The Cruciform Pattern to Reality
The Gospel of Mark is the shortest gospel and likely the oldest. In many ways it is the simplest and clearest, and it cuts the hardest because it is so utterly without frills. The more that commentators have studied this gospel, the more they have found that the way in which Mark put events together is trying to say a lot about the centrality of suffering and the cross.
By the end, it is as if the entire gospel is an extended introduction to an extended passion, death, and resurrection account. Mark is telling us that this is how a life of truth and faith culminates in this world. Rather bad news more than good news. There is a cruciform pattern to reality. Life is filled with contradictions, tragedies, and paradoxes, and to reconcile them you invariably pay a big price.
It eventually becomes evident that you’re going to get nailed for any life of real depth or love, because this upsets the world’s agenda of progress. This is not what the world wants, and not what the world understands. Any life of authenticity will lead to its own forms of crucifixion—from others, or, often, leading to various forms of self-denial. Mark constantly brings us back to the central importance of suffering. There’s no other way we’re going to break through to the ultimate reality that we call resurrection without going through the mystery of transformation, which is dramatically symbolized by the cross.
~Richard Rohr, The Four Gospels (CD)
God is not a Spectator
We live in a finite world where everything is dying, shedding its strength. This is hard to accept, and all our lives we look for exceptions to it. We look for something strong, undying, infinite. Religion tells us that something is God. Great, we say, we’ll attach ourselves to this strong God. Then this God comes along and says, “Even I suffer. Even I participate in the finiteness of this world.” [This] image of God [is] not an “almighty” and strong God, but in fact a poor, vulnerable, and humble one like Jesus. This is at the heart of the Biblical worldview.
The enfleshment and suffering of Jesus is saying that God is not apart from the trials of humanity. God is not aloof. God is not a mere spectator. God is not merely tolerating or even healing all human suffering. Rather, God is participating with us—in all of it—the good and the bad! I wonder if people can avoid becoming sad and cynical about the tragedies of history if they do not know this.
~Adapted from Richard Rohr, Job and the Mystery of Suffering
