Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, John 3,13-17

Today, the Church pays homage to the cross of Christ, in which the mystery of God’s infinite love shone in the highest way. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (Johan 3:16).

Today’s holiday has a long history in the Church. It was first celebrated on September 14, 365, when St. Helena found the cross’s real remains. The celebration of this event spread rapidly among Christians around the world. In Jesus’ day, crucifixion was a reasonably common punishment. The Romans had a real terror before the crucifixion. Cicero himself says it is the cruelest punishment for slaves. The convict had to carry the cross’s transverse arm for the ridicule and fury of the crowd to the execution site. We do not know precisely what the cross of Jesus was like. It doesn’t even matter. The important thing is that he did not move away from him and that he brought him to Calvary. His cross, which he carried for all of us, thus became an assurance that every difficulty, every cross carried in connection with him, makes sense.

From the apostles’ time to the present day, many people have failed to accept that God became man and died for our salvation on the cross.  The cross’s drama “foolishness to the Jews and folly to the Gentiles” (1 Cor 1:23). There has always been and still is, a temptation to deny the cross its value. Although the ancient world boasted thinking death by crucifixion, the terrible and humiliating way of execution, Christians worship the cross as a sign of Jesus’ suffering and his victorious trophy in the fight against the devil, sin, and death. We honor the cross because Jesus revealed to us his great love for us, and through the suffering, he endured on him, he saved us and healed us.

The cross teaches us what love is. What was the wood of disgrace turned into the wood of life and the ladder of salvation? As Jesus spread his shoulders on the cross, he was filled with great joy. He wanted everyone to understand that his shoulders would welcome sinners approaching him in this way. He saw how people would love the cross and worship him because he died on it. Jesus saw martyrs who, out of love and in defense of the truth, experience a similar fate. He saw the love of his friends and their tears beneath the cross. He saw triumphs and victories and great miracles that will take place around the world in the sign of the cross. Christ also saw us, on many occasions, respectfully kissing the cross, he again revisited our frequent beginnings. The cross of Jesus, which for many is madness and offense, is for us a school of daily life. Let us have the courage to go to the cross. In it, not only has God’s infinite love manifested itself, but it also gives us light and a sense of everyday situations and even leads us further. In it, the mystery of Jesus and our resurrection is revealed to us.

Life brings various situations that we often cannot cope with. The reality that most often raises questions is suffering, pain. We meet her in many forms and look for the meaning behind the pain. He who searches sincerely will sooner or later discover the sense of pain that has befallen him. Suffering and pain came into our human lives, along with sin. However, through the cross of Christ, they became the gateway leading from sin to holiness. He who has been too good for a long time forgets God, feels good in the world where he is, and does not desire another. However, if this person encounters suffering, he realizes his weakness and realizes that he does not have as many strengths and virtues as he thought. Many times we feel helpless against human suffering, pain. We do not have the power to carry our cross, to receive it with love in our lives. Our mouth is accused, “Why me, Lord?” My dear, in Christ! Just like at the cross of Jesus, Mary stands with us – Jesus and our loving mother. Jesus could not give us a more excellent gift on the cross than his mother. She stands by the cross full of hope, an example of patience to us, for she loves very much, and the love of her mother extends beyond death, and we believe that her tears did not flow in vain, for her Son’s death overcame sin and death.

The Christian life is to be similar to the life of Christ. And what else can bring us closer to the Crucified more than the cross? This cross will often be manifested by minor inconveniences at work, at school, in interpersonal relationships, and in a mild illness … Suffering can be a means of practicing in virtues and uniting with the suffering of Christ the Savior, who, although innocent, still suffered for our sins. There is no doubt that suffering allows us to develop, to grow. From suffering may come the ability to love sincerely and unselfishly, to understand oneself correctly and truthfully. Nothing is forgotten on the cross of Christ. There is the cry of that operate, the tragedy fired, fired from the apartment, the hunger of children, the despair of mothers, the humiliation of the unemployed, the torment of cancer, the abandonment of the old man, the growl of a dying girl, the drama of a lifted girl, long hours of insomnia, grief, physical torture, mental anxiety, … nothing is lost here. In this sense, too, it is true that the Son of Man came to seek and save what perished.

He came looking for your pain and found it. He seized it. And he did a lot with that. He did not come to present an intellectual debate about his suffering, nor did he eliminate human pain. He did something much more: He came to share, to participate, to taste, and to take upon people’s pain. Since then, one understands that suffering is not unnecessary. From this point of view, the whole history of salvation is understood as a constant expression of God’s love for us, and by our suffering, this love can be repeated. As interventions by garden shears, they serve to refine the fruit and sow the grain for a rich ear, and the suffering thus received is the renunciation of wild fruits in the interest of a beautiful harvest.

These are just a few views of the cross that this holiday tells us about – the Exaltation of St. Cross. Therefore, let us come to the cross with Mary, the new Eve, and the mediator of grace, to seek glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. For the world, the cross is foolishness, but it is a place of an answer for us. Answers how He loves the world. So that he sent his only Son.

I wish you and ourselves that we may always discover the love of God in the daily cross because only here can we surrender entirely to God, empty our insides, so that God, the Lord of peace and love, may enter.