Today we celebrate the centre of human history, the climax of God's self-giving to his most favoured creature - the human species. Omnipresent God has all through history made his presence felt by signs: fire, cloud, wind, thunder. One day a child was born and grew up like any other child. When he became an adult, the Father pointed to him and said: THIS IS MY BELOVED SON. That simple! Now He is one of us! Still more, to be one of us, the Son had to experience all human miseries, sin excluded, and death was the last misery. Any death? An execution on the cross, a torment reserved for major criminals, for slaves, for barbarians, enemies of the Empire. As a man, He represents the whole human race.

As Son of God, He brings an infinite value to this gesture of atonement for His fellow humans, and bridges the gap existing between Heaven and Earth since original sin. Only a God-Man could achieve this result. Today we venerate the cross, as the instrument of our Salvation. Today, in our liturgy, we have the boldness to pray solemnly for ten or more intentions; what can the Father refuse us, a Father who has sacrificed his Son for our Salvation? Today there is no Consecration, out of respect for the reality we recall at the Eucharist.