Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Josép Martinez-Cubero, OHC
Good Friday - Friday, April , 2021
It is not at his birth, not in his teaching and preaching, not through the miracles he performs, not at his resurrection that Jesus is the most human and most identified with us, but in his perfect sacrifice, in his suffering and dying in solidarity with all who suffer. Through Jesus on the cross God enters that vulnerable place of the fears, loneliness and brokenness we hold secret; where we are afraid to be known and yet afraid not to be known. Through Jesus on the cross, who in the despair of abandonment cries “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”, God is revealed, not as powerful, almighty and conqueror, but as Richard Kearney puts it, as the “vulnerable and powerless one who suffers with us” (in "Anatheism: Returning to God After God"). Through Jesus on the cross, who from the goodness of the heart pleads “Forgiven them”, God is revealed as loving, compassionate and faithful.
It is from the Cross that Love echoes the sorrow, suffering and emptiness of the brokenhearted, the sick, the marginalized; the very people that the powerful of this world oppress and exploit through greed and wealth. But it is also from the Cross that Love echoes the triumph of the human spirit through Grace.
I want to share a story about one of these voices of triumph read by our beloved Br. Andrew on this day years ago. It came from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa in 1996. The Commission brought an elderly black woman face to face with the white man, Mr. Van de Broek, who had confessed to the savage torture and murder of her son and her husband a few years earlier. The woman had been made to witness her husband’s death. The last words her husband spoke were “Father, forgive them.”
One of the members of the commission turned to her and asked, “How do you believe justice should be done to this man who has inflicted such suffering on you and so brutally destroyed your family?”
The old woman replied, “I want three things. I want first to be taken to the place where my husband’s body was burned so that I can gather up the dust and give his remains a decent burial.” She stopped, collected herself, and then went on. “My husband and son were my only family. I want, secondly, therefore, for Mr. Van de Broek to become my son. I would like for him to come twice a month to the location and spend a day with me so that I can pour out to him whatever love I have still remaining in me.
And finally, I want a third thing. I would like Mr. Van de Broek to know that I offer him my forgiveness because Jesus died to forgive. This was also the wish of my husband. And so, I would kindly ask someone to come to my side and lead me across the courtroom so that I can take Mr. Van de Broek in my arms, embrace him and let him know that he is truly forgiven.
The assistants came to help the old woman across the room. Mr. Van de Broek, overwhelmed by what he had just heard, fainted. And as he did, those in the courtroom—friends, family, neighbors, all victims of decades of oppression and injustice—began to sing “Amazing Grace.”
Never had the message of the cross been clearer to me than when I heard this story. The fear, the hunger for power, the rejection of truth, and the sin that led to Jesus’ crucifixion are as present today as they were then. But the message of the cross teaches us how we are to respond. What the cross reveals is not just information or news. The invitation of the cross demands our participation in a new reality and a new way of being. It invites us to move from brokenness to wholeness and life triumphant through love.
Demos gracias a Dios.
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