Our Only Hope: 25 Quotes about the Cross

Today is Good Friday, the day in which we remember the saving passion and death of our Lord Jesus. On the cross, Christ mightily won our salvation, conquering death and destroying the power of sin forever. All our hope of eternal life is founded upon the cross, and this is why we pray, “Ave Crus, Spes Unica! Hail, O Cross, our only hope.”

Around the world, Catholics will gather today to pray and venerate the cross. Here are 15 quotes to help you in meditating on our Lord’s passion.

Quotes

The cross is the school of love.  – St. Maximilian Kolbe

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Mount Calvary is the mount of lovers. All love that does not take its origin from the Savior’s passion is foolish and perilous. Unhappy is love without the Savior’s death. Love and death are so mingled in the Savior’s passion that we cannot have one in our hearts without the other. Upon Calvary, we cannot have life without love, or love without the
Redeemer’s death. – St. Francis de Sales

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Mount Calvary is the academy of love. – St. Francis de Sales

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No one, however weak, is denied a share in the victory of the cross. No one is beyond the help of the prayer of Christ. His prayer brought benefit to the multitude that raged against him. How much more does it bring to those who turn to him in repentance. – St. Leo the Great

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As they were looking on, so we too gaze on his wounds as he hangs. We see his blood as he dies. We see the price offered by the redeemer, touch the scars of his resurrection. He bows his head, as if to kiss you. His heart is made bare open, as it were, in love to you. His arms are extended that he may embrace you. His whole body is displayed for your redemption. Ponder how great these things are. Let all this be rightly weighed in your mind: as he was once fixed to the cross in every part of his body for you, so he may now be fixed in every part of your soul. – St. Augustine

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The death of the Lord our God should not be a cause of shame for us; rather, it should be our greatest hope, our greatest glory. In taking upon himself the death that he found in us, he has most faithfully promised to give us life in him, such as we cannot have of ourselves. – St. Augustine

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God had one son on earth without sin, but never one without suffering.  – St. Augustine

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The passion of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is the hope of glory and a lesson in patience. What may not the hearts of believers promise themselves as the gift of God’s grace, when for their sake God’s only Son, co-eternal with the Father, was not content only to be born as man from human stock but even died at the hands of the men he had created? – St. Augustine

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He died, but he vanquished death; in himself he put an end to what we feared; he took it upon himself and he  vanquished it, as a mighty hunter he captured and slew the lion. – St. Augustine

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How precious the gift of the cross, how splendid to contemplate! In the cross there is no mingling of good and evil, as in the tree of paradise: it is wholly beautiful to behold and good to taste. The fruit of this tree is not death but life, not darkness but light. This tree does not cast us out of paradise, but opens the way for our return. – St. Theodore the Studite

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By nothing else except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ has death been brought low: The sin of our first parent destroyed, hell plundered, resurrection bestowed, the power given us to despise the things of this world, even death itself, the road back to the former blessedness made smooth, the gates of paradise opened, our nature seated at the right hand of God and we made children and heirs of God. By the cross all these things have been set aright…It is a seal that the destroyer may not strike us, a raising up of those who lie fallen, a support for those who stand, a staff for the infirm, a crook for the shepherded, a guide for the wandering,a perfecting of the advanced, salvation for soul and body, a deflector of all evils, a cause of all goods, a destruction of sin, a plant of resurrection, and a tree of eternal life. – St. John Damascene

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Looking to Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. – St. Paul

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But far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. – St. Paul

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For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. – St. Paul

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If you seek patience, you will find no better example than the cross. Great patience occurs in two ways: either when one patiently suffers much, or when one suffers things which one is able to avoid and yet does not avoid. Christ endured much on the cross, and did so patiently, because when he suffered he did not threaten; he was led like a sheep to the slaughter and he did not open his mouth. – St. Thomas Aquinas

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If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. – Jesus Christ

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It is not the finest wood that feeds the fire of Divine love, but the wood of the Cross. – St. Ignatius of Loyola

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The crosses with which our path through life is strewn associate us with Jesus in the mystery of His crucifixion.  – St. John Eudes

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Whenever anything disagreeable or displeasing happens to you, remember Christ crucified and be silent.- St. John of the Cross

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The road is narrow. He who wishes to travel it more easily must cast off all things and use the cross as his cane. In other words, he must be truly resolved to suffer willingly for the love of God in all things. – St. John of the Cross

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O souls! seek a refuge, like pure doves, in the shadow of the crucifix. There mourn the Passion of your divine Spouse, and drawing from your hearts flames of love and rivers of tears, make of them a precious balm with which to anoint the wounds of your Saviour. – St. Paul of the Cross

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The Passion of Christ is the greatest and most stupendous work of Divine Love. The greatest and most overwhelming work of God’s love. – St. Paul of the Cross

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Oh cherished cross! Through thee my most bitter trials are replete with graces! – St. Paul of the Cross

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There is no evil to be faced that Christ does not face with us. There is no enemy that Christ has not already conquered. There is no cross to bear that Christ has not already borne for us, and does not now bear with us. And on the far side of every cross we find the newness of life in the Holy Spirit, that new life which will reach its fulfillment in the resurrection. This is our faith. This is our witness before the world. – St. John Paul II

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Our Savior’s passion raises men and women from the depths, lifts them up from the earth, and sets them in the heights. – St. Maximus of Turin