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I say 'literally'.
If we are amongst those receiving salvation through The Cross of Golgotha,
then we can expect
to have been included amongst those
Christ perceived at Gethsemane.
If we expect to be amongst that number, then why not become conscious of this fact and take a fuller advantage of it?
For example, if we say the Holy Rosary,
why not say it
at Golgotha
before the Cross
which carries our Lord?
Re-presentation of Golgotha
That real-Priest Father Heffernan reminded us years ago, more then once, that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a re-presentation of Christ's Sacrifice.
If we are truly present at Mass therefore we are truly present at Christ's Eternal-sacrifice - somehow.
It is a long quote but it is so delightful that I can not but requote it, here.
PAfter Jesus had with deep emotion gazed upon those citizens of Heaven belonging to former ages,
the angels pointed out to Him
the multitudes of future saints who,
joining their labours
to the merits of His Passion,
would through Him be united
to the Heavenly Father.
This vision was unspeakably beautiful and consoling.
All passed before the Lord
in their number, their race, and various degrees of dignity
all adorned
with their sufferings
and good works.
Then did He behold the hidden and inexhaustible streams of salvation and sanctification that were to spring from the death that awaited Him as Redeemer of mankind. The Apostles, the disciples, virgins and holy women, martyrs, confessors, and hermits, Popes and Bishops,
the future multitudes of religious
men and women
in a word, the immense army
of the blessed
passed before Him.
All were adorned with crowns of victory won over passion and suffering. The flowers of their crowns differed in form, colour, perfume, and vigour in accordance with the various sufferings, labours, and victories in which they had gloriously struggled.
Their whole lives and actions,
the peculiar worth and power
of their combats and victories,
as well as all the light, all the colours
that symbolised their triumphs,
came solely from their union with the merits of Jesus Christ.
The reciprocal influence
and relation of all these saints
upon one another,
their drinking out of one same Fountain,
namely, the Most Blessed Sacrament
and the Passion of the Lord,
was a spectacle
unspeakably wonderful and touching.
Nothing connected with them happened by accident: their works and omissions, their martyrdom and victories, their apparel and appearance,
though all so different,
yet acted upon one another
in unending unity and harmony.
And this perfect unity in the most striking diversity sprang from the rays of light and sparkling colours of one single Sun, from the Passion of the Lord, the Word made Flesh, in whom was life, the light of men, which shone in darkness, but which the darkness did not comprehend.
It was the army of future saints
that passed before the soul of the Lord.
Thus stood the Lord and Saviour
between the ardent desires
of the Patriarchs
and the triumphant host of future saints,
which reciprocally filling up
and completing one another, so to say,
surrounded the loving Heart
of the Redeemer
like an immense crown of victory.
This unspeakably touching spectacle afforded the soul of the Lord, who had allowed all kinds of human suffering to pass over Him,
some strength and consolation.
P (A.C. Emerich p. 105/6)
Jesus perceived these exquisite visions of the future and we can only hope that we were included in that number, in that multitude of men and women;
in that immense crown of victory.
Indeed, not only should we hope and pray for that,
but we MUST do what we do
on the premise
that we were so included
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