Today is Good Friday, but what is so good about it.  Jesus is nailed to the Cross and dies after three hours of agony.  His mother’s heart breaks at the foot of the Cross.  Of course, this is true and we mourn on this day when we enter our parishes and the altar is bare, our sacred images are covered, the holy water fonts (often implicitly the ‘sign of our faith’ we’re most familiar with) are empty; the Church of our Lord Jesus is stark, bare, the Tabernacle door is open and our Lord is not there.  What would life be like if not for our Lord and His Sacrifice?  How can any of this be good?  How can we look on this day as Good Friday?  But it is: blood and water poured forth from His side as the sword of the centurion pierced His side.  His Body and Blood became the salvation of the entire world; God Incarnate died on the Cross but the Church and humanity through Him is given salvation. God can make good from everything, and nowhere is this more predominate than from the Cross.  He works this out in our own individual lives; God can take us as sinners and do some of the greatest things through us, His weak instruments – AND HE WILL, if we let Him.  And we must, on this day think of the ultimate sacrifice made by Jesus Himself and as we seek to configure ourselves more closely to Him (and this is what our vocation will call us to do) we need to consider the ways we give our own lives away in love for others.

Today, I reflect upon my own priestly ministry and I know that this year’s Lent has shown me the ways and places that I can be more generous in love, giving more generously of the gifts given to me in priesthood.  There can be a temptation to believe that we are sacrificing enough, but in this Holy Week I know there are ways and places I can be more sacrificial for others and the key is to take this and run with it, not to drop the ball.

My hope for each of you is that this Lent has been a reflective and holy one for you.  This is what will make it good; the Lord desires good things for each one of us.  May this Good Friday be good for you.  May God bless you.