Purification
Stations of the Cross (1)
The First Station:
Jesus is condemned to death
We adore you O Christ and we praise you,
because by your Holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
“Condemned!” – that is such a strong word. “Jesus is condemned to death!”
Most of us will never actually be “condemned to death” in the sense that Jesus was. And yet, one of the sad realities for all of us who walk in this valley of tears, is that at some point in our lives, we may have to deal with situations that will very much seem like a death sentence.
People with incurable diseases know this all too well, not just in terms of physical suffering, but in spiritual suffering as well. The terminally ill, especially if they are young, can feel as though a great injustice has been committed against them, and something precious has been taken from them, not just their lives, but their dreams and hopes as well. Terminal illness can test even the strongest faith, and destroy even the most fervent hope.
Others may experience something similar even when there is no immediate prospect of death, such as people who are “condemned” to live the rest of their life in a wheelchair, or a bed, or be without the use of their limbs, or their eyesight, or their mind. The thought that they may have to spend the rest of their lives with these limitations, especially if their situations degenerate to the point where they become a burden to others, can seem to many people a fate worse than death.
Some people are “condemned” to live in abject poverty, without access to the basic necessities of life, or an education, or anything that might help them hold any hope for the future. Some are born into psychological, physical, or sexual abuse – maybe even slavery – without any possibility of ever escaping their desperate circumstances.
All of these situations share a finality that makes the person feel like there is no way out. And this is what Our Lord must have felt when He was officially condemned to die on the Cross. Certainly, nobody was taking His life from Him. He had said shortly before that He was laying His life down freely. And yet, He must have felt that same sense of finality and inevitability when He finally heard the words: “You are condemned to death!”
Which is why this First Station is so powerful. Our Lord felt then, and feels now, the same dread and anguish we feel whenever WE have been “condemned” to a fate we would like to avoid.
The difference between Jesus and us is that He knew this was His mission, this was His Father’s will. And so, He embraced it out of love for us, without sparing Himself the suffering that went along with it.
“There is a baptism with which I must be baptized,
and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!” (Luke 12:50)
Gregory of Nyssa, one of the Fathers of the Church, wrote that it is not so much that the death of Christ was a consequence of His birth, but rather, that He was born precisely that He might die. And because He did, because He embraced the Father’s will when He might have preferred to do things differently, the way we are able to deal with our own desperate circumstances has also been changed forever.
What we have to remember is that the moment our first parents committed the Original Sin, the whole human race was already condemned to death. The purpose of the Incarnation of Our Lord, as well as His Passion, Death, and Resurrection, was to lift this “death sentence” from us.
For God so loved the world that He gave His Only Son, so that anyone
who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life. (John 3:16)
Essentially, Jesus traded places with us: Christ the Son of God became SIN, so that we who are sinners might once again become children of God.
His act of total humility, and His willingness to become obedient unto death, and death on a Cross, eliminated once for all the hopelessness we can sometimes feel whenever we face difficult situations, because it assures us that death is no longer the end, but only a necessary step we all have to take in order to find our way to Our Father in Heaven. That doesn’t mean that the road to Calvary is going to be easy… it’s not. What it does mean, is that it will not be pointless.
As we begin this walk with Our Lord, maybe we can take a moment to reflect on those things in our lives that may seem like a death sentence: situations that are bringing us pain, anxiety, and fear; situations that may be causing us to question our faith, and lose our hope. And then, let us take comfort from knowing that we are not walking alone, Jesus is walking with us, not by taking away our pain, but by lifting us over it, and making it bearable.
St. Paul understood this when he wrote to the Corinthians:
Our hope for you is firm, for we know that just as you share in the sufferings of Christ,
so also will you share in His consolation. (2 Corinthians 1:7)
So it will be with us.
