Monday Musings — The Triumph of Love

“…the wood of the cross has brought joy to the world.”
Antiphon, Morning Prayer

This day is glorious. This day, heaven and earth are brimming with joy. Because this day, we celebrate the Triumph of the Cross. Some might say we ought to commemorate this feast with great solemnity and somberness, recalling our sinfulness and keeping in mind the Passion and death of the Lord. And that is beautiful and good. But as we approached this day, I knew there somehow had to also be joy amidst the sorrow and thanksgiving flowing from our contrition. And there is, because today, what we are actually celebrating is the triumph of Love.

We hear in the letter to the Hebrews that Jesus, “for the sake of the joy that lay before him, endured the cross, despising its shame …”(12:2). What joy was Jesus anticipating that He freely consented to undergo such shameful humiliation, brutal torture and finally, a most painful and horrific death?

The joy of being our Savior.

The joy of knowing that His sacrifice of love would win our eternal salvation.

The joy of drawing the whole world to Himself.

So that this joy might be His — because He loved us that much — Love embraced the Cross, and brought about the greatest victory ever known.

“Had there been no cross, life itself could not have been nailed to the tree. And if life had not been nailed to it, there would be no streams of immortality pouring from Christ’s side, blood and water for the world’s cleansing. The legal bond of our sin would not be canceled, we should not have obtained our freedom, we should not have enjoyed the fruit of the tree of life and the gates of paradise would not stand open. Had there been no cross,  death would not have been trodden underfoot, nor hell despoiled.”

St. Andrew of Crete, Office of Readings

 

 

So Jesus took our punishment, died for our sins, rose from the dead, and is now rejoicing forever in heaven, right? Well … it’s not quite that simple. When He was on the Cross, He cried out, “I thirst!” He didn’t simply want a drink of water; He was thirsting for love. For your love; for my love; for the love of every soul. In other words, His sacrifice of love requires a response. We cannot just look at the Cross as if it’s only a historical event, another symbol of our faith, or a decoration on our walls. That’s all head, and this is all about heart. It’s not enough to glance at the Cross occasionally and say, “Well, thanks, Lord, that was nice of you” and then move on. We need to remember daily that it’s personal by going frequently to the foot of the Cross, immersing ourselves in His thirst, and doing as much as we can to satisfy His longing for love.

We can do that by trusting in Him, thanking Him for His love, and asking for the grace to love Him in return. The result of doing these three things consistently is joy! In His humility, Jesus allows us to bring joy to His Heart, and in turn, we receive the joy that comes from knowing we are loved by Him. As Blessed Mother Teresa said so beautifully, “Joy is love, the normal result of a heart burning with love.” She continues, “Joy is a sign of union with God…”(Joy In Loving). The Heart of Jesus burns with love for each of us, and our hearts ought to burn with love for Him, which will bring about a joyful union of our hearts with His.

This joy that flows from the Cross, the joy of trusting in God’s love for us, of being united with Him in His thirst, is truly bittersweet, because it is intermingled with the acute sorrow we begin to feel for the suffering of our Beloved. For just as His joy increases with each soul that responds to His love in trust, so too, His pain continues each time a soul rejects the mercy He is longing to give. (There’s a lot more to this theologically, which we don’t have time to get into here, but for a full treatment, see Fr. Michael Gaitley’s Consoling the Heart of Jesus.)

The more we understand the depth of Jesus’ thirst, the more we desire to bring souls to Him, and this adds to His joy, which becomes our joy as well, because we love Him. We are so privileged to know the goodness of this open-Hearted God!

This week, may we each cultivate in our hearts the joy of the Cross, asking the intercession of our Mother of Sorrows, that we will be able to respond to Jesus’ thirst for us by trusting in His love, and thanking Him for His sacrifice. By meditating on His Passion, receiving Him in the Eucharist, and contemplating His goodness, may we be filled to overflowing, that our joy in Him might bring others to the foot of the Cross to experience personally the triumph of Love.

“O Jesus, when I consider the great price of Your Blood,
I rejoice at its immensity, for one drop alone would have been enough for the salvation of all sinners. Although sin is an abyss of wickedness and ingratitude, the price paid for us can never be equalled.
Therefore, let every soul trust in the Passion of the Lord, and place
its hope in His mercy. God will not deny His mercy to anyone.
Heaven and earth may change, but God’s mercy will never be exhausted. Oh, what immense joy burns in my heart when I contemplate
Your incomprehensible goodness, O Jesus!”
St. Faustina, Diary, 72