With Christmas past the path laid before us now is an ascent to Jerusalem and all that implies. Ironically the ascent is one into darkness or tenebrae as Christ sets his sights squarely on the temple and the cross. I say ironic because one envisions an ascent as leading into light and while the calendar journey to Easter leads us to more hours of daylight it is deceptive for at the end of the line is death.

Of course there is light in this death in the sense that with the great sacrifice having been made no more are required and the cross becomes a tool of justification, righteousness and ultimately a lamp of grace. Still, darkness before light.

This God is interesting. Rather than eradicate suffering this God chooses to participate with us in it, silently suffering alongside us until we pass through death and come out clean and whole on the other side.

I hope this months ahead can be months of contemplation for myself and others. A time to contemplate the point of Christ in the world. I am reminded in a myriad of different ways that when I take my eyes off of Christ and focus on myself and/or others I become disoriented and lost. So often the journey of the cross is marked by the watching of other travelers on the path and how they walk it to such a degree that one misses the bumps and is tripped up, falling while others stumble past.

Easter is the pinnacle of the liturgical year and the cross is its centre. All things radiate from the sacrifice of Christ – truth is found in its most pure form in this one death and existential meaning is there as well for those who care to look.