Joint Project Commissariat of the Holy Land in Canada and Antennes de paix à Montréal
4th station
Station 5: Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry his cross
1st voice
“As they were leading him away they seized on a man, Simon from Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and made him shoulder the cross and carry it behind Jesus.” (Lk, 23, 26)
Here is Jesus, the icon of the suffering servant: “And yet ours were the sufferings he bore, ours the sorrows he carried. But we, we thought of him as someone punished, struck by God, and brought low… On him lies a punishment that brings us peace, and through his wounds we are healed.”*
A stranger, a passerby is made to take up Jesus’ cross, odious sign of the apparent failure of his mission of reconciliation in the midst of his people. Jesus, well acquainted with suffering, accepts the cooperation of all those of goodwill who undertake to travel with him the trying road toward peace.
2nd voice
Our first reaction is unfortunately to recoil from a scene of violence. We are slow to recognize in the humiliated and the oppressed another face of the suffering servant. It is not easy to admit that we are an accessory, albeit unwillingly, to injustices resulting from economic and political systems.
The tangible solidarity of Simon of Cyrene earned him the distinction before all of contributing to Jesus of Nazareth’s mission of peace. Throughout the centuries men and women have stepped forward, generous architects of peace and justice, to befriend the victims of violence.
3rd voice
Let us pray:
O Jesus, suffering servant, teach us to stand by the persons and the peoples bending beneath the yoke of injustice. Teach us to overcome individualism and to open our hearts to a greater solidarity. Amen.
* Is 53, 4-5