Good Friday 2026

​ It’s a perennial question we face this day. We hear the same lessons every year, we go through the same rituals, even though it’s tempting to jump ahead a couple of days so we’re not left standing before a sealed tomb. 
Why? 

I used to spend a lot of time trying to answer the question about why Jesus had to die, especially a cruel death that puts him in the same place as one who is an abomination to God. That’s what Torah says about anyone hanged on a tree. Images of not just three crosses on a hill outside Jerusalem, but those in dark fields and front yards in our own country come to mind as they bear this “strange fruit.” 
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I think I may have answered that question, and it’s not one usually taught in seminary theology classes. However, I think that dependence on those often confusing answers are what leads me to ask it again today. 
Why? 

We’ve been led to believe that the cross of Jesus served as a replacement for the sacrificial offerings made from the time of Abraham up until the destruction of the last Temple in the year 70 CE. Another theory is that his death is a ransom paid to Satan in order for God to purchase humanity back from the clutches of sin. I’ve read that there are anywhere from four to ten theories that try to answer my question, “why,” and, there may be some truth in each one. But frankly, they tend to raise more questions than they answer. 

So, rather than keep chasing that proverbial tail, while ignoring the true nature of the beast it’s attached to, I want to pose it another way. Why, after some 2,000 years, have we found it easier to just repeat the act of crucifixion rather than try to understand and live its atoning possibilities? 

Our world is possibly on the brink of a global conflict brought about because we not only find it easier, but we revel in the short-term successes of crucifixion. Closer to home, we turn a deaf ear or even become defensive because one group or another dares to point out that their lives matter, too, when true sadness comes when we understand and admit why they have to say that so loudly. We relish the possibility of employment gains when prisons and detention centers are built nearby to house those who for some reason are easier to isolate or remove from our community than to find ways to reach out before it’s too late and to teach and share in life’s abundance. 

To top it all off, why do we who wear jewelry in the shape of a cross still not understand the long-term effect of creating more martyrs?
​Maybe it’s because we believe that one cross is sufficient, so long as it’s not our pain or suffering but only for personal gain. Maybe it’s because we believe some of those theories rather than wonder why religion itself sometimes conspires with government power in order to keep pointing out just who ought to hang on those many crosses we continue to create and then turn our backs on because we have other things to do.

Maybe it’s because we have too much invested in kingdoms of death to really believe that in his death, Jesus entered that realm and overturned it once and for all.

There could be many answers, and just as many defenses of their opposites. We’ve been hearing all this for two millennia, but it looks like little in our world has changed since it occurred.
Why?