Friday, May 27 : Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger [Pope Benedict XVI]

“Have among yourselves the same attitude that is also yours in Christ Jesus: who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the death, even death on a cross! Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him a name that is above every name” (Phil 2,5-9)… This exceptionally rich text clearly alludes to the first fall… Jesus Christ goes back over Adam’s footsteps. Unlike Adam he is indeed “like God” (cf Gn 3,5). But to be like God, equal to God, is to “be Son” and thus wholly in relationship: “The Son can do nothing of himself” (Jn 5,19). That is why he who is truly equal to God does not cling to his own autonomy, to the limitless nature of what he can and will do. Because he travels the road backwards, he becomes the wholly dependant, he becomes servant. Because he does not take the way of power but the way of love he can descend down to Adam’s deceit, down to death, and there raise up the truth, give life. Thus Christ becomes the new Adam through whom human life assumes a new start… The cross, the locus of his obedience, thus becomes the true tree of life. Christ becomes the image set against the serpent, as John says in his gospel. From this tree it is not the word of temptation but the word of saving love that emanates, the word of obedience through which God himself becomes obedient and thus offers his obedience to us as an arena of liberty. The cross is the newly accessible tree of life. Christ, in his Passion, has turned aside the flaming sword, so to speak (Gn 3,24), has passed through the fire and set up the cross as the world’s true axis on which the world is raised up. That is why the Eucharist, as the presence of the cross, is the tree of life remaining amongst us always and inviting us to receive the fruits of true life.

maronite readings – rosary,team