Seventh Station
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| Seventh Station St. Emma Monastery |
Jesus Falls the Second Time
Christ is down in the dust. This second fall in harder than the first; He in nearer the end of His tether now, more dependent than before on others to help Him to get up and go on. It may have been something trifling, almost absurd, that threw Him down. Perhaps something as small as a pebble on the road; yes, that would have been enough to send Him hurtling down, with that terrible burden on His back, and His own exhaustion as He nears the end of His bitter journey.
It is the same today, the same for those "other Christs" who have gone a long way on the road and who fall, not for the first time now, under the heavy cross of circumstance--those who have carried this cross for a long time, who have become exhausted by the unequal struggle and fall, who with Him are down in the dust. Ii is for them that Christ falls for the second time and lies under the crushing weight of His cross, waiting for those who will come forward to lend their hands to lift it from His back and enable Him to go to the end of His way of suffering and love.
If something as trifling as a pebble in the road or a false step could throw Christ down on the road, so may a tiny provocation, a sudden temptation, a mocking word--a fragment that adds to the struggle-- bring the man staggering under the cross down:
the servant is not greater than his master.
The Way of the Cross by Caryll Houslander
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