The Way of the Cross

posted on: Wednesday, February 22, 2012 by: renaebauer

Station 7 - Jesus falls a second time.

by Sister Laura Zelten

How many times have I prayed the Way of the Cross?  I remember the times as a small child in grade school that during Lent the entire student body would go to church every Friday afternoon to pray the way of the cross together.  As a family we would go on Sunday afternoons during Lent to pray with the parish community.

While I was ministering in Nicaragua the Stations became real to me.  Living with my brothers and sisters who could relate to the sufferings of Jesus made me understand oppression in a very true sense of the word.  On Good Friday the whole town would gather to pray the Way of the Cross. It would take about three hours in the heat of midday.  Hundreds of people would walk the streets praying and singing Jesus' walk to Calvary.

The Way of the Cross is a guide for our heart or a blueprint for expressing our response to what happens in our world today.  They offer us counsel on how to walk with dignity and grace as we compassionately respond to the needs of our times.

As a design for life, the Way of the Cross can offer us a pattern for life that will afford us a way to walk with integrity and grace in the midst of a world where injustice, violence and despair exist.

We walk the Way of the Cross to the death of Jesus but we do not stop with death.  We go to the tomb where we experience the power of the Resurrection.

During this Lenten season as you pray the Way of the Cross may you experience the Jesus as our brother and liberator from death to eternal life.