The paradox of life was well voiced by Caiphas; it is expedient always that one man should die and that the whole people should not perish. How or why such a law should enter into the world we cannot tell, but the existence of it is unquestionable: over and over again one single victim has set a people free. The Old Testament enshrined it in the ritual of the Temple-worship and in the religious practices of the Tabernacle. The scapegoat was little else than this mysterious law consecrated and sanctioned by God. Irrational, incapable of guilt, it was driven into the desert, and there, in solitude, atoned for the sins of the whole nation. This process of vicarious atonement is frequently evident in history, where over and over again we find the death of one man, himself most frequently innocent, being required for the abolition of some injustice or the setting free of some people. The story of the hermit who journeyed to Rome to put an end to the gladiatorial games where human life was sacrificed even in Christian times for the amusement of the populace, and who found no other way to achieve his purpose than by throwing himself into the arena and thus by his death forcing the evil side of such an entertainment on the crowd, is but one instance out of many. The same sort of story or legend can be found in the history of evei y nation, for in the attempts made by a people to throw off the yoke of a tyrant there is always one man who comes forward and at the risk of his own life rescues the lives of his people from their oppression.
In the New Testament the teaching of Christ seems at times to contain little else than this doctrine that, to save life, life must be lost. It is the one consistent principle that explains all the rest itself remaining a mystery above all comprehension: one Man dies that the world may go free. Somehow upon His head are all our sins placed: "He hath borne our iniquities." He took upon Himself the sins of all the world. Nor should it be overlooked that our Lord does not suffer the loss of life because He despises life. It is not as though He surrendered something, the value of which He underestimated, since to give freely away what is of no con sequence to the donor can hardly be considered an act of generosity. He surrendered life just because He put so high a value upon it and realized the responsibilities of it very much more than anyone else has ever done. For Him all the world was full of beauty. No one ever spoke as He has done of the charm of nature, of field flowers and falling sparrows, or the graceful fascination of childhood. He lived more intimately with the deep joys of sheer life, for in Him was life. He died that others might live, just because He knew their need of life, certain that life alone could be of any avail for them. He Himself in one place made the comparison of the mother in labour who put herself in peril that she might set free her child. It was the lesson that better the peril of one than the death of all. It is, therefore, He would seem to show, only with the pangs of death that life can at all begin.
On Calvary, therefore, this teaching received its highest sanction; but its richest expression, as far as we individually are concerned, is evident in the Blessed Sacrament. Daily can I draw upon this unfailing fountain of sacrifice. Let me look upon the daily Mass and the Communion as the living gospel of vicarious suffering. Dying daily for me is Christ, here upon the altar. It is the most eloquent missionary venture of all our Lord's life. To have preached it was, indeed, of great avail, nor will the world willingly let His words die. Men who do not believe Him divine have yet taken His parables as the most expressive utterances on the duty of brotherly love. But His example was even more splendid than His words; for the example of the dead is never so potent as the example of the living. He died, but death did not exhaust the scope of his action, for He rose again, and again acted the same principle. He is sacrificed always for the world, and in the Eucharist puts Himself at the mercy of men. How can I be selfish in my relation to others once I have received within me this Victim of the world's redemption? How can I be unjust in life or even watch in silence the injustice of others, the oppression of the poor, the spiteful persecution of the rich, the revenge of Capital, or the pent passion of Labour? If I go every morning to this sublime sacrifice, it must surely have an influence on my day, the influence of having seen God die. I must take home to my life the saying of Caiphas, and prefer that I should lose all than that all the world be lost, prefer their success to my failure.
- text taken from Meditations for Layfolk by Father Bede Jarrett, O.P.