Triumph of the Cross

Homily
TRIUMPH OF THE CROSS
14 SEPTEMBER 2008

Numbers 21: 4-9

[Num 21:4] From Mount Horeb they set out on the Red Sea road, to by-pass the land of Edom. But with their patience worn out by the journey,
[Num 21:5] the people complained against God and Moses, "Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert, where there is no food or water? We are disgusted with this wretched food!"
[Num 21:6] In punishment the LORD sent among the people saraph serpents, which bit the people so that many of them died.
[Num 21:7] Then the people came to Moses and said, "We have sinned in complaining against the LORD and you. Pray the LORD to take the serpents from us." So Moses prayed for the people,
[Num 21:8] and the LORD said to Moses, "Make a saraph and mount it on a pole, and if anyone who has been bitten looks at it, he will recover."
[Num 21:9] Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole, and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent looked at the bronze serpent, he recovered.

Philippians 2: 6-11

[Phil 2:6] Who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped.
[Phil 2:7] Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance,
[Phil 2:8] he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.
[Phil 2:9] Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,
[Phil 2:10] that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
[Phil 2:11] and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

John 3: 13 - 17

[John 3:13] No one has gone up to heaven except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man.
[John 3:14] And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
[John 3:15] so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life."
[John 3:16] For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.
[John 3:17] For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.
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1. Introduction

Today is the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross, also called the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. This feast originally commemorated the finding of the Holy Cross by St Helena, and the consecration on September 14, 335 AD of the Basilicas built by her son the Emperor Constantine on the sites of Calvary and the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.

2. The Cross is the Second Tree of Life

After the fall of our first parents, God willed that the estrangement from God of Adam, Eve, and their descendants should not last forever. So He stationed the cherubim to guard the way to the tree of life, lest they eat of its fruit and live forever in their state of separation from God. Such an existence would have been more of a "second death" than life.

Sacred Tradition has repeatedly observed that whereas Satan defeated the old Adam by a tree, the new Adam, Jesus Christ, in turn defeated Satan by a tree. This is stated in the Preface of the Holy Cross of the traditional mass, which says in part:

(Our heavenly Father) set the salvation of mankind upon the tree of the Cross, so that whence came death, thence also life might rise again, and that he who overcame by a tree might by a tree be overcome..."

God forbade Adam to taste of the fruit of the first tree of life. But God planted a second tree of life, the Holy Cross which we exalt today. He invites mankind to taste of its fruit, which is nothing less than the second Adam, His beloved Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. We taste of the fruit of this tree each time we partake of the Body and Blood, along with the soul and divinity, of Our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ.

Unlike the first tree of life, the life which the fruit of this second tree of life imparts is not an eternity of separation from God which would be a "second death"; the life imparted by this second tree is an eternity of life from which sin and death have been utterly annihilated. Moreover, it is not our own life which becomes eternal, rather it is a profound union of our life with the very life of God, the eternal divine life each of us receives in Baptism.

3. The Bronze Serpent is a Type of Christ Crucified

In today's gospel, Our Lord Himself cites that the bronze serpent that Moses lifted up is a type (symbolic forerunner) of His own forthcoming crucifixion:

[John 3:14] And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ...

Moses did not put a serpent atop a pole; he put the likeness of a serpent atop the pole.

The likeness of a serpent, apparently on the pole in defeat, served as a sacramental of God for the Israelites who had been stricken by live serpents. For, gazing on the likeness of a defeated serpent, their bites were healed.

This is a type of the cross, since:

at the crucifixion of Christ, the likeness of a sinful man, apparently on the cross in defeat, served as the sacrament par excellence of God for all smitten by sin. For, gazing on the likeness of a sinful man, and believing in him, men were healed from sin.

That Jesus was sent to us in the likeness of a sinful man, we read in Romans 8:

[Rom 8:3] ... what the law, weakened by the flesh, was powerless to do, this God has done: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for the sake of sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, ...

4. The Victory of the Cross

The victory of the "second tree of life", the Cross of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is manifold:

It is a victory over Satan.
Jesus overcame him by whom death entered the world, by winning eternal life for mankind.

It is a victory over sin.
Jesus expiated the guilt of the whole human race, from the beginning of time to the end of time.

It is a victory over death.
Jesus was the first to manifest this victory in His own person by rising from the dead, so that He might be "the first born from among the dead".

5. Our Participation in the Cross of Our Lord

It is not intelligible to think of a coin without its having two sides. It is also not intelligible to think of Good Friday and Easter, either one without the other. Without Easter, Good Friday becomes meaningless. The Romans of those times executed tens of thousands on the cross. However, without Good Friday, there would be no Easter.

When we contemplate a crucifix and what it represents, we are witnessing an execution. On the natural order, a man is being executed. On the supernatural order, what is being executed is nothing less than death itself.

An ancient prayer of the Church states:

For us, O Savior, you endured the Cross and burial; but as God by your death you put death to death; and so we worship your Resurrection on the third day. Lord, glory to you!

Just as Jesus' resurrection is inseparable from His cross, so the personal resurrection of each man is inseparable from his own personal cross. In Mark 8, we read:

[Mark 8:34] He summoned the crowd with his disciples and said to them, "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.

These words may be hard for some to hear, but much harder still would be the words:

[Mat 25:41] ... Depart from me, you accursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Our Lord commands us to follow him: to follow Him first in His crucifixion, and then to follow Him in His resurrection and ascension into heaven.

For someone to follow Him in His crucifixion, Our Lord commands him to "take up his cross, and follow me". Just as Jesus' cross and resurrection are akin to the two sides of a coin. so it is with each of us. For each of us it is true that we cannot pass on to eternal life through our personal resurrection unless we first approach the second tree of life, the holy cross. For this, we must do two things:

1. We must accept the cross into our life as a life-giving gift of God. This acceptance is what we call "our own personal cross".

2. We must partake of the fruit of this tree. That is, we must live a sacramental life, bearing in turn our own fruit in faith, hope, and charity.

6. Jesus Asks Us to Take Up Our Cross, Not His Cross

We take up our own cross each day of our life in ways such as the following:

1. Experiencing the buffetings of the evil one in our daily spiritual combat;
2. Experiencing moral evil through the agency of other men, either by ignorance, frailty, or malice;
3. Battling our own proclivity to sin: again, either by ignorance, frailty, or malice;
4. Experiencing damage to mental or bodily health;
5. Experiencing damage to material possessions.

Jesus asks us to take up our own cross, not His cross. Only one person helped Jesus carry His cross: Simon of Cyrene. Simon was forced by the Roman soldiers to do so. We can, however, help Jesus carry His cross in the person of our neighbor--for Our Lord says in Matthew 25:

[Mat 25:40] ... 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.'

Part of our exercise of charity in this life is to freely offer to help our neighbor carry his cross. We can do this by providing our neighbor with spiritual assistance, or by providing him with material assistance--sometimes with his knowledge and sometimes not.

7. We Die to Ourselves through the Cross

The cross is also an means of purification of the effects of sin, after sin has been forgiven. Before a man can enter into the contemplation of the Beatific Vision, he must undergo purification from the effects of sin which have accrued throughout his life. He can do so in this life, through the wholehearted acceptance of his cross. When he dies, whatever purification is still required will be accomplished in Purgatory.

As we progress through this, the wayfaring state, let us keep in mind the following scripture verse:

[1 Cor 1:18] The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

We conclude with an ancient vespers prayer:

Rejoice, O life-bearing Cross, the unconquerable triumph of true worship, O door of paradise, the confirmation of believers, the wall of the Church, through which corruption has disappeared and perished, the power of death has been swallowed, and we ascend from earth to heaven, O incontestable weapon and adversary of Satan….

Amen.