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Exaltation of the Holy Cross (Sept 14)

September 14, 2025

Fr. John Colacino C.PP.S.

Introit

Collect

O God, who willed that your Only Begotten Son
should undergo the Cross to save the human race,
grant, we pray,
that we, who have known his mystery on earth,
may merit the grace of his redemption in heaven.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever. Amen.

First Reading Numbers 21:4b-9

The Israelites set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; but they became impatient on the way. 5 The people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.” 6 Then the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. 7 The people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord to take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. 8 And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” 9 So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.

Responsorial Psalm Ps 78:1bc-2, 34-35, 36-37, 38

Second Reading. Philippians 2:6-11

Though Christ Jesus was in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, 7 but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, 8 he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Alleluia

Gospel John 3:13-17

Jesus said to Nicodemus: 13 “No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. 16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. 17 “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

Catena Nova

That brazen serpent was hung up as a remedy for the biting serpents, not as a type of Him that suffered for us but, as a contrast. It saved those that looked upon it, not because they believed it to live but because it was killed and killed with it, were the powers that were subject to it, being destroyed as it deserved. And what is the fitting epitaph for it from us? “O death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory?” You are overthrown by the Cross. you are slain by Him, Who is the Giver of Life. You are without breath, dead, without motion, even though you keep the form of a serpent lifted up high on a pole. (St. Gregory of Nazianzen)

Do not rejoice in the Cross only in times of peace, preserve the same faith in times of persecution. Do not be a friend to Jesus in times of peace alone, only to become His enemy in times of war. You are now receiving forgiveness for your sins and the spiritual gifts lavishly bestowed by your King so, when war breaks out, fight valiantly for your King. (St. Cyril of Jerusalem)

As we keep this feast, we are lifted up with the crucified Christ, leaving behind us earth and sin so that we may gain the things above. So great and outstanding a possession is the cross that he who wins it has won a treasure. Rightly could I call this treasure the fairest of all fair things and the costliest, in fact as well as in name, for on it and through it and for its sake the riches of salvation that had been lost were restored to us. Had there been no cross, Christ could not have been crucified. Had there been no cross, life itself could not have been nailed to the tree. And if life had not been nailed to it, There would be no streams of immortality pouring from Christ’s side, blood and water for the world’s cleansing. The legal bond of our sin would not be cancelled, we should not have attained our freedom, we should not have enjoyed the fruit of the tree of life and the gates of paradise would not stand open. Had there been no cross, death would not have been trodden underfoot, nor hell despoiled. Therefore, the cross is something wonderfully great and honorable. It is great because through the cross the many noble acts of Christ found their consummation – very many indeed, for both his miracles and his sufferings were fully rewarded with victory. The cross is honorable because it is both the sign of God’s suffering and the trophy of his victory. It stands for his suffering because on it he freely suffered unto death. But it is also his trophy because it was the means by which the devil was wounded and death conquered; the barred gates of hell were smashed, and the cross became the one common salvation of the whole world. (St. Andrew of Crete)

Let us then learn from the Cross of Jesus our proper way of living. Should I say ‘living’ or, instead, ‘dying’? Rather, both living and dying. Dying to the world, living for God. Dying to vices and living by the virtues. Dying to the flesh, but living in the spirit. Thus in the Cross of Christ, there is death and in the Cross of Christ there is life. The death of death is there and the life of life. The death of sins is there and the life of the virtues. The death of the flesh is there and the life of the spirit. (St. Aelred of Rievaulx)

O wise Love, what a remedy you prepare so that universal ruin be filled. Oh, what a plaster you apply to cure the wound of all. O Love, your counsel is help for those who are lost. You condemn the blameless man to save the miserable culprit. You pour out innocent blood to be able to placate enraged justice and to ransom the motto is relief for those who are miserable. You plead the cause of peace. You heed the importuning mercy. By your prudent counsel you bring help for the anxiety of all through the most gracious will of your clemency. You impose an end to universal misery through the glorious work of your mercy. O Love, what you have devised is the opportunity for salvation for those who are lost. (St. Gertrude the Great of Helfta)

How precious the gift of the Cross, how splendid to contemplate! In the Cross there is no mingling of good and evil, as in the tree of paradise; it is wholly beautiful to behold and good to taste. The fruit of this tree is not death but life, not darkness but light. This tree does not cast us out of paradise but opens the way for our return. (St. Theodore the Studite)

Innumerable crowds have lovingly, obediently, walked in the footsteps of Christ, treading a long tragic way that leads from earth to the very throne of God and into God’s Kingdom. They walk on, following Jesus, crowd after crowd, and with innumerable kinds of crosses—some of them fashioned by the sin or malice of fellow Christians. In this way, the disciples of Christ are crucified….Are we standing and looking, watching this long procession, this throng of people with shining eyes and with hope unquenched and yet with unfaltering love, or are we joining them? They seem to have an unbelievable joy in their hearts as they pass by us, but why? Isn’t it our turn to join all these and find the answer? Aren’t we to take up our cross and follow Christ and all those who love him? Christ has commanded us to follow him. He is inviting us to the celebration, the party of parties, that is his Kingdom. Is this a nightmare? How can flesh and blood endure what seems a tragedy, and is? We can because Christ is Risen! We don’t see the Christ who walks before us as his tormentors saw him, as a defeated prophet. We know him even now to be in glory. We know his every word and promise is true. We know that the Kingdom of God is ours if we simply follow him. Each day we are given the grace to make that decision. (Anthony Bloom)

Homily

While waiting in a doctor's office recently, I noticed on the wall the traditional emblem of the medical profession— a snake wrapped around a pole. Ever wonder where that came from? It’s the symbol of the Greek god of medicine, Asclepius, who was believed to have healing powers. Harmless snakes named after him were kept in hospital-temples built by the ancient Greeks in honor of the god. The entwined serpent wrapped around Asclepius' rod symbolized the shedding of the snake's skin, a metaphor for renewal, regeneration, and the healing process. That’s why you see them in doctors’ offices, hospitals and pharmacies to this day.

Now I must confess I always thought the medical profession got its snake from the Old Testament. When the people grumbled against God and against Moses in the desert. And the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. Those snakes weren’t harmless. They were called “saraphs,” which in Hebrew means “the fiery one,” because their bite burned.

Strangely, after the people repented God commanded Moses, ‘Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.’ So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live (Num. 21:5-9).

Now I don’t know about you, but a snake--whether the innocent kind Asceplius carried or the poisonous kind Moses fashioned--a snake isn’t my idea of medicine. Nor, I fear, was the cross. Which makes Jesus comparing his being lifted up on the cross to Moses lifting up the serpent in the wilderness (Jn. 3:13) so very strange. For no one would imagine the cross to be a sign of healing. Much less something that would draw all people to himself (cf. Jn. 12:32). On the contrary, the sight of it would provoke as much terror as any saraph would. Which is why, I suppose, Jesus made the comparison. There was nothing else to suggest such a loathsome thing as the cross could save people from perishing but those seraphs on the pole.

It reminds me of homeopathic medicine — from a Greek word meaning “similar suffering.” It’s a system of alternative medicine based on the principle that “like cures like.” So you’re given a very small dose of what ails you in order to cure whatever you have. As in the case of Moses, a serpent was just what the doctor ordered to cure a snakebite! It doesn’t seem to make much sense, doesn’t it” Yet, as in Jesus’ case, it was death that healed death--even death on a cross (Phil. 2:8)!

So God, it seems, is the great homeopath, the One who embraces suffering similar to our own in Christ: “Like curing like” in human likeness to save humanity; in the form of a slave to free the captive; emptied for the desolate; humbled for the lowly (cf. Phil. 2:7-8); the appearance of sin curing real sin; the appearance of guilt curing the liable; the appearance of condemnation curing the criminal; the pain of the world cured by the pain of the cross. Yes, like curing like when for our sake [God] made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor. 5:21). But only if we take the medicine God prescribes, an alternative medicine that doesn’t fit our view of what’s likely to cure us, taking up our own cross — as we heard last Sunday — in order to be Jesus' followers.

And today's feast could not be more timely in light of this past week. We desperately need to learn the lesson of the cross in this country and in particular how the cross was the only time in human history when violence cured violence. As Rene Girard reminded us

[The cross] teaches us that human beings are fundamentally prone to look for and to murder scapegoat victims. This looking for victims is very important in the birth of human culture. So the revelation of the cross brings out this dreadful aspect of humankind….when you understand the cross, you understand that all society is based on scapegoat violence. Christianity today seems to be disintegrating, but the state is also disintegrating—disintegrating in a particular way. We know with increasing clarity that states are always based on something like the crucifixion—on the ability to kill to cure the community of disorder—or, in other words, a smart use of the scapegoat mechanism, which the leader himself triggers to reconcile his people against the scapegoat….There is a difficulty with the Christians themselves to assimilate fully the nature of the cross and the refusal to see its implications. It is becoming more apparent that we are responsible if something happens to the marvelous place that God has given us. It is ours. Of course, he could intervene to stop it, but in a way it would cancel the lesson. (Interview with Mack Stirling; April 3-4, 2009; https://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V43N01_113.pdf)

So if we see a further uptick in political violence it will not be because the cross was lifted up. It will be because the rivalry between polarized elements of society will increase and the scapegoat mechanism will kick in. There will be no greeting of "Peace be with you" offered to anyone as was given by the Forgiving Victim. Instead violence will be given a sacred aura of righteousness and other martyrs for the cause will be offered up on its altar. The cycle will repeat. In other words those who live by the sword will continue to die by it.

No, taking the alternative medicine of the cross requires people who truly believe in the gospel, someone who could be named secretary of the newly-established "Department of Peace." But it's all too easy to miss that kind of cure, isn't it? A cure that leads from the cross to the resurrection — for where death arose, life sprang forth again (cf. Preface).

Which reminds me, the myth of Asclepius ends with him being struck dead by one of Zeus’ lightning bolts. Why? Because the God of medicine was raising people from the dead — unlike the Supreme God of Christian faith who highly exalted [Christ] and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Phil. 2:9-11). Who lives and reigns, forever and ever. Amen.

Intercessions (Joe Milner; The Sunday Website)

For the Church: that we who were signed with the cross at our baptism, may walk with Christ through the Paschal Mystery and allow God to guide us through all of life's trials.

For all who carry the cross each day; for parents of troubled children; for those struggling with addiction: and for those who have been abused: that Christ who has been lifted up will walk with them through the pain and into new life.

For all who have long-term illness or disability and for their families: that they may draw strength from the sufferings of Christ and hope from his resurrection.

For health and safety in our schools and colleges: that God will protect all students and faculty from violence and disease and help everyone to learn and grow in the coming months.

For leaders in governments, business, education, and religion: that they may follow the example of Christ and become servants to all the voiceless and marginalized of society.

For families who are broken and in turmoil: that Christ's example of love and service may guide them toward reconciliation and compassion for one another.

For all who are facing death: that the cross will bring strength and grace to those with terminal illness, those who live in danger of violence, and those who are awaiting execution, and lead them to Christ who is the resurrection and life.

For freedom from war and violence: that the cross of Christ will show the way to peace and new beginnings for all experiencing violence and bloodshed.

For peace: that the cross of Christ may illumine a new way to settle conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and South Sudan and open a path toward forgiveness and reconciliation.

Lifted up among us, O God, is Jesus the crucified: sign of your steadfast love and pledge of your will to save. To those who look upon the cross with faith grant healing of soul and life eternal. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever. (ICEL; 1998)

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