I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. —1 Corinthians 2:2
In a world demanding eloquence and wisdom, Paul preaches nothing but the folly of the Cross, the triumph of Love, Christ and Him Crucified. As a Holy Cross religious, his words convict me. Do I preach not only with my words but with my life the One to whom I have vowed to conform myself? Do I seek to be wise and eloquent, or do I strive to conform myself to Christ crucified and risen, recognizing Him in the people I serve?
In his Meditations, Fr. Moreau called his religious community to be “Other Christs,” to be so united with Him that in our lives we make His life manifest to all. We are not meant to be the most eloquent preachers or the wisest administrators. We are to be a family that bears the Face of Christ to the world while learning to find Him there.
That family’s name tells you who we are and Whom we are about. As a novice I recall a conference wherein one of our brothers spoke to us as to the origin of our community’s name. Moreau named us as the Congregation OF Holy Cross, not the Congregation OF THE Holy Cross. Founded in Le Mans, France, the Congregation took on the name of the neighborhood where it served, Sainte-Croix.
I serve the parish of Sts. Casimir and Adalbert on the West Side of South Bend. Had Moreau founded our religious family there we could just as easily have been the Congregation of the West Side. He chose our name deliberately. Holy Cross as a family was to be one that embraced our neighbor, in whom we saw the One we preached. Taking the name “Holy Cross” for Sainte-Croix is not meant to put neighborhood and Cross as an opposed dichotomy. Instead, Providence names us for both God’s holy people and for God’s salvific action, revealing the heart of our mission.
The face of every human being who suffers is for us the face of Jesus who mounted the cross to take the sting out of death. —Constitutions of the Congregation of Holy Cross 8.114
In my ministry to preach Jesus Christ and His Cross do I see in those I serve the face of the One I preach? Do I see Jesus incarnate in His Body the Church? Is the kindergartener in the school line, the young woman in crisis, the belligerent neighbor, and the construction worker fixing our roof for me the face of Jesus? When I gaze at the Cross do I see my parishioners? The Cross and God’s people are joined. The hard work of parish life is a living out in a small way the Passion of Christ. The joy of lives touched and renewed is a glimpse of Easter’s first light. To discover within the inevitable suffering of pastoral ministry the gift and joy of Christ’s life incarnate is what marks me as a Holy Cross religious.
To preach Jesus Christ and Him Crucified is to have before me always the Cross, not just in the theological abstract but in the people that I serve. Christ calls me to this great work of Resurrection not primarily as a competent administrator or a great speaker but as one who embraces Him and His Cross present in His people. God’s face endures, not in one Man but eternally in all those joined to Him by Baptism. My ministry, my life, must be about Him and the ones for whom He gave up His life.
I am with them and for them. Mine is a task to embrace God’s people as they truly are, with their joys, hopes, griefs, and anxieties. As a Holy Cross religious and parish priest, each day I must embrace the Cross concretely present in my flock and resolve to know nothing in them but Christ and Him Crucified.
Fr. Felipe Campos, C.S.C.
Provided by Vocations Office, March 4, 2026
