Good Friday morning to you, my friends. On this day of solemn quiet, I wish you peace and the sense of a hope for each other and for our world thanks to the 'yes' Jesus gave to the Father and to us on that day He passed from this world. I am well aware of an incident going on in Yemen sometime today, a place where four nuns were martyred three weeks ago and the only Catholic priest there, a Salesian, was kidnapped. The report now is that Al Quaida will crucify him sometime today, on this Good Friday, yes, crucify him! May God give him every strength!! And so I pass on to you a statement I found recently. It truly impresses me and seems so fitting for this day, Good Friday. It goes this way: If you would like to know God, look at the crucifix. If you would like to love God, look to the crucifix If you want to serve God, look at the crucifix. If you hope for eternal happiness, then look at the crucifix. If you wonder how much God loves you, look at the crucifix. If you wonder how much He wants you in heaven, look at the crucifix. If you wonder how much you should forgive others, look at the crucifix. If you want to know what unselfishness and generosity are, look at the crucifix. If you want to understand the need for self-denial, look at the crucifix. If you want to live well, look at the crucifix. And if you want to die well, then look at the crucifix. I want to finish here by passing on to you, for your consideration, an essay by Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI, a very popular write of Catholic spirituality. It is perfect for reading and pondering on this Good Friday. He says: It is one thing to love when you feel love around you, when others understand you and are grateful for your person and gifts; it is quite another when everything around you speaks of misunderstanding, jealousy, coldness, and hatred. It is one thing to maintain your ideals when they are shared by others, when the gospel works for you, when principle works out in practice; it is quite another when it seems you are alone in some ideal and when the gospel appears to be delivering more death than life. It is one thing to keep your balance when the rhythms of life support it, when there is a healthy give and take to things, when life is fair; it is quite another when things are unfair, when you are unjustly criticized, when everyone else seems to have lost balance, when, like on Good Friday, it gets dark in the middle of the day. It is one thing to be gracious when those around you are respectful, warm, and fair. It is quite another when everyone seems bitter, disrespectful, jealous and cold. It is one thing to bless others when they want to receive that blessing, when they hang on to your every word, when they want to be in your company; it is quite another when their very glance speaks of loathing and when they avoid you when you come into a room. It is one thing to forgive others when that forgiveness seems fair, when it isn't impossible to swallow the hurt, when the wound dealt you is not mortal; it is quite another to forgive someone when it isn't fair, when the wound dealt you is mortal, when the life being murdered is your own. It is one thing to give your life over to family, church, community and God when you feel loved and supported by them, when they seem worth the sacrifice, when you get a good feeling by doing it; it is quite another thing when you do not feel support, when it doesn't seem worthwhile, and when you feel no other reason for doing it except truth and principle. These contrasts capture, in essence, what Jesus did in the Garden of Gethsemani and on the cross. His passion was a drama of the heart, not an endurance test for His body. What made the sacrifice of Jesus, His handing Himself over, so special? We have, I think, focused too much on the physical aspects of the crucifixion to the detriment of what was happening more deeply, underneath. Why do I say that? Because none of the Gospels emphasizes the physical sufferings, nor indeed, in the fears He expressed in conversations before His death, does Jesus. What the Gospels and Jesus emphasize is His moral loneliness, the fact that He was alone, betrayed, humiliated, misunderstood, the object of jealousy and crowd hysteria, that He was a stone's throw away from everyone, that those who loved Him were asleep to what was really happening, that He was unanimity-minus-one. And this moral loneliness, mocked by those outside of it, tempted Him against everything He had preached and stood for during His life and ministry. What made His sacrifice so special was not that He died a victim of violence (millions die as victims of violence and their deaths are not necessarily special.) nor that He refused to use divine power to stop His death (as He Himself taught, that would have proved nothing). What made His death so special is that, inside of all the aloneness, darkness, jealousy, misunderstanding, sick crowd hysteria, coldness, and murder, He held out, He gave Himself over, without bitterness, without losing His balance, His meaning, or His message. This is the ultimate test and we face it daily in many areas of our lives. Some years ago, I was participating in a forum debating a book on chastity. The book, written by a woman still in her early twenties, was a very idealistic one and it urged young people to not have sex before marriage, but to keep their virginity as a special gift for their partners in marriage. One of the panelists, a very sincere woman, had this reaction: "I like what this young woman says, and when my daughters are in their teens I'll have them read this book, but what she says makes a lot more sense when you are 20 years old and know what you are waiting for than when you are 39 years old and no longer know what you are waiting for." The sacrifice of Jesus was so special because, long after the clock had run out on everything and there seemed no reason left to wait for anything, He still held on, to His ideals, His balance, His graciousness, His forgiveness, and His love. The struggle to do that, to remain faithful, is the real drama inside the death of Jesus, and in the end it is a struggle of the heart, not of the body. I plan to post one more Easter-related article, tomorrow sometime. Bernie Owens