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| Stations of the Cross
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| The
First Station |
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Jesus is
Condemned to Death |
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V.
We adore thee, O Christ, and we bless thee:
(genuflect)
R.
Because by thy holy Cross thou hast redeemed the world.
THE
READING: (St. Mark 14:61-64)
The high
priest asked him, and said unto him, Art thou the Christ, the Son of the
Blessed? And Jesus said, I am... And then all condemned him
to be guilty of death.
V.
Oh my people, what have I done unto thee, or wherein have I wearied
thee? Testify against me.
R.
Holy and Immortal, have mercy upon us.
Let us
pray:
Almighty
God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy, but first he suffered pain,
and entered not into glory before he was crucified; Mercifully
grant that we, walking the Way of the Cross, may find it none other than
the way of life and peace; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our
Lord (who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost,
ever one God, world without end). Amen.
V.
O Savior of the world, who by thy Cross and Precious Blood hast redeemed
us:
R.
Save us and help us, we humbly beseech thee, O Lord.
| Reflection:
Leaving
the House of Caiphas, and dragged before Pilate and Herod, mocked,
beaten, and spit upon, His back torn with scourges, His head crowned
with thorns, Jesus, who on the last day will judge the world, is
Himself condemned by unjust judges to a death of ignominy and
torture.
Jesus
is condemned to death. His death warrant is signed, and who signed
it but I, when I committed my first mortal sins? My first mortal
sins, when I fell away from the state of grace into which Thou didst
place me by baptism; these it was that were Thy death warrant, O
Lord. The innocent suffered for the guilty. Those sins of mine were
the voices which cried out, "Let Him be crucified." That
willingness and delight of heart with which I committed them was the
consent which Pilate gave to this clamorous multitude. And the
hardness of heart which followed upon them, my disgust, my despair,
my proud impatience, my obstinate resolve to sin on, the love of sin
which took possession of me--what were these contrary and impetuous
feelings but the blows and the blasphemies with which the fierce
soldiers and the populace received Thee, thus carrying out the
sentence which Pilate had pronounced? |
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