AS THE WORLD TURNS

A SERMON FOR THE INVENTION OF HOLY CROSS

There used to be a soap opera on CBS called As The World Turns.  It had quite a long run, from April 1956, just a couple of months before my first birthday, until 2010.  I’m proud to say I never saw a single episode.  Nevertheless, I did want to draw your attention today to one episode in particular.  They broadcast live in those early days, and this particular episode began at its usual time slot of 1:30 pm, Eastern Time.  But about ten minutes into the action, the show was suddenly interrupted with a news bulletin from CBS.  It was November 22, 1963, and back then breaking news bulletins actually meant something important had happened.  People stopped what they were doing and looked nervously at their television sets.  Only the actors of the soap opera were oblivious to the horrifying news that was about to break, and they continued filming the segment of As The World Turns, as the rest of the world suddenly stopped turning for a few breathless seconds to learn that President John F. Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, Texas.

 

It was one of the most memorable moments in modern history, and those who were alive at the time will never forget where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news.  I was eight years old at the time, over in England, too young perhaps to understand the significance of the moment.  And yet I can still remember the shock and then the grief of my mother and grandmother as the BBC relayed the news.  It’s impossible to convey the power of that moment, as sounds and pictures were embedded in the collective memory forever.  The news bulletin from CBS lasted only a few seconds, and then, in one surreal jump, the network went over to a commercial for Nescafé.  Imagine: millions of people are sitting there with their mouths wide open, having just heard the most terrible news of their lives, and then they’re invited to pour coffee into those open mouths as though nothing had happened.  And the world turns.

It’s a fact that no matter what happens in our lives, life goes on.  Even when we die and our own little world comes to an end, the rest of the world continues turning as though nothing had happened at all.  Look around at the world today—tens of thousands of people have been dying of Covid-19, alone in hospitals and nursing homes, struggling to breathe, frightened and in pain, with not even a priest at their side to pray with them and perform the last sacraments.  But with all this going on, we still managed to pour coffee down our throats this morning, didn’t we?  We’ve managed to put out of our minds the terrible suffering that has been going on around us.  Thousands upon thousands of our fellow citizens have died, and we blithely turn our attention to the economy, the elections—and the world turns.

This is not news.  It’s simple human nature, and we should be thankful that at least God understands us.  He must understand, for he created human nature.  Admittedly, he created it to be a lot better than what it turned into after our original sin.  But he knows where we’re coming from when we act so selfishly.  He understands that our minds are constantly perverted towards our own best interests and pleasure, and not those of our neighbor, let alone those of his own divine majesty.  He understands, and that’s why he was able to forgive those who persecuted him, “for they know not what they do.”  Let’s just remember though, that whether God understands us or not, there’s no excuse for our foolish ways.

Soon after our blessed Lord uttered those words of forgiveness, he was nailed to a cross, which was then hoisted aloft at the summit of Mount Calvary.  “And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour… And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; and the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves.”  Terrible events.  Incredible events.  Events that make the assassination of an American president pale in comparison. And yet, even then, as the cross stood atop Calvary, overlooking the Holy City of Jerusalem, people in that city were going about their business, drinking their coffee in the market places.  “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

A few years ago, I visited a monastery in the French Alps.  It was the mother house of the Carthusian Order, founded by St. Bruno in the year 1084, the so-called Grande Chartreuse.  Interestingly enough, the Carthusian coat of arms is a globe on the top of which stands a cross.  Its motto is in Latin and is the key to today’s great feast, the Invention of Holy Cross: Stat crux dum volvitur orbis—"As The World Turns, the Cross Stands.”  A television soap opera from the 1950s, you see, provides us with only half the truth—great events like Kennedy’s assassination may occur, “as the world turns.”  Great plagues spread across the globe, great multitudes suffer and die, but the world turns and we survivors continue to drink our morning Nescafé.  But where’s the meaning in that?  Without the Cross, indeed, there is none.

You see, life is not just a series of events.  It’s not just “as the world turns.”  Because, as the world turns, The Cross Stands.”  It’s the Cross that remains our grounding stability in this ever-spinning world that revolves around it.  Without that pivot of the Cross, not just the world but each one of us simply spin and spin and spin, until we’re dizzy, unfocused, and out of control  But if we hold on to the Cross, fixed in place atop a world that spins incessantly beneath us, we will never lose sight of what that Cross represents, namely, our salvation.

Look upon that Cross, cling onto it.  For tomorrow, the world will surely turn again, and what shall there be then?  Plague, pestilence, warfare, famine?  Keep your focus on the Holy Cross we venerate today.  It is our royal banner and beckons us ever onward, the symbol of our victory over sin and death.  By clinging to the Cross, we will vanquish both.  Treat each day, each turn of the world, as if it were your last.  Because one day you will be right.  Eventually, our world will turn one last time, and we shall surely die.  May our last vision of this passing world be of Christ’s Holy Cross, leading us to the salvation and eternal life it represents.

“Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes;

Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies;

Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;

In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.”