St. John Chrysostom on Good Friday

Today's second reading from the Office of Readings:

From the Catecheses by Saint John Chrysostom, bishop

The power of Christ’s blood

If we wish to understand the power of Christ’s blood, we should go back to the ancient account of its prefiguration in Egypt. Sacrifice a lamb without blemish, commanded Moses, and sprinkle its blood on your doors. If we were to ask him what he meant, and how the blood of an irrational beast could possibly save men endowed with reason, his answer would be that the saving power lies not in the blood itself, but in the fact that it is a sign of the Lord’s blood. In those days, when the destroying angel saw the blood on the doors he did not dare to enter, so how much less will the devil approach now when he sees, not that figurative blood on the doors, but the true blood on the lips of believers, the doors of the temple of Christ.

If you desire further proof of the power of this blood, remember where it came from, how it ran down from the cross, flowing from the Master’s side. The gospel records that when Christ was dead, but still hung on the cross, a soldier came and pierced his side with a lance and immediately there poured out water and blood. Now the water was a symbol of baptism and the blood, of the holy eucharist. The soldier pierced the Lord’s side, he breached the wall of the sacred temple, and I have found the treasure and made it my own. So also with the lamb: the Jews sacrificed the victim and I have been saved by it.

There flowed from his side water and blood. Beloved, do not pass over this mystery without thought; it has yet another hidden meaning, which I will explain to you. I said that water and blood symbolized baptism and the holy eucharist. From these two sacraments the Church is born: from baptism, the cleansing water that gives rebirth and renewal through the Holy Spirit, and from the holy eucharist. Since the symbols of baptism and the eucharist flowed from his side, it was from his side that Christ fashioned the Church, as he had fashioned Eve from the side of Adam. Moses gives a hint of this when he tells the story of the first man and makes him exclaim: Bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh! As God then took a rib from Adam’s side to fashion a woman, so Christ has given us blood and water from his side to fashion the Church. God took the rib when Adam was in a deep sleep, and in the same way Christ gave us the blood and the water after his own death.

Do you understand, then, how Christ has united his bride to himself and what food he gives us all to eat? By one and the same food we are both brought into being and nourished. As a woman nourishes her child with her own blood and milk, so does Christ unceasingly nourish with his own blood those to whom he himself has given life.

And it was night.

A number of years ago, I was part of a week-long class on presenting a dramatized reading of Scripture. We got to pick the passage we wanted to present, and I selected John 9, the account of the healing of the man born blind.

One of Jesus' lines in the passage was always intriguing and a bit mysterious to me: We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night comes, when no one can work (John 9:4). While I wasn't totally "in the dark" about the implications, I admit to being a little puzzled. When, exactly, would night come when no one can work? Didn't Jesus, light of the world, promise to be with his Church always, to the very end of the age? Wasn't the Daystar himself to be eternally with us?

The obvious answer, I thought, was Jesus' death, burial, and descent into hell. For that is when the bridegroom was not with us. But I was only surmising.

The Gospel reading for Mass today, Tuesday of Holy Week, shed a confirmatory light on this. As I listened, it caught me in an entirely new way:

Reclining at table with his disciples, Jesus was deeply troubled and testified, “Amen, amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me.”...After Judas took the morsel, Satan entered him. So Jesus said to him, “What you are going to do, do quickly.”...So Judas took the morsel and left at once. And it was night.

And it was night. Not just a statement about time of day, but a jarring statement about the state of the cosmos.

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The word "night" in the Gospel of John occurs infrequently, but in revealing fashion:

Nicodemus admitting at night that no one can work Jesus' works without God.

• John 3:2 This man [Nicodemus] came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him.” [emphasis added]

Jesus echoing his statement in John 9, that walking in the night is useless.

• John 11:10 But if any one walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.

Nicodemus again coming "at night"--when Jesus had died--to prepare his body for burial.

• John 19:39 Nicodemus also, who had at first come to him by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds’ weight.

Peter and the other apostles unsuccessful in their work before seeing the Resurrected Christ (still in their night).

• John 21:3 Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat; but that night they caught nothing.

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Of course, the liturgy of the Sacred Triduum leads us to this as well, from the darkness of the vigil kept after the Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord's Supper, through the striking absence of candles (except at veneration of the Cross and distribution of Communion) on Good Friday of the Lord's Passion, to the utter darkness at the beginning of the Easter Vigil in the Holy Night.

Thanks be to God that the light of Christ banishes the darkness to enlighten and empower us to work his works--into the Eternal Day!

The Triduum According to Mary

On the eve of this Triduum, I am struck by the thought that Jesus accepted beatings, scourging, a crown of thorns, and the Cross as someone’s son. I’ve been contemplating what Mary must have gone through, seeing her only son—knowing he was completely innocent—mocked, beaten, and tortured to death. Soul-piercing sword, indeed.

Noble fathers can be imagined to give their lives sacrificially in defense of their children. Loving mothers protect and watch over to the point of death. Even not-so-noble, not-so-loving parents are generally expected to precede their children in death. It is an aberration of the natural order for parents to outlive their children, especially once the more vulnerable stages of infancy have passed.

Yet Mary watched as her adult son underwent unspeakable cruelty. While others laughed, he bled. While others mocked, he breathed his last. I imagine Mary unable to weep, so paralyzed by the depth of her anguish.

In Catholic theology, Mary is not only the Mother of God, she is the Mother of the Church—mother to us all. These next three days, may we have but a taste of her tremendous grief, may we have a mother’s love for the afflicted Jesus, that we might share in her exuberant joy at the Resurrection.

Blessed Mary, our Mother, grant us through thy intercession the grace to walk these sorrowful days with your love in our hearts.