~ The 4D Cross

I read a homily from Pope Benedict this morning which inspired this piece.  The content is just promoted by one of the concepts that got me thinking.

There has historically and still exists a gap between humankind and God as well as person to person, the so-called “man’s inhumanity to man”.  This is where the four dimensional cross has its place in history and the present.

Most people, I am sure, would admit to a feeling of dissatisfaction with their life.  This manifests in many ways probably the most common being the hunt for possessions otherwise known as consumerism or the safety of masks.  We are not fully human when we hide behind anything that affects personal relationships.

This satisfaction gap is the result of our separation from God, and other humanity generally.  The Papal homily addressed the separation using the analogy of gravity.  It doesn’t matter how good a person we are there is a force like gravity that means we will never be able to ascend to Gods level regardless of our virtue or our prowess in technology.

To complicate the relationship picture we seem to have a need for “privacy” and “space”.  We have a capacity to relate to people only after we decide that that person is safe. Everyone else is suspect and must be held off with the concepts of privacy and space.

Now see the Cross that we treasure.  As you look at it place the privacy and space issues on the horizontal on either side of the cross then parts of the bar disappear behind the issues.  Now look at the vertical part of the Cross, which is the God to man relationship. Father being by nature loving of His creation is constrained by the fact that He is also holy.  He will not compromise that in order to reach out to creation.  He reaches out but cannot reach us.  We on the other hand may be lovers of God.  We may have faith to move Mount Everest but we have a fundamental problem.  We have a sin nature that pulls us back away from our desire to reach out to Father, just as gravity keeps us earth bound.

So then, when we see the cross covered in the centre with our selfish issues of privacy and personal space plus we see God trying to reach down to us but restricted by his holy nature and us being unable to get close to God what we have created in our minds is a cross with the centre taken out of it.

This was the reason that Jesus chose to go to His Crucifixion.  He was fully aware that He must die that death; it was the only way to connect the separated pieces.  This was His calling, the reason that He was born but it was not His fate.  He chose the Father’s way knowing the cost of such a decision but also the benefits of accepting Father’s way. 

The crucifixion is more than an historic event.  Jesus by going to the Cross fulfilled Fathers will but He also whipped out the gap between Father and us and by His arms outreached He enables us to reconnect with other people: but that is not all.

The other thing that He did was to provide us with an example to follow.  Father had a special job for Jesus but He also has a very special job unique to each of us.  When we accept His call on our lives He provides us with the resources to do what He asks us and as well He provides us with a fulfilled life.  Finally we live unified in relationship with Him