meditations

 My Meditations on the STATIONS OF THE CROSS

JESUS IS CONDEMNED TO DEATH
Through birth, we are each condemned to death.
Then how should we live?


JESUS TAKES UP HIS CROSS
No life can escape its suffering, its cross.
Can we make the pain of our crosses sing?


JESUS FALLS THE FIRST TIME
Only when we pick ourselves up does the fall have meaning.
Can we celebrate the profoundly simple act of getting up again?


JESUS MEETS HIS MOTHER
Love nurtures us beyond a painful birth and sustains us in our life’s troubles.
How do we practice a love that comforts God’s suffering children?


SIMON OF CYRENE IS FORCED TO TAKE UP THE CROSS
We must be Simon for the stumbling Jesus in each other.
Can the cross ever be too heavy?


VERONICA WIPES THE FACE OF JESUS
Jesus has left his anguished image everywhere.
Have we seen it and responded with a caring act?


JESUS FALLS A SECOND TIME
Getting up again turns weakness into strength.
Do we have the courage to continue on to the Golgotha that may await us?


JESUS MEETS THE WOMEN OF JERUSALEM
Understanding suffering is a lesson of wisdom and compassion.
Can we see suffering as a teacher?




JESUS FALLS A THIRD TIME
Life brings us to our knees and brings us to our knees again.
Can faith lift us up and lift us up again?


JESUS IS STRIPPED OF HIS GARMENTS
Jesus lived a life of unadorned simplicity, stripped naked at the end.
At the end, who will we be in our nakedness?


JESUS IS NAILED TO THE CROSS
Jesus nailed to the cross is a lesson in deep humility.
Can we embrace the cross we have been nailed to?


JESUS DIES ON THE CROSS
Jesus’ painful human destiny was also his enduring gift.
How do we affirm his death as a force for life lived with courage?

THE BODY OF JESUS IS PLACED IN THE ARMS OF HIS MOTHER
We take comfort in the love which created us, and give comfort by the love we create.
Have we given up our own comfort to bring comfort to another?


JESUS IS LAID IN THE TOMB
The tomb holds the measure of our faith.
Can we believe in the resurrection of our own failed selves?