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Friday, May 11, 2012
Monday, March 26, 2012
Sculpture of death and resurrection
Sculpture of death and resurrection
Set in the rocks of Mirador Hill in Baguio is an outdoor brass sculpture of the Death and Resurrection of our Redeemer. On the cross is our Lord, one hand freed and pointing skyward and the other also freed drawing to himself a young man. "When I am lifted up, I shall draw all things to myself." This immediately makes us think of the ascension. But it is also true of Jesus on the cross.
Michelangelo symbolized in the Sistine Chapel the account of Genesis. Instead of God breathing life into Adam, God draws Adam with the slightest touch. Here too the New Adam gives new life to man by the delicate touch of finger tips.
The artist tries to represent not the death, not the resurrection but the unity between the two. Death and resurrection is one saving event. And not only that, but the effect of this one saving event on man. One can see the entire statue in motion upward as Jesus draws us not to the cross but to where he has gone ahead.
The artistic representation makes the viewer reflect on the reality and meaning of the death and resurrection of Jesus and ponder the effects in his own life. But one need not travel to distant Mirador to see the representation and actuality of the Paschal Mystery. Each Sunday the community gathers around the alter to offer its self in union with the Sacrifice of Jesus. And there is the mystery of the death and resurrection of Jesus present. And we are caught up in it.
Even after the Eucharist, in our daily lives we in turn are the expression of the resurrection to all we meet by our lives of service and love. We raise from the dead those whom we heal, comfort and console. In meeting the needs of others, we are God's response to their prayers for help.
Credits to Manny Flores for the photo and to Dolly Perez the sculptor.
DEATH AND RESURRECTION
FORGIVEN
v l badillo
The Lord said, “Because the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah is grievous, I will destroy the inhabitants.”Abraham said, “Will you destroy the righteous with the wicked? If there are fifty righteous within the place, will you spare it for the fifty righteous?”
The LORD said, “If I find fifty righteous in the place, I will spare it for their sake.”
Abraham said, “Oh let not the LORD be angry, and I will speak. If thirty shall be found there?” And the Lord said, “I will not do it, if I find thirty there.”
And Abraham said, “Oh let not the LORD be angry, and I will speak yet but this once. If ten shall be found there? The Lord said, “I will not destroy it for the ten's sake.”
Ten could not be found in the Old Testament to save Sodom and Gomorrah.
The Good News is that in the New Testament there was one good man and because of that one man, Jesus, son of Mary of Nazareth, the whole of mankind was saved.
There is nothing that man could do to be forgiven, until a man was born who was good and pleasing and manifested it in all he said and did. When he was dying, unjustly convicted, he cried out, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they are doing.” God was so pleased with him, that he forgave man.
God forgave man not because Jesus took upon himself the punishment that guilty man deserved. He was not our ransom in the sense that he paid the ransom for our release. God is not an ogre who has to be appeased. God is all goodness. God forgave man, because he loved Jesus. His forgiveness was all for the sake of Jesus.
The only way we can be saved is for us to live as Jesus did. And we cannot do this without grace. Grace is pure gift, totally undeserved. In this sense, Jesus is the exemplary cause of our redemption. As Paul said, “I live now not I but Jesus.”
Why did Jesus suffer and was killed? He suffered and was killed because of his life, of his words, of his healing and revealing the truth. He was killed because men felt threatened that they would lose their power if he was not silenced. He was not killed to appease the anger of God.
How do we know we have been redeemed? How do we know that God answered the prayer of Jesus?
In a sacrifice, gifts are laid on an altar and offered to God. They become the property of God. They are no longer for our use. This is the purpose of the holocaust. The gifts are destroyed. The gifts disappear. At times a fire from heaven consumes the gifts. In other cases, the gifts are distributed to the poor. It is not the givers’ gift that is distributed, but God’s gift.
In the mass, gifts of bread and wine are offered. Christ at the last supper said, “Do this in memory of me.” The bread and wine becomes the body and blood of Christ. The separate consecrations of the bread and wine symbolizes the separation of blood from the body. A body without blood is dead. In the mass, the death on the cross is present in an unbloody manner. In the last supper, his death on the cross is prefigured. He said, “This is my body which will be broken for you on the cross, eat it. This is my blood which will be spilled for you on the cross, drink it.” There is only one sacrifice, There is only one and the same death. This one sacrifice suffices.
When our Lord died, he was buried. When the Father raised him from the dead, the gift disappeared. The gift has been accepted. Christ on the cross is the acceptable gift. Christ not in the tomb is the accepted gift. The emptied tomb is what we see and which tells us that God has forgiven us. We have not been redeemed until the Father raised Jesus. The resurrection is not the reward of Jesus for a job well done. It is essential to our redemption.
The resurrection is the good news. Not just because we too will be raised, but that we have been redeemed. We preach the resurrection even if it leads to our being persecuted and killed. Go preach the good news to all the world. It is not good news if what we preach are new regulations, new burdens.
Preaching the resurrection does not mean proclaiming in words, “Jesus rose from the dead.” It means living a life makes no sense if there were no resurrection. It means living the beatitudes. It means living a life contrary to the way of the world. It means fighting injustice in all its forms. It means living a life that the world finds threatening enough to do to us what the contemporaries of Jesus did to him.
It means being wounded healers, afflicted consolers, beggar givers, servant shepherds, contemplatives in action, decreasing that He may increase, working to make Him better known, loved and imitated, acting justly, loving tenderly, and walking humbly before the Lord.
We have been Good Friday Christians, Too much concerned about the suffering of Jesus. We are Easter Christians, brimming with the joy Jesus gives to be shared with all we meet and live with, They have hope in the midst of doubt and despair. The Jesus we pray to is the risen Jesus. Jesus is no longer in the manger or in the cross. He is with us but is not recognized. He is known when we are broken in serving others, in empowering others.
The resurrection too is symbolized in the mass. It is true that in receiving the body and blood of Jesus in communion, we receive food and drink to live. “Unless you chew my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you.” But it is more than that that. What we receive is God’s gift; God accepted our gift, no longer bread and wine, but the body and blood of Jesus. That is the resurrection. In communion the gift we receive is the body and blood of Jesus. Again the gift disappeared. The altar is emptied. In communion, we proclaim the resurrection. In communion we receive the risen Christ.
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