Welcome to Lent! Over the course of the next six or so weeks, Catholics will be focused on fasting, prayer, and almsgiving, including various devotionals to assist their Lenten journey. All paths, however, lead to Good Friday and the cross. But what is the cross?

Countless reflections have been written about the cross over the centuries, and I’m sure many more will follow in the future. However, I think it’s important for each person to examine the various meanings of the cross so that they can be open to Jesus’ guidance when He uses it. One perspective that I find comforting is the cross as the shepherd’s staff. After all, Jesus did call Himself the Good Shepherd, and any good shepherd will have a staff in hand. Most bishops and cardinals carry a shepherd’s crook during liturgical celebrations, illustrating they are the shepherds in Jesus’ name for their geographic area. Typically a shepherd uses a staff for guidance, either of the whole flock or to separate a few sheep from the herd. A staff is gentle enough not to spook the sheep, but strong enough to encourage the most stubborn of sheep to follow the shepherd. When we object and complain about the challenges and trials of life, we are like the ornery sheep who are resisting the guidance of the shepherd. Yet when we lean into Jesus and surrender to His Will, Jesus will guide us through the tribulations (not remove them) and we will be blessed with the fruits and graces the surrender brings to us. 

Perhaps the most obvious is the cross as a device of execution. It cannot be stated more bluntly than its purpose was Jesus’ death. Jesus really and truly died. We cannot have the resurrection of Easter without the death on Good Friday. All four Gospels are in agreement with that fact, as well as many of the letters in the New Testament. Skeptics, under the heresy of Docetism, doubted that Jesus had a real body and could die, but the early Church condemned this perspective, and does so every time this surfaces as an objection to the Church’s teaching. 

Another way of looking at the cross is as the tree of life. While this might seem the exact opposite of an execution device, it is through the death of Jesus that we can have eternal life. The fruit of the cross is dying to one’s desires so that we can do God’s Will instead of our will. Another fruit is the life of the Church and all the sacraments that sustain us during our earthly pilgrimage. We are baptized with the sign of the cross and are sealed with the oil of chrism in that same way in confirmation. In confession we are absolved through that sign and the form of a cross is used during the anointing of the sick. Our entire spiritual life revolves around the cross, not because it is a sign of death, but because it allows us to be saved and enter eternity with God.

Lastly, one can consider the cross the throne of Jesus. Because Jesus accepted His Passion and Death, the cross became His throne, His way of bringing the Kingdom of God to earth. His throne served as a bridge between physical life on earth and the spiritual realm. As beings with both bodies and souls, living with a focus just on the physical life is like only living half a life. To be fully alive is to embrace both the physical world as well as the spiritual. Through Jesus, we have access to God and the spiritual realm. On this throne, Jesus dispenses forgiveness and mercy, both to the thief who acknowledges his sinfulness as well as those actively persecuting Jesus in their stubborn ignorance. Jesus bestows blessings and graces by giving His Mother to be a Mother to us all. 

The cross is many things. As we progress through Lent this year, let us pause and remember both the tragedy and beauty of the simple intersection of two pieces of wood that Jesus used to transform the world in every age. May we be humbled by its power and rejoice in the fruitfulness of its blessings.