The Crucifix is a distinctive reminder of God’s infinite love and mercy. God, who is all-powerful, made Himself so vulnerable that He could die, but only so that He could conquer death by his glorious Resurrection.
The Cross and the Crucifix are both Christian symbols but, while you may find simple bare Crosses in a Catholic Church, you are more likely to see a Crucifix, which is a Cross with the body (corpus) of Jesus still nailed to it.
Crucifixion was a slow and painful way to die. As the Savior of the world, Jesus gave up pleasure, power, treasure, and honor to allow Himself to experience this type of death to redeem mankind from sin.
In the Old Testament, when Israelites were bitten by venomous snakes, God commanded Moses to mount a bronze serpent on a pole for them to look at for healing. Jesus said that He would be lifted up in the same way.
Crucifixes usually depict Jesus hanging with his hands and feet nailed to the Cross, wearing a Crown of Thorns, and with a wound on his side from a soldier’s lance. The sign over his head, “Jesus Christ King of the Jews”, is represented by the initials INRI.
A crucifix does not diminish belief in the Resurrection but shows the pain and suffering that Jesus endured in his supreme and eternal sacrifice more clearly than a plain Cross.
The beaten and bruised body of Jesus on the Crucifix helps Catholics to avoid sin, reminding them that He died for all of their sins; not just those of the past, but current and future sins as well.
In the Crucifix, Catholics can find consolation in knowing that any pain and suffering that they experience may be united to Jesus’ suffering on the Cross, and that they can share in his victorious Resurrection one day.
Crucifixes are sacramentals, holy objects provided by the Church to help Catholics achieve holiness and proclaim the Gospel. In addition to Catholic churches, they may be placed in homes, carried by Catholics, and worn as jewelry.
The price He paid to set us free from our sins:
When I came to you, brothers, proclaiming the mystery of God, I did not come with sublimity of words or of wisdom. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear and much trembling, and my message and my proclamation were not with persuasive words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of spirit and power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God.
1 Corinthians 2: 1-5
The invisible made visible through the physical:
The body on the Cross is a reminder:
A reminder of Christ’s eternal sacrifice:
The Church remains faithful to the interpretation of “all the Scriptures” that Jesus gave both before and after his Passover: “Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” Jesus’ sufferings took their historical, concrete form from the fact that He was “rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes”, who handed “Him to the Gentiles to be mocked and scourged and crucified”.
Catechism of the Catholic Church 572
Catholics find consolation in the Crucifix:
Jesus is with Christians in their sufferings:
The visitor to this Cathedral cannot fail to be struck by the great Crucifix dominating the nave, which portrays Christ’s body, crushed by suffering, overwhelmed by sorrow, the innocent victim whose Death has reconciled us with the Father and given us a share in the very life of God. The Lord’s outstretched arms seem to embrace this entire church, lifting up to the Father all the ranks of the faithful who gather around the altar of the Eucharistic sacrifice and share in its fruits. The crucified Lord stands above and before us as the source of our life and salvation, “the high priest of the good things to come”, as the author of the Letter to the Hebrews calls him in today’s first reading.
Pope Benedict XVI, Homily, 18 September 2010
A visual reminder of Jesus’ love:
The history of this distinctive symbol of Christianity:
The Truth, Goodness, and Beauty of the Catholic Church
Giving up everything to be near God:
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