Take Up Your Cross
Dear Jesus, in this season, as in many before, I have felt so distant from You. My cross can feel overbearing. While I should be grateful for my family, I am most commonly the opposite. I feel starved for attention and respite, bitter at the need to be constantly humble. I react with anger and impatience rather than with the submission you ask of me.
Stabbing, searing, loneliness and despair. Giant, twisted trees of wood rising into the sky. The piercing heaviness of the cross. You received Agony for my sins, took on my suffering and understood it.
John Paul II said You have made room in Your suffering for me to participate, to know your love. Paul says to rejoice in it. Help me to offer my pain to You, to empty myself so you can fill me. Not my will, but your will be done. Jesus, may I trust in You.
— Alexis Dallara-Marsh
Reflection provided by diocesan.com. Reprinted with permission.