THE Mass is the greatest event in the history of mankind, the one holy act that keeps the wrath of God from a sinful world. For it holds the Cross between heaven and earth. No wonder a priest remarked at the changes which slipped the Cross from its socket, that the earth tilted in its axis that day — a catastrophe which plunged us into the cold and darkness of year-round spiritual winter.

The sorrows of death now surround us. Only we get used to it — this outer space to which we have been exiled. But Calvary belongs to all places and all times. Its surrounding sorrows were not that of Jew or of Greek or of Roman, anymore than they were of yesterday. The Declaration of Independence, the Civil War — these things are done, they are in the past. We study them today, but that is all. The Sacrifice of the Cross is still happening. He hangs on that Wood, beneath its trilingual sign, to stop the careless passerby, to draw the thoughtless closer, to arouse the worldly from their torpor. The one inescapable fact of history, of today, which we cannot resist. As long as there is sin in the world, the Crucifixion is a reality.

The poet said:

 I saw the Son of God go by
Crowned with the crown of Thorn.
‘Was It not finished, Lord?’ I said,
‘And all the anguish borne?’

He turned on me His awful eyes: 
‘Hast thou not understood?
Lo! Every soul is Calvary,
And every sin a Rood.’

— Bishop Daniel Dolan, January 28, 2018

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