The Holy Face in the Way of the Cross VI-A holy woman wipes the Face of Jesus

(The sixth in a series of posts praying the Stations of the Cross...begin here and then follow along each day.)

 

No less a symbol than Simon of Cyrene, as well as more admirable, is the holy woman whom we call Veronica.  Breaking through the crowd of morbid, curious people, unmindful of rabble jeers or soldier brawn, this holy woman-representative of the more generous lovers of Jesus-threw herself at the feet of the suffering Master and rising, offered her veil to wipe from His Sacred Face the Blood of Divine Love and the spittle of human hate.

Jesus, How swift, how gracious Your recognition of Veronica's heroic action!  Upon her veil You left an image of Your outraged Face, and thus sanctioned for all time devotion thereto.

Sorrowful Mother, lift my soul as a Veronica's veil to the outraged Face of Jesus.  Beg him to leave thereon the image of His Holiness and Beauty so clearly impressed that the beauty of creatures may not draw me from my allegiance to the beauty of Christ.

(From The Holy Face in the Way of the Cross with etchings by Hippolyte Lazerges and reflections by  Father Page, C.S.C. aka Fr. Gerald Fitzgerald, sP, the founder of the Handmaids of the Precious Blood, published by the St. Columban's Fathers Foreign Mission Society)