A story out of South America to help us put Good Friday into perspective:
Poor family, scrimped and saved to get a piece of land. The day they took possession of the land was a day of celebration. They gathered in their two room shack that would serve as their home, and the father ceremoniously walked off and marked the boundaries of the new property, praying and thankful for what they had. As he laid stones at the corners of the property he noticed something sticking out from under a bush. As he dug it up he soon unearthed a corpus from a crucifix. It had been in the ground a long time. Its hands and arms were gone, and its feet and legs were missing. It was mangled, scratched and cracked, the paint nearly gone. He carried it back to the shack in his arms. He laid it on the kitchen table. Pronouncing it was the first fruit of the land they had bought, what should they do with it? Take it to the church, burn it, bury it again?
The youngest spoke up, "Why don’t we hang it on the wall in the kitchen and put a sign under it?"
Poor family, scrimped and saved to get a piece of land. The day they took possession of the land was a day of celebration. They gathered in their two room shack that would serve as their home, and the father ceremoniously walked off and marked the boundaries of the new property, praying and thankful for what they had. As he laid stones at the corners of the property he noticed something sticking out from under a bush. As he dug it up he soon unearthed a corpus from a crucifix. It had been in the ground a long time. Its hands and arms were gone, and its feet and legs were missing. It was mangled, scratched and cracked, the paint nearly gone. He carried it back to the shack in his arms. He laid it on the kitchen table. Pronouncing it was the first fruit of the land they had bought, what should they do with it? Take it to the church, burn it, bury it again?
The youngest spoke up, "Why don’t we hang it on the wall in the kitchen and put a sign under it?"
"What would you write": tacked underneath this corpus in this home was a sign written in printed block letters: "Jesus had no arms and legs. Will you lend him yours?"
(paraphrasing St Theresa of Avila:)
“Christ has no body now on earth but yours,
no hands but yours,
no feet but yours,
yours are the eyes through which Christ's compassion
is to look out to the earth,
yours are the feet by which He is to go about doing good
and yours are the hands by which He is to bless us now.”
“Christ has no body now on earth but yours,
no hands but yours,
no feet but yours,
yours are the eyes through which Christ's compassion
is to look out to the earth,
yours are the feet by which He is to go about doing good
and yours are the hands by which He is to bless us now.”
Thi is Good Friday
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