Exaltation of the Cross: Scripture, History, and Faith | Sept 14, 2025
Readings and Virtual Homily for September 14, 2025, Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross; In Love With the Cape; A Major Mass at O'Dowd
Readings for Mass this Sunday:
Numbers 21;4-9
Psalm 78:1-2, 34-38
Philippians 2:5-11
John 3:13-17
Dear Friends and Family,
This Sunday's readings all line up around a common theme because September 14 is one of those rare feast days that is observed on a Sunday. The feast is that of the Exaltation of the Cross. I want to consider briefly each of the readings, before diving into a bit of the history of this feast day, as it is rich and colorful, and it involves one of my all-time favorite saints, Helena, the mother of Constantine and the first Christian Roman empress.
The reading from the Book of Numbers tells of the episode in which poisonous serpents came into the camp, biting many of the Israelites and causing their deaths. The people acknowledged that they were being punished for their rebelliousness and begged Moses for intercession. Moses had a bronze serpent made and lifted above the camp, and whenever someone who had been bitten looked at it, he or she was healed (vs. 7-9). The contemporary medical image of a serpent on a pole borrows directly from this passage.
This story of course foreshadows the crucifixion, when the Son of Man, as Jesus tells Nicodemus in the Gospel, will be "lifted up" and all people will be able to draw near and be healed (vs. 14-15). The psalm also recounts the rebelliousness of Israel in the desert, and reminds us of God's abundant mercy (vs. 38). And the passage from Philippians at once gives us an exalted Christology (vss. 6, 9. 11)) and at the same time reminds us of the way that God chose to redeem sinful humanity -- by the lifting up of the God Man on the cross (vs. 8).
This feast (the Exaltation of the Cross) is deeply historical. It is not just a commemoration of the Lord's saving passion. The feast is directly tied to the discovery of the cross by St. Helena in the 320s. There is quite a bit in the way of legend surrounding Helena's discovery, but there is no good reason to dismiss the story out of hand as mere saintly lore.
It is historical fact that Helena left Constantinople (the new seat of the empire under her son Constantine) for the Holy Land about the year 326. Helena is thought to have been born in 247; if we have her birth date right, that would have made her 78 or 79, when she undertook her journey to the Holy Land. (And there is some evidence, as well, that this may not have been Helena's first trip to Palestine, but that is beyond the scope of today's homily.)
It is reliably established as well that, whether or not the 326 trip was her first to Jerusalem, it was the empress' last. She did not return to Constantinople. There is a fascinating history attached to the empress' decision to leave the capital and never return. I may write a book about it someday. What matters here is that the first Christian Roman empress chose, late in her seventies, to go to the land where Jesus had walked, and to stay there the rest of her life.
Helena was, of course, greeted with much joy by the Christian community in Palestine (and by this time, the area was overwhelmingly Christian). Locals took her to the places of Jesus' life and ministry -- three hundred years after the fact, these places were still known to the people of Christian Palestine. There is good reason to trust that we have got a lot of these places right. Just to draw a parallel...
I was just this past week in Massachusetts and saw, among other things, Plymouth Rock. 1621 is now four hundred years ago, but we know where the pilgrims landed. Less time than that had transpired from the events of Jesus' life and the arrival of Helena in Jerusalem. Tour guides today will tell you just how sure, or in some cases, not sure, we are, with regard to the sacred sites -- from the Church of the Annunciation to Holy Sepulchre (which actually houses the rock -- not really a hill -- of Calvary). We may thank Saint Helena for what we know of the sites of pilgrimage in the Holy Land.
In any event, Helena appears to have discovered the true cross -- that is, the upright, permanently placed post, not the crossbeam Jesus carried. It is legend (that does not mean it is not true, only that it cannot be verified) that this large piece of wood was immediately associated with miracles of healing; that is how Helena was able to identify it (as opposed to other uprights standing, that is, lying, in the same location). Legend again tells us that the empress had the cross sent to Rome. From there, the story goes viral, so to speak. There would in time be so many claims that "this is a piece of the true cross discovered by St. Helena" that you could construct the Titanic with them.
Leaving that aside, the point here is that we know what we know about the holy sites in Jerusalem and throughout modern-day Israel and Palestine because St. Helena, the first Christian pilgrim, took it upon herself to travel to the Holy Land and stay there for years, stay there until her death. The last Roman coins struck with her image, or anyway, the last that we are aware of, date to the year 332. It is reasonable to assume then that Helena was alive at the start of that year, but died before 333. Her tomb is in the Vatican; at some point (and this part of the story I do not know) the Christian community in Jerusalem returned Helena's body to Rome.
Just some of the historical background surrounding today's feast, the Exaltation of the Cross.
As you are aware from my last e-mail, I was in Boston most of the past week, visiting with friends who are like family to me, and connecting with their parish community in the Charlestown district, a parish community with which I am beginning to feel very much at home.
It would have been a great trip had we simply hung out in Boston all week -- along with New Orleans and Chicago, Boston is one of my favorite outside-of-California American cities. It is rich in history and culture; it is spectacularly situated on its bay and rivers; and it reminds me of San Francisco, more than any other American city, for its dynamism, its vibrant neighborhoods, its diversity, its deep associations with the sea, with ships and with waves of immigrants from many nations. We might easily, as I say, have stayed in Boston all six days and not come close to running out of things to do.
But this trip to Boston -- I have lost count how many times I have been there; this may have been the eighteenth or twentieth time -- my friends and I actually got out of town for two days, and I discovered the Cape. I've been north of Boston many times -- to places along the North Shore like Marblehead, and beyond the state line to Portsmouth, to Portland. And of course I know the Amherst area in the western region of Massachusetts, where my sister Flo lived. But this was my first visit to Cape Cod.
Beyond Plymouth, which technically is not on the Cape, we visited Truro Vineyards (I had no idea there were wineries on the Cape). We visited Chatham (maybe my favorite), Hyannis and Hyannis Port, Provincetown. We spent the night in Provincetown -- right at the tip of the Cape. The weather was near-perfect; sunny, breezy, in the seventies and not at all humid. It was a great adventure, and I am really grateful to my Boston hosts for having so generously provided me with it. I plan to return.
I got home from Boston to a day at leisure Wednesday (ahhh...sabbatical charms) and then to a fifteen-hour Thursday, starting with Mass in the parish, followed by a big Mass at O'Dowd, followed by meetings for San Gabriel Media, followed by Adoration and confessions in the parish that evening, followed by getting to work on this homily (which, however, I am finishing Friday morning).
There have been many days this summer that reflect the happy fact that I am on sabbatical. This past Thursday was not among them. But that is no complaint. The Mass at the high school was our first campus-wide Mass of the new academic year, the Mass of the Holy Spirit. It was great to be on the altar before my school community for such an important liturgy.
I did my best to reassure the Class of 2026 that I love them as much as I did love 2025 or do love 2027 -- it is the first half of their senior year, after all, that I will largely be missing this fall. I hope my presence at the Mass reassured them; and in any event they will be seeing more of me, not just at other big Masses, but at all four of this autumn's retreats. This was all arranged last year, as we were working out the details of the sabbatical. Although Fr. Leo Edgerly is also assigned to the high school, his role is restricted simply because of his many, many other responsibilities in the diocese. There was no way I might fairly ask Leo to handle all the big Masses and the retreats, this autumn. There was, in fact, no way I wanted to absent myself from these joyful times with my students and colleagues. It was wonderful to be with them this week, at the Mass of the Holy Spirit.
Once again I have written us into near-oblivion! Aren't you glad my spoken homilies are so much shorter than these e-mailed ones?!
Hope the late summer is going well for you. Take good care and God bless.
Love,
Fr. Brawn