22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A - Take Up Your Cross & “Lift High The Cross”

Reflecting on this weekend’s Gospel (Mt. 16:21-27), put yourself in Peter’s shoes. After rebuking Jesus for predicting the Passion, the Lord in turn reprimands Peter saying, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are thinking not as God does, but as humans do.” And then, immediately, Jesus says, “If anyone wants to become my follower, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”

We may be inclined to regard “the cross” as representing hardships, afflictions, tribulations, annoyance, and occasions for self-denial. But when considered within its context, we see that “the cross” implies much more. Peter has probably never felt worse, since he has just been called ‘Satan’! But it is THAT misery, that desolation and anguish that Jesus wants Peter to take up in self-denial as his cross. Jesus is commanding Peter: Take up your cross RIGHT NOW!

We carry our cross following Jesus when we recognize, in brutal honesty, what we are when left to ourselves … and, in that excruciating knowledge, we love Jesus. We follow Jesus when we love him in the knowledge of what we are without him … in the actual experience of our despondency. “The cross is the disarming of self by which we give ourselves to God.” (Fr. Bernard Bro). The cross is a purification that removes from us everything that is not in Jesus. The faithful carrying of the cross serves to conform us more and more to Jesus Christ. St. Theodorus the Studite (+826) says that “…with the cross we are freed from the restraint of the enemy and we clutch on to the strength of salvation.”

We will end with a little prayer written by poet and Jesuit priest Fr. Gerard Manley Hopkins:

“O God, lift me above myself to a higher state of grace in which I may have more union with you, in which I may be more zealous to do your will, and be freer from sin. For to be raised to a higher degree of grace means being lifted on a higher cross.”

In honour of this weekend’s Gospel, we would like to share our latest video, "Lift High The Cross", a traditional Christian hymn that reminds believers of the ultimate expression of God's love in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The cross motivates believers to active faith and mission, and this hymn beautifully expresses the power of the cross.

Video can be watched by clicking here or on the picture below: