Vigils Reading – Good Friday

Living United to Your Cross 6

A Meditation by St Rafael Arnaiz

Today, at Holy Communion, I felt the consolation of being close to You when it seems that everything else has abandoned me. Lord, I wanted to nail to Your heart the words I say every day: “Lord, do not permit me to be parted from You.” May I remain, Lord, in the shadow of the stark wood of the cross forever. Put my cell and my bed at Your feet… There may I find all my delight, Lord, and my rest amid my suffering too… Water the ground at Calvary with my tears… There, at the foot of the cross, may I pray and examine my conscience… “Lord, do not permit me to be parted from You.”

What a great joy it is to be able to live at the foot of the cross. There I find Mary, and Saint John, and all those who love You. There is no pain there because, looking up at Your own, Lord, who would dare to suffer? There everything is forgotten. No one desires joy, no one thinks of suffering… Upon seeing Your wounds, Lord, only one thought reigns in the soul…love…yes, love, to wipe away Your sweat; love, to tend Your wounds; love, to relieve such great and immense pain. Lord, do no permit me to be parted from You.

Let me live at the foot of your cross without thinking of myself, or wanting or desiring anything other than gazing wildly upon the divine blood that is pouring down upon the earth… Let me weep, Lord, but weep for how little I can do for You, and how much I have offended You while I was far away from Yourcross… Let me weep for the forgetfulness that humanity shows You, even those who are good… Let me live at the foot of Your cross, Lord… day and night, at work and at rest, in prayer and study, while eating and sleeping…always… always.

I only came to know the gentleness of Christ’s ways such a short time ago, but I have always found consolation in the cross. What little I know, I have learned from the cross… I have always done my prayer and meditation at the cross… In truth, I don’t know a better place, and I’m not going looking for one… so stay still, then. Therefore, Lord, as I consider the divine school of your cross, as I consider that it is only on Calvary, at Mary’s side where I can learn to be better, to love You, and to forget and disregard myself: “Do not permit me to be parted from You.”

God is so good to me. I truly don’t have the words for it. He forcibly removes me from the world. He sends me a cross, and draws me near to His own… and so all I have to do is wait, wait with faith and love, wait, embracing His cross… Therefore, Lord, clinging to the cross with all my strength, uniting mytears to Your blood, shouting, wailing, howling… wanting to go mad… mad for Your most holy cross… Hear me, O Lord! Listen to my supplications, and od not spurn them… With the water pouring from Your side, wash away my great sins, my faults, and my ingratitude; fill my heart with Your divine blood, and give rest to my soul as it unceasingly cries out, “Lord, let me live united to Your cross, and do not permit me to be parted from it.”

Virgin Mary, Mother of Sorrows, when you gaze upon Your Son, bleeding on Calvary, let me humbly tend to Your great sorrow, and unworthy though I am, allow me to wipe away Your tears.