Celebrating Golgotha

Father Victor D8217;Souza washed my feet last Thursday as 500 men, women and children watched his every gesture in our new...

Father Victor D8217;Souza washed my feet last Thursday as 500 men, women and children watched his every gesture in our new and very beautiful parish of the Blessed Mother Teresa, Saint of the Gutters of Calcutta. With me before the altar were 12 other 8216;apostles8217;, two of them women, chosen democratically by a Biblical draw of lots.

Father Victor washed my feet, dried them with a towel, and then kissed a foot still swollen and puckered in the aftermath of a cardiac procedure. Touching of feet is in tradition, but we do it only if the 8216;Other8217; is an elder, someone big, powerful, upper caste, perhaps. Father Victor, an administrator of the archdiocese of Delhi, is 72. I am touching 60. But in washing my feet, he was just following the example of his Master and mine, Jesus, who did something similar two millennia ago in the city of Jerusalem on an evening when he knew he was to be betrayed, delivered to the rulers, and executed.

Jesus marked mankind8217;s transition from the terrible God of old, who would wipe out evil with a stroke of the sword or tongue of fire, who would demand blood sacrifice. Jesus-God chose to be born of Woman, chose to live among the poor, freely consorted with the occasional thief, the despised harlot who was untouchable but for the moments when someone quenched his lust, and with those with malignant skin. People like us. Jesus chose to be the sacrifice, replacing a multitude of religious diktats with the solitary commandment, 8216;Love one another8217;, as he trudged his way up Golgotha Hill to die on the Cross.

As God incarnate, he could have defied death. He chose not to. In that fleeting moment, he assured me and millions such as I, of eternal life in His Resurrection, the day now marked Easter Sunday, which we just celebrated.

Was Judas destined to betray Jesus? Are human beings prisoners of a God-ordained, steel-jacketed destiny? At every stage of His trials, by Caesar8217;s regent and the devil himself, Jesus made it clear that Man always had the free will to do what his conscience dictated. Judas chose not to do so. Many who rape nuns, kill priests and persecute us also chose not to. It seems difficult, but the days of the Holy Week tell us to use our free will, and forgive, as Jesus did those who nailed him to the wood.