Good Friday and Solidarity in Suffering

Jesus and Pontius Pilate (1948) by Henry Coller

Today is Good Friday, a day that not only followers of Jesus, but people of all faiths and beliefs, can join in solidarity in recognition of the one common denominator that unites us all: pain.

Growing up in Catholic school, we were told that Good Friday was a day to be sorrowful for our part in the crucifixion—that every wound inflicted on Him was partly our blame, our personal sin. That was quite a burden to be asked to carry, especially for a fourth grader.

But then comes life, with many joys we can choose to recognize, and also the pain, the struggle, the self-doubt, the condemnation, and rejection. And then comes the realization: Jesus came not as an accuser, but in solidarity. What He endured tells us that suffering, pain, and rejection are not only part of the human condition, but of the Divine as well. He sanctified pain and suffering because, by living among us as a brother, He experienced it for Himself. In fact, He experienced the criminal legal system of His day. Jesus was system-impacted.

And yet, even along that road, He did not carry the burden alone. A man named Simon of Cyrene was compelled to help Him carry the cross—a quiet reminder that even in the darkest moments, we are called to bear one another’s burdens, whether by choice or by circumstance.

For the brothers and sisters we hide away in our prisons, Good Friday is a reminder that punishment without fairness and mercy is not justice, and that in the end, when the Peacemaker’s time is at hand, there will surely be a reversal of the order of the things this world calls just.

On Good Friday, the Prince of Peace—with brown skin and wooly hair—who roamed the city and countryside teaching, feeding, and healing people, was seized by the authorities based on false accusations, arrested, arraigned, and indicted by a secret grand jury, and tried in the middle of the night so that no one could see, and before those in authority who might act more justly could intervene. He had no advocate or defender and stood alone. He said nothing in his own defense because He did not recognize the legitimacy of the system accusing Him. They moved Him from one jurisdiction to another. When the second jurisdiction refused to indict, corrupt officials manipulated public opinion to demand torture and execution. The men in His circle fled from Him in fear; the women stood by His side to His last breath. Does any of this sound familiar?

They gave Him a crown of thorns. Mother Teresa compared it to our addiction and mental illness. Good Friday was the day of our atonement. That word is the root for the word we call attorney. How far the practitioners are from the source.

Today, we share a meditation from Isaiah, read one night from a piece of paper in a prison chapel. The audience was men who were leaving to go home the next morning—some convicted for crimes related to their addiction and mental health conditions, and who had endured the abuses and deprivations of the prison system for decades.

"....But now hear this, O afflicted one, drunk but not with wine, Thus says the Lord, your master, your God, who defends his people: See, I am taking from your hand the cup of staggering; The bowl of my wrath you shall no longer drink. I will put it in the hands of your tormentors, those who ordered you to bow down, that they might walk over you, while you offered your back like the ground, like the street for them to walk on..."

Isaiah 52:21–23

The core belief of the followers of Jesus is that He overcame injustice, cruelty, deprivation, and death itself, and that on the third day, He rose from the tomb and, without missing a beat, returned to walk, talk, and eat with His people on a road called Emmaus.