Pope Benedict XVI holds the cross as he leads the traditional Via Crucis (Way of the Cross) Good Friday service at Rome’s ancient Colosseum April 14, 2006.


This taken from:
OFFICE FOR THE LITURGICAL CELEBRATIONS
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF .
WAY OF THE CROSS
AT THE COLOSSEUM
LED BY THE HOLY FATHER
POPE BENEDICT XVI
GOOD FRIDAY 2006
MEDITATIONS AND PRAYERS
COMPOSED BY
Archbishop ANGELO COMASTRI
Vicar General of His Holiness for Vatican City
President of the Fabric of Saint Peter’s
THIRD STATION:
Lord,
we have lost our sense of sin!
Today a slick campaign of propaganda
is spreading an inane apologia of evil,
a senseless cult of Satan,
a mindless desire for transgression,
a dishonest and frivolous freedom,
exalting impulsiveness, immorality and selfishness
as if they were new heights of sophistication.
Lord Jesus,
open our eyes:
let us see the filth around us
and recognize it for what it is,
so that a single tear of sorrow
can restore us to purity of heart
and the breadth of true freedom.
Open our eyes,
Lord, Jesus!
FIFTH STATION:
Lord Jesus,
love is fading away,
and our world is becoming cold,
inhospitable, intolerable.
Shatter the chains that hold us back
from reaching out to others.
Help us, through love, to find ourselves.
Lord Jesus,
our affluence is making us less human,
our entertainment has become a drug, a source of alienation,
and our society’s incessant, tedious message
is an invitation to die of selfishness.
Lord Jesus,
rekindle within us the spark of humanity
that God placed in our hearts at the dawn of creation.
Free us from our decadent narcissism,
and we will find new joy in life
and burst into joyful song.
SEVENTH STATION:
Our arrogance, our violence, our injustices
all press down upon the body of Christ.
They weigh upon him … and he falls a second time,
to show us the unbearable burden
of our sins.
But what is it that today, in particular,
strikes at Christ’s holy body?
Surely God is deeply pained
by the attack on the family.
Today we seem to be witnessing
a kind of anti-Genesis,
a counter-plan, a diabolical pride
aimed at eliminating the family.
There is a move to reinvent mankind,
to modify the very grammar of life
as planned and willed by God.
But, to take God’s place, without being God,
is insane arrogance,
a risky and dangerous venture.
May Christ’s fall open our eyes
to see once more the beautiful face,
the true face, the holy face of the family.
The face of the family
which all of us need.