A light for my Journey

"Your word is a lamp to guide my feet, a light for my journey"

There is no story more moving in the Bible than that of the stations of the cross. I have never yet managed to listen, read or watch it without it changing me in some way. This weekend I joined a group of ordinands from college on a pilgrimage to Walsingham, taking with us our children. As part of the pilgrimage we walked the stations of the cross, whilst reading liturgy and singing hymns

We stood waiting for us to become a gathered community to walk the story of the Lord's suffering together. As we stood the cold bit into us all, we were to suffer as we traced the footsteps of the Lord. As we began our journey my youngest turned to me and asked to be lifted. So I started my journey in pain because of the cold piercing it's way through my feet and carrying on my back my child.

 As Jesus took up his cross, he carried his and our greatest burden, in order that we should receive the joy of redemption. I took up my child for whom my husband and I carry the burden of responsibility. My daughter, along with her brothers are also one of our greatest sources of joy. It is a bitter sweet mix of emotions that Our Lord must have felt carrying his cross, for the burden of responsibility is a heavy one. He did not carry the weight of one upon his back as I did, nor of the three I carry everyday, he carried on his back the weight of all of humanity. He did not do this with a strong body, he did this with a body that had already been broken and beaten by the evil of the world. He carried our weight on his back, even after we had broken him physically and emotionally. He took all this pain, hate and sin without complaint and walked away to his death.

As he walks the path to the top of the hill, he falls. He falls because we fall. We fall from the path of Faith, sometimes we consciously turn away, at other times we unintentionally stumble on our journey. Our Lord is there to take our hand and lead us no matter how many times we fall, and he does so gladly.

As Mother and Son meet I can not imagine the pain and suffering for Our Lady. To have to stand by and watch your child stumble on the pathways in life is hard enough. To have to watch your child take on the world's pain and evil, must have wrenched her heart out. In the midst of this pain, she does not lose faith, but runs to comfort her child as she always has. Our Blessed Mother has shown us that in spite of  heart wrenching suffering in our lives and others, the love of God is there in the way we show our love to others. 

Simon of Cyrene a bystander forced into helping Christ. Looks into the eyes of suffering and in it finds salvation. I had reached this point in my journey round the stations, my arms ached, my feet throbbed with the pain of the biting cold clawing it's way in from the ground. I had the wavering thought of turning round to the door just behind me into the warmth. How could I though? I am not doing this for my pleasure, but for others, it is not meant to be enjoyable. Simon no more wanted to help Jesus, than I or any of the others wanted to stand in the bitter wind and rain. Yet none of us turned back. Through suffering our own pain and experiencing the pain of others, we can transform lives. Just as Jesus transformed the life of Simon.

Veronica, in all her simplicity took a cloth to Jesus without a thought to the consequences for her. It is more often than not, that when we decide to do things impulsively without thought to the consequences for us that we come closest to God. Our Lady did not stop either to think of the consequences of accepting the gift God gave her, nor did God hesitate to give his and her son so freely for us. There are many things we can and do hesitate over, what would happen if we did not?

When Jesus reaches his final destination, he is stripped and robbed of his dignity. The soldiers valued his clothes more than the beaten Messiah lying next to them. We place value and take pride in our possessions, this corrupts our relationship with God. It is easy to collect a possession and take pride in it's newness, but is it any more use to us than the old one we had in it's place. To try and find peace in possessions is a never ending downwards spiral, because each new thing becomes old and our requirement for the next thing comes along. To look for peace in God is a constant for it never grows old nor ceases to be.

The next two steps on the journey are the hardest to listen to, our broken defeated Messiah lonely and despairing is nailed to his cross. He is bent and pulled out of shape to fit the burden he must carry with him to the last. We too are pulled out of our comfort zones if we are to fit the Christian life.  Then at the point at which he feels all have left him, even his own Father, he breathes his last breath of this life. There have been many points in my life when I have felt neglected and abandoned by all including God. It has often been in taking the last few breaths of that part of my life, the God comes pulls me back and sends me in a whole new direction because he has never left my side. It is in reaching the points of loneliness that we reach for God all the harder, when we reach he welcomes us and breathes a new life and a new strength into us.

Here I shall end this reflection as we stopped at the laying of Jesus in the tomb, for good reason, the best is yet to come. After many anxious months and much worrying, I feel now to that our lives are also sitting in the tomb to be reborn. I left here last Friday full of worry and discontent about our future. Spending time in reflection, listening to the stations of the cross, and finding the stillness in the Shrine, has left me with a peaceful anticipation of our future. Deo gratias.