For Faith in Action: The Way of the Cross in New York

Friday morning, my two sons and I will travel from New Jersey  to Brooklyn's Cathedral Basilica of Saint James by train and by subway to participate in what promises to be a beautiful event. Thousands of believers are expected to walk in silence from Brooklyn, cross the Brooklyn Bridge, and into Lower Manhattan to commemorate the death of our Lord. If you live in the New York metropolitan area, I hope you will join us.

I also am wondering: What special way will you observe Good Friday?

I never have participated in such a public procession of faith and I pray that all of us who walk will, as the organizers suggest, "maintain silence all along the Way of the Cross, a silence in front of God dying for us, a silence that isn’t merely not speaking, but is the simplest, purest way to beg to recognize His presence in our daily life."

This particular Way of the Cross began in 1996 with a handful of friends in the Communion and Liberation movement. Slowly, the event grew and now 6,000 are expected to fill the streets and stop at stations that follow Christ's walk to Calvary. This is a dramatic way to commemorate this day. I will let you know how it goes.

Let the Spirit, who made the God made man and made this man capable of dying for us and raised him from the dead with his poweLet the Spirit, who made the God made man and made this man capable of dying for us and raised him from the dead with his power, work these marvels in us too, tear away curiosity from our being here, from our going back to the facts, from our imagining what happened without understanding, without ever penetrating, without ever letting ourselves be challenged by the real meaning of the matter. So, let us say this invocation with all our heart: Glory be…

-a meditation by Msgr. Luigi Giussani on the Way of the Cross