Good Friday Reflection
Peggy Devlin, OP
Winter is the season of paradox. It boasts of cold but also friendly warmth. On the outside, this season is icy and stone-faced, but on the inside there is security and strength in huddling close to a fire. Winter is more than cold emptiness - it is also the season of waiting. Not a passive waiting but a straining, expectant search for new life and deeper meaning. Those seeds and bulbs planted last fall must dwell in darkness and be rooted deeply in order to burst forth with the new color and life of Spring.
This has its own parallel in our spiritual lives. We are in the season where we are reminded of the Paschal Mystery, the paradox of the Crucifixion and Resurrection. Only any incredibly compassionate and wise God could fool us into believing that out of the tragedy of a Good Friday could come the new life of Resurrection. We are tempted to believe that "what you see is what you get"; and, yet, our faith assures us that what we see is not what we get.
How odd! But, then again, the God we believe in is very odd – not given to being analyzed, reasoned out, sensible and definitely one whose ways often confuse and befuddle us - who can figure? You see, it's more important to God that we believe rather than understand, trust rather than analyze, and be loving persons more than intelligent beings.
You see, our God refuses to be figured out. The very essence of God is one of paradox and contradiction. Things are not always as they appear; what we see and experience in this life is not the totality of reality. The ultimate symbol of paradox and contradiction for us is the cross we see before us. What do we see with our eyes? Death, destruction, failure, the end, despair. But, faith says: "wait a minute - don't be fooled - what looks like death is really life; what looks like the end is really the beginning; what looks like failure is indeed victory; and what looks like despair is really hope." Why? God so loved the world that God gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him may not die but have eternal life. Notice how the gospel says: "Whoever believes in Him" - not, "Whoever understands Him..." God is not a puzzle to be solved but a mystery to be lived.
And, for us – what's the message? Some of our greatest blessings have been difficult and uncomfortable at first – ones we wanted to get rid of as quickly as possible. Who of us has not had the experience of looking at the past and now in retrospect, able to identify a painful struggle as the very means for new life and growth?
Sometimes our greatest pain holds a gift for us that is hidden for a long time. The blessing is disguised amid the turmoil, confusion, heartache and struggle. Sometimes we're unable to accept the blessing because we are too hurt, too angry, too grieved, too overwhelmed to receive it. It is only much later that we see the gift that has come from what we thought would destroy us. Within each struggle there is a blessing waiting to be received.
Crucifixion is no symbol of success in 21st century America any more than it was on that horrendous Good Friday eons ago. And so, how can you and I follow a Lord, the symbol of whose failure is above our altars, on top of our churches, hanging around our necks - and claim to be a stranger to pain and struggle? The power of Christ's passion is that everyone of us can identify with it - we've been there, done that! My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
The Way of the Cross, the downward mobility of God, becomes our way not because we try to imitate Jesus, but because we are transformed into living Christs by the Spirit. The spiritual life is the life and power of Christ surging within us, a life that sets us free to be strong while weak, to be free while captive, to be joyful while in pain, to be rich while poor, to believe when all the external evidence points to foolishness.
Our experiences of loss and hurt are not the final chapter. The drama of life is a comedy, not a tragedy. The final sound is not a whimper, but a full-throated laugh of one who knows a God who transforms cocoons into butterflies, barren branches into green, leafy trees; gray skies into sunny days and passing sorrow into eternal joy. Our God refuses to be figured out – God will always be the God of surprises.
In the early days of Christianity, one of the first ways that people sought to represent Christ artistically was as a clown. Christ, the Fool; Christ the Clown! Why? What a foolish thing to do – to give your life for a world that seems not to give a damn. Did He waste His time. I don't think so; God doesn't think so...
God so loved the world that God gave his only son that whoever believes in him may not die but have eternal life.