We approach the most sacred days of our spiritual calendar: The Three Days (in Latin, Triduum).  These are the days of the passion, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus.  It was drama extraordinaire, a surprise to any of those who lived through the events of those days.  Far from being a surprise, we often under-estimate the power of these days.  But many of us have “been there” where this week leads us: at the foot of the cross.  Yes, I suggest this week is a vigil at the cross. 

We stand together at the cross, not like the soldiers or leaders who derided and jeered Jesus, but we are believers!  Yet, as we gaze upon this bloody mess we see how human hands have caused this ugly suffering; we witness the horror of the sin of humankind that kills and destroys.  And we see similar sin within ourselves.  Who can save us from all of this?  God can.

This is a week of keeping vigil at the cross.  Many of us have done this throughout the year.  Some of us have kept vigil during the ultimate sickness and death of a beloved family member or a friend.  Relatively helpless before the powerful grasp of nature, all we could do was to watch and wait with the beloved so that this person did not have to suffer alone.  And we kept vigil.

Some of us have kept vigil in a room full of homeless persons.  The winter shelter could not end their homeless situation.  All we did was to provide a place of warmth and of safety.  Relatively helpless before the endless circle of streetwalking and finding a place to rest for a while, these men and women are our brothers and sisters with complicated issues beyond our abilities, maybe even beyond our hope.  But we kept vigil.

Some of us stood before the Clinic where abortions can and do happen.  The life situations that enter and leave there are complicated and sometimes quite tragic. Adding to the tragedy is the termination of a life, a person who will never see the light of day.  Relatively helpless before the intention of death, we watched, prayed, and hoped.  Death seemed to wring out a victory, but we kept vigil for Another to act.


These are the vigils at the cross that have left us feeling helpless before circumstances that are larger than our ability to exercise influence…or so it seems.  And so was the gibbet of the cross: it appeared to have exclusive, ghostly power over life.  No one curbed that dying…except The One who acted when humanity was exhausted in its dealing out of death and in its tears of sorrow.  But God was in the strange mix of death…and He altered the course of this defect, this flaw in our human condition.  Death still reaches out it tentacles in the world, but we still keep the vigil of faith, a vigil of hope and a vigil of love.  Let us be the testimony that God has space to work whatever marvel He so chooses in this work, among the weak and the vulnerable who turn to Him.  We depend on His immutable love. 

Hence, this week, and every week, is holy week.