Him her life, and He gave

her back her life in His forever. He gave His life, too,

to all those who would receive Him through the ages:

"And I have given them the privilege which thou

gavest to me, that they should all be one, as we are

one; that while thou art in me, I may be in them, and

so they may be perfectly made one" (John xvii.22-23).

As the dead Christ lay in His Mother's arms she

laid to her heart all those sinners to whom He would

give not only life but His own life: in baptism, that

first stream of the waters of birth, cleansing and

irrigating the soul; in the sacrament of penance,

restoring the soul of the sinner to its primal inno-

cence. She saw them as God sees them. No matter how

battered and bruised they had been by sin, the in-

nocence of Christ was restored to them, they were

restored to His beauty; no matter how darkened their

minds and hearts had been by evil and by the oppres-

sive sadness that follows upon evil, they shone now

with the purity, the glory, of Christ of Tabor, clothed

in His loveliness that burns with the splendour of a

fire of snow. No matter how cynical and faded and

old their sins had made them, they were restored to

their childhood now, to Christ's childhood. Now they

could possess the kingdom of heaven in a wild flower,

a stream of water or a star, and now in the body of

Christ Mary took them, each of them as her only

child, to her sinless heart.

And there from the summit of Calvary, at the

foot of the cross with her dead child in her arms,

Mary saw how in all the centuries to come Christ

would be born again day after day, hour after hour,

in the sacred Host. She heard the multitudinous

whisper of the words of consecration coming to her

on Calvary from every part of the world, from every

place on earth: from the great cathedrals of the

world; from the little village huts that are makeshift

for churches; from the churches themselves, whether

they were beautiful or cheap and tawdry; from the

chapels and wards of hospitals; from prisons and from

concentration camps; from the frozen forests of

Siberia—from dawn till dusk, and from dusk till

dawn, the words of consecration on the breath of

men, and Jesus lifted up, as He had been lifted up

on the cross, in the Sacred Host.

And she saw, through the darkness that covered

Calvary, how at all those Masses those who were to

be her children and the children of God would flock

to the altars to receive her Son in the Host—little

children clothed in the white muslin and gossamer

of their First Communion clothes, old people leaning

upon their sticks, young men and women who would

carry Christ in their hearts to face and conquer the

workaday world.

She saw, too, how He would be carried into

prisons and hospitals and concentration camps, to

be given to the lonely and the sick and the dying.

And how in all these people, in every one of them,

sinners as well as saints, Christ her son would live

again and overcome the world.

So it was that when Jesus was taken down from

the cross, Mary received her dead son into her arms

and took the whole world to her heart.

Prayer

Mary, Mother of God,

receiving the dead body

of Jesus Christ your son

taken down from the cross

and laid in your arms,

receive us,

to whom He had given His life,

and lay us with Him

and in Him

upon your sinless heart.

We are sinners,

but save us from despondency

and despair.

Save us from morbidity

which kills the soul.

Save us from dwelling on the past.

Take our heads into your hands

and turn them gently

to look upon the light of God.

Let us feel the warmth and radiance

of that healing sun,

although we are still too weak

to bear the blaze of its glory.

By the dead body of Christ

laid in your arms,

save us from the death of sin.

Ask our Heavenly Father,

whose will is your will,

to restore us to life,

to Christ's life in our souls,

so that in each one of us

you may see your only child,

the Child Jesus,

and give us the heaven

of your tender love.

By the passion

and death

of your only Son,

give us His life.

Make us new,

give us the trust of children,

give us the childhood of Christ.

Grant to us,

Virgin Mother,

a new heaven and a new earth,

because we see with His eyes,

hear with His ears,

work with His hands,

walk on His feet,

trust with His trust

in His Heavenly Father,

and love with His heart.

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