by Kevin Noonan

Created on: June 30, 2008   Last Updated: August 21, 2010

"Remember?"

It's a curious mistake, and I can only speculate as to the intentions of the heart, but the evidence soon becomes maddeningly clear.

Please don't dismiss this to the five hundred year war between the faiths - though that would be the easy way out.

Instead, consider the brutality of remembrance: Jesus, hanging there;

it's a function of crucifixion to spread wide the humanity of the criminal - spikes in arms and feet fully extended - inviting variations of curious stares.

Why, then, did it happen? Why did they take him down,
take him off the cross? Long ago I asked. Long ago, my pastor proclaimed: "He is risen!" though we certainly weren't.

Perhaps it's Jesus' fault, still hanging vulnerable, naked even; still hanging there ugly, twisted and torn;

a reminder of our enemies: the terrorists and atheists; the homeless, homosexuals and whores; the abortionists and pedophiles - the least of these

remember?

And of those other failures: of forgiveness and of love and of sacrifice and of surrender. The things we despise: like weakness and suffering; like vulnerability, like defeat - writ large in red

remember?

"Our colors don't run!" the Christians demand. But there was no white and no blue that day on Golgotha; and it's too bad Jesus had to stop bleeding otherwise the color of blood
might still be running.

They took Jesus off the cross and he's no longer exposed, no longer thirsty,
no longer in need.

They took Jesus off the cross and he's no longer crying out, no longer forsaken, no longer pierced, no longer a threat.

They took Jesus off the cross.

And the Christians? They, too, no longer bleed.

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