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The Foolishness of the Cross
Photo by Matt Marzorati on Unsplash
To be crucified in the ancient Roman Empire was to suffer a horrific fate of unimaginable pain and torture. It was an extreme punishment reserved for the most heinous of criminals and for those who threatened the established order of the Roman Empire.
In the time of the Roman Empire, there was no 8th Amendment to the Constitution prohibiting “cruel and unusual punishments.” There was no United Nations or Amnesty International to protest against Rome’s inhumane method of execution.
The Romans were not the originators of death by crucifixion. That infamous honor belongs to the ancient Persians. The Romans learned crucifixion by way of Alexander the Great and the Carthaginians. The Romans adopted crucifixion as the ultimate means of criminal punishment and frequently employed the barbaric practice with depraved cruelty.
Yet God and Our Savior took this brutal ignominious form of execution, and completely transformed its meaning. In Christ, what was a humiliating, excruciating and degrading form of death became the ultimate act of sacrificial love and Divine mercy.
Saint Paul tells us in his First Letter to the Corinthians “The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18).
On trial before the Sanhedrin, Saint Peter boldly proclaimed, “The God of our ancestors raised Jesus, though you had him killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand* as leader and savior to grant Israel repentance and forgiveness of sins” (Acts of the Apostles 5:30-31).
On Good Friday 1997, Pope Saint John Paul II said, “O Lord, a ray of light shines from your Cross. In your Death our death is conquered, and we are offered the hope of resurrection. Clinging to your Cross, we wait in joyful hope for your return, Lord Jesus, our Redeemer!”
On Calvary, the Romans instigated by the Jewish religious leadership thought that they were putting an end to a religious and civil troublemaker who was threatening the established order. Instead, they unwittingly helped fulfill Christ’s salvific mission and reconcile a fallen humanity with its Creator.
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