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From the
Gospel of John 19:6-7, 12, 16
When the
chief priests and the officers saw Jesus, they cried out, “Crucify
him, crucify him!” Pilate said to them “Take him yourselves and
crucify him, for I find no crime in him.” The Jews answered him, “We
have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he has made
himself the Son of God”…
Upon this, Pilate sought to release him, but the Jews cried out, “If
you release this man, you are not Caesar’s friend; every one who
makes himself a king sets himself against Caesar.”
Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.
MEDITATION
Why was
Jesus, the one who “went about doing good” (Acts 10:38), condemned
to death? This question will accompany us along the Way of the
Cross, even as it accompanies us throughout our lives.
In the
Gospels we find a true answer: the Jewish leaders wanted his death
because they understood that Jesus considered himself the Son of
God. We also find an answer that the Jews used as a pretext, in
order to obtain his condemnation from Pilate: Jesus pretended to be
a king of this world, the king of the Jews.
But behind
this answer there opens up an abyss, to which the Gospels and indeed
all of Sacred Scripture direct our gaze: Jesus died for our sins.
And on an even deeper level, he died for us, he died because God
loves us and he loves us even to giving us his only Son, that we
might have life through him (cf. Jn 3:16-17).
It is to
ourselves, then, that we must look: to the evil and the sin which
dwell within us and which all too often we pretend to ignore. Yet
all the more should we turn our eyes to the God who is rich in
mercy, and who has called us his friends (cf. Jn 15:15). Thus the
Way of the Cross and the entire journey of our life becomes a way of
penance, pain and conversion, but also of gratitude, faith and joy. |
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