when faith becomes a cross - 24th sunday B
The gospel of Mark was written at a time when the legend Quo Vadis was told and retold among the Christians. The legend tells of Peter who upon knowing that the Christians were about to be persecuted slid quietly to escape it. And as he fled he encountered the Lord just outside the city gate carrying his cross entering the city Peter was leaving behind. And Peter asked, Quo vadis, Domine? Where are you going, Lord? And the Lord replied saying, “In Rome, to be crucified again.” It was once again a confrontation and a rebuke that has already become too familiar to Peter. Peter could not understand why the messiah would suffer, why the messiah would be rejected, humiliated and dishonored and why his followers would suffer the same fate. If the legend is true, then Peter had been grappling with this reality of Christian life, the reality of the cross in our lives, the reality of persecution and rejection, until he himself died a victim of the same persecution he struggled to understand. Just like us.
Jesus called Peter Satan because Peter continued to do to Jesus what Satan failed to do in the desert. Peter wanted him to be a popular Messiah, the same intent of Satan in asking Jesus to turn stone into bread. Peter wanted Jesus to be a triumphant and victorious messiah, the same intent when Satan asked Jesus to jump from the highest point of the temple because the angels will not allow his foot to dash against a stone. Peter was rebuked because that was not the way of Jesus. Jesus chose the cross, he chose rejection, he chose humiliation.
And it is in this context now that Jesus turns not just to Peter but also to all of us saying: "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself,take up his cross, and follow me… to lose one’s life for my sake.”
Several years ago I was approached by a couple with a little gift for the seminary. The gift was part of what they received from their retirement – the husband was a judge and the wife was a prosecutor in the Philippines. It was an early retirement. They could have received more had they waited a little longer for the full benefits but they opted out early. Why I asked? Pressures they said, pressures to do things contrary to their faith – to use and accept planted evidence, to decide in favor of somebody through persuasion at first, then turning to compulsion the next, to do something which they knew was wrong and dishonest, and it was becoming a burden they knew they cannot live with. And as they narrated their experiences I would hear this one phrase which becomes as it were a mantra – the phrase, but because of the faith, but because of the faith.
Faith becomes a cross, it becomes a burden when I am asked to choose between saving my life or losing it for Jesus. It is never easy.
Living our catholic faith amidst the scandals today also becomes a cross. It is carrying the weight of rejection and dishonor, of humiliation and shame. It is a cross not of our own making, nevertheless it is a cross shared by the one body, the church, as we do in our family. Many times like Jesus we are made to carry the sins of others and it is unfair. But that is how it is as a family and as a church, and it is never easy. Nevertheless we confidently sing in the psalm, “I will walk before the Lord, in the land of the living.” The cross may be heavy but we carry it in the presence of the Lord, for faith is not just a burden we carry. Faith is also the certainty of hope, a hope that we will one day overcome.
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