The Mystery of the Crown of Thorns

It is good that the author of this remarkable work should remain anonymous. Laurels of praise would have sharply contrasted with the crown of thorns he so cherished. At the start of the holy season of Lent, out of devotion to our exemplar Jesus Christ, who endured for our education the first quadragesium of prayer and fasting, ashes are placed on our foreheads so that we might remember not only the clay from whence we came, but also, the dust into which we shall return. Smeared with the blessed ashes, the thumb of Christ s minister draws the cross above our eyes that it might be, as it were, like the Ten Commandments of the Law, written forever before our spiritual gaze as was the latter by the command of God as it is written in the book of Deuteronomy. Contemplating the holy face on the Shroud of Turin, one sees a deep wound on the forehead of our savior where one of the many thorns of his cruel crown punctured that very spot above his eyes where those members of his Church are marked who enter rightly into the penitential season. From the many figures of that spiny diadem in the old testament, to the reality of the instrument of torture beaten into the head of the son of God amidst insults and spittle, this terrible book, unforgettable in its endearing pathos, will help us to understand something of the true ugliness of sin and the awesome price that the Just One had to pay in conquering it.

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