Good Will Triumph

Perhaps you saw that, last Sunday, two new saints were added to the register of those canonized by the Church. There are maybe a dozen canonizations per year, usually of men and women who lived hundreds of years ago, often who founded religious orders, or who lived lives of obvious holiness through some outstanding sign, such as dedicating themselves entirely to service to the poor or renouncing the world to live a life of penance and prayer.

The two canonizations that happened on Sunday were a bit notable though in that they were young men declared saints despite not doing anything overly remarkable. Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati lived in Turin in the early 20th century. He loved sports of all kinds, especially mountaineering. He was involved in works of charity, especially for the sick of his hometown, and was involved in organizations and causes dedicated to social reform. He contracted polio and died at age 24 in 1925. Saint Carlo Acutis was born in 1991. He was a self-professed computer geek, who taught himself programming and website development. Raised in a non-religious family, he became fascinated by and eventually devoted to the Eucharist. He built a website that catalogued the Eucharistic miracles that have been recorded throughout the world – a website you can still visit to this day. He died of leukemia at the age of 15.

The remarkable thing about Saint Pier Giorgio and Saint Carlo is how *ordinary* they were. Some have questioned whether, because of this, they really deserved to be canonized. But I agree with those who say that they are important saints for our day precisely because they are so relatable. They didn’t found a religious order or become missionaries to foreign lands or receive heavenly visions or the stigmata. What they did do is live lives of what we might call real-but-regular holiness. They were in love with the love of Jesus, and they radiated that love to all who knew them.

I mention all of this as a sort of long prelude to today’s feast. We take a break from the Sundays of Ordinary Time to celebrate today the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. One of the oldest feasts of the Church’s year, we remember today what we just read in the Gospel – that God so loved the world that he sent his Son, so that whoever believes in him will have eternal life. But the way we are called to believe in Jesus is not just in his teachings and in his miracles, but in his Cross – his salvific death and resurrection. It is the Cross that heals us – looking upon it and believing, just like the Israelites did in the desert. It is the Cross that opens up the way to eternal life. Indeed, it is the Cross that *shows* us the way to eternal life.

Today’s feast used to be called the Triumph of the Cross, and I have to say that in some ways, I like that name better. Because as much as the Cross may look like a defeat, we proclaim it to be a triumph – a triumph of love and self-sacrifice over sin, hatred, ignorance, and error. Jesus was lifted upon the Cross, and as Christians we lift up the Cross as the sign of hope by which we believe that nothing in this world can overwhelm the love of God. We have all kinds of reasons to see the brokenness of the world; we see examples of it every day in the news. And we all know far too well our own brokenness – the error, confusion, violence, and immorality that too often marks our lives. But the Cross tells us that God so loves us that he can save us from all of these things – indeed, that in the life, death, and resurrection of his Son, he *has* saved us from these things.

Saint Pier Giorgio and Saint Carlo were not perfect people. They were sinners – like all saints before them, with the exception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. But they were redeemed by the Cross of Christ, lifted up from sinfulness to friendship with God, and they became cooperators with his grace to achieve real sanctity – real holiness. And that holiness is not just for the canonized saints – it is what the Lord calls us all of us to, every one of the baptized. That’s why we have canonized saints – to show us that holiness really is possible, really attainable. The Cross of Jesus makes it so, and the saints show us that it not some fairy tale or fantasy, but is lived out in the ordinariness of daily life.

"St. Carlo at the Cross" (sculpture, detail), Assisi, Italy

Friends, what is the form of real-but-regular holiness the Lord is calling you to? In our homes and families, in our schools and workplaces, on the sports field, at the restaurant, in the deer woods – Jesus is calling each one of us to holiness just as surely as he called Pier Giorgio Frassati and Carlo Acutis. And like them, we can respond, we can cooperate – because of the Cross of Christ. The Lord has shown us that, in the end, good will triumph. May we triumph with him!