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Bishop Burbidge's Good Friday Homily
Good Friday - Celebration of the Lord’s Passion
Sacred Heart Cathedral
March 21, 2008
As we come forward today to venerate the cross, I can only imagine what we will be carrying in our hearts. But this is for sure: all of us in this cathedral will come forth with some sort of suffering in our lives. It may be physical or emotional. It may be concern for ourselves or those we love. Yet, without exception we carry a cross. That is what it means to be His disciple: to walk in His footsteps and to share in His sufferings.
In the midst of our sufferings, we find blessings and tools to assist us: support of other people, counseling, research materials and other resources. No doubt they are gifts from above. However, as demonstrated by your presence here today, they are not enough. It is impossible for us to endure our sufferings; to find ultimate meaning and victory in them without God. That is the message that Our Holy Father Pope Benedict has been stressing so frequently, most especially in his encyclical On Christian Hope. Christ is our “great hope” who attains for us what we cannot attain for ourselves. We find reason to live in confident and joyful hope, even in the midst of sufferings and crosses, only in relationship with Him.
Our Readings today explain why Christ is our “great hope.” The Letter to the Hebrews explains that He is our High Priest who is able to sympathize with our weakness because, though without sin, he has been tested in every way as we have been. And as foretold by the prophet Isaiah, Christ is our “great hope” as demonstrated in His infinite love for us. It was a love through which he bore our infirmities, endured our sufferings, was pierced for our offenses and crushed for our sins. As we hear the details of the Passion account, we do so with the knowledge of the Good News: Christ dispelled the power of darkness; defeated evil; and destroyed death itself. No wonder we come forward to venerate the cross. No wonder we say, “We adore you O Christ and we bless you because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
Of all the spiritual messages we receive today, I believe that the Lord is asking that we meditate upon and trust in his great love for us, a love that knew no limits. If we are convinced of that love then we will strive daily to live in relationship with him and never try to carry our burdens and crosses alone. We will use our inner resources and the gifts of this world that God gives to assist us. But most important, we will always do so with the conviction that we discover our confidence, our victory, our “great hope” in Christ alone, the One who by his cross and resurrection has set us free for He is the savior of the world!