Giving All of Ourselves

Friday, March 15, 2024 12:00 pm EST

The Lenten painting for the fifth Friday in Lent, presented by economics and political science major Catalina Scheider Galinanes ’25, points us explicitly to the Passion. Christ Carrying His Cross by Gian Francesco de Maineri offers a dramatic close-up of Jesus on his way to Calvary. It crops the figure at his elbow and shoulder, positioning him near the viewer to reveal fresh tears, bloody thorn wounds, and tensely gripped fingers.

The painting seeks an emotional impact with this accessible presentation but also tempers its vision of suffering through the soft directional lighting, lowered gaze, and gentle curls of hair. Half-length devotional images like this one, representing holy figures excerpted from familiar Biblical narratives, became very popular across Europe in the late fifteenth century. In particular, representations of Christ carrying the cross appear to have been a northern Italian iconographical invention.

Christ knew in the weeks leading up to his Passion that the Jewish leaders were plotting to kill him, yet he remained steadfast to the call of the Father in everything. In today’s gospel, we read, “So Jesus cried out in the temple area as he was teaching and said, ‘You know me and also know where I am from. Yet I did not come on my own, but the one who sent me, whom you do not know, is true. I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.’”

Jesus, despite facing opposition and danger, consistently expressed a closeness with the Father and a willingness to follow his will to the very end.

Are we willing to submit all of ourselves to God in this same radical way?

As we draw closer to Holy Week, may our hearts ponder the absolute, loving obedience of the Son to the Father who continued forward, fully aware that each day brought him closer to that very hour of sacrifice.

This Lent, ThinkND invites you to join FaithND and the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art for a journey of Lenten discovery through some of the most significant liturgical paintings in the Raclin Murphy collection, challenging you to contemplate prayer, fasting, sinfulness, mercy, grace, and God’s infinite love from the perspectives of the artist’s gaze. To subscribe to the FaithND Daily Gospel Reflection visit faith.nd.edu/signup.