I've been doing Way of the Cross, using Pope Benedict XVI's meditations and prayers. I would like to borrow some of the his thoughts from the meditations he wrote for the Seventh and Ninth Stations, which are "Jesus falls for the second time" and "Jesus falls for the third time," respectively.
We have fallen too, fallen miserably short of loving the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind. People of today in general no longer believe in anything; they simply drift through life, having built a new kind of paganism. In attempting to do away with God, they have ended up with doing away with man. Christians have also fallen away from Christ into a godless secularism. Do we ever think of how much Christ suffers in his own Church? How often is the Holy Sacrament of his Presence abused when he must enter empty and evil hearts! How often is his Word twisted and misused! What little faith is present behind so many theories, so many words! How much filth there is in the Church, even among those in priesthood who ought to belong entirely to him! How much pride, how much self-complacency! What little respect we pay to the sacrament of Reconciliation, where he waits for us, ready to raise up whenever we fall! Jesus is enduring his greatest suffering right now! Let's call to him from the depths of our hearts: Lord, save us.
No comments:
Post a Comment