The Appeal of Calvary

'Christ Carrying the Cross', c.1565, by Titian (1490-1576), Museo del Prado, Madrid

‘Lent brings before us the vision of the One Who deliberately chose to pursue the perfect way at all costs, and Who followed the perfect way that He had chosen at the cost of a lonely death upon the gallows. To some people the main point about Lent is that it gives them the chance of listening to eloquent preachers. To other people Lent is a time to accept discomfort and especially to consider our Lord’s suffering. Perhaps we shall go deeper still if we realise that the secret of our Lord’s suffering and all the value of His Passion lay in the perfection of His obedience to the law of love which was expressed in the deliberate choice of His human will.
 
It is only our Lord Who could die deliberately in the divinest way, but you and I can try to live deliberately in the best human way we can. Whatever we do not do, there is something we must do this Lent, and that is to try to deepen our prayer life. The Church calls us in Lent to express our Christian faith in a threefold sacrifice: first, a sacrifice for God, that is prayer; secondly, a sacrifice for others, that is almsgiving; thirdly, a sacrifice for our own self-discipline, and that is fasting.
 
Let us make a deliberate effort to pray, to think, to do, as we really do believe in our deepest and best selves that the God Who created us, died for us, cared for us, would have us do. Our Lord quite deliberately lived and died for us at His own expense. How often do we live heedlessly for ourselves at His expense? A daily dying to self-love will be our best answer to the appeal of Calvary’.

Father Andrew SDC, 1869-1946