Cruciform Reality

So just what do I mean by "Cruciform Reality?"


First, let me talk for a moment about what I am referring to when I speak of "Reality." By "Reality" I mean the world we humans have created around us through language, the arts, systems of thought and education, cultural values and social mores, academic research and commercial production - everything that makes up the way we think, reason, behave, believe, relate to the natural world and other persons, what we do and how and why we do it.

It's like the movie that came out in 1999, The Matrix. The basic plot conceit in that movie is that two centuries in the future, machines have taken over the world after humans have perfected Artificial Intelligence. Much of humankind has become slaves to the machines by being used as an energy source for the machines. In order to remain captives for this purpose, humans are connected up via a neural interface  to a central computer that has created a virtual world in which humans perceive via this interface that they are born, live and eventually die. But there is a remnant of humans that are not plugged into this system who live underground and wage a war against the machines. Part of their task is to unplug the younger humans connected to the computer and show them their true situation, and enlist them in the struggle for human freedom. (For further reading, see the Wikipedia article, "The Matrix", or the Internet Movie Database site for the movie, or the fan-created website The Matrix 101.)

In the scene where the character named Morpheus (played by Lawrence Fishburn) begins to explain to Neo (Keanu Reeves) the real nature of the Matrix, he says this: "The Matrix is that world that has been pulled down over your eyes." The same can be said of Cruciform Reality. This is the world we live in, that we accept as being "the way things are" simply because we know no other reality, no other possible way of living and being. We are so thoroughly immersed in our cultural way of thinking and living that we forget that everything about human societies are made by humans. With this realization comes a second realization: anything made by humans can be unmade by humans. Nothing is a "given," everything is a "made." 


However, just as depicted in The Matrix, the System in power does not take kindly to anything challenging the presuppositions that justify and preserve its power. Systems in power devise strategies of punishment and even elimination of those who oppose them or put forward other ways of thinking and being. The Roman Empire in the time of Jesus was one such System of power, and the means they devised to maintain order and control in their realm was crucifixion.


"Cruciform" refers precisely to how power is wielded in order to preserve a way of life, and the cultural, religious, economic and political systems that define that way of life. "Cruciform" describes how persons are valued and declared to be of worth precisely by how well they fit into the system and advance its goals over anything else, including other human lives. Humans become commodities to be cultivated and consumed by the System as it sees fit. Of course, keep in mind, ever System is created by humans. It can be unmade by humans.



Holy Week is all about this world we’ve created as humans with our own choosing.  It is about a crowd that follows Jesus into town crying "Hosanna!" and waving palm branches, only to be yelling “Crucify him!” at the end of the week.

Holy Week reminds us that we live in a world in need of redemption, in need of saving.  We are reminded that this is a world of crucifiers.  The crucifiers are those forces in our world that make you think that there is someone out there who is going to take away your job, or take away your freedom, or take away your land or your possessions or your family, or take away your way of life, or take away your religion and so you better get them first before they get you.  The crucifiers rule by fear.  The crucifiers rule the imagination by painting a picture of a world of scarcity wherein the goal of life is to be “on top” with others under your thumb, or to have more land or goods than your neighbor, or to have more freedom than someone else.

It is into this world shaped by a Cruciform Reality that Jesus is born, sent by God. This world, shaped by a human-made Cruciform Reality, was created for good by God, but it needs to be redeemed from this reality of its own making. It needs to be  shown a different reality, a reality conceived in the mind of the One who created the universe and all its beings. In this reality, what matters the most to God isn’t powerful armies, it isn’t wealth and power, it isn’t correct religious doctrine, it isn’t scrupulous ritual, what matters to God is what happens between us, between you and me, between us and our neighbors, between us and our children, between me and my spouse. What matters is when we speak one another’s names in love and compassion and caring.  What matters to God is when our hearts are expanded and enlarged to take in a hurting and painful world, and to love it as deeply and fully as God loves it.  That’s what matters to God.

That's what Holy Week is all about.

(Images of the Matrix from: http://www.thematrix101.com/ ; and http://thefuturebuzz.com/pics/the-matrix.jpg, 
Image of crucifixion from http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/050324/Crucifixion4.hmedium.jpg, and http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/jkh/gr5.html.
Image of Palm Sunday (Triumphal Entry) from http://godspace.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/jesus-mafa-palm-sunday.jpg)