Because of health issues, I walk almost every day. As long as the weather is fine, I am out walking the same circuit of blocks. I walk the same path because this route offers the maximum amount of sunlight. Since the interior of our house is so dark, I really crave the sunshine.
For the most part, the walk is rather uneventful. Sometimes, one or both of my younger daughters will join me. I might pass a barking dog, a little girl chalking up the sidewalk or a pre-teen wheeling about on his bicycle.
But one late Saturday afternoon in summer, I saw something quite different and disturbing.
That Saturday I was walking the usual path, which passes by a set of apartments on the street behind our home. As I was passing these apartments, a young man walked in front of me to go to his car with his girlfriend.
As I approached, I though he looked like the typical rebellious youth, tattooed neck, wearing a black T-shirt. That is I assumed he was the “typical” rebellious, young man until I read his T-shirt. “To the triumph of Evil” was scrawled on the back with a symbol of Satan.
I thought, “Do you really know what that means? You ignorant fool. Have you any clue?” That slogan was particularly disturbing, since I was reading Priestblock 25487, A Memoir of Dachau at the time.
We are engaged in a battle of good and evil. There are those who would like to deny that the devil exists. He is alive and real. Nothing brings the Great Deceiver more pleasure than creating chaos and confusion. If that young man would have encountered God as a loving Father would he have instead sported a T-shirt for Christ?
One of the most important messages of Vatican II is that we are all called to bring Christ to the world. We are all called to be leaven.
We may not feel up to the task. We may feel weak. We may feel alone. However, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2:20, RSVCE), because “In [Christ] who is the source of my strength I have strength for everything” (Phi 4:13, NA).
In The Way of the Cross by Hans Urs von Balthasar, he says, “His [Jesus’] preaching and miracles failed to convert the people and their leaders, but only made them reject him all the more.”
Today, they still reject Him. Are they enticed by the glamour of evil? Or they are repulsed by the cross? St. Paul said, “… but we preach Christ crucified—a stumbling block to Jews, and an absurdity to Gentiles; but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:23-24). Yet it is by the cross He redeemed us. It is by the cross He set us free.
On Good Friday, all appeared bleak. All appeared dark. Evil appeared to have triumphed. But appearances can deceive. On Easter Sunday, the glory of the cross reveals itself.
Let us pray without ceasing, “Help us Lord to turn the darkness into light,” so that we may “overcome evil with good” (Rom 12:21, RSV).
