Christ Crucified, the Power and Wisdom of God (Friday, Week 21, Year 2, St Augustine)

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We preach Christ crucified, the power and wisdom of God (cf. 1 Cor. 23-24). What led St Paul to make this bold statement? 
Remember that we are still reading from his letter to the Church in Corinth. And Corinth, being a Greek city, was full of intellectuals and men of letters to whom the theology of the cross made no sense. The language of the cross was a folly to them. They explained the cross away; they emptied the cross of its power; they emptied Christianity of its essence. St Paul did not waste time to correct such a gross theological deviation. He taught, “To those who are perishing, the cross is a folly; but to those who are being saved, it is the power and wisdom of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). 

Let us get this point: To sincerely identify with the cross is to identify with Christ who suffered, died and rose from the dead. By His suffering and death on the Cross, Christ has created a path of salvation for us. 
What it means then is that we must go through that same path, the path of the cross if we must be saved. That is why St Paul says, “To those who are perishing, the cross is a folly; but to those who are being saved, it is the power and wisdom of God”. The cross is what makes Christianity what it is; if you reject the cross, you have rejected Christ and His way.

These teachings will make no sense if we are not convinced that the Christ on the Cross is our savior. If we are convinced, do we act upon our conviction? To act upon our conviction is to start living a life of sacrifice: always ready and willing to embrace suffering in whichever way or form it comes, for the sake of Christ. If we reject the cross, then we will be like the five foolish virgins who were locked out of the banquet hall because they did not make the sacrifice of carrying some extra oil (cf. Matt. 25:1-13).
 
St Augustine was a man who came to realize at a certain time in his life that he must take the path of the cross if he must be saved. We know his life story, how immoral and self-indulgent he was. By the grace of God which he received with the help of his mother’s prayers and the homily of St Ambrose, St Augustine came to understand the language of the cross and realized that therein lies the power and wisdom of God. And that was the beginning of his journey unto salvation. He was finally saved; he is in heaven. As we celebrate him today, we must learn to follow the path he followed so that where he is today we will be at the end of our earthly life.

          

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