Advent Reflection Series: Part Two
Jerusalem- ‘Via Dolorosa’
As we begun the Way of the Cross, I subconsciously expected it to be in the reverent quiet reflective way I had always experienced it as a cradle catholic. In Jerusalem, the reality was different, starkly so.
I felt thankful to be asked to read the 2nd station after which I tried to reflect on Jesus carrying his Cross as we carried on walking towards wherever the 3rd station would be. Other pilgrims and local residents walked by, occasionally brushing past hurriedly, talking about whatever , sometime laughing at a joke. Some hawkers sometimes, tried to catch our attention and ushered us to come into the market stalls which lined either side as we progressed on. I felt hot, slightly bothered and internally cross. I felt like shouting out loud ‘shut up everyone and focus, pay attention you locals, we have travelled all the way to come and walk the Way of the Cross, can’t you see…don’t you believe what we believe?’. Not very charitable but such was the nature of the internal stewing.
I thought: ‘Why doesn’t everyone think of you Lord and just shut up for these few moments. I will not give in to being tempted to buy a thing’ today. I was lead to: ‘although many lamented and wailed not many people shut up and thought of Jesus on that Good Friday, whilst He walked for me, for you and for the whole world. It was much worse for Him. He was spat at, jeered, kicked, lashed and carried that heavy cross for us all, whilst it was simply business as usual , for others too? Yet here I was, without such a cross to bear yet moaning for silence? I was utterly humbled. It made ‘he pulled the mighty from their seats and exalted the lowly’ quite poignant!
I settled to: perhaps this is how Christ is born again in our world? In the very mundane: talking, laughing, praying, and walking. Hopefully, in the pots and pans, we bear witness somehow…not ‘confined in some dark building some light years away but here in this place’ as that hymn rightly says, he gathers us in the poor and the lame, rich and haughty?’
By the end of the day, I was less wound up. My sister Jane bought me an ice cream before which my sister Helen helped me bargain for the only dress I bought, a blue Bedouin dress, both oblivious of my ‘inner journey’ and carrying the cross of humble pie! Tempted to meditate on the Stations of the Cross in a busy airport, on a bus, or train or in supermarket queue? Can’t knock it…
(Aba and her husband David are parishioners of St Maria. Her reflections are fruits of their pilgrimage to the holy land in October 2014. It is hoped that they inspire prayer. Aba is a theology student of Maryvale Institute-Birmingham, UK.)
