Today is Holy Cross Day.

The traditional story of how Holy Cross Day came about is that in the year 335, St. Helena, Roman Emperor Constantine’s mother, discovered in Jerusalem what she said was the True Cross on which Christ had beencrucified.

Well, it was her story and she stuck to it!

A church was then built on the site where Christ was crucified to house this True Cross. 300 years later the Persians overran Jerusalem, destroyedthe church and took the cross away. Some years later, the Roman Emperor Heraclius recovered the cross, and returned it to Jerusalem.

He then in his richest clothing, wanted to carry the cross in procession from Jerusalem to Mount Calvary. When he tried to lift the cross, he found that it was too heavy. The bishop told him that the only way to carry the cross was to do it as Christ had done. So, the Emperor changed intopilgrim’s clothing and going barefoot carried the Holy Cross out to Calvary.

This story, shows a tension that the church has always had with respect tothe cross. We want to celebrate the cross as the triumph of God’s love. We want to lift up the cross. But when we do, we are tempted to turn it into a symbol of glory and power, rather than seeing it as a symbol of suffering and love.

Of course, we want the cross to be a glorious symbol of our amazing God,and make it the symbol of glory and power and majesty. But as theemperor found, the cross is too heavy when we try to lift it up in this way.

Instead, we must admit that the cross is a symbol of suffering and even death, and it is only through our suffering, and death to our old way of life and to the old way of seeing the world, that we are able to take up the cross and carry it ourselves.

Sadly, in our society, the cross has become a ubiquitous symbol. It pops upeverywhere. The sign of the cross is made by pious footballers after they have scored a goal. The cross has become all the rage as a fashion statement with cross-inspired jewellery hanging from necks, ears, and wrists.

The notion that our society is all “crossed up” may or may not be a good thing. Indeed, the fact that it is a cross that is popping up all over tells us that some Christian memory or at least some Christian superstition is still very active in the subconscious of the UK today. It doesn’t make us a “Christian nation,” but perhaps it makes us a “Christ haunted” nation; not sure of what faith is really about, not sure who Jesus really is, but none the less fascinated by some of the concepts of the Christian religion.

The calling we have as Christians in a Christ haunted but not Christian society, is to march boldly along the way of the Holy Cross.

Each of you reading this is a living symbol of faith. The people who know you look and may see in you the benefit a life of faith can bring and perhaps try it out for themselves. For some, this may be the closest they may ever get to Christ and the cross. That is what it means to be a witness for the Lord, that is why we are called to be disciples. That is why we are to be ambassadors for the Lord, because many come to faith by first seeing faith in other people.

Marching along the way of the Cross, as St Paul pointed out, means having “…the same mind…in you that was in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness, and being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient (even) to the point of death …” (Philippians 2:5-8).

On this day dedicated to the Holy Cross, let us recall the cross traced upon us in baptism. And let us resolve to march with one foot in God’s kingdomto light up the way of the Cross for the people we know.

Remembering, that God sent his Son into the world in order that the world might be saved through him.

The Revd Malcolm France