On this afternoon we typically venerate the cross.  This year we will not venerate it in the usual fashion, coming forward during Mass to touch or kiss it, I will ask you to remain in your pews. 

We usually venerate the cross because “As we kneel before the crucifix and kiss it, we are not adoring the material image; rather, we are paying the highest honor to the Cross of Our Lord as the instrument of our salvation. Because the Cross of Jesus is inseparable from His sacrifice, as we reverence His Cross we, in effect, adore Christ.” 

This is still an important practice, but this year I will invite you to kneel and venerate the cross from your pews as I elevate it.

The cross, as we just heard in the Gospel, was a powerful method of torture and execution used by the Romans and many other cultures throughout history.  People would suffer for hours and hours, sometimes even days, until they eventually would die from asphyxiation.

It was a brutal form of capital punishment, but it would get the message across to all who saw it to not act as this person did, or else they might end up suffering and dying in the same way.

Today we tend to see the cross as almost decorative. It is ironic if you think about it, imagine wearing around your neck or decorating your house with depictions of the guillotine, or the gas chamber, or the electric chair. 

So what is it about the cross that we can decorate with it and wear it around our necks, knowing it’s intended use?  Well, it’s simple, it is a sign of hope for us strictly because of the Resurrection.  

If Jesus hadn’t been raised from the dead then there is no way we would have been celebrating.  But Jesus has overcome this cruel suffering and death, and because He has overcome death, we have hope as well. 

Oftentimes at a burial, a committal service at the cemetery, the funeral director will hand me a cross or a crucifix, and I will take it to a family member, and bless it in front of them, including something to the effect of, “may all who look upon this cross see it as a sign of hope, and know always of God’s unconditional love for them...” 

For Jesus to go through so much pain and suffering and die such a horrific death shows just how much God loves us and wants us to be with Him in Heaven.  

So we venerate the cross, despite its intended use, because for us who profess to be Christians, this is a sign of hope. It is a sign of God’s love for us, because it was the instrument of our salvation.  

It is through the cross that Jesus has won the victory over death. 

It is through the cross that Jesus forgives us of our sins.

It is through the cross that Jesus has opened the gates of Heaven.

When Jesus was raised up on the cross, He intended to draw all men and women to himself.  Jesus has given the cross a new meaning, God’s love is the message it is intended to give to us now. 

This is why we venerate the cross today especially, but every time we look at a cross or a crucifix, we should remember it as a sign of hope, and remember God’s great love for us.