Growing up Roman Catholic, from an early age I saw many images of Jesus on the cross— on candles, prayer cards, and church statues. I recall being discomforted by the image of Christ wearing a crown of thorns, with blood running down his face.

The cross, we must remember, was an instrument of execution. But on Holy Cross Day, a day that our Christian tradition has observed since the fourth century, I’m forced to think about how to celebrate this instrument. For me, it’s less about the cross itself and more about what happened in spite of the cross. Despite the terrible death Christ faced on the cross, we have life through the resurrection. The cross itself transforms from an object of death to a marker of Christ’s love and life.

How do we boast of this cross of love today? In the Episcopalian baptismal rite, we say these words as the newly baptized is marked with the sign of the cross: “You are sealed by the Holy Spirit…and marked as Christ’s own for ever.” When we see or make the sign of the cross, may we be reminded that we always carry Christ’s love within us.