Lent Video Five – Meditation: “Only a Shadow of You Love”

Next Sunday is Palm Sunday and next week is Holy Week. In anticipation of those solemn commemorations, today, Fr. Ron will help us pray and meditate on the Stations of the Cross.

The stations, also known as the Way of the Cross or Via Crucis in Latin, is an ancient tradition in Catholicism. The stations are a series of 14 vignettes portraying events in the Passion of Christ, from Jesus’ condemnation by Pontius Pilate through his crucifixion and entombment.

Here are a couple of links to resources that Fr. Ron will be using today. You might want to look them up before you begin so that you’re ready.

• We begin with a reading from John’s Gospel, John 19:13-37
• We will sing two songs, first “Only This I Want” by Dan Schutte of the Saint Louis Jesuits.
• The second song is “Only A Shadow — Isaiah 49” by Carey Landry.

As Fr. Ron begins, he invites you to close your eyes and to allow yourself to see Jesus’ journey through the various Stations of the Cross.  You will be drawn back to the fifth station where Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry his cross.

Whether Simon volunteered or was forced to carry the cross, as he carried it, Jesus looked at him with eyes filled with appreciation. What was a burden, became a privilege of Simon.

Special Note for the next video meditation: Please bring a crucifix that you can hold in your hands for next week’s meditation. Maybe you should set it aside right now.

God bless you on your Lenten journey.

All of the videos in this series can be found here: Lenten Video Meditations

Never miss an article published on the Renewal Center website: Sign up to receive our newsletters.

Image above is 5th Station, Simon of Cyrene carries the cross, Church of the Holy Trinity in Gemunden am Main, Bavaria, Germany © Zatletic | Dreamstime.com

This post and video were originally published on April 7, 2020.

[Fr. Ron Will, a Precious Blood priest and spiritual director, is a graduate of Catholic Theological Union and Creighton University’s School of Christian Spirituality. He has a special interest in helping form intentional disciples of Jesus, encouraging others to go spiritually deep-sea diving to explore a deeper relationship with God, and walking with people as they dive into the ocean of God’s mystery actually experiencing God rather than simply dipping one’s toe into the water.]

The image above “Simon’s mother-in-law, Fen Ditton” by TheRevSteve is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

We’d Like to Hear from You!

We’d like to know what you think about this article. Send us a comment using the form below. Do you have a suggestion? Is there something you want to learn more about? Send us a note.