The Cross

Last night,  Friday September 14, 2018, the Melkite Catholic parish in Toronto celebrated "The Exaltation of the Cross." The elaborate Mass was presided over by the Pastor Fr. Ibrahim El-Haddad and his Assistant Pastors, Fr. Michel Chalhoub, and Fr. Youhanna Hanna and served by the renowned Homsy choir. The Gospel's reading reminded me by a lecture given in September 2008 by Fr. Georges Farah, Ph.D. on the dialogue of Pilate with Jesus before his crucifixion. The comment by Fr. Farah applies to us today. The reader may wish to read the lecture here: https://todayquestions.blogspot.com/2008/09/georges-farah-on-exaltation-of-cross_14.html
The illumination of fire is a tradition which to-date is followed by the faithful in Lebanon. The reason of illuminating mountains with fire on this day is precisely that fire used to be the fastest way of communication between different locations and mountains in the empire. Horses, which were then the fastest method of communication, would take weeks or months to transport messages. Christian leaders understood the message since they had agreed on it generation after generation.
In his book "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind", a Professor of history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and holder of a doctorate from the University of Oxford, Yuval Noah Harari shows how the first homo sapiens evolved and challenged by their intelligence other forms of animals, building primitive cultures in Africa and eventually moving to Eurasia. The "imagination" of homo sapiens distinguished them with respect to other animals, but above all allowed them to develop social connections to live together and conquer the known world. Primitive religions unified people to worship deities.
Now we continue with history: Kings made themselves gods to control the rest of their tribes, which created a class of priests that assist them. This is found in ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Babylon. In Rome the emperor claimed to be a god, The Greeks worshiped many gods; one for each star...
However, the Hebrews believed in one God who revealed himself to Abraham and ordered him to leave Ur in Babylon. When Abraham had to go to Egypt due to a famine in Palestine, the Hebrews mixed with the Egyptians until Moses, resisted by his Israelite people, led them out across the Red Sea according to the Old Testament.
In his homilies, the Jesuit scholar, Fr. Henri Boulad says that Christ who started a revolution of love in Judea is the axis of history. Jesus Christ was a man who equated himself to God the Father and was crucified by the chief priests because of  "blasphemy". Christians believe that Christ rose from the dead and ascended to heaven (or rather brought heaven to earth). Following his commands to the Apostles they went preaching in his name to the known world.
Today we seem to have forgotten the cross of Christ. Atheism is rampant while most Christians hardly go to Church and receive Christ in the Eucharistic meal. Pilate seems to still ask sarcastically "What is Truth?"