The death of Christ has always been a spectacle, either laden with disease or wrapped in unbelief, as if human wickedness could not go that far. However, on the bed of his agony something essential is revealed, while a whole people booed him and treated him as a criminal, his mother, Mary, stood standing, looking at him, without leaving him even in the darkest moment. Not even when he exclaimed, Father, why have you forsaken me? In that moment of maximum pain for the deep loneliness, his mother was with him, at the foot of the cross. That presence alone was enough for mankind not to lose faith in the human being altogether.
I wonder, then, if in the midst of so much evil of man against man, there is still a light able to sustain the hope that the human heart is well made.
A politician washed his hands and delivered an innocent to the people’s trial and systematic torture of the Roman empire. That politician was Pilate. Today, Pilate would be that president who promotes the mass exodus of migrants-especially Latinos- back to their countries of origin, who restricts economic aid and does not hesitate to say that other nations are licking his ass. Today’s Pilate proposes to take over Gaza, expel the Palestinians “for their own sake” and reform that disgraced territory mocking it on social networks. And I see, once again, how evil disguises itself as good. Because one of their tricks is to propose a false good, a lie wrapped in promises of order, peace and justice. But it is not. It’s more of the same evil.
The religious power of Israel convinced its people that Jesus’ death would be a solution. Today, many still believe that the death of the other can solve something. The evil goes so far that it is even justified by killing children, separating them from their parents, leaving widows and orphans.
Evil has that, convinces, justifies itself, manipulates itself, disguises itself as reason. It is cunning in the face of a good which, instead, resists. Like Mary, who stood firm at the foot of the cross. Like the silence of the innocent, when Jesus did not speak while they were judging him. His silence was the best argument. His death was not necessary to “save” the people from a false prophet, but to redeem all humanity, to proclaim that love always wins. His sacrifice, like a slain lamb, is the highest expression of love. And while some try to make a spectacle of his death, others know who to look at. Like the British song Birdy God knows what is hiding in this world of little consequence/Behind the tears, inside the lies because we must let the truth be behind the tears and inside the lie so that one day it will resurface.
Christ is today the people of Palestine, who cry to heaven Father, why have you abandoned us? , while so many Marys stand firm, trying to show the world that even if they ask for their crucifixion, the death of Palestine will also have its moment of glory.
The shed blood is fertile water, it will raise up the heart of man. For Jesus did not die forever. He was resurrected on the third day to show that evil cannot overcome permanent good.
There is something that moves me about the Christian story, that Jesus, knowing what was waiting for him, chose to die there, in his land, with his executioners. He did not run away from death. He did not avoid evil. He faced it. Good, though we may not always see it, never ceases to win. It reminds me of the poem I just want to be in the bosom of the Palestinian poet Fadwa Tuqan who begins I just want to die on my land/ Let me be buried in it.
I am convinced that the third day of Palestine will come. And we will witness how our humanity is redeemed. The resurrection of one people does not imply the death of another, as many claim. On the contrary, life, when it is true, rips off the blindfold and unmasks the power that convinces that the other is evil. The good, in its silence and in its presence, shows us that the other is always a good. Because the heart of the human being is the same in each one of us. And when a child is killed or a family is taken from their land, they are doing it to themselves.
The day that people are resurrected will be the day when we no longer point a gun at another human being, but instead approach each other with the power of an embrace, with the urgency of affection. Tenderness is urgent, as when Pope Francis saw an Israeli and a Palestinian hugging each other, he said: They had the courage to hug. It’s not a gesture without pain. That hug is a project for the future. David Bowie sings in Five Years the story that we are on the verge of the end of the world where only five years remain. In that state of shock, in the same state of today as we see the world falling to misery, he begins to observe with a new tenderness all the people the fat-skinny people, the nobody and the somebody. And in that contemplation I never thought I’d need so many people understand that to redeem is a look again to all, to those who are someone and to those who are nobody. Humanity, in its diversity and complete fragility is the only thing that deserves to be saved.
We still live on Calvary. But we know that future will come. Resurrection Sunday must come. Please let Good Friday end. And the promise be fulfilled. Let us not leave them alone, lest the lament of God be overcome because you have forsaken me.
I ONLY WANT TO BE IN YOUR BOSOM of Fadwa Tuqan (Nablus - Palestine)
I just want to die in my land,
Let me be buried in it,
Melt me and fade in their fertility
To resurrect being grass in my land,
Resurrecting as a flower
That a grown-up child is born
In my country.
I just want to be in the bosom of my homeland
Being earth
Grass
Or flower
Felipe Román, Lawyer and poet. Author of the interview with Julio Más Alcaraz on "Ser multitud" published in Palestine.com
