prismaticbleed | the resurrection (Reply)

The Resurrection (La Resurrezione) is an 800-quintal (80-metric-ton) bronze/copper-alloy^[1] sculpture by Pericle Fazzini in the Paul VI Audience Hall in Rome.^[2]^[3] Intended to capture the anguish of 20th century mankind living under the threat of nuclear war,^[1] La Resurrezione depicts Jesus rising from a nuclear crater in the Garden of Gethsemane.

You know what, I never understood why such a shocking sculpture was chosen for the Hall, but now-- looking with open heart, and reading that artist's note-- I get it.

Let me pour myself out here.

The Cross itself is "scandalous." It's inherently terrifying. Our most common representation of the God Who Loves Us is of His Son's destroyed and bleeding body nailed to a piece of ragged wood. It's horrific, really. But it's true. It's "foolish" and "insane" to those without faith-- and understandably so! God's Wisdom is incomprehensible to the proud human mind; it is "ridiculous" to those who boast of their intelligence and perspicacity. Why would God crucify His own Son? Better yet, why would God the Son choose to become a man, humble and lowly-- and as a man, choose TO be crucified? What's the point? Isn't it barbaric? Isn't it gruesome? Why would Love work through-- and suffer through-- blood and sweat and spit and gore?

Because Pride wouldn't.

Life itself chose to die so we wouldn't have to.

But Life cannot die. So what then? When Immortality clothes Himself in mortality, what happens to that mortal existence when it is stripped away? Immortality is naked and pure, unaffected by any coverings, but that "clothing" of human nature carries the scent and warmth and blood of God, now. So what happens to the humans who recognize that hidden change, that "wedding garment" set aside and waiting for them? They live, too. They strip off their dusty rags and wrap their souls in His reddened Robe, the Body of the Lamb, and they become sharers in eternity.

That transcendent truth is hidden at the heart of this shocking sculpture. It's meant to shock. It's meant to make you stop, and wonder, and tremble-- this is God, but it's not how we would imagine God to be; why this hideous sight? Why this macabre display?

Yet Christ is still untouched. Gilded and transcendent, He rises above the horror; He ascends out of the very mouth of the underworld-- unscathed, incorruptible, perfect, alive.

In my eyes, this is the fruit of that grisly image we Christians remember with honor. This is the harrowing of hell, perpetually so.

We live in a world increasingly dominated by death, and ruled by rancor. Our very souls are at war with God, and our rotten fruit virulently infects every citizen of the world-- we are entombed in selfishness, apathy, condemnation, violence, dishonesty, abuse, persecution, injustice, terrorism, hatred, want, greed, vanity, and impurity. We dwell in Gethsemane, betrayers all, we sinners who would kiss our Teacher but never hail Him as King. We spit upon the Cross and we crown Him with thorns, as we comfort ourselves with comfort and dress up as sparkling gods. We want nothing to do with His self-denial, we laugh; look at where it leads-- look at that corpse pinned to a tree! How is that God? How is that Love? There is nothing enjoyable or attractive there! There is only blood. There is only death, and useless sacrifice, a man dying for sins we did not commit! This we crow as we distract ourselves from the corpses also around our feet, from the stench of grave-rot even now mildewing our souls. We live in the Garden of Agony but we keep eating the forbidden fruit, proud of our "wisdom," forgetting that we shall die from it. Meanwhile the Lord of Light sobs in the dark and chooses to be murdered so He can save you. You don't ask for it. You wouldn't. But He does it anyway, because you still need it.

As bombs leave craters in the earth, so the explosions of sin destroy our hearts. So our offenses ruin each other. We don't even see the mushroom cloud; it's too far away. Perhaps those people deserve it. Perhaps it's better this way; it would've been worse if we didn't drop it. These are our excuses. We wash our hands and let Love be crucified. We turn our backs on the annihilation, unwilling to admit it exists, let alone that our actions-- or our total inaction-- is what ripped open the world like that. All we did was push a button, or let someone else do so; how could such a little thing be bad? We forget the butterflies and hurricanes. We walk away from the Cross.

The Garden is nuked. We have nothing to eat. We have nowhere to mourn. God is dead and we all have blood on our hands. Hell has come to earth, and we have nowhere to run.

Christ walks into the heart of the crater we made.

This is Love. This is the Cross. This is the Burial and the Resurrection. This is death, in all its red & raw reality, burning holes in our bones, undenied and yet completely powerless now that Life has met it in the very Garden it thought it devoured. The Tree of Life remains, incomprehensibly whole, ingrued now with the seeds of agony, yet blooming into fathomless sweetness. Christ is in the crater; He has endured the scorching heat and crushing force of hate, and despite all devastation He lives!! And He has opened the gates of Life for all of us beneath the bombs. We, too, have tasted His bitter Cross; therefore we, too, will join the Wedding feast with Him-- we lost and repentant sinners, now naked without our wealth and scared without our knowledge, living in the streets and begging for bread. He pulls us close to His pierced Heart, kisses our ashen lips, and carries us to His Home. He knows what we've done. He knows what we didn't do. He recognizes our hands as the ones that held the nails and scourges and silver and swords, our voices as the ones that mocked and condemned or mumbled or stopped, our faces as the ones that sneered or turned away or just glanced, unfeeling. We did not love Him. We did not want Him. We loved ourselves enough to satisfy; we had everything we desired. But the bombs fell, and we lost the world, and now death is lurking the back alleys and what now, we asked each other, shaking and weeping? What hope is there? Is there a God? Was He really God? If He died, then-- if we killed Him; if we let Him die, if we didn't even care-- what now?

We forget He chose to. We forget that He never forgot us-- until suddenly He is there, in the slums with us, the moment we remember and decide to go look for Him. Hope does not disappoint. He still lifts us from the debris and dries our tears.

"Do not worry, my child. It's easy to find Me," He says. "I am always on the Cross; you only need to meet me there."

See, Love does not run from death. Love does not ignore the suffering. Love knows it is inevitable. Love does not try to justify or diminish the reality of the horrors we face. Love does not shun responsibility either. Love sees how we all hurt and hurt each other, unable or unwilling to bandage our collective wounds, and Love immediately runs onto the battlefield with every salve and suture it can carry. Love does not pick sides; Love does not exclude or reject; Love does not hold grudges or biases or proud judgments. Love sees every soul as a part of itself, and cherishes it as such. Love is willing and able to willingly give its own life for the sake of those it loves. Love chooses to pick up that Cross and shoulders it with absolute ardor, bleeding all the way to death itself, even if you're the one who it belongs to-- even if you put it on His shoulders yourself-- because now you don't have to carry that Cross alone.

And it is no mere man Who carries your sorrows. It is God Himself.

Now, even though you will still die-- for all men eventually do, no matter how far and fast they may run-- now, you have the option to die with Him. With God.

So. If He dies with you, what then? If you admit that your name should be on that Cross instead, and surrender to the suffering life brings, what then, if He joins you in that choice, if you join Him in His?

Do you wonder, when you look at His face there, bruised beyond visual recognition? Do you wonder, when you hear His voice clogged with pain? Your own body is torn to pieces. How is this saving you? Why is He dying too? He is not coming down from the gibbet. Neither are you. All you can smell is blood.

But God smiles with broken teeth. "I am the Resurrection and the Life," He whispers to you over the air raid sirens. "Whoever believes in Me will never die, but will have eternal life. Do you believe this?"

What, then? Do you? Or are you still too frightened to have faith?

What if He told you He loves you?

There, on your own Cross, in your own death, ruined and wrecked, He loves you. He did not do this to you. Sin itself did-- yours, and all of humanity's, known and unknown-- its very touch is a death sentence, now nailed above your head in lurid letters, but He knew those words already and He speaks different ones, against all common sense and self-loathing and bitterness, and you cannot understand. He shoulders the weight with you, without your asking-- your pride would not let you. You don't understand how He loves you if you're up there, but... so is He, you must admit. Smiling, His eyes so sincere. He looks at you and for a moment you forget pain; you forget death. For a moment, you get it.

He loves you. Life Himself loves you.

Do you trust in that love? Do you trust in Him, dying with you?

Now, in your bleakest moments, you have a spark of hope. You are embraced in the infinite reach of His outstretched arms. You are seen, you are cared for, you are healed-- somehow, somehow, no matter the damage, your soul is preserved entire, clothed in dazzling light, and no man on earth can frighten you now--

This is love, you suddenly realize. How strange. How perfect.

O Death, where is your sting? It has been transmuted into song.

Through the Cross, God has claimed the very territory of death for Himself. In His awesome Wisdom and Power, He has vanquished every enemy by their own weapons; He has ultimately disarmed hell itself. Death has been nullified. Through the Cross, every tombstone now becomes a door, to soon be rolled away in joy.

Now, by His sharing in humanity's suffering, every soul seemingly trapped in misery now has a Way out of it, forever. That misshapen wreck of bronze, that mangled tree, those burned branches of our scarred and scalded arms reaching desperately to a heaven we cannot see-- Christ has come down to bind our broken hands, and with all tenderness, to lift us up with Him. We shall ascend from our anguish. We have hope beyond all hell.

We look to the Cross, in all its awful splendor, and we no longer run-- we embrace it. No matter what we must endure at human hands, Christ is in the crater with us.