Sharing in the Glory of the Virtues
The culmination of the Purgative Way leads a soul to the wisdom of Christ’s Cross. In order to understand that wisdom, natural intuitions and experiences must begin to give way to supernatural understanding and knowledge. Though those supernatural gifts will only be perfected further along in the spiritual journey, they begin to be received now. Saint Paul’s insight helps illustrate this point.
For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the cleverness of the clever I will thwart.” Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men (1 Corinthians 1:18–25, RSV-CE).
The natural mind, affected by Original Sin, does not understand Christ’s Passion, i.e., selfless sacrificial love. The human will does not naturally choose sacrificial love, and one’s desires and emotions are opposed to it unless grace intervenes. In this stage, the soul must begin to see the wisdom of sacrificial love as it was perfectly manifested in Christ’s Passion and embrace that wisdom so as to override the fallen natural tendencies to avoid it. We must understand the Agony of the Garden, Scourging at the Pillar, and Crowning with Thorns from God’s perspective, not from our fallen human perspective. We must understand and choose the Passion of Christ so that we can desire, love, and embrace it with every part of our souls. For this to happen, a profound interior purification must take place.
Step Three concludes and perfects the Purgative Way of the Beginner. It seems reasonable to associate the Virtues with this stage, the highest choir in the lowest triad. In this third stage of spiritual development, the soul has made much progress and is ready to surrender deeply to the will of God. Once a person has understood and accepted our Lord’s teachings presented during His public ministry and prayerfully meditated upon those teachings for some time, our Lord invites the soul to enter into the perfection of the Purgative Way. Though anyone can attain this level of holiness and glory, the descriptions of this third step might appear challenging at first. Imitating Jesus’ lived human experience requires profound conversion, the perfection of moral virtues, an unwavering embrace of the divine will, and a willing embrace of Christ’s Cross.
It’s reasonable to conclude that the angelic choir of the Virtues especially helps the soul in this stage. The name “Virtue” comes from the Latin virtus, which is derived from vir, meaning “man,” in the generic sense. It can also mean “a person with courage, honor, and nobility.” The Guardian Angels direct us in our daily activities, and the Archangels deliver the most important messages, guide us at consequential moments, and protect us from sin and evil. The Virtues assist us with the increase of habits (virtues) that are foundational for spiritual growth. Since the Virtues also govern the Universe, including all physical matter, they also play a direct role in taming our bodily appetites and emotions, reorienting them toward God.
Though God is the source of all infused virtues, the name of the angelic choir of the Virtues suggests that they play a central role in enlightening our minds to understand the virtues’ value. The natural cardinal virtues of prudence, fortitude, temperance, and justice strengthen the soul. As the soul deepens its prayer and more fully responds to grace, God infuses the soul with the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. Prior to this stage, the soul turned away in fear when faced with the Cross, believing that choosing suffering was imprudent. Now the soul, whose human judgment is led more fully by divine insight, chooses the Cross. Because this stage of spiritual development involves an intentional embrace of the Cross and patient endurance of all suffering, the virtues are essential aids.
Recall that during Jesus’ public ministry, He not only predicted His own Passion but also told His Apostles that they must follow after Him by embracing their own crosses: “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world and forfeits his life? Or what shall a man give in return for his life? For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay every man for what he has done” (Matthew 16:24–27).
The Cross comes to us in various ways. For some, there are painful external situations in which they find themselves every day, such as persecution, job loss, illness, or a broken relationship with a family member. In that case, the willing embrace of those exterior crosses, by responding to them with divine love, becomes a means of the purification and elevation of one’s soul at this stage. For others, God will directly impose an interior dryness, a lack of spiritual sweetness in prayer, or an absence of spiritual consolation, referred to by Saint John of the Cross as a “dark night” or “purgation.” Those interior sufferings are not the result of sin but are trials meant to deepen one’s virtue. Some great saints, such as Saint Mother Teresa of Calcutta, endured this interior purgation through more than half of her life as a Missionary of Charity. Exteriorly, her smile radiated the love of God; interiorly, she lived the Cross of her Beloved.
Like Saint Peter who denied knowing Jesus, the initial response to one’s crosses, be they interior or exterior, is often fear and avoidance. In the previous stages of spiritual development, virtue has not yet increased within the soul enough to enable it to respond with willing acceptance and a desire to lay down one’s life selflessly and sacrificially. Though prayer and meditation have been fruitful in providing inspiration and insights into the mysteries of God’s Word, this third stage is a time of profound change during which the soul begins to imitate Jesus’ sacrificial offering of His life. Our Lord confronted the evil inflicted upon Him with divine love. Doing so robbed the evil of its intended effect, producing infinite good instead.
The first three Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary provide insight for this stage. In the Agony of the Garden, Jesus is fully aware of His approaching arrest, suffering, and death. With His divine foresight, He perceives every suffering He will endure. Prayerfully, He gazes upon that suffering and freely aligns His will with the Father’s will, choosing all that awaits. Though our Lord always acted with perfection, it wasn’t until this moment in time that the Father’s will invited Him to manifest a profound obedience as He faced the imminence of His suffering. Jesus’ Scourging at the Pillar provides Him with an opportunity to accept His suffering within His sacred body. His Crowning with Thorns gives Him the opportunity to conquer every temptation of pride as He freely embraces humiliation and mockery.
As explained in more detail in Part One, Chapters Six and Eight, Saint John of the Cross’ description of the Active Night of the Senses, which is an awareness of and time for conscious choices directed toward purification, parallels this stage. Saint Teresa of Ávila’s Third Mansions depicts this as a period of dryness in prayer and a diligent search for God in silence. Saint Bonaventure assigns “leading” to this stage—the soul is more firmly led from sin and into an increase in virtue, also preparing the soul for a fuller participation in the mission of the Church.
Agony in the Garden: Accepting Spiritual Purification
Unless otherwise noted, quotes in this reflection are taken from Matthew 26: 36–56, RSV-CE
“Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, ‘Sit here, while I go yonder and pray.’ And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, ‘My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.’”
Jesus’ “hour” had arrived. It was the hour of His Passion, but also the hour of His glorification, through which He redeemed the human race by conquering sin and death. By divine insight, Jesus was fully aware that Judas had betrayed Him and that the soldiers would soon arrive to arrest Him. The sorrow Jesus felt in His human soul was not sadness; it was a form of love.
Holy sorrow is the loving response to the sacrifices we are called to offer for the defeat of evil. Holy sorrow is rooted in love of God and compassion for others. It is a response to sin, suffering, and injustice as it is perceived through the lens of divine love. It is not a selfish sadness by which we sulk over our own loss or suffering.
The distinction between spiritual sorrow and human sadness is important to understand. When love confronts sin, evil, and suffering, the appropriate response is holy sorrow. By way of contrast, sadness, shock, outrage, and anger result from sin. They diminish a person’s ability to think clearly, function well, love in the face of suffering, and can lead to despair, which is a loss of the virtue of supernatural hope.
In contrast, holy sorrow drives a person to love and to freely embrace interior or exterior suffering. Jesus’ holy sorrow was the perfect manifestation of His divine love as He prepared to encounter His Passion’s exterior evil and His soul’s interior dryness as He cried out from the Cross, “My God, my God, why have You abandoned me…” We must learn to react to sin, evil, and interior dryness with the Sorrowful Heart that Jesus had in the Garden, which the Mother of God also perfectly lived in her Sorrowful Heart. Emotional sadness diminishes peace and joy. Holy sorrow increases peace and joy, just as love increases as the loving sorrow is endured and its cause is embraced. Confronting evil or interior suffering with divine love bears an abundance of good fruit. The evil or suffering loses its power to damage the soul.
Jesus invited His three closest companions—Peter, James, and John—to join Him in prayer, but they fell asleep. They did not understand the intense interior suffering our Lord was experiencing. Because His love was perfect and because the evil He was soon to endure encompassed all sins ever committed, His holy sorrow was beyond what any human or angelic mind could fathom.
Reflect upon your own life in the light of Christ’s. When others sin against you, how do you react? Often, we reject those sins by rejecting the person. We get angry, become outraged, and refuse to permit ourselves to endure the suffering caused by their sins. Our thinking can even become obsessive, dwelling on the offense over and over again, leading to increased anger. Ideally, we regard those sins with the flames of divine love and accept the cross they inflict. But that hurts! To love in the face of hate or other forms of sin is painful, but we must choose love and embrace holy sorrow. The angelic choir of Virtues aids us by enlightening our minds with divine truths, helping us grow in the moral and theological virtues. Through this guidance, we come to understand the mystery of the Cross and the transformative power of freely embracing suffering united with Christ. As fortitude, prudence, justice, and temperance are more clearly understood, they are more easily chosen. As the mysteries of evil and suffering are more clearly understood, divine faith is bestowed by God, which increases hope and the charity that is necessary to embrace the Cross with holy sorrow.
“And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.’” Jesus’ prayer was perfect. By falling on His face in prayer, He showed the totality of His human surrender to the divine will. He also acknowledged and permitted Himself to experience our fallen human tendency when we face our own crosses—the temptation to avoid them. By praying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me,” Jesus permitted Himself to experience that fallen human tendency without giving into it, so that He could conquer it and instill within human nature His own divine strength.
Think about those things in your life that you shun. Are there uncomfortable situations that you avoid? Are there things you know God wants of you but you hesitate to do them? Are there people you dislike and regard critically? Ponder Jesus in the Garden, calling to mind every painful experience that He was about to endure and choosing not to run from them but to turn toward them. He didn’t do so reluctantly or begrudgingly; He did so on His face in prayer, with absolute conviction, determination, and divine love. Every passion, desire, and sensibility within His human soul hurt. He freely chose, however, to perfectly align with the Father’s divine will, and it was immediately accomplished within Him. By calling upon the aid of the Virtues, we must do the same.
After Jesus had been praying in agony for some time, He returned to find his disciples asleep. He said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Peter, James, and John reflect our own struggles. We often have good intentions, but in our weakness we fail to follow through on those intentions. Though Jesus chastised Peter, He did so lovingly and with encouragement. We must hear our Lord saying the same to us.
Call to mind any spiritual or charitable work that you have resolved to do but have not followed through on. Or call to mind any vice you have resolved to overcome but continue to struggle with. Jesus speaks to us the same words he spoke to Peter. First, He invites Peter to pray for an hour. We must hear this as an invitation to be diligent in prayer because diligent prayer, on our faces before God, is the only way we will be able to say with our Lord, “not as I will, but as thou wilt.” Saying a few prayers in the morning or just before bed is good, but a few prayers each day are insufficient to help us advance through this stage of the spiritual life. Prayer needs to become the most diligent work of love in our lives, as our Lord modeled in the Garden. Extended periods of prayer, retreats, holy hours, devotions, the Rosary, and meditations are all ways that we can keep vigil with our Lord. We must “watch and pray.” That is the only way we will be able to fully enter into the perfection of the Purgative Way.
“Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, ‘My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, thy will be done.’” Jesus prayed the same prayer a second time, returned to find His disciples asleep again, and returned to pray the same prayer a third time. Three times is a symbol of perfection, indicating the perfection of Jesus’ prayer, “Thy will be done.”
It’s difficult to fully comprehend the depth of Jesus’ prayer in the Garden and the definiteness with which He united His human will with His divine will and that of the Father. The only way to understand what Jesus did is to do it ourselves.
As you ponder this depth of prayer, conversion, and resolve, it might appear overwhelming and unattainable for your life. How can I completely unite my weak and sinful human will with God’s will? For us alone, it is impossible. Only by the grace of God and by the assistance of the choir of the Virtues can our prayer become fully united with Jesus’ prayer. Jesus permitted Himself to experience every form of human struggle that we experience. He felt the pain of our hesitancy, our weakness, and our sin, while remaining free from all of them. By permitting Himself to experience what we experience, Jesus made it possible for us to receive His divinely directed human strength in our lives. He now wants to live within us, so that we can choose His divine will with His strength. If completely uniting your will to God’s will seems an impossible task, know that it is possible only in Christ.
In Luke’s version of the Agony of the Garden, we are given two additions: “And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling upon the ground” (Luke 22:43–44). Why would the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity need the ministry of an angel? Because Jesus was fully human and angels minister to humans. Though Jesus was the source of all grace as God, as a man He subjected Himself to all that we are subjected to, including the ministry of angels.
Though Scripture does not reveal which angelic choir ministered to Jesus during His agony, it is reasonable to speculate that it might have been an angel from the choir of the Virtues since they are responsible for preparing us to receive every virtue necessary, such as fortitude, prudence, faith, hope, and charity. What a beautiful act of humility on our Lord’s part to subject Himself to the ministry of one of His creatures and to permit Himself to experience strength and consolation! The addition that “his sweat became like great drops of blood falling upon the ground” adds clarity to the revelation about His intense interior agony during which He was consoled.
After praying three times, Jesus returned to His disciples and said, “Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.” Jesus had no fear or bitterness. He had perfect resolve. This is our model. Every passion and desire within our souls must become so fully purified by grace and prayer that we resolve to accept every cross we are given. Our minds must be enlightened by the angels and convinced by divine wisdom to say “Yes” to the Cross, and our wills must immediately submit to that wisdom.
When Judas betrayed our Lord with a kiss and the guards proceeded to arrest Jesus, Peter reacted with fear and anger. He took out his sword and severed the ear of the high priest’s servant. Jesus quickly rebuked Peter and healed the servant’s ear saying, “Put your sword back into its place; for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then should the scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so?”
Ponder those words carefully. A legion of Roman soldiers typically consisted of about 3,000 to 6,000 men. In the Old Testament, King David’s army consisted of twelve divisions of 24,000 men. Depending upon what Jesus meant by “legion,” He could have meant anywhere from 36,000 to 288,000 angels. Imagine that scene. No earthly army could overcome twelve legions of warrior angels, most likely the choir of the Powers. Despite Jesus’ authority to call upon such a vast army of warriors, He didn’t do so. Witness Jesus’ full and unhindered willingness to face sin and death with the perfection of divine love.
As soon as Jesus was arrested, the disciples fled in fear. They were not ready for this willing embrace of suffering. They did not yet have the understanding and grace to do as Jesus did, to love as Jesus loved, to forgive as Jesus did, and to suffer with their Lord. The mystery of the Cross challenges us to the core of our being.
If we can face these events on the night of Holy Thursday with grace, then we will do what the Apostles did after they were filled with the Holy Spirit. However, doing so is no small task and can only be accomplished with a profound depth of prayer and virtue. Pondering all that Jesus modeled at the beginning of His Passion will humble us at our inability to even remotely imitate our Lord by our own strength. But through deep prayer and openness to grace, we have hope that Jesus’ strength can become ours.
Scourging at the Pillar: Enduring Bodily Suffering
Unless otherwise noted, quotes in this reflection are taken from Mark 15:1–15, RSV-CE
“And as soon as it was morning the chief priests, with the elders and scribes, and the whole council held a consultation; and they bound Jesus and led him away and delivered him to Pilate. And Pilate asked him, ‘Are you the King of the Jews?’ And he answered him, ‘You have said so.’ And the chief priests accused him of many things. And Pilate again asked him, ‘Have you no answer to make? See how many charges they bring against you.’ But Jesus made no further answer, so that Pilate wondered.
“Now at the feast he used to release for them one prisoner for whom they asked. And among the rebels in prison, who had committed murder in the insurrection, there was a man called Barab’bas. And the crowd came up and began to ask Pilate to do as he always did for them. And he answered them, ‘Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?’ For he perceived that it was out of envy that the chief priests had delivered him up. But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to have him release for them Barab’bas instead. And Pilate again said to them, ‘Then what shall I do with the man whom you call the King of the Jews?’ And they cried out again, ‘Crucify him.’ And Pilate said to them, ‘Why, what evil has he done?’ But they shouted all the more, ‘Crucify him.’ So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released for them Barab’bas; and having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified.”
The Virtues are believed to be tasked with the governance of the physical world. Though this implies the ordering of the Universe, the physical world also includes human flesh. Because Jesus endured great physical suffering during His scourging, it’s reasonable to speculate that the Virtues play a role in assisting us during our own times of physical suffering. Ponder that fact as we reflect upon the extreme physical suffering Jesus endured.
Saint Bridget of Sweden, a fourteenth century mystic, had numerous visions of Christ and our Blessed Mother, which are recorded in The Prophecies and Revelations of Saint Bridget (Birgitta) of Sweden. In Book I, Chapter X, our Blessed Mother spoke the following to Saint Bridget:
When the time of my Son’s suffering arrived, his enemies seized him and struck him on the cheek and neck, spat at him and ridiculed him. Then he was led to the pillar of torture where he voluntarily removed his clothes and placed his hands around the pillar, and his enemies then mercilessly bound them. When he stood bound at the pillar, he had no covering at all, but stood naked as he had been born, suffering the shame of his nakedness.
Then all my Son’s friends fled from him, and his enemies came together from all directions and stood there, scourging his body, which was pure from every stain and sin. I was standing nearby, and at the very first lashing, I fell down as if I were dead. When I regained consciousness, I saw his body whipped and scourged so badly that the ribs were visible! What was even more terrible—when the whip was pulled out, his flesh was furrowed and torn by it, just as the earth is by a plough! As my Son was standing there, all bloody and wounded, so that no place could be found on him that was still intact and no sound spot could be scourged, then someone present there, aroused in spirit, asked: ‘Are you going to kill him before he is even judged?’ And he cut off his bonds immediately.
Then my Son put his clothes back on, and I saw that the place where he had been standing was filled with blood! By observing my Son’s footprints, I could see where he had walked because the ground was bloody there as well. They did not even wait for him to get dressed, but pushed and dragged him to make him hurry up. While my Son was being led away like a robber, he wiped the blood from his eyes…
In Book I, Chapter I, Jesus also spoke to her about His scourging at the pillar:
I, the King of glory and of angels, was clothed in ugly, wretched rags and stood naked at the pillar and heard all kinds of insults and ridicule with my own ears. Always prefer my will before your own, because my Mother, your Lady, has, from the beginning to the end, never wanted anything but what I wanted.
“Always prefer my will before your own…” Jesus modeled this by choosing His divine will over any human temptation to resist such a selfless human sacrifice. He made the human choice in the Garden of Gethsemane. At the Scourging at the Pillar, Jesus began to experience the consequences of that decision.
When we choose to confront evil with love and suffering with grace, we must be ready to accept the consequences of that holy choice. The “consequences” will include enduring the wrath of others with patience and love and obeying God’s will, even if we encounter interior dryness. This act of endurance that our Lord modeled is placed here, on the third step, corresponding to the Active Night of the Senses in the teaching of Saint John of the Cross because there is a conscious choice made to accept and endure pain.
If you have prayerfully united yourself fully with our Lord during His Agony in the Garden, freely saying about every cross in your life, “Thy will be done,” when the time comes for you to feel the pains of the cross, are you willing to endure them? Call to mind some concrete examples in your life. When faced with interior dryness in prayer, do you persevere anyway? If you experience a cross as a result of another’s sin, do you accept the injustice and respond with love and holy sorrow? If you suffer from some bodily illness or anything else that imposes a burden, do you stand in the face of that burden and receive it with open arms? Doing so requires much grace, but it is doable if we allow our Lord to act within us.
Recall from the previous reflection what Jesus said to Peter during His arrest the night before, “Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?” (Matthew 26:53, RSV-CE). At a moment’s command, Jesus could have called upon thousands of warrior angels to come to His defense. The Roman authorities and guards would have been powerless against them, and the chief priests and their supporters would have been overwhelmed by fear at such a sight. Yet Jesus peacefully and patiently refrained, choosing to accept abuse, a mock trial, false accusations, a brutal scourging at the pillar, and the condemnation to death.
In a sense, we can say that He chose to model for us the need to rely more upon the choir of the Virtues in these moments than upon the Powers. Suffering needed to be embraced with love so that it could be transformed, not eliminated. A constant temptation we endure in the face of persecution is to reject it, fight back, or flee. Human and theological virtues enable us to see the bigger picture—the divine wisdom behind sacrifice. Reflect on your own reaction to sufferings unjustly inflicted upon you. Pray that the Virtues may enlighten your mind to understand the value of embracing suffering with silence, strength, acceptance, and mercy, so that grace may flood you and transform you in imitation of our Lord. Humanly speaking, this makes no sense, but when enlightened by divine wisdom, everything becomes clear. Pray for that enlightenment.
Crowning with Thorns: Enduring Spiritual Suffering
Unless otherwise noted, quotes in this reflection are taken from Matthew 27:27–31, RSV-CE
“Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the praetorium, and they gathered the whole battalion before him. And they stripped him and put a scarlet robe upon him, and plaiting a crown of thorns they put it on his head, and put a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him they mocked him, saying, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ And they spat upon him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe, and put his own clothes on him, and led him away to crucify him.”
It wasn’t enough for our divine Lord to willingly permit His sacred body to be brutally beaten and bloodied; He also permitted Himself to endure another form of painful suffering. He endured extreme humiliation. As is the case with every aspect of Jesus’ Passion, the mockery directed at Him confounds us. It’s confounding that human beings can be so cruel to any man, let alone Him Who exuded nothing but pure divine love. The soldiers who mocked our Lord obstinately embraced grave sin. Their witness should fill us with a holy fear of ever falling into grave sin ourselves.
Why did Jesus permit Himself to endure their mockery? Because His willing acceptance of this humiliation enables us all to overcome the mother of all sins—pride. Pride is conquered by humility. Humility is incomprehensible as a virtue to the natural mind. Divine wisdom is needed to understand its beauty and transforming power. Without divine wisdom, pride gets in the way of authentic love. With humility, the mind understands divine love and sheds the selfishness that hinders it.
Saint Faustina Kowolska, in her mystical Diary of Divine Mercy, spoke not only of humility, but also of the transforming power of humiliations when embraced with love:
O my Jesus, nothing is better for the soul than humiliations. In contempt is the secret of happiness, when the soul recognizes that, of itself, it is only wretchedness and nothingness, and that whatever it possesses of good is a gift of God. When the soul sees that everything is given it freely and that the only thing it has of itself is its own misery, this is what sustains it in a continual act of humble prostration before the majesty of God. And God, seeing the soul in such a disposition, pursues it with His graces. As the soul continues to immerse itself more deeply into the abyss of its nothingness and need, God uses His omnipotence to exalt it. If there is a truly happy soul upon earth, it can only be a truly humble soul. At first, one’s self-love suffers greatly on this account, but after a soul has struggled courageously, God grants it much light by which it sees how wretched and full of deception everything is. God alone is in its heart. A humble soul does not trust itself, but places all its confidence in God. God defends the humble soul and lets Himself into its secrets, and the soul abides in unsurpassable happiness which no one can comprehend (Diary, #593).
Just as the cruelty inflicted upon our Lord is confounding, so also do humility and the loving acceptance of humiliation confound the natural mind. Never tire of praying to the Virtues for enlightenment to understand these deep mysteries so that you can joyfully embrace them.
As Jesus was mocked, stripped of His garments, crowned with thorns, spat upon, beaten, and laughed at, no hate welled up within His Sacred Heart. His Heart contained the fullness of humility. Pure love was exchanged for hate, compassion for cruelty, mercy for violence, and holy sorrow for sin. Though the demons did all they could to prod and push the soldiers to try to extinguish divine love in the Heart of Jesus, they only succeeded in offering Him the opportunity to manifest within His humanity the holiness of His divinity. Love conquered, and the sin of pride was destroyed.
When we are ridiculed, treated with disdain, mocked, or humiliated in any way, responding with our Lord’s grace requires a profound depth of holiness. Who but God alone could do what Jesus did? No one. Even our Blessed Mother needed grace to live the fullness of humility, which she did with perfection.
If we want to imitate our Lord’s humility, we must allow ourselves to be amazed by His call. We must face the incredible mystery of this deep and pure love, open ourselves to the divine wisdom that teaches it, and embrace it with Jesus’ human strength living in us. By ourselves, humility is impossible. In Him, all things are possible.
John’s Gospel offers additional details about Jesus’ crowning with thorns, mockery, and condemnation. “Then Pilate took Jesus and scourged him. And the soldiers plaited a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and arrayed him in a purple robe; they came up to him, saying, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ and struck him with their hands” (John 19:1–3, RSV-CE).
Though the soldiers did not realize it, they were not only hailing the King of the Jews but the King of the Universe. With the eyes of divine wisdom, we can see Jesus’ true kingship manifested as He sat mocked and crowned with thorns. His kingship was not one of worldly power, wealth, or honors. It was not a domineering kingship that sought to subject people to His authority. It was a kingship of interior transformation by which each believing soul was invited to crown Jesus as King.
As you prayerfully gaze upon the King of Kings, crowned with thorns, do you welcome His kingship into your life? Do you choose to be governed by His divine authority? If so, then His first command is to humble yourself before Him in His humiliation. We are all called to be governed not by worldly standards of pride, power, and prestige, but by profound love that confronts evil with grace. We must be governed by the very humility modeled by our Lord. This means that if Jesus is our true King, then we always strive to show mercy in the face of persecution, strength in the face of suffering, and divine love for every person we encounter, regardless of how that person treats us.
“Pilate went out again, and said to them, ‘See, I am bringing him out to you, that you may know that I find no crime in him.’ So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, ‘Behold the man!’ When the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, ‘Crucify him, crucify him!’ Pilate said to them, ‘Take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no crime in him’” (John 19:4–6, RSV-CE).
Jesus, in His perfect humility, was certainly worth beholding. Just as divine wisdom used the mockery of a crown of thorns to reveal Jesus’ true kingship, so also was Pilate’s condescension toward our Lord used in the same way. Ponder those words and consider how you would react to them if you were in the crowd hearing Pilate pronounce them: “Behold the man!” With the eyes of faith, we must peer beneath the veil of Jesus’ torn flesh and His humiliation to see His greatness, give Him glory, behold His true identity, and be drawn into His grace and love. This Man is the Son of God, the eternal Son of the Father. Jesus was willing to present Himself as God in such a veiled way, concealing His divinity from the eyes of the world while revealing His Sacred Heart to those with faith. We also must strive to see our Lord through faith alone, leading us into the illumination of divine wisdom. Human reason alone is insufficient to know Him, comprehend Him, and love Him in such a form. We need divinely infused faith in order to understand.
Take, for example, Jesus’ hidden presence in the Blessed Sacrament. Only by divine wisdom is a person able to gaze upon His veiled presence in the Eucharist and know Him to be the God of Heaven and Earth. God is also present in every person in varying ways and degrees. Only the illumination of grace can enable us to see God in others, especially those who sin against us. Grace lifts the veil so we can perceive God’s presence in their lives and behold their dignity and worth.
“The Jews answered him, ‘We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he has made himself the Son of God.’ When Pilate heard these words, he was the more afraid; he entered the praetorium again and said to Jesus, ‘Where are you from?’ But Jesus gave no answer. Pilate therefore said to him, ‘You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?’ Jesus answered him, ‘You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore he who delivered me to you has the greater sin’” (John 19:7–11, RSV-CE).
Jesus was the source and fulfillment of the Jewish Law. Therefore, when Jews said, “We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he has made himself the Son of God,” they were speaking an important truth without even comprehending what they were saying. The New Law mandated that the Son of God die for the salvation of all. This was so because the Holy Trinity declared it so. Jesus, fully aware of His divine mission, accepted this new dictation of the Law of Grace, even though those referring to the Law did not understand what they were saying.
“Upon this Pilate sought to release him, but the Jews cried out, ‘If you release this man, you are not Caesar’s friend; every one who makes himself a king sets himself against Caesar.’ When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called The Pavement, and in Hebrew, Gabbatha. Now it was the day of Preparation of the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, ‘Behold your King!’ They cried out, ‘Away with him, away with him, crucify him!’ Pilate said to them, ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered, ‘We have no king but Caesar.’ Then he handed him over to them to be crucified” (John 19:12–16, RSV-CE).
Pilate appears to have had a conscience. He did not condemn Jesus on a whim; he tried to release Him. Pilate’s primary problem was that he was more concerned with worldly power than he was with spiritual and moral power. He caved to the pressure when he perceived that failing to do so would diminish Caesar’s opinion of him.
Within all of our lives, this is a common temptation. We want to do the morally right thing, but if we face any criticism or ridicule, we give into fear and do that which we really do not want to do. Feeling pressured, being misunderstood, or experiencing judgment places a heavy burden on us and tempts us to work toward “peace at all costs.” If, however, we can remain firmly planted on the moral and spiritual principles of divine Truth and remain unwavering in our fidelity to those truths, then we are able to live authentic Christian lives governed by the King of Kings. When we cave to pressure, our king is the worldly opinions of others and the fleeting and superficial “unity” that those opinions bring about.
As Jesus stood on The Pavement, Gabbatha, and Pilate sat on the judgment seat, those who were actually on trial at that moment were the chief priests. Pilate asked them for their testimony from the judgment seat, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar.” By rejecting the King of Kings—who stood before them in veiled form, bloodied and beaten—the chief priests, all who went along with them, and all who reject the supreme Kingship of Christ ultimately condemn themselves. For those who accept Jesus in faith, the grace won by His earthly condemnation is poured forth upon us, as we acclaim Him the one and only King of our lives.
Summary of Step Three: Perfect Purgation
Strengthened by the Virtues, the soul begins to incorporate deeper spiritual practices. It’s a time of grappling with inner weaknesses and striving for moral excellence. The soul learns to practice virtue not just in actions, but also in thoughts and desires. Prayer becomes more reflective and meditative, moving beyond vocal expressions to a quiet, heartfelt communication with God. We understand more fully the invitation to carry our crosses and embrace them with the help of the Sacraments, especially Confession and the Holy Eucharist.
The mysteries of Christ’s life we just reflected upon are confounding to our natural minds, as is the depth of divine light necessary to fully understand them. Though we might understand those mysteries on a superficial level, understanding them on a personal and experiential level means that we live as our Lord lived, experience what He experienced, and react as He reacted. Call upon the Virtues to enlighten you and prepare you for the grace you need to unite yourself more fully with the mysteries Jesus modeled.
The grace needed for this stage can be found modeled in the first three Sorrowful Mysteries:
- Agony in the Garden: Accepting spiritual purification.
- Scourging at the Pillar: Enduring bodily suffering.
- Crowning with Thorns: Embracing spiritual suffering.
Jesus’ Agony in the Garden, Scourging at the Pillar, and Crowning with Thorns reveal to us the depth of interior transformation to which we are all called. This will require a correspondingly profound level of prayer, selfless surrender to God’s will, the willing embrace of Jesus’ Cross, and an exceptional level of divine love manifested by our lives. Through ongoing and deepening prayer and meditation, divine wisdom is infused into the mind, grace strengthens the will, and every virtue begins to rapidly increase. Calling upon the angelic choir of the Virtues will greatly assist us during this level of spiritual transformation.
Though many might embrace these spiritual ideals to a certain extent, perfecting them requires heroic virtues to be instilled through an ongoing cooperation with grace. We must not let the high ideals modeled by our Lord discourage us. We must allow them to instill hope in our hearts that, in Him, anything is possible. The saints have shown us that ordinary human beings are capable of living gloriously transformed lives and becoming extraordinary instruments of God’s grace in the world.
Next: Reflections for Step Four—Beginning Illumination: Sharing in the Glory of the Powers
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