Reflections on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross
Fr. Kurt Belsole, OSB
September 14, 2008
Today’s feast, which we share with Orthodox Christians, commemorates the finding of the true Cross by St. Helena on September 14, 320 and the consecration of the church of the Holy Sepulcher at Jerusalem.
Just as Holy Thursday is so great a feast with so much to celebrate that it gives rise to the additional solemnity of Corpus Christi, the same is true of Good Friday, there is too much to celebrate for the mystery of redemption wrought through Christ and his Cross to be confined to a single day. So, in a sense, today is a little Good Friday, the day when Christ’s sacrifice on the cross triumphs over the powers of hell, and the devil who had conquered by the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is himself conquered by the tree of the cross.
Orthodox Christians in Greece even celebrate this feast by observing the Good Friday fast. A number of years ago, when asked about how they could celebrate a feast by fasting, the Orthodox Archbishop of Volos replied and said that it is a matter of the heart. They could not celebrate the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross without entering into the mystery of the cross by the Good Friday fast.
In terms of natural sacredness and Christian liturgy, it is worth noting that we are entering now into a period of autumn, and the days are already becoming noticeably shorter. Good Friday is a feast of springtime when the light clearly triumphs over darkness. Now as we approach the beginning of autumn, the Cross of Christ is raised against the encroaching darkness so that in the radiance of Christ and his Cross even night becomes as day.
It is helpful also to note that first antiphon for today’s Office of Readings: “Ecce crucem Domini; fugite, partes adversae; vicit leo de tribu Iuda, radix David, alleluia” (Behold the cross of the Lord! Flee, ye, hostile powers! The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David has conquered. Alleluia) is engraved on the base of the obelisk in the center of Saint Peter’s Square; and what was once a sign of pagan worship is now surmounted by the cross.
In fact, the obelisk in the center of Saint Peter’s Square in Rome, after it had been exorcized, was erected on that site on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, September 14, 1586.