On Jan. 23, 1944, Allied bombs dropped on the Franciscan church outside Siena, Italy, shattering the 500-year-old wooden crucifix within. The bombing’s survivors, struck by shock and grief, began digging through the rubble. In the midst of the destruction, they made a discovery: the crucifix’s sculptor had hidden two tiny parchments inside his masterpiece. One he nailed inside the head of Christ, the other inside the knee. These were texts he surely never expected to be seen by human eyes, and yet now the fragments of wood yielded them up. They are intimate prayers addressing God, Mary, various saints, and, eventually, “all saints,” asking their prayers, again and again, for mercy on his soul, his family, and all humanity.
“Spes non confundit”: hope does not disappoint. Pope Francis chose this title for his formal proclamation of the Jubilee Year 2025. It is St. Paul’s encouragement to the Romans (5:5); the Greek original can also mean, “hope does not let us down” or “hope does not cause us to be ashamed.” There are many things in which we can place our trust that do eventually disappoint or shame us — when we trust in our own abilities, for example, or in wealth or influence. Sometimes even our family or friends let us down. We end up being mortified that we counted on these things, because they were not as trustworthy as we believed them to be.
Hope is certain. Hope will never let us down, because when we hope, we hope in God, who is all loving and all powerful. Lando di Pietro, as he worked in his studio in 1338, carving his almost life-sized wooden crucifix, knew this. His prayers place hope in the Cross, which he endeavored — with moving success — to portray in a lifelike way. He asks the Cross itself to commend him to God. He asks Mary to ask the Cross of the “sweet son of God, Jesus Christ” to commend him to God. His prayers to each of the saints — John the Evangelist, John the Baptist, Mary Magdalene, all saints — follow this same pattern.
Unfortunately, Lando’s creation did not survive man’s inhumanity to man — although what remains of Christ’s face is recognizable, gentle, and beautiful and can perhaps speak more eloquently now than before its disfigurement. But it is hope, embodied in the prayers Lando placed within, that always survives. Hope in Christ’s Cross unites Lando with Christians living centuries after Lando’s death. Lando’s hope, we pray, was realized in heaven, as ours will be. Hope does not disappoint. In the words of a hymn that predates Lando by another 800 years: Hail Cross, our only Hope.
Sr. Maria Veritas Marks, OP, is a member of the Ann Arbor-based Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist.
