Homily for Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion

The readings for Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion may be found at:  

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/041522.cfm

What is truth?

The truth is that five days ago, Jesus was celebrated, honored and praised with joyful anticipation by adoring crowds who waved palms to welcome a messiah they had waited centuries for.  

Today, this same man is handed over by his own people - by us really - to Pontius Pilate, a weary, middle manager of the Roman Empire trapped in a dusty, remote outpost, longing to be anywhere else - looking very much like a man in a no-win scenario.

Standing in front of this tired man, Jesus says, “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.  Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”  

To which Pilate responds, “What is truth?”  

I bet most of us can’t imagine what it was like to be Pilate and not see the truth standing literally right in front of him.

But nearly two thousand years later, we have to ask ourselves…would we know the truth if it bit us on the nose?

Every day we are exposed to so many different versions of reality all presented to us as the truth.  

Truth in morality, politics, cases going up or down, things getting better or worse, what is gender and biology, when does life begin or end, who can love who, who can compete with who and even the questioning of God, Jesus, religion and the church.

Every day we hear different versions of the truth.  Are we really so different from Pilate, not being able to recognize the truth right in front of us?

Today, truth stands before us as the crucified Christ, who testifies to the truth that God still loves and saves His people and still blesses the whole of creation - regardless of the mess we are.  

Christ stands before us today battered by betrayal, jealousy, evil and our sins.  

He stands before us bloodied for preaching forgiveness, mercy and love in a world that prefers violence, pain and revenge.

Faced by these evils, Jesus didn’t retaliate in kind.  

Instead, he absorbed the abuse and sins of the world and retaliated with unrelenting love and mercy and in the process, transformed us and the world.

The truth is he asks us to do the same. 

To transform ourselves and this world we live in with unrelenting love and mercy.

Today, let us fully appreciate the truth of a Lord who endured the most brutal punishment, torture and death so that we might have eternal life.

And let us embrace the truth of what he expects from us in return.

“We adore you O Christ and we praise You, because by your Holy Cross You have redeemed the world.”