The Cross is for imitation, not decoration. I grew up seeing rosaries dangled on the rearview mirrors of many cars. They are often seen as a good luck charm driving on freeways. Touch briefly, with a Sign of the Cross to follow. The rosary’s beads were never touched, passing through the hand, and the color of the beads faded through time and exposure to the sun. At the center of the rosary is the Cross, a symbol of sacrifice and obedience, not decoration.

Today’s feast is the Exaltation of the Cross. The Ukrainian Catechism eloquently explains the Cross in light of the Pascha: “To your Cross, O Master, we bow in veneration; and we glorify your holy Resurrection.” The Cross and the Resurrection are one single liturgical event!

Pope John Paul II spoke of how the Cross transforms suffering into love and self-sacrifice. The Cross is the great gift of the Son to the Father.

Pope Benedict XVI spoke of the Cross in his homily, stating, “The wood of the Cross became the vehicle for our redemption, just as the tree from which it was fashioned had occasioned the Fall of our first parents. Suffering and death, which had been a consequence of sin, were to become the very means by which sin was vanquished. The innocent Lamb was slain on the altar of the Cross, and yet from the immolation of the victim new life burst forth: the power of evil was destroyed by the power of self-sacrificing love.”

In Sacramentum Caritatis, Benedict ties in the importance of the Cross and the Eucharist, “In instituting the sacrament of the Eucharist, Jesus anticipates and makes present the sacrifice of the Cross and the victory of the resurrection … the Church is able to celebrate and adore the mystery of Christ present in the Eucharist precisely because Christ first gave himself to her in the sacrifice of the Cross. The Church’s ability to “make” the Eucharist is completely rooted in Christ’s self-gift to her” (10, 14).

The tree from which Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit brought sin into the world. The tree of the Cross from which hung the fruit of Mary’s womb forgives sin. This fruit of Mary’s womb becomes our food now.

As we eat his body and drink his blood, let the Cross of his love trace our lives. May every Sign of the Cross remind us of our call to imitate divine love.