The Stations of the Cross
with Meditations by Paul Claudel
 
 
INTRODUCTION
 
+ In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
 
Let us pray.
 
Lord, may our prayer today
be more than a moment of passing piety.
Open our hearts and minds to your Spirit:
as we trace your footsteps,
teach us how we can bring your strength,
your compassion, and your love
to all those whose lives touch ours.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
Through her heart, his sorrow sharing,
all his bitter anguish bearing,
now at length the sword has passed.
 

The First Station : Jesus is condemned to death
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
 
It is finished.
We have judged God
and we have condemned him to death.
Pilate sits in state in the place called Gabbatha.
“Have you nothing to say?” says Pilate.
And Jesus does not respond.
The sentence is given
in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek;
nothing is omitted.
And you can see the crowd that yells
and the judge who washes his hands.

 
Let us pray.
 
Lord Jesus,
teach us how to be silent,
and how to speak the truth.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
For the sins of his own nation
saw Him hang in desolation
all with bloody scourges rent.
 

 
The Second Station: Jesus receives his cross
 
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

They give him back his clothing
and the cross is brought to him.
“Hail,” says Jesus, “O Cross that I have so long desired!”
And you, Christian, look, and tremble!
Ah, what a solemn moment -
that in which Christ for the first time
accepts the eternal cross!
Are you going to carry it all by yourself, Lord Jesus?
Make me patient in my turn
with the cross you want me to carry.
Because we must carry the cross
before the cross carries us. 

Let us pray.
 
Lord, teach us to take up our cross
and follow in your footsteps. 
In your name, we pray. Amen.

O how sad and sore distressed
was that mother highly blessed,
of the sole-begotten One!
 

The Third Station: Jesus falls the first time
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
 

On the way!  Victims and executioners together
set off towards Calvary.
God, whom they drag by the neck,
suddenly stumbles and falls to the ground.
What do you say, Lord, of this first fall?
How do you find this earth which you made?
Ah!  it is not only the good way that is hard.
The way of evil is also treacherous and steep!
You do not enter it straight on;
you must learn it stone by stone,
And your foot often stumbles—
but your heart perseveres.

                 
Let us pray.

Lord, you became like us in all things but sin.
When we fall, teach us to accept your loving forgiveness. 
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
Christ above in torment hangs;
she beneath beholds the pangs
of her dying glorious Son.
 

The Fourth Station: Jesus meets his afflicted mother
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

The fourth Station is Mary, who has accepted everything.
She says not a word and she watches Jesus come.
The mother looks at her Son, the Church at her Redeemer.
She is silent before God and offers him her soul to read.
There is nothing in her heart that refuses or holds back,
not a fiber in her pierced heart that does not accept and consent.
And as God himself is there, she is present.
She accepts and she looks at this Son
she conceived in her womb.
She says not a word and she gazes on the Holy of Holies.

                 
Let us pray.
 
Lord, give us your Mother’s faith.
Teach us how to hope, when hope seems lost. 
In your name, we pray. Amen.

Is there one who would not weep
whelmed in miseries so deep
Christ’s dear mother to behold?
 

The Fifth Station: Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus to carry his Cross
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
 
The moment comes when they cannot go on,
when they can no longer advance.
It is here that we find our place, when you permit
that we, too, might be of use,
even if by force, for your Cross.
Thus Simon of Cyrene,
who was summoned to this piece of wood.
He takes it up firmly and walks behind Jesus,
So that nothing of the Cross drag on the ground,
and be lost.

                 
Let us pray.
 
Lord, teach us to offer our hearts and hands
in the service of others,
for you wish no one to carry the cross alone.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
Can the human heart refrain
from partaking in her pain,
in that Mother’s pain untold?
 
The Sixth Station: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
 
All the disciples have fled.
A woman throws herself into the thick of the insult
and the center of death,
and finds Jesus and takes his face between her hands.
Let us look once more, Veronica,
at the cloth you gathered up,
at the face of the Holy Viaticum,
that holy linen veil
where Veronica hid the face of the Harvester,
so that his image would cling to it eternally,
that image which is made of his blood, his tears,
and our spittle! 

                 
Let us pray.
 
Lord, in your holy face we see the face of God.
Teach us to see your face
in the poor and the afflicted of our world. 
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
Bruised, derided, cursed, defiled,
she beheld her tender child,
till His Spirit forth he sent.

 
The Seventh Station: Jesus falls the second time
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
 
It is not the stone beneath his foot,
nor the rope pulled too sharply,
it is the soul that suddenly stumbles.
O middle of our lives!
O voluntary fall!
When love no longer has a center, faith no longer a foundation,
because the road is long and the end is far away,
because you are alone and there is no consolation. 

 
Let us pray.

Lord, teach us how to repent.
Grant us the grace to realize
that when we are weak, then we are strong.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
       
O, thou Mother, fount of love,
touch my spirit from above,
make my heart with thine accord.
 


 
The Eighth Station: Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

 Before he climbs the mountain for the last time,
Jesus raises his finger
and turns towards the people who accompany him,
a few poor women with their babies in their arms.
It is not a man who lifts his finger
in the midst of the crowd.
It is God who suffered for our salvation.
This man was God almighty; it is true, then!
There really was a day
when God suffered this for us! 
              

Let us pray.

Lord, give us the compassion
of the women who wept for you.
Teach us how to reach out
to the suffering and afflicted.
In your name, we pray. Amen. 

Make me feel as thou hast felt,
make my soul to glow and melt
with the love of Christ my Lord.
 
 
The Ninth Station: Jesus falls a third time
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

 “I have fallen again,
and this time, it is the end.
I would lift myself up, but there is no way.
I have done with the wood, but the iron remains.”

Jesus falls a third time,
but it is at the summit of Calvary. 

                 
Let us pray.

Lord, teach us to lift up the falling:
those deprived of justice,
and those who have lost hope.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
Let me share with thee his pain,
who for all my sins was slain,
who for me in torments died.

 
The Tenth Station: Jesus is stripped of his clothes
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

Hands are raised against God,
the Flesh of Flesh trembles;
the Universe, touched at its source,
shakes to its very depths!
Now that they have taken the tunic
and the robe without seam,
We raise our eyes and dare to look at Jesus in his nakedness.
They have left you nothing, Lord, they have taken all.
God is hidden. 
But the Man of Sorrows remains.

Let us pray.

Lord Jesus, stripped of everything,
teach us to detach ourselves from possessions,
and to find our true selves in relationship with you.
In your name, we pray. Amen.

Let me mingle tears with thee,
mourning him who mourned for me,
all the days that I may live.

 
The Eleventh Station: Jesus is nailed to the Cross
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

They have tied the Lamb by the feet,
they have bound the Omnipresent.
They mark with chalk on the cross
his height and the width of his arms.
It is difficult for a God to fit himself to our measure.
They pull, and the half-dislocated body cracks and cries.
You are taken, Lord, and you can no longer escape.
You are nailed to the cross by your hands and your feet.
I will no longer look to the skies with the heretic and the fool.
This God is enough for me, who is held by four nails.
 
                  
Let us pray.

Lord, you forgave those who crucified you,
and your last words were words of blessing.
Teach us to forgive. 
In your name, we pray. Amen.

  
By the cross with thee to stay,
there with thee to weep and pray:
this I ask of thee to give.

 
The Twelfth Station
Jesus dies on the Cross
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

 In the night, the great cross trembles with the breath of God.
There is nothing more
but to let the Instrument do its work.
Our host is weighed down
and his head droops little by little.
He no longer sees his Mother
and his Father forsakes him.
Have you not had enough of that bitter wine,
mingled with water, that you raise your head suddenly,
and cry, “I thirst!”
You are thirsty, Lord?  Are you speaking to me?
Do you still have need of me, with my sins?
Am I what is lacking
before all things can be fulfilled? 
                 
  
Our Father....
 
 
Virgin, of all all virgins best,
listen to my fond request:
let me share thy grief divine.
 
 
The Thirteenth Station
The body of Jesus is taken down from the Cross
                 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

 Here the Passion ends and the Compassion continues.
The Christ is no longer on the Cross,
he is with Mary who has received him.
The Christ who suffered in the sight of all
is once more hidden on the breast of his mother.
The Church takes her beloved in her arms.
That which is from God, that which is from the mother,
and that which man has made,
all this is with her, beneath her mantle forever.
She has taken him,
she sees, she touches, she prays, she weeps, she wonders.
Here the Cross is finished and the Tabernacle begins. 

                 
Let us pray.
     
Lord, you are living in our midst.
Teach us to recognize your presence in the bread we break,
and in the family of the Church, your living Body.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
                 
Let me, to my latest breath,
in my body bear the death
of that dying Son of thine.
 
 
The Fourteenth Station
Jesus is laid in the tomb
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

This is the tomb where the dead Christ, having suffered, is placed,
the hole, opened up in haste, that he might sleep his night there,
before the pierced one is resurrected
and ascends to the Father.
Now that his heart is open and his hands pierced,
There is no cross among us to which His body is not accustomed,
There is no sin in us without its corresponding wound in Him.
Come, then, from the altar where you are hidden from us,
Savior of the world!

  
Let us pray.

Lord, teach us to wait.
Give us the faith and hope
of the disciples who placed your body in the tomb,
trusting  in God’s holy will.
In your name, we pray. Amen.
 
Holy Mother, pierce me through;
in my heart each wound renew
of my Savior crucified.

 
The Fifteenth Station: The Resurrection of the Lord
 
We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you.
Because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
  
Through the curtainless window, for a while now,
I have seen a little star shining at me.
I do not sleep.
But the night between Holy Saturday and Easter
was not made for sleeping.
O happy night, you alone know
the hour when Jesus was raised!
You women, what are you looking for in the tomb?
Jesus lives, he is no longer here!
And my soul, too, tears itself from the tomb
with a wild laugh!
I, too, have conquered death
and I believe in Jesus, my Savior! (Paul Claudel)
 

 
Glory and praise to you, O Christ!
Lord, by our baptism, you have given us a share
in your death and resurrection.
Teach us to keep on rising from the dead,
leaving behind the old life
of selfishness and sin,
and living the new life of love and service.
In your name, we pray. Amen.

 
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.