Early Good Friday morning, as my husband and I scrambled to pack up our kids, the sound equipment, sheet music, Easter posters and booklets—the cross—don’t forget the cross!-- I had begun the day with a list of regrets and self-recriminations running through my mind—“…we should have advertised more here and here and that parish over there…”, “...x, y and z should have been delegated to so and so,” “there will be so few of us this year…it’s -12 C.”

All of this negativity was compounded by an earlier disappointment from a couple of weeks previous—my teenage son, Andre, who has always willingly helped us organize the Way of the Cross—including carrying the Cross—informed me that this year he had offered to help with the Stations of the Cross at our parish, instead of coming to the Way of the Cross downtown. Not the usual parent-of-a-teenager problem—how could I complain that he was willingly assisting at our parish?! I expressed my sadness about our son’s upcoming absence at “our” Way of the Cross to my husband, Louis—to which he firmly replied, “Andre needs to decide what is important for his life—we can’t dictate that to him.” Deep down I agreed and knew this to be true…and yet, I couldn’t help but acknowledge my sadness that this would be the first time he wouldn’t be with us at our downtown Way of the Cross.

Another worry (I was beginning to feel like Martha from the Gospel—distracted and worried by many things)—the previous year there was a group of about five of our ten-to-eleven-year-old boys who had not been terribly attentive—or silent—during the Way of the Cross. Would they behave this year? Would they at least be quiet? Our friend Laura and I had discussed the possibility of them perhaps taking turns carrying the Cross—one boy for each of our five stops. At this point it almost seemed a necessity now that our older, more useful, teenage son had decided he couldn’t come!

Everything in the car. All the kids. The cross. The music binders. The pitch pipe. The posters. We should have left earlier….regret, regret, regret. Worry, worry, worry.

We arrived. And there were people…and not just a few people. Not only our little rag tag Edmonton CL bunch, but other friends. Actually—many friends. Two families from Calgary had also made the three hour drive that morning to come for a 10 am start! Including Renata who showed up with her camera and ended up being the photographer God provided—another item we had forgotten to organize!
A few unfamiliar faces. We set up…the previously rambunctious boys were silent and focused and attentive. They were eager and ready to carry the Cross from place to place. And then… running across the plaza came our teenage son, Andre! I was truly surprised…actually, overjoyed to see him—he said that the parish Stations of the Cross had finished early so he had decided to come—he didn’t really want to miss the downtown Way of the Cross!
This was all a moment of profound recognition for me that this was clearly not “our project.” It was as if the meager offerings of our attempts, failures, disorganization, worries and regrets were the two small loaves and fish that Another had taken and transformed into a beautiful gesture completely beyond us. Despite the fact that I had been, like Martha, distracted and worried about “many things”—only one thing was necessary—it was His presence that was the overwhelming fact and reality of this gesture. Multiplied beyond any of our limits and measures.

Colleen, Edmonton, AB