Text and photos by Glen McCullough
Windows from the Chapel Ambulatory, St Patrick’s College, Silverstream, NZ
Sin is a reality in our lives. We have the inclination to sin, even if we never carry out a sinful action. Experiencing Jesus’ final journey is a good way of counteracting sin.
So each Lent we pray the Stations of the Cross and go to Calvary with our suffering Lord.
1st Station: Jesus is Condemned to Death
Lord, it was inevitable that you were condemned to death. You called the priests and law-makers hypocrites with their fine clothes and manners hiding corruption deep within. You threatened their power base. You kissed lepers, spoke to outcasts, ate with sinners. You loved the poor, the handicapped, the gangs. You healed on the Sabbath and broke their man-made laws . You taught that All were to be loved without reservation – even enemies.
Now they are taking their revenge. And yet, Lord, I know that you ask for more. Lord, I am afraid. If I live like you, I will be condemned. I will be labeled a religious crank. Some will laugh, some will be shocked. Several of my friends will desert me. They will tell me it is enough to lead a good life and go to Mass on Sundays. Help me to be true. Help me to love. Help me to speak and live your Gospel. Even to the Cross if need be.
2nd Station: Jesus Takes up His Cross
Lord, here is your Cross. But it did not start out as your Cross. You had no Cross of your own, and you came to bear ours. All through your long walk towards Calvary You took on the sins of the world, one by one. You are committed to carry them and bend and suffer.
The Cross must be carried.
Lord, you said that whoever wanted to follow you must renounce himself and take up his or her cross daily. I would rather fight my cross, because to bear it is so hard. The more I grow and see the evil of this world, the heavier is the cross on my shoulders.
Lord, help me to understand that your Cross was infinitely heavier than mine and that you will make my burden light. With the dawning of each new day, give me the courage to begin.
3rd Station: Jesus Falls for the First Time
He fell. For a moment he staggered, then fell full length under the weight of his cross. God in the dust. For us. Lord, I followed you, set out with confidence. I thought I was totally committed, until I saw a bright flower by the roadside. So I left you and my hard-to-carry cross, and here I am, off the road with a wilted dandelion. All alone. Others are still on the road, broken and exhausted, as you were.
Crosses are in the making, and backs are breaking. But they have you for company.
Lord, help me to keep my eyes on you and ignore sudden weaknesses that tempt me away from my cross.
4th Station: Jesus Meets His Mother
Lord, I pity your poor mother. She follows you, she follows mankind on its way of the cross. She walks in the crowd unknown, with her eyes firmly fixed on you. Every gesture of yours, every sigh, every blow, every wound you suffer enters her heart. And without coming near you, without touching you, without speaking to you, she endures your sufferings.
Blessed Mother, thank you for supporting your son on his last walk. Lord, help me to walk among others, to suffer with them, to share their miseries and their sins, even when I am powerless to help. Lord, give me some of the compassion that your mother had for the sufferings of others.
5th Station: Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry the Cross
Lord, Simon just happened to be passing, and they forced him to help carry your Cross. He was just a stranger, compelled to help. But you accepted him. And how it must have hurt to know there were no friends there to help carry your cross.
Lord, how often I have been forced to help when I should have given gladly.
How often I have not been there when my friends needed me to help carry their crosses. How often has my pride rejected help from strangers. Lord, help me to accept all the Simons on my road.
6th Station: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
For a long time, Lord, Veronica followed you, suffering with you. When she could bear it no longer, she pushed the soldiers aside and wiped your face. The image on the fine linen was bloody, scarred, and disfigured.
Lord, I was made in your image. In the past I have disfigured that image through my sin. I have disfigured others in the same way. Through your pain and suffering, help me to truly reflect the perfect image of your resurrection
7th Station: Jesus falls the second time
Lord, how alone you must have felt as you fell again. Exhausted, no one to help you up. Deserted, alone. How frightening to suffer the pain of aloneness as well as the physical pain of carrying your cross.
Lord, you came to make us all brothers and sisters, to unlock the beauty of each person’s soul, to set it free through your suffering. Help me to recognise when others become isolated. Let me show them that there is someone who cares
8th Station: Jesus meets the Women of Jerusalem
Lord, the women of Jerusalem wept and wailed as you laboured under your cross. You told them not to weep for you, but for themselves and their children, because of the sins of Jerusalem. Were you telling them to weep for their own sins?
It is easy, Lord, to pity your sufferings and the sufferings of the world. But it is much harder to weep for my own sins. I would rather judge the sins of others because it’s so much easier. I see fault and sins everywhere, except in myself. Lord, teach me that I am a sinner.
9th Station: Jesus falls the third time
Lord, you do not move – despite the jeers and prods of the soldiers. Then, slowly, you begin again – on the road to our salvation, painful step by painful step.
Lord, Peter denied you three times and, forgiven, went on to lead the Church. I fall all the time, and think I will never get there. Give me the courage to pick myself up and be saved, step by step.
10th Station: Jesus is stripped of His clothes
Lord, you had nothing left but your seamless cloak. You were fond of it, because your mother made it. But it had to go. Only one thing was needed now – your cross. Nothing could come between you and your cross. Together, you will save the world.
Lord, I need your cross. Help me to rid myself of all the seamless wonders that come between me and your salvation.
11th Station: Jesus is nailed to the Cross
Lord, they weren’t content just to tie you to your cross. They had to nail you there to make doubly sure. Yet they made it easier for you, nail by nail by nail
to collect the pain of our sinfulness and carry it to your death, so we could be free of it forever.
Lord, my sins nailed you to the cross. Yet you bore the pain so selflessly. Help me to be as selfless, to love those who suffer disadvantage, one at a time, just as you suffered the nails, one at a time.
12th Station: Jesus dies on the Cross
Lord, you took three hours to die.
Hanging there, bleeding, suffering, in agony. Now it’s over. You died so that we might have spiritual life, and have it to the full. You gathered your life, you gathered all the sins of the world, and in a cry you gave All. “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”
Lord, help me to die for you. Help me to die to myself so that I might live the life you gave to me by your own ultimate sacrifice.
13th Station: Jesus is taken from the Cross
Lord, your work is done. You can leave your cross and rest in peace.
What did your mother feel, holding you in her arms?
Lord, sometimes I am so lonely and afraid. That loneliness makes me doubt and even despair and, although I try to hide it, I can’t hide it from you, because you know me so well. Lord, make me aware of your presence, let me feel your loving arms, whenever I would be lonely without them.
14th Station: Jesus is laid in the Tomb
Lord, your friends have laid you to rest, rolled the stone over the entrance, sealed you in your tomb, and gone away without understanding that you would rise. How sad, how empty, how desolate they must have felt. Lord, how easy it is to forget that you are alive, not dead and buried as they thought you were. For we know you rose again, and gave us hope of eternal life. Keep your presence alive in me, so that I am always on the road to the kingdom of heaven.
Father look on your people with the love your Son Jesus showed when he delivered himself to evil men and suffered agony on the Cross. As he lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
A fully scripted version for devotional use is available from the Messenger
