A 14th Sunday after Pentecost Thought On The Exaltation of the Holy Cross

The 14th Sunday after Pentecost falls on the 14th day of September. Significant in its coincidence. 

Of  course, we know that there are no coincidences, given that all unfolds according to God's Holy Will. Maybe God arranged for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross to fall on a Sunday so that we might give it due attention.

Fact is, how many of us pause and turn our minds and hearts to Our Lord's Holy Cross when this feast day rolls around every year? Once this was normal. Now...well, it's more likely the spirit of the age discounts this great feast in our minds and we just go about our business as if nothing of importance is going on.

OK, when the feast falls on a week day, we can easily just get on with our daily work; or on a Saturday, with those pressing domestic tasks we couldn't attend to during the week. But Sunday? There's no excuse for Sunday. 

Many of our posts have addressed the fundamental importance of the Cross in our lives. And we've discussed many times the fundamental importance of our accepting, even loving, our own crosses. So with this Sunday respite from our usual work routines (for most of us), let's take a few minutes to dwell on the Cross and our own crosses.

The Cross should not present any problem for us. We know what Our Lord did for us; we know His Sacrifice opened the Gates of Heaven, that our salvation flows from His Cross. And if we have only given a kind of intellectual recognition of the Cross, perhaps we can spend some time today allowing our knowledge and understanding to grow into love for Our Lord - profound, heartfelt love.

We know how much He loves us. If nothing else, the Cross proves this. But His Love did not begin and end with the Cross. Jesus is Love Itself. And He is with us now and always. His Love never ceases to flow to us. So it behooves us to consider whether our love - and to what degree - flows back to Him.

So shouldn't this "coincidence" of the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross falling on a Sunday give us all the time to really meditate on all this?

And that goes not just for the facts related to the Cross, facts we Catholics know (or should know) all too well. But what about the Love that the Cross represents? 

With this in mind, let's consider these words written by St. John of the Cross. He's talking to us about this Love.   

“It is of the highest importance that the soul should be well exercised in love, so that, being rapidly consumed, she will tarry but a short time here below and quickly attain to the vision of God face to face. The smallest act of pure love is more precious in the eyes of God, and more profitable to the Church, than all other works put together. Without love all our works, all our labors, are as nothing before God, for He holds acceptable only our love. Wherefore the soul which is aglow with this perfect love is named the Spouse of the Son of God, and appears to us raised to a footing of equality with Him, because of their mutual affection renders all common between them. Enkindled by this love, the soul desires neither wages nor reward. Its will is to lose all and sacrifice itself without desiring to gain naught for itself, so that it may please Jesus. Happy the soul that loves! The Lord becomes, as it were, its prisoner, and holds himself ready to fulfill all its desires. Love is repaid only by love.” (St. John of the Cross)
 

Thank You, Lord, for this coincident coupling of Your Feast of the Exaltation Holy Cross with this 14th Sunday of Pentecost. Please grant us the grace to grow closer to You this day by spending some time thinking about You, Your Holy Cross, and the Love You continue to freely give us, sinners that we are.

 

Happy 14th Sunday after Pentecost!

Happy Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross!