Stations of the Cross (3)

Third Station: 

Jesus falls the first time

 
We adore you O Christ and we praise you, 

because by your Holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

How weak our humanity is! The King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the God who created the universe and everything in it, cannot, in His humanity, keep from falling under the weight of the Cross… under the weight of our sins! If we ever had any doubts about the ominous and destructive the power of sin, all we have to do is to look at Our Lord’s body collapse to the ground on the way to Calvary.

Very often, the three falls of Jesus have been seen as reminders of our need to persevere on our journey through life, to realize that we are bound to fall from time to time, as Our Lord did, and when we do, we need to follow His example and get back up again. And, there is nothing wrong with this view. We do indeed need to persevere in the midst of life’s difficulties and put our trust, not in our own strength, but in the power of Our Father in Heaven.

But, the falls of Our Lord are not just a consequence of our human weaknesses dealing with human problems. They are a sobering reminder of our human inability to battle the forces of sin and evil on our own. To fall as Jesus did, is to be crushed to the ground by the power of sin and evil, and to discover that we are powerless to do anything about it, other than to look at Christ and say: “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

It’s important that we re-capture this dimension of our Faith because we live in a culture that dismisses, makes fun of, and even glamorizes sin. People are told that they have the power to decide for themselves what is right or wrong, and that nobody else has the right to “lay a guilt trip” on them. In our modern world, the word “sin” is rarely if ever used, at least in the sense that the Gospel uses it, and those of us who insist that sin is an objective reality that is destroying our culture, are seen as religious fanatics who are out of step with our “modern and sophisticated world”.

But, of course, they’re wrong! Sin DOES exist, and those who deny it only have to look at this Third Station to see its power to destroy. If the oppressive nature of sin could have such a devastating effect on Jesus, then we can begin to understand why the world is in its present state.

This knowledge is not new. People throughout the ages have been warning us that pain and suffering are the consequences of sin, and yet we refuse to listen to them.

As Psalm 32 says:

 Happy the sinner whose fault is removed, whose sin is forgiven. Happy those to whom the Lord imputes no guilt, in whose spirit is no deceit.

 As long as I kept silent, my bones wasted away; I groaned all the day. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength withered as in dry summer heat. Then I declared my sin to you; my guilt I did not hide. I said, "I confess my faults to the Lord," and you took away the guilt of my sin.

 In other words, “guilt” is not something the Church heaps on us to scare us. Guilt is the direct result of sin, of separating ourselves from that for which we were created, of refusing to believe that God knows better than we do what is good for us. Just as physical pain is an indication that something is wrong with our body, so guilt (spiritual pain) is an indication that something is wrong with our soul.

 Psalm 32 and this Third Station remind us that, if we try to ignore our sins or pretend they don’t exist, the hand of God will be heavy upon us, and our strength will wither as in dry summer heat, not because He is trying to punish us, but because we are hurting ourselves… we are acting contrary to that for which we were made. But, if we confess our sins to the Lord and do not hide our guilt, our souls will be healed and our spirits refreshed.

 As we contemplate Our Lord’s first fall, let us take a moment to reflect on our sins, on those situations that may be pressing us down to the ground, situations that may be weighing heavy on our hearts, or on our conscience. And then, let us remind ourselves that we cannot liberate ourselves from these burdens on our own… our humanity is just too weak and our sin too heavy.

 Jesus looked to His Father for the strength to get up from the ground and continue on His way. Let us pray for the grace to do the same.

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