I love sleeping in the day. Opening the blinds and letting all the natural sunlight in makes me feel so secure and warm and content. Too much light? no way, I want all that sun shining in my room.

Christ is called “the Light” by St John who says, and I am paraphrasing, the light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not comprehend it.

Light is a double-edged sword. It can be so amazing and beautiful but it can also be disconcerting. Think about shining a bright light on something. That reveals details that maybe should be left in the dark, so to speak. Shining a bright light in a dark corner, what comes out? vermin of all sorts, spiders, roaches – we know yucky, ugly things hide in the dark.

So you see, when you invite Jesus, the Light, into your life, you are inviting not only light that is beautiful into your life but also the full glare of light on all your dark corners. Scary. It’s frightening because that light is not going to be dulled. You see, Jesus Christ does not submit Himself to our false doctrines about how beautiful I am “in every single way” or “who says you’re not perfect” because, well, in our dark corners we are not beautiful or perfect.

But what is the light of Christ? what is it exactly? It is the cross. It is Christ’s death on the cross. But how is that light? Because in the light of the cross, all our dark corners are revealed. Father, forgive them, Jesus says, they know not what they do. He is speaking of all of us. Our stupidity, anger, mistrust, betrayal, unspeakable cruelty, violence, impurity, scapegoating, all of that is what put Christ on the cross. So on that cross all dysfunction, all darkness is revealed.

Peter says, The author of life came…and you killed him.

But in that cross, we can see our dark corners, and yet, simultaneously, we can see the divine mercy, the love that is God, Jesus Christ, the person, be our forgiver, our link to freedom from the darkness. The only way out of the dark is to go down into the dark with the Suffering One and climb out. On that cross, He, who is Divine Mercy, swallowed up all that darkness and draws us to Himself!

So let the Light, Jesus Christ, be with you and look at that cross – not some cleaned up pretty cross – no, look at the man suffering on the cross and see your darkness there and know there is hope.

So this is my weak restating of an amazing sermon done by Father Robert Barron which is found here.