It has not always struck me how strange it is that we have a feast of the exaltation of the cross. Having grown up in Malta in very catholic surroundings, I did not interrogate this practice much growing up. When I moved to the UK, found myself in conversation with those for whom Christianity was new and delved a little deeper into scripture studies and history, the scandal of the cross started to become apparent to me. The cross was one of the worst possible instruments of torture that the Roman Empire used. It was meant to make an example of anyone who showed defiance or seemed like a threat, one of the ways used to keep peoples in line. It led to an agonising and very public death. So, why exalt the cross of Jesus?

In the Gospel today, Jesus alludes to ‘being lifted up’ like the serpent in the desert. In the Old Testament reading, as the Israelites make their long journey across the desert the people are disgruntled and complaining, so fiery serpents are sent to them causing fear and death. When they ask Moses’ intercession, God instructs Moses to make a fiery serpent and set it up on a standard so that those who look at it can be healed. This is an unusual solution. God does not eradicate the fiery serpents; instead God transforms the image of the fiery serpent into one that heals and saves the people. The thing that brought fear and death, is now transformed into what brings salvation.

When Jesus compares himself to the fiery serpent, could he be saying to the disciples that God is about to transform this symbol of fear, oppression and empire into a symbol, an action, that gives life? Jesus’ free choice of facing the cross and living the torture with compassion and forgiveness towards those around him obviously made a great impression on those who saw it, from Simon of Cyrene to the centurion, and surely on his friends and the bystanders who followed the proceedings from various distances. It has also had reverberations and repercussions throughout the centuries to our time.

The passion of Christ has always been a source of comfort and strength to those who find themselves in hard times, the poor, the bereaved, those facing suffering in their personal lives. In my native Malta, the commemoration of the passion in Holy Week with its sombre processions is often more popular than Easter Sunday itself. The people find solace in a God who knows how to suffer and so understands their suffering. They see in the sure knowledge that Jesus is also the Risen One, hope for their own situations even if this is often hard to imagine.

The cross of Christ has also been set before Christians as a challenge. St Ignatius of Loyola in his Spiritual Exercises invites the retreatant to pray in front of Christ crucified and ask herself: ‘What have I done for Christ? What am I doing for Christ? What ought I do for Christ?’ This invites the retreatant to respond to Christ with her life choices, it invites her to ponder how she might love, serve and follow Christ who is willing to suffer and die. This meditation in the Spiritual Exercises has enabled many to generously give their lives for others in ordinary and extraordinary ways throughout the centuries. Praying these three questions in front of Jesus on the cross certainly intensifies their meaning. Maybe you might want to pray this yourself in the coming days?

Marie Madeleine D’Houët, foundress of the sisters, Faithful Companions of Jesus (FCJ) used to say to her sisters, ‘The cross is our rallying point; from there we go forth to serve a risen Christ.’ This was her response to Ignatius’ meditation. It becomes a place of real encounter with Christ, with others, with the suffering of our world. Marie Madeleine speaks about ‘the cross and beyond’. The cross of Jesus becomes the place where the seeds of hope are sown. She identifies with the women who were faithful to Jesus at the foot of the cross. This is a place of deep love, of true companionship, of enormous grief, of hopelessness… and it is also the place that enables new life and resurrection.

Like Moses’ fiery serpent, God’s love transforms the image of a man tortured on the cross into a powerful invitation to love deeply, to be more, and to reach out to others.

In a homily on this day in 2022, Pope Francis said, ‘for from the cross of Christ we learn love, not hatred; compassion, not indifference; forgiveness, not vengeance.’ These are lessons that humanity has needed to learn over and over again. What might they mean in my personal life and yours? What can we do so that the earth can once more learn love, compassion and forgiveness?