top of page
Search
  • Bisley Benefice

Stations of the Cross III and IV – 5th March

We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you because by your Holy Cross you have redeemed

the world.


I love you, Lord Jesus, my love, above all things. I repent with my whole heart for having

offended you. Never permit me to separate myself from you again. Grant that I may love

you always and then do with me as you will.


III Jesus Falls for the First Time


We remember the cross of Jesus

Jesus falls. Here Jesus shows us that being heroic does not mean staying on one’s feet at all costs. Being heroic means getting up again after falling and starting off on the road chosen. Human beings will never resign themselves to staying flat on the ground. Like Jesus, they will get up again, pick up their crosses and keep on searching for a promised land of total liberation. We adore you …


We name the crosses of today: Look at Jesus fallen in the gutter or slouched in a doorway. He doesn’t look much like God there, but he didn’t look like God when he fell into the dirt on the way to Calvary either. The crowds look on with disdain at this man whom they see as a sinner, who has been condemned to death by the authorities.


Like the crowd, we often have only condemnation and rejection for those we see as sinners: the alcoholic, the drug addict, the homeless. We judge them without knowing about their trials, scourging and crowning with thorns. Do we even suspect the part we might have played in knocking them down? What do we do to help them?


We Pray: Jesus, it’s easy to see your image in saints. Help us to see you in the sinners too. You had a place in your heart for the divorced Samaritan woman, Zacchaeus, the good thief, and for those who crucified you. Give us this same compassionate heart. I love you, Lord Jesus ….


II Jesus receives the cross


We remember the cross of Jesus

Mary had been with Jesus from the first moment of his conception. She had seen him grow like a sapling in the arid ground of poverty and obscurity in Nazareth. She had pondered all that had been said about him and she had listened to his words. She had witnessed his miracles and listened to his teachings. She had come to that fulness of faith which is a love beyond all understanding.


But she knew too that a sword would pierce her heart, as it was to pierce his. This was that moment, and she was helpless. She could only suffer with him whom she now saw so cruelly treated. As she suffered with him, so she suffers with us and for us because we are the Church; we are the Body of Christ. We adore you …


We name the crosses of today: We see Mary’s pain in the mothers and fathers who watch their children giving up their life to drugs, addictions and suicide, in the men and women who suffer violence and the ongoing threat of violence in their home from spouse or child. We see Mary’s pain in the child coping with the breakdown of a parent’s marriage, in the couple trying desperately to rebuild their relationship and family anew.


We Pray: Jesus, we remember the gaze that rested between you and your mother. In that moment of pain there was also a moment of deep and enduring love. Jesus, give us the courage to bring that love into the deepest recesses of our homes, to our children and to our spouses, to those places of fracture and disharmony in our circle of relationships. I love you, Lord Jesus…

 

3. St Mary of All Angels, Bisley 4. M McGrath.

3 views0 comments
Post: Blog2_Post
bottom of page