Detroit – Reflecting upon Christ’s Passion and death on Good Friday, Christians could focus on any number of details, Archbishop Allen Vigneron said today during services at the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

The one he chose to focus on was the fact that Christ told Peter that the cup he was to drink – Christ’s crucifixion and death – was given to Him by his Father.

“This is his Father’s gift to his Son,” Archbishop Vigneron said in his homily before the veneration of the cross. “Jesus beaten, Jesus slapped, Jesus mocked, Jesus crowned with thorns, Jesus pierced in his hands and feet, Jesus giving up his spirit – all of this is the Father’s gift to Jesus.”

Jesus took this gift, and for the love of his father and for that of the whole Church, he endured his death – receiving his love from the Father in order to do it, the archbishop continued.

“Here today is the disclosure of the very essence of the very being of God,” he said. “The Father loving the Son, the Son returning his Father’s love… the life placed in the Father’s hands would never be lost.”

Witnessing this love gives each Christian their example of how to embrace their own gift, and challenge, from the Lord, he said.

“Each of us has a cup to drink… these are the gifts of our crosses,” Archbishop Vigneron said. “But they’re given to us with the promise that we will find fulfillment and happiness in Jesus Christ.”

He added that each Christian needs to pick up his or her cross, “with the same heart and mind of Jesus.”

Hundreds heard the archbishop’s message as they gathered at Detroit’s mother church for the stations of the cross and veneration. The service was led also by a number of concelebrants, and seminarians led the congregation in song without the aid of instruments.

On Saturday evening at 9 p.m., Archbishop Vigneron will celebrate the Easter Vigil at the cathedral. And at the conclusion of the Sunday 11 a.m. Easter Mass, he will bestow an apostolic blessing on those in attendance at the mother church.