CHRISTIANITY SAYS THAT GOD knows me; it matters to God that I exist. Here El Greco has painted Jesus holding and carrying the Cross. He carries it for me.
In the last season of Downton Abbey there is a particularly lovely scene which takes place one evening in the nursery. Young Tom Branson (who had been married to Lady Sybil who died in childbirth) and Lady Mary (who had been married to Matthew who was killed in a car accident immediately after their son's birth) are joined by Isobel Crawley (mother of Matthew Crawley). Isobel has just wished Mary happiness as she discerns that another suitor has been coming around to visit Mary. Then this conversation ensues.
Isobel: "When I got engaged to Reginald I felt sick - sick with love literally."
Tom: "It was the same for me. I felt as if I'd gone mad or been hypnotized. For days, weeks, all I could think of was her."
Mary: "And me! I was standing outside in the snow, and I didn't have a coat, but I wasn't cold, because all I kept thinking was, 'He's going to propose, he's going to propose.'"
Isobel after a silent moment: "Well, aren't we the lucky ones!"
Many of us know what this lucky kind of love feels like - a young love; a first love. In Christ, God loves us each like this! It seems too good to be true! Oh, if only the world knew it! And in walking these stations these Lenten weeks we might pray to have that sense revived or deepened within ourselves. The love of God for us. Love for Jesus!
