This year the Triduum has taken on a new meaning for me. It is a grace I have received from my participation in the 19th Annotation. For the past few weeks, I have been using the Passion accounts from all of the Gospels in my prayer time. For an hour (or sometimes more) per day, I have been praying and meditating with these passages using a technique called the
“application of the senses” in which I fully enter into the stories in which I am reading, seeing, hearing, touching smelling and tasting everything, as if I am truly present. I have, with the grace and help of God, been able to
“be” with Jesus and his disciples as the events of His passion have unfolded.
It has not been an easy few days. Reliving the betrayal and abandonment of Jesus by his friends, has brought up a lot of my own
“stuff”. Betrayal and abandonment are things I would not wish on my worst enemy, let alone my
“best friend”, and I fully understand how Jesus must have felt. I would much rather deal with physical pain than with the emotional pain caused by such acts. For me, the betrayal and abandonment of a friend was far worse that any physical pain I have ever suffered, and while the gaping hole left in my heart and life by this experience has been healed through prayer and by the grace of God, there are still twinges of pain when I am reminded of the happy times that I had spent with my friend. And this pain, I believe, will never fully go away. It is something I will carry with me for the rest of my days. It is there, in the form of doubt, when I am about to share something of myself with another. It is there as a constant reminder that the unconditional love that I seek is something that can only be given to me by God and God alone.
As I sat in Good Friday services yesterday afternoon, and at the Tenebrae service I attended last night, thinking about what Jesus did for me- the suffering, the humiliation, the pain, the abandonment, I was overcome with grief. I wanted to be angry. I wanted to know how the people that I loved could betray and abandon me. I wanted to know how, people who claimed to be Jesus’ friends and followers could have handed Him over to such a horrific fate. And then I heard Jesus’ words so clearly, that I almost thought He was sitting right next to me,
“Father forgive them: they do not know what they are doing.”
and suddenly things became crystal clear.
As a human being, I am a sinful creature. My sinfulness comes out of my thinking that
I am in control of things, and that
my will is what is important. What Jesus showed me on the cross is that
it is not, has never been and never will be my will that brings me peace and salvation. Only God, through the life, death and resurrection of His son, can do that for me. The catch is I have to let Him!
As I prayed before the cross last night, I offered all of my feelings of anger, loss, grief, abandonment and betrayal there at the foot of the cross. Today, as I
“sit in the tomb”, I can, with God’s help, finally let go of all of the negative emotion that has brought me into my one personal
“hell” the past few months. I can offer my suffering in solidarity with that of Jesus’ suffering. I can take my human brokenness and leave it there in the tomb, so as to make room in my heart for the awesome gift that Jesus has in store for me,
new life in Him!
I found this beautiful image of Jesus being laid in the tomb at www.sistermarygrace.artspan.com. through a "google image" search. There is much more artwork available. I urge you to take a moment and check out the website, and maybe even buy something. I know I will!
