THE POWER OF SYMBOL

When Mel Gibson’s the passion of the Christ was being shown in American theaters last March, it touched many people. For one, it changed behaviors producing sudden conversion, a moral miracle.

An item appeared in the US Media about a crime committed a few years back. Because of the clever way the pregnant woman was killed, the incident was reported as suicide by the police. When the murderer saw the movie, he was so touched that he went to the police and confessed the crime.

Moral miracles like this one stress the power of symbols like the “cross of suffering.” Many of us Christians believe, and rightly so, that Jesus suffers because of our sins and crimes. He does so as payment in our stead. As the scripture says He embraced the cross of suffering in order to free us from sin.

Freedom, liberation, transformation or simply change of hearts happen when the symbol evokes an inner impulse in the soul and stirs it to a decisive action. Philosophers call this process as “metaphor becoming a symbol.” Here metaphor is a sign showing some similarity. When the sign is experienced, it no longer just a sign; it has become a symbol.

To us the Cross is a symbol of the love of God – in Jesus, a love manifested in this painful self-giving till death. It is a symbol of supreme sacrifice of one who loves so much.

Sadly, the Cross has lost its meaning and power for many of us. Or, to put it in another way, we have forgotten its meaning and power. How can it be revived? How can its power and impact be allowed to change behavior?

St. Paul tells us how. In the letter to the people of Colossas, he says that when he suffers he is completing the sufferings of Jesus in His body the Church (1:24). St. Therese of the Child Jesus understood this mysterious statement very well. She believes that since the sufferings of Jesus has the power to effect a change in Dismas, the thief being hanged along with Jesus, our suffering offered together with His would surely have a similar effect.

In her biography, there is an incident about a hardened criminal who cursed God and the Church and refused the sacraments. St. Therese prayed for him and offered her sacrifices and pains for him. It was reported that a few minutes before he was executed he ask for a crucifix and kissed it and went to his death peacefully.

When missionaries in Indochina asked her for help, even financial and other material needs of the mission, the Little Flower, as she called by the Church, prayed and offered her sufferings for them. Documents show how the missionaries confirmed the effects of her self sacrifice. This is why even without leaving the cloistered monastery, the Little Therese was proclaimed by Pius XI as patroness of the missions together with St. Francis Xavier, Blessed Pope John XXIII knew this too. Before he announced the Second Vatican Council he ask the sick and bedridden people in Europe to offer their sufferings for the success of the Council.

This was my purpose when I ask my priests, religious and lay people in Davao to give up something – their allowance – as a form of sacrifice and offered it to the government which is experiencing fiscal crisis. It is meant to manifest to the government officials, some of whom need to be converted, that the poor and the powerless are praying for them and are offering their hard-earned money as a form of sacrifice like the widow’s in the gospel. I am sure that when this sacrificial offering becomes a collective sign acquires a national impact, it will have an effect because it is being offered together with the Cross of Jesus, and being done out of love for every Filipino. So when there is conversion on the part of these political leaders and economic managers, crisis will turn into Kairos, a moment of change and conversion.

The collective response to the crisis is being symbolized by the cross of suffering of millions of the poor, the simple, the uneducated and marginalized but not politicized Filipino Christians. In our tradition and culture they as individuals have been called Juan or Juana de la Cruz (of the Cross). This calls to mind San Juan de la Cruz, the famous Carmelite mystic and doctor of the Church. He was a poor man and learned much from his experiences of the cross of suffering and taught the Church the salvific power of sacrificial offering. He underlines the paradoxical truth that nothingness or self effacement (nada in Spanish) is the only way to perfection or union with God. In other words, nothing or no one matures to perfection without pain or something similar to pain.

It seems to me that the Filipinos by the name of Juan and Juana de la Cruz – rich or poor - - collectively offering their crosses will be the saviors of our country.

MOST REV. FERNANDO R. CAPALLA, D.D.
Archbishop of Davao
CBCP President