Welcome to the latest edition of the weekly Say Yes to Holiness newsletter—designed to help inspire, encourage and accompany you on the path towards holiness.
Today is the Feast of the Exhultation of the Holy Cross. It also would have been my 30th wedding anniversary, so today’s newsletter will be a bit different than previous weeks in that instead of focusing upon the Gospel, we’ll focus upon how we might carry our crosses, especially in the joys, sorrows, challenges that occur in the midst of our daily lives.
“We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you, because by your Holy Cross you have redeemed the world.”
This is our response throughout the Stations of the Cross, a devotion normally practiced during Lent, but we celebrate that reality, and confront one of the great paradoxes of our faith today with the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross.
How is it that an instrument of torture becomes the instrument of salvation? How can a symbol of humiliation become a sign of victory? How can an apparent defeat become a triumph of Love? And how does death become the pathway to eternal life?
These are the questions we confront on this day, and ones that I am meditating upon as I look back upon my life with my beloved late husband, Paul. When we were married on this day back in 1996, neither one of us registered that the Exhultation of the Cross was the feast day, but eventually when we did realize it, we would joke that each of us was the cross that would get the other into Heaven!
Although we joked about it, this actually is the truth of the cross.
For every cross we encounter in our life has the capacity to become the means by which we are prepared for eternal life with the Lord in Heaven.
No one knew this truth better than Mary as she stood at the foot of the Cross, and tomorrow, September 15th, we celebrate the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows. This day gives us the chance to intentionally contemplate the woman who stood faithfully beneath that Cross and showed us what it means to remain with Jesus in suffering.
We continue this contemplation on Wednesday as we celebrate the memorial of Saints Cornelius and Cyprian. Each of them remained faithful to Christ and His Church as bishops in the midst of persecution, and ultimately they both embraced martyrdom as a result.
Thursday is the memorial of two Doctors of the Church—Saint Robert Bellarmine and Saint Hildegard of Bingen. Each led very different lives, but they model for us how our enitr lives with our gifts, intellect, creativity, and wisdom can all be placed at the service of Christ and His Church.
But that brings us back to today. Everything this week begins at the Cross because Christianity without the Cross would be a Christianity without Christ. Jesus never promised us a life without suffering. But He did enter into our suffering, then transformed it before invites us to follow Him.
So, this week’s Food for the Head, Heart, Hands and Feet will seek to inspire, encourage, and accompany each of us in seeing Jesus in the midst of our crosses, surrendering those crosses to God, seeking to allow them to teach us how to love, and ultimately discovering the Cross is our great beacon of hope to sustain us while we continue on our journey towards holiness…
Food for the Head
"Yes, I love the cross, the cross alone, because I always see it behind Jesus' shoulders." — Saint Pio of Pietrelcina
Perhaps one reason we struggle so much with our crosses is because we look at the cross and stop there.
Perhaps we hear the diagnosis. Or see a broken relationship. Or experience the disappointment. Or encounter the financial difficulty. Or feel the loneliness or the grief. Or remember the unanswered prayer.
But Padre Pio tells us that when we look at the Cross, we should see something else.
Jesus.
And Jesus changes everything. I can attest to this after having walked with Paul through his cancer journey. Jesus didn’t take away the suffering or the challenge of walking with Paul during that difficult time. But the Cross doesn’t give an explanation for suffering.
Rather, the Cross is God’s response to it. God chose to not remain distant from our pain. Instead, He entered into it by carrying the Cross and falling beneath its weight. In the process, He experienced all of what we experience in our lives—rejection, abandonment, physical agony, and finally, death.
Padre Pio invites us to look beyond the cross to see the One carrying it, and then to remember that when we encounter our own crosses, we are not going anywhere that Jesus hasn’t already been.
So, perhaps the question we need to ask when a cross enters our lives is not just, “Why is this happening?” But rather, “Jesus, where are You in this?”
Because if we can see Jesus behind the Cross, we’ll know that we don’t have to carry it alone.
This week, resolve to identify one cross you are carrying and then consciously look for the presence of Jesus within it. And if the cross has become burdensome, resolve to pray, “Jesus, help me see You behind this cross.”
Food for the Heart
"Let us bear our cross and leave it to God to determine the length and the weight." — Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne
I know that at the beginning of Paul’s cancer journey, two questions were subtlely present. First was ”How difficult is this going to be?” And second was “How long is this going to last?”
If we are honest with ourselves, those tend to be the two questions that come up any time we run into a cross. But usually, God doesn’t answer either question, does He?
Instead, He asks us to trust Him.
I would contend that Our Lady of Sorrows understood this better than almost anyone. From the moment of Simeon’s prophecy in the Temple that “a sword would pierce her heart” to standing beneath the Cross of her Son, Mary encountered suffering that she neither chose nor completely understood. But she remained faithful.
Just like Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne tells us, Mary could not determine the length of Calvary, or the determine the weight of the sword that would pierce her heart. All she could do was to keep saying YES—just like the YES she spoke in response to Saint Gabriel in Nazareth.
That is what surrender looks like.
And Saint Rose reminds us that we aren’t responsible for determining the dimensions of our crosses, but rather to only carry today’s portion of that Cross. When we do this, our hearts are freed from an enormous burden.
Because we don’t have to figure out how we will endure tomorrow. Or next month. Or next year. We just simply need to ask God for enough grace to get through today.
And God promises to provide it.
This week, resolve that when you find yourself worrying about how long a difficulty will last or how much harder it might become, that you will pray, “Jesus, I trust You with the length and the weight. Simply give me the grace to carry my cross today.”
Food for the Hands
“The Cross is the school of love." — Saint Maximilian Kolbe
I have discovered that there are so many lessons that we can learn at the school of the Cross, but the primary one is that we learn how to love. Not a sentimental love or a convenient love or a love that exists when the other person loves us in return.
We learn sacrificial love.
Saint Maximilian Kolbe knew something about this, didn’t he? So much so that he literally was able to offer himself as a sacrifice for the life of another and subsequently was placed in a starvation bunker and eventually shot to death at Auschwitz.
Saints Cornelius and Cyprian, whom we remember on Wednesday, learned this lesson of sacrificial love through their fidelity to Christ. Such faithfulness demanded courage, perseverance, and ultimately the sacrifice of their lives.
Both of them discovered what every disciple must eventually discover—love costs something.
Parents can discover this. Spouses can discover this. Caregivers can discover this. Friends can discover this. In fact, anyone who has genuinely tried to love another human being can eventually discover it. But we must be willing to sacrifice something that world tells us to hold on to—our time.
But sacrificial love requires us to sacrifice not only our time, but also our preferences, our comfort, our pride, and sometimes even our plans. I know my plan wasn’t to become a widow by the age of 56, but would I change it? Absolutely not.
Because Jesus teaches us from the Cross what love actually looks like: “This is my body, given for you.” And every day Jesus invites us to imitate Him. All the crosses created by our responsibilities, relationships, and vocation are actually be classrooms in which Jesus is teaching us to love more like Him.
Is it painful, difficult, and sometimes overwhelming?
Yes.
But is it also a school filled with love, joy, peace, goodness, patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control?
Yes to all that, too.
This week, instead of merely enduring one sacrifice required by your vocation or responsibilities, resolve to allow your cross to become an act of love by consciously offering it for someone you love.
Food for the Feet
"One cannot desire freedom from the Cross when one is especially chosen for the Cross." — Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)
Our natural response to suffering is to escape it, isn’t it?
We pray for the problem to disappear or for God to remove the difficulty. (Or at least this is the first thing that I do!)
Now, there is nothing wrong with asking for relief. Jesus prayed for it in Gethsemane when He asked His heavenly Father, “Let this cup pass from me.”
But He also said, “Yet, not as I will, but as you will.”
Eventually, being a disciple requires us to stop asking only about relief, and instead to start asking, “Lord, how do you want me to follow You through this?”
Both of the Doctors of the Church whom we celebrate this week, Saint Robert Bellarmine and Saint Hildegard of Bingen, show us that following Christ can take wonderfully different forms according to our unique gifts and talents.
God calls some to teach. Some to create. Some to lead. Some to counsel. Some to heal. Some to defend truth. and some to quietly serve.
Holiness does not require us to become someone else. Rather, it requires us to surrender who we are and what we have been given back to God.
Inevitably, our journey towards holiness and our surrender will involve the Cross. So, allow Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross to guide you in this process. Because the question is not whether we will spend our lives trying to escape every sacrifice, but rather will we allow Christ to use those sacrifices to make us saints?
Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross might be better known to you as Edith Stein. Edith was a brilliant woman who also happened to be Jewish. Although she eventually converted to Catholicism and became a Carmelite nun, she was still perceived as a Jew, and because of it, was eventually sent to the death camp at Auschwitz where she was killed in 1942. Only a year after Saint Maximilian Kolbe’s death there.
Although Saint Teresa was given the opportunity to flee, she refused knowing that her path to sanctity would probably involved the cross of marytrdom, and it did. She did not run away, rather, she embraced the cross and God’s will for her life.
The question for us is, will we have the courage to do the same?
This week, resolve to stop resisting one unavoidable cross in your life by asking Jesus how He desires you to carry it, and then take the next faithful step.
One of the most beautiful ways to learn how to walk with Jesus beneath the Cross is by praying the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary. This week, consider praying them with Our Lady of Sorrows, especially as you walk with Mary from Gethsemane to Calvary, and ask her to teach you how to remain beside Jesus when you cannot fix the situation, remove the suffering, or understand what God is doing. A favorite rosary podcast of mine is the Daily Rosary podcast by the School of Faith.
Exhortation
"The Cross is a beacon of hope towering above chaos, calling us to embrace it with faith, love, and hope as the path from earth to heaven." — Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)
Saint Teresa Benedicta has such a wealth of wisdom to share with us regarding the Cross that I couldn’t help using another one of her quotes to conclude this week’s newsletter that is focused upon the Cross.
The idea that the Cross is a beacon is such a beautiful image, especially when you remember the purpose of a beacon—to shows us where to go in the midst of storms and chaos.
Our world contains plenty of chaos for sure.
And so do our lives, don’t they?
Yet towering above all of the chaos stands the Cross. The Cross bears witness that God has NOT abandoned us. In fact, Our Lady of Sorrows stood beneath that beacon. Under its shadow, Cornelius and Cyprian gave their lives while Saints Robert Bellarmine and Hildegard of Bingen used their gifts to point others toward its truth.
Countless saints throughout the centuries have discovered that the road to holiness inevitably passes through the cross, and so will ours.
But we don’t need to be afraid.
Rather, when the Cross appears, look for Jesus.
When its weight becomes heavy, let God determine its length and weight.
When sacrifice is demanded, enter the school of love.
When you are tempted to run, ask Jesus how He wants you to follow Him through it.
And when the chaos becomes so great that you cannot see the way forward, look again at the Cross.
Because the Cross is never the end. It just is pointing towards Resurrection.
No cross that we offer to Christ is meaningless.
And no suffering united to Him will ever be wasted.
All our acts of sacrificial love will be remembered for all eternity, because darkness never will have the final word.
So, keep doing WHATEVER IT TAKES to embrace the Cross with faith, love, and hope as you keep your eyes fixed upon Jesus, trusting Him that the road through Calvary ultimately leads to Resurrection, all so that we can tell the Master of Death, “NOT TODAY!”
All the best,
Christina
PS—If you haven’t already, go check out my new book, Solving the Parish Puzzle: One Person, One Disciple, One Leader at a Time is now available for purchase on Amazon.
Below are the Latest Happenings In the Say Yes to Holiness Community!
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Latest Posts on the Women of the New Evangelization (WINE) blog:
Mercy, Peace and Exultation (April 12)
Harden Not Our Hearts (Mar 9)
Guest appearance on the Equipcast Podcast:
"When God Asks, How Do You Answer?: The Power of 'Yes' with Christina Semmens
Articles on the Catholic365.com Platform:
Recognizing the Path to Life
We Are All Eucharistic Missionaires!
Latest episode of the Say Yes to Holiness podcast...
Episode #266
“9/11, Fulton Sheen, Faith, Freedom and Liberty”
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Episode #265
“America’s Saint-Venerable Fulton Sheen”—1:1 Conversation with Dr. Peter Howard, President, Fulton Sheen Institute
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Update from The Catholic Leadership Puzzle
Now that Solving the Parish Puzzle: One Person, One Disciple, and One Leader at a Time has been released (and is available for purchase at Amazon), I have just started a NEW PODCAST SERIES that highlights different topics covered in the book by having conversations with a variety of guests.
The next in the series was just released, and the topic this time around was HOSPITALITY. My guest on the Catholic Leadership Podcast was Richard McCorry, Author of Company's Coming: A Spiritual Process for Creating More Welcoming Parishes.
The Power of Hospitality: Insights from Richard McCorry
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