Could someone be nailed to a cross without knowing it? The pain that Jesus experienced as he was violently fixed to the cross was excruciating. But we have anesthetics these days, which divert our attention from the pain. So we have been nailed with spiraling costs over many years that have led us to seek spiraling credit, which has now led us into a downward economic spiral we have not seen for decades. Our brains have been so pounded with the mantra of individual rights that we now see the once tight-knit fabric of our social contracts scourged and torn to pieces. Our freedom to commit ourselves in lifetime relationships — whether in marriage, or in priesthood, or religious life — has been pierced through by a pessimism that doubts there is any such thing as forever. Our grasp of the whole truth of the dignity of each person, of the sanctity of all life, of the complementary nature of male and female has been punctured by grains of truth that are taken as the whole. All humanity is hanging on a cross of sin and death, and we often do not even feel the pain.

Jesus hung on the cross as a perpetual reminder that sin really does hurt us. It tears apart the sinews of our relationships. It beats to a pulp our true dignity as children of God. It pierces our hearts and our homes. It bleeds the very life blood out of us.

The Church calls us during this Holy Week to contemplate deeply the wounds of Christ, which he suffered for us without the benefit of anesthesia, not even the soothing voice of his Father, to whom he called out in his agony. He shows us how truly painful and life-draining sin is — not his sin but ours! He does this so that we may have courage to face sin in our lives without the anesthesia of drugs, of gossip, of vengeance, or of lust. He teaches us, above all, that the only true freedom, the only fullness of life, comes when we are not afraid to be ridiculed because we stand for the truth; when we are not going to run away, when confronting injustice earns us crosses; when insisting on the sanctity of true marriage leads others to peg us as bigots; when raising our voices for the unborn pierces our hearts with accusations of being out of touch with the reality of people’s lives.

But after he endured his horrible pain, Jesus rose from the dead, overcoming sin and death for us all! His refusal to be anesthetized in his suffering for us led him to a joy that is alert, awake, alive! It has changed the world and forever destroyed the pessimistic view that nails can hold us forever. As we rejoice in the resurrection of Christ, we are filled with hope. It is not a hope that turns our eyes away from the sufferings and sins of the world in a blind stupor, but a hope that embraces them all with a vision of radiant light. It is a hope that gives us the courage to dare to renounce Satan, and all his works, and all his empty promises. It is a hope that joins us together to give joyful witness to Jesus, our Savior, our Victor over sin and death forever. Let us rejoice and be glad!