Agony in the Garden

The Agony

Entering the garden

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Tonight will be the Mass of the Last Supper. The beginning of our Lord's Sorrowful Mysteries that culminates with His death... on a Cross. For some of us, the Cross we will bear during this Triduum is in our own 'garden.' I don't say this to be critical or pessimistic, but only truthful. What we find in our own parishes and in our communities is not the faith, but something fallen. We are all to blame for this, and it isn't just at the hand of modernists. We too, those who desire to uphold the orthodoxy of the faith, we too are culpable. We are owed suffering, not because God is angry or spiteful, but because he is just.

I think often of what Jesus said that night:

Father, if thou wilt, remove this chalice from me: but yet not my will, but thine be done.

He, nor the Father, wanted the pain and suffering that was to come. It was due in justice though, and in the mercy that stems from that justice. "Mercy", says Dr. Peter Kreeft,  "is not free." Jesus pays the debt of the mercy He gives us, in His death and crucifixion.

Our suffering is not ignored or forgotten

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Christ wants us not to suffer, but we must at some things, I think. When His bride is harmed and maligned, the Mercy that pours forth for the preservation of the Church must be paid. Surely Christ's Death and Resurrection were enough, but I wonder if our payment, our suffering, our Cross, that it might just be required of us to struggle through - our agony is the payment for the Mercy of the Church.

I could be wrong. I probably have stated about 27 heresies in this post, but there must be a reason for the abuses in the Church. There must be some reason, some good, some Grace that flows from the desecration of the Liturgy, the Eucharist, and the Church. It cannot be ignored by God - he must weep with us. We want not this chalice, but His will be done. And how simple and light the burden is... the pain we endure isn't even committed on us, we just witness it. How loving a God is that - that even in just payment, we are spared the pain and suffering of direct affliction?

let us enter... the Agony - freely

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I feel as if entering this Triduum it is the day of a game. I used to play sports, and I remember the eery silence in my heart and mind that occurred on game days. There is a focus and a preparation that I am undergoing, and I am sure that Jesus underwent at the Last Supper. I can forsee not the specifics, but I know that agony will ensue. Again, I say this not out of spite, pessimism, or fear. I say it out of truth and acceptance.

The acceptance comes from some wise words that someone told me yesterday, in acknowledgement of what is to come for myself and others they know. He told me that all that we endure - the struggles, are nothing in comparison to the mocking, ridicule, and pain that Christ must have felt in His heart on that day. The depravity that must have existed for what occurred, to have occurred. 


Forgive us Father, we know not what we do. 

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