The Cosmic Cross

Doctrinal reflection

Christ is missing from the cross.

The apse of Sant'Apollinare in Classe is filled with a starry blue dome. At the center is a large gemmed cross. At the cross's intersection, where you would expect to see Christ's body, there is only a tiny disc with a small bust of Christ — almost lost in the brightness of the cross itself. The cross has become him. The cross IS him.

This is a 6th-century Italian working of a doctrine the Eastern church understood and the modern church too often forgets: the cross is not separable from the Christ. It is not an event he passed through. It is the form he is. When you see the cross, you see him.

Above the cross, the hand of God descends from clouds. To one side: Moses. To the other: Elijah. Three sheep below the cross — Peter, James, and John. The apse is staging the Transfiguration of Matthew 17 in cosmic mode. But it is also staging Matthew 24:30: "And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven... and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory." The Patristic reading of "the sign of the Son of man" is that it is the cross. The Classe apse is preparing you to recognize him when he comes back — by the cross.

The hand from the cloud is doing triple duty. The Father spoke at the Transfiguration: "This is my beloved Son" (Matt 17:5). The Father will speak at the parousia: "every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him" (Rev 1:7). The Classe mosaicists collapsed the moments. One cloud. One Father. One Son who goes up with clouds and will come back the same way.

When you preach the return of Christ, preach the cross with him. He is not coming back without it. The wood that killed him will be the standard he carries.

The Lamb of God still bears his marks. Forever.