Station 13: Jesus is taken down from the Cross

Now there was a man named Joseph of Arimathea…This man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.  Then he took it down and wrapped it in a linen shroud.
                                                                                    Luke 23:50a, 52 – 53a
Reflection:    The soldiers, the religious leaders, and other onlookers have drifted away.  The circus is over!  The legs of the thieves who were crucified with Jesus have been broken.  The side of Jesus has been pierced with a lance.  Mary, John, and the women still stand there.  Who will help them?
 
It is a man named Joseph who comes up that hill.  He respectfully tells Mary that he has made all the arrangements for the burial.  The body is lifted from the cross, and laid in the arms of Mary.  For a few moments Mary is young again, a new mother receiving from Joseph the newborn child.  She closes her eyes and softly hums a lullaby, gently rocking the body of her dead son.
There is another mother and another son who stand a little ways off, respectful of Mary’s grief, wanting to offer sympathy.  They are from Naim.  She is remembering the day when she held her dead son, and how Jesus came through the city gates as the funeral cortege made its way to the burial grounds.  And Jesus had seen her desolation, a widow whose only son had died.  He had given that son back to her alive.  But there is no Jesus here to give a dead son back to his mother.  The death of Jesus is her grief, too.
 
Mary opens her eyes, and accepts the help of Joseph as the body of Jesus is laid out.  The women help Mary wash the blood, the dirt, the dried spittle from the body of Jesus.  Then they swaddle Jesus in the long strip of winding cloth that Joseph has provided for a shroud.
 
Let us each remember a woman of our own times who has lost a child, who has held a dead child, or who only knows that in some unknown place her child lays dead…She may be a woman in Central America, in the Mideast, in our large city ghettos, in our neighborhood, or in our faith community.  Let us stand in solidarity, and offer our own prayer of compassion and consolation for her.
 
Prayer:          Were you there when they laid him in the tomb?
                        Were you there when they laid him in the tomb?
                        Oh sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.
                        Were you there when they laid him in the tomb?
 
Our Father, who art in heaven; hallowed by Thy name.  Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.  Amen.
 
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.  Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb Jesus.  Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death, AMEN.
 
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end, AMEN.
 
Jesus Christ crucified, have mercy on us.