03 April 2010

God becomes Filth: a reflection for Good Friday / Holy Saturday



I found this on the blog of Fr Ray Blake, parish priest of St Mary Magdalen Parish, Brighton, England.

Is there anything more dehumanising than nailing a living man to a piece of wood, than fixing him there and waiting for him to die. Listening, as he struggles for breath, to the creak of the timbers. Looking on, as the timbers become bloodied and sweat stained, smeared with faeces and urine as the victim is incapable of controlling his his body, as the knots and snags and splinters make their own wounds in his body, He becomes one with it. And all this happens amid the stench of the city rubbish dump, amidst the dead dogs and excrement cleared off the streets.

Here God become Man, becomes Filth, Rubbish, Garbage, Scum, all that is rejected. This the consequence of the Incarnation, the consequence of Divine Love.

Here is a deeper Mystery; the Crucifixion is Eternal, the Good Friday events are for all time. The Cross is the Bride of the Lamb, He is fixed to it, He and it are caught in an Infinite Eternal embrace. The Crucifixion is the Lamb's marriage feast. What God takes on He cannot reject. The Cross is at the very heart of the Trinity. Christ is wedded to it, the two have become one, nailed together by the iron nails of Divine Love.

The Cross is the Church, in which Christ is continually crucified, freely taken up in love, unrejectable, one with Christ, the source of His infinite pain and the source of His infinite joy.

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