Editor’s note: Father Raymond J. de Souza recorded meditations on the Seven Last Words at St. Mary’s Cathedral in Ogdensburg, New York. They will air on EWTN on Good Friday at 1 p.m. (EDT). It will also be available at ewtn.com and EWTN+. The Register will publish those meditations through Good Friday.
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“When Jesus had received the wine, he said, ‘It is finished.’ Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit” (John 19:30).
It is finished. In Latin, consummatum est. It is consummated. It is completed. It has been accomplished. It is finished, but it is not left behind. It is finished, but it remains.
On Friday afternoon at Golgotha, Jesus says, “It is finished.” On Sunday afternoon at Emmaus, Jesus makes it all present again. On Sunday afternoon in the Upper Room, he tells his Apostles, “As the Father sent me, even so I send you” (John 20:21).
If the stained-glass windows of this cathedral were being designed today, they would include Archbishop Sheen, who did his part to continue that mission.
Instead, there are windows here of Father Damien of Molokai, who tended to lepers as Jesus did; of Marguerite d’Youville, Rose Hawthorne and Frances Xavier Cabrini caring for the sick, as Jesus did; of priests offering the first Mass within the territory of New York State. What Jesus did on Good Friday, we do each day upon our altars. It is finished and it continues. The mission of the Cross continues and is entrusted to each new disciple at baptism.
Americans look to 1776 and the bringing forth of a new nation. There is a window here depicting 1676, a hundred years earlier. It shows the bringing forth of a new disciple, the baptism of a Mohawk maiden, Kateri Tekakwitha. To her, as to every disciple, was given a share in the mission which Jesus consummated on the Cross. Kateri’s face during life had been marked by disfiguring scars due to smallpox. When she died, her face was miraculously healed. Those attending her were able to see the transformation of her earthly body by a soul now in the presence of the Risen Christ.
Americans rightly celebrate this anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, but 1776 — like all political arrangements — is worthy of celebration to the extent that it makes room for 1676, for the mission of the baptized to be more freely, more fully lived in this vale of tears.
Our meditations are now almost finished. But it is not possible to preach on the stained-glass windows of a New York cathedral without recalling what Pope Benedict XVI said upon visiting St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan in 2008:
From the outside, those windows are dark, heavy, even dreary. But once one enters the church, they suddenly come alive; reflecting the light passing through them, they reveal all their splendor. Many writers — here in America we can think of Nathaniel Hawthorne — have used the image of stained glass to illustrate the mystery of the Church herself. It is only from the inside, from the experience of faith and ecclesial life, that we see the Church as she truly is: flooded with grace, resplendent in beauty, adorned by the manifold gifts of the Spirit. It follows that we, who live the life of grace within the Church’s communion, are called to draw all people into this mystery of light.
The Cross is like that. It was designed to be dark and terrifying, but seen in the light of the One who hung upon it, the Cross floods the world with grace and beauty.
Benedict cited Nathaniel Hawthorne, who knew something of what he wrote; his daughter, Rose Hawthorne — Mother Alphonsa — founded a religious order dedicated to caring for cancer patients. She flooded the United States with grace and beauty. There is a window of her here in St. Mary’s Cathedral, Ogdensburg.
Rose Hawthorne died a century ago, in July 1926, when America was celebrating the Declaration’s sesquicentennial. From St. Kateri, a hundred years before the Declaration, to Rose Hawthorne, 150 years after, the mission continues.
“It is finished.”
We adore Thee, O Christ, and we praise Thee, because by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.
