In some Christian traditions,
the journey
towards the cross is marked by a process
known as
the ‘stations of the cross’.
This is a replication of the route Jesus was traditionally believed
to have walked
through
Jerusalem as he carried his cross.
Pilgrims to Jerusalem continue to walk the way of the cross,
or Via Dolorosa as it is known,
pausing at each of the stations of the cross to remember
stories
such as Jesus
stumbling, meeting his mother,
having his cross carried by Simon of
Cyrene,
St Veronica
wiping his face with a cloth, and so on.
This pilgrimage journey has its roots party in the
scriptural stories of Jesus’ death,
but also in
the many traditions that emerged about Jesus’ final hours
in the
early centuries of the Christian tradition.
However, its historicity isn’t really the point.
The power
of the pilgrimage of the stations of the cross,
whether undertaken in Jerusalem or
through the use of icons or images,
is that it
invites those doing it to enter into the story,
to spend time with the pain and
suffering and death,
and to not rush too soon to the happy
ending.
Baptists are not normally known for observing the stations
of the cross,
but I do
wonder if at this time,
we have
something we can learn from this ancient pilgrimage tradition.
Sometimes, you can’t rush to the happy ending.
Sometimes,
you just have to stay with the pain,
and the suffering, and the death.
Sometimes
you just have to wait.
And this is not easy.
It’s not easy at the best of times,
but it’s
even more difficult when the pain, suffering and death
are visiting our own world, our
county, our city,
perhaps even our families and
friends.
Each of us is having to make our own, personal, journey
towards the cross;
and whilst
we gather in online spaces such as this one,
nonetheless this year we are more disconnected, more
isolated, more alone
than any
other Holy Week in recent generations.
And this is not easy.
It’s hard.
It’s lonely. It’s painful.
Because this year,
the story
of the cross resonates so strongly with our own story.
We are not passive observers of the disciples, the women,
and the
crowds around Jesus as he walks the way of the cross.
We are part of the procession,
we are making
the journey ourselves,
and we are
feeling the grief, the loss, and the pain.
I’ve heard a few people in the last couple of weeks
refer to
the experience of the Coronavirus lockdown
as an experience of grief.
We may, or may not, have lost loved ones ourselves;
but we are
all experiencing loss.
We have lost our freedom, we have lost our normality,
we have
lost our sense of connection with others;
we have lost our place of worship, our place of work, our
social lives;
many are
facing loss of income, loss of security, loss of independence.
And this is hard,
and we are
grieving the losses we have already experienced,
and we are
grieving the losses yet to come.
There is a process known as anticipatory grief,
where you
start mourning in advance for a loss not yet experienced.
It’s a kind of anxiety, and it can be all consuming,
as our mind
conjures worst-case-scenarios
for us to
obsess over in the dark watches of the night.
And, at the moment, the end, the exit strategy as the
politicians call it,
seems to
reside in the far distance of an uncertain future.
We can feel trapped in our grief at all that has been lost,
and unable
to move on.
And so we experience, not only the stations of the cross,
but also
the stages of grief.
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross wrote about these in 1969,
and they
resonate now as much as ever.
We will see them playing out in others,
and we will
(if we are self-aware enough) see them in our own lives too.
Some of us are in denial,
carrying on as best as we can with normal life,
telling
ourselves that this is a temporary blip,
and that we’ll
all be back to normal in a week or two.
Some of us are experiencing feelings of intense anger,
irrationally
lashing out at others or ourselves
as we
process the frustration of the loss that has been thrust upon us.
Some of us are bargaining,
possibly with God,
seeking to lose
ourselves in thoughts of ‘if only…’ or ‘what if…’,
feeling
guilt at the things we didn’t do whilst we had the chance.
Some of us are feeling depression,
a fog of intense
sadness that overwhelms our days
and saps
our ability to function.
And some of us are beginning to get hints of acceptance
that this world
of loss is something we will have to live with,
and so we are reaching out,
investing time in friendships and
ourselves,
listening to
our needs and being gentle with ourselves.
And the thing is, these stages of grief
are all a
necessary part of healing after loss.
They are not experienced in order, or separately;
they come
at us randomly, furiously, like waves washing over us.
This is what it means to live in Good Friday,
to weep at
the foot of the cross,
to pause at the stations of the cross,
to
experience the stages of grief.
And without wanting to rush too quickly to Easter Sunday,
because
none of us are rushing out of this dark valley for some time yet,
there is
still hope in the distant future.
The co-author of The
Stages of Grief was a man named David Kessler,
and he has
since written of final, sixth, stage,
which he
calls Finding Meaning.
He suggests that the end result of the experience of grief,
can be a
new meaning in life,
where peace and hope are found in the midst of grief,
and begin
to point to a new future.
The loss cannot be reversed,
but the
future is not hopeless.
So today, as we contemplate the cross,
let us be
alert to ourselves, and to those whom we love.
Let us be kind to one another,
as we
process our grief in different ways.
And let us hold fast to the hope
that the Good
News for all humankind
is found in
the horror of the cross of Christ.
