Good Friday
On Good Friday, we stand before the cross not in despair, but as pilgrims of hope. Though the day is marked by suffering and silence, it is good because God chose to enter our broken world, confront sin, and redeem it through love. In Jesus, the innocent one who suffers for the guilty, the cycle of sin is interrupted and transformed. And through His death, we discover that we are never alone—not even in suffering or death—for Christ has made every cross a crucifix by sharing it with us.
Listen to homily here:
Good Friday Homily – Making Our Cross a Crucifix
Almost 1,700 years ago, the Emperor Constantine built what is perhaps the most famous church in all the world: the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Construction began around the early 4th century, and although the building has been destroyed and rebuilt many times, it still stands today as the most central pilgrimage site for Christians of all traditions—Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Armenian, Coptic, and Ethiopian alike all stream to this sacred place.
When you enter the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, you pass through the main entrance and, to the right, ascend a steep flight of ancient stone stairs, worn smooth by centuries of pilgrims. At the top, there is a chapel. Pilgrims wait in line to approach an altar beneath which there is a small opening. Each pilgrim kneels and reaches through the opening to touch the rock below—a rock polished smooth by countless hands. That rock is believed to be the summit of Calvary, the place where Jesus was crucified.
This church was built around Calvary, the hill where the events we commemorate today—on Good Friday—took place. And today, as we continue our Triduum pilgrimage that began last night, we walk with Jesus to the cross. We hear His words, witness His actions, and ask ourselves: How should this change the way I think? How should this change the way I live?
This year, as part of the Jubilee Year of Hope, we are invited to live the Triduum as pilgrims of hope. But at first glance, today doesn’t seem like a hopeful day. Put yourself in the shoes of Jesus’ followers. As we heard in the Passion according to John, Jesus is arrested, brought to trial, abandoned by His companions—including Peter, the very one chosen to lead. He is scourged, condemned, and crucified.
It is, in many ways, a dark day—a day of fear, of silence, of loss. The disciples were filled with hopelessness. How, then, can we find hope?
To begin with, we must be willing to pass through the darkness. Part of our pilgrimage with Christ means acknowledging the pain, fear, and hopelessness that His disciples felt. And it means recognizing the painful truth at the heart of Good Friday: sin has consequences.
From the earliest chapters of Genesis, we see this clearly. The story of Adam and Eve, followed by stories of jealousy, murder, greed, and lust, all reveal how sin spreads. Like a virus, sin begins small and then infects everything, bringing hurt and destruction in its wake. This is the cycle we all live in. We say things that wound others, who in turn may wound someone else. We are caught in this chain reaction of sin.
And yet, today is not called Bad Friday. It is Good Friday. Why?
Because in the midst of this brokenness, God chose not to leave us alone. In the face of sin, God sent His Son. Jesus died for our sins. As St. Paul tells us in one of the earliest creeds of the Christian faith—recounted in 1 Corinthians 15—“Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.”
The death of Jesus is God's response to sin. In a mysterious way, Jesus’ death brings an end to the cycle of sin and violence. The New Testament authors wrestled with how to express this mystery, and one of their key resources was the prophet Isaiah’s image of the Suffering Servant. This Servant, righteous and sinless, suffers not for His own wrongdoing, but for the sake of others. His suffering brings healing, even for those who caused it.
The early Christians recognized Jesus as the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy. In Jesus, the sinless one absorbs the violence and hatred of the world and transforms it—offering mercy instead of retaliation, life instead of death. This is the foundation of our hope.
Good Friday also reminds us that whatever we are going through, Jesus is with us. Today is the culmination of the Incarnation—the mystery that God became one of us. We celebrate the Incarnation at Christmas, but it finds its fulfillment today. Jesus shares in our humanity not only in joy and love but in suffering, rejection, and death.
Death is something we all face—either through the loss of loved ones or in our own lives. It is something many fear. But Jesus does not leave us to face death alone. He enters into it with us. He walks with us to the very end.
Tomorrow, we will celebrate with joy the triumph of life over death. But even today, as we stand in the shadow of the cross, we are not without hope. We face the reality of sin and its consequences—but we do so knowing that God has entered into our suffering. Christ walks with us.
In a few moments, we will have the opportunity to venerate the cross. This is a deeply meaningful gesture. Each of us carries burdens, struggles, personal crosses. There’s a powerful phrase that captures what we do today: “Make your cross a crucifix.”
A cross is simply a burden. But a crucifix is a cross that Christ shares with us. When we make our cross a crucifix, we are not alone in our suffering. We invite Jesus into it. That is what we are invited to do today.
So let us come to the cross with hope. Let us offer Christ our pain, our struggles, and our fears. Let us remember that He suffered and died for us—so that we would never be alone.
Let us make our cross a crucifix. And let us be pilgrims of hope.
