Embracing Christ and the Cross – Reflections for Holy Week

Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira

An authentic piety penetrates every recess of our souls, naturally stirring our most intimate emotions. Piety, however, is far more than feelings. It arises deep within ourselves from our knowledge of the truths that govern an interior life formed in accord with the Faith. To be sure, these life-giving truths are often acquired through diligent and disciplined study, but intelligence, like emotion, is an inadequate foundation for piety, which also resides in the will.

Thus we must desire to live the truths we know. It is not sufficient to understand that God is perfect, for example. We must also love His perfection and desire to have some share in it; we must aspire to sanctity.
To desire is not simply to entertain vague notions or feelings. We truly desire something only when we are ready to make every sacrifice necessary to attain it.



Without the will to sacrifice, our “pious desires” are but vain illusions. Tender contemplations of divine truths and sacred mysteries are sterile seeds if they do not bear fruit in firm resolutions to live our faith.
It is especially timely to recall this during Holy Week. Meditating on the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ is a praiseworthy devotion, but we must follow the Way of the Cross in our lives as well as in our churches. We must give Our Lord sincere proofs during these days of our devotion and love, amending our lives and fighting with all our strength in defense of the Holy Catholic Church.
“Why persecutest thou Me?”
When Our Lord confronted Saint Paul on the road to Damascus, He asked him, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” (Acts 9:4). Since Saul was persecuting the Church, Our Lord’s words make it clear that to persecute Christ’s Church is to persecute Christ Himself, for the Church is the Mystical Body of Christ.

Conversion of St. Paul

If the Church is persecuted today, then Christ is persecuted, and Our Lord’s Passion is being relived in our days. Every act that draws a soul away from the Church persecutes Christ. To separate a soul from the Church is to amputate a member of the Mystical Body of which Our Lord Jesus Christ is the Head. To wrench a soul from the Church is like chopping off Our Lord’s hand, severing His leg, pulling out His eye.
Therefore, if we desire to identify with the Passion of Christ, let us indeed meditate on His sufferings at the hands of His persecutors nearly 2,000 years ago, but let us not forget to consider all that is being done to inflict the same wounds on His Mystical Body today.


Related (Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira):
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2015/10/saint-michael-archangel.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2015/08/harmonious-social-inequalities.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2015/07/fatima-and-necessity-of-suffering.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-military-virtues-every-catholic.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-equality-myth-founding-legend.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-salutary-right-to-resist.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2016/02/three-faces-of-revolution.html
http://tradcatknight.blogspot.com/2016/01/our-lady-of-peace.html




Above all, let us not fail to examine our own acts of indifference, cowardice, and betrayal. While His sacred blood mingled with the dirt during His agony in the garden, Our Lord foresaw the sins of all men of all times. He saw our sins and suffered for each one of them. In the Garden of Olives we were present with Christ as executioners and, as such, we accompanied His bloodstained steps to the heights of Golgotha.
Behold the suffering of Holy Mother Church mocked and jeered before our jaded eyes. She stands before us as Our Lord once stood before Veronica. Let us console the Church by defending Her whatever the cost. In doing so, we will be consoling Christ as Veronica did.

…to be continued

Holy Week: Sacred Music for Meditation