The Crucified Peoples of Today
On Good Friday, we pause to remember the crucifixion of Jesus by the Roman Empire.
Commonly carried out on hilltops for all to witness, crucifixion was a brutal and public form of execution. The Romans used it as a tool of terror — to shame, humiliate, and dehumanize those deemed disposable or dangerous: resistance fighters, insurrectionists, enslaved people, and threats to the state.
Jesus was a clear threat to the state.
He led a movement of poor peasants, women, orphans, fishermen, and day laborers — and even drew in the oppressors — grounded in nonviolent resistance, love, dignity, and radical solidarity. This movement challenged the very foundations of an imperial world built on domination and exclusion.
So the empire did what empires do: it tried to silence the movement by making an example of its leader.
Jesuit theologian Jon Sobrino speaks powerfully of the “Crucified Peoples of Today” — the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized — those who, like Jesus, still bear the weight of injustice and violence.
They are the children at the border, the victims of genocide, the people of color who endure systemic racism, those unjustly and illegally deported, the exploited worker, the unhoused neighbor.
They are the ones still carrying the cross — today.
Good Friday is not just a memory. It is a mirror. It reflects the ongoing crucifixions in our world — and it asks us: Where do we stand?
As Catholics and Christians, we are not called to be bystanders at the foot of the cross.
We are called to respond:
To walk in solidarity with those who suffer
To challenge the systems that create inequality
To bring compassion, truth, and justice wherever we are
The Cross is not the end of the story. But we cannot rush past it. We must dwell on this day and ritualize the lamentations brewing in our hearts and souls.
Let this day sharpen our vision to see Jesus in the suffering of our world — and move us to recommit ourselves as a Resurrected People: walking forward with courage, love, and action.
May this Good Friday open our eyes, break our hearts, and strengthen our resolve to follow Jesus, not only to Calvary, but into the lives of the crucified peoples of today.
By Joanna Arellano-Gonzalez, Good Friday 2025
