Acceptance

 

I am sensitive to rejection, and in thinking about the last supper of Jesus, I encounter Him pondering the depth of rejection by human beings, that led to His dying. How He could go on to finish what He began in such a humiliating way, I cannot fathom.

In the face of the passion-life of Jesus, from the triumphant entry into Jerusalem to the rolling of the stone to seal His sepulcher, the physical component was devastating enough, but to be able to persevere and endure until His death, is unimaginable in merely human terms.

Let us not forget how much He loved the human race, including those who rejected Him and sought His death by crucifixion from Pontius Pilate.

One can make no sense of the suffering without a feeling for the love. To imagine one could cooperate with being nailed to a cross is impossible, because it only exists as an outcome of a Will that is divine and totally dedicated to love.

Neither can a man desire and achieve the crucifixion without a grasp of love, especially divine love. St. Padre Pio described how Jesus appeared to Him during his prayers, holding a lance which He thrust into the side of Padre Pio, and the imposition of nails into his feet and hands. There is also the matter of the suffering of the crown of thorns, the scourging and the physical abuse He endured. These too he encountered and suffered with for at least fifty years, quietly, silently and patiently amongst a humanity drowning in sin without realizing what was happening. That has not stopped, nor has it diminished until this moment.

Jesus still endures this in all the ages since until right now. Our prayers are weak, but we still must say them, and to say them we must want to say them, in order that His love might pervade reality until we do love and want to pray.

There are certain truths which we cannot reject and still call ourselves Christians. Men avidly embrace spurious creeds and beliefs that go counter to logic, reason and God's truth, and they reject the creed of Jesus which He handed down to us which can be used to make us saints and assure a place at His side in triumph. The rejection of the truths of Jesus in arrogance is equally painful to Him, and He will do all He can to counter lies with truth, but men who reject the truth have fallen off the earth and are adrift in darkness until the new reality begins. Until then, those willing to atone are few but very well blessed. Padre Pio could not accept what Jesus brought him the day Jesus penetrated his side, and pierced his hands and feet so he could be like Him and He could be with him as He was as he prayed to save souls. His acceptance of the Will of Jesus was accomplished by the same love with which Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane.

So, if you are sad with an endless sorrow, suffer loneliness and emptiness in the desert that is life, we should realize how close we are to sharing with the love that enabled Jesus to receive crucifixion. We cannot love enough on our own to be able to accept the offer of the cross, regardless of what it means. For Jesus, it meant suffering beyond imagining and a labor of divine love to incorporate the cross into the divine life, from whence all suffering of His passion comes forth from Him.

One might reflect that his own personal share in the cross this Lent does not amount to much, no matter how deeply we suffer pain and rejection in life.

Yet, enough people evidently have received enough love to accept a great deal, or life as we know it might already have been extinguished in the world. The light we have and that is, emanates from the love in Jesus and His cross and the adherence to the Faith and the truth. No one can say they are Christian, let alone Catholic, who are actually willing to accept as truth, what is a lie and contrary to what He has revealed to us.

Do not fear that you realize your weakness, but fear that anything might separate you from the suffering Jesus and a participation in His passion life.

To be saved means not to cease to exist separate from Jesus. The whole universe will change in an instant to a new reality we cannot imagine; Scripture tells us so. Jesus bore the agony of their loss and the loss of their love. We cannot imagine not being, but it is possible to not be. To be missing from the  universe would be bad enough, but to be suddenly aware that we also are separated from Jesus is incomprehensible. Our enemy who hates truth and hates love hates us and Jesus as well. We must be  counted one way or the other, do we accept the truth, and union with Jesus, and all that must be endured in order to be with Him forever, or not? At some momentous point in life we will be asked; pray that you may say the word that saves you and fulfills His Will at the same instant of His love.