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The king set the example by prostrating himself at the feet of the monk and receiving from his hands the badge of the cross. "The cross! the cross!" was the response of thousands who crowded about the platform. Queen Eleanor imitated her husband and was followed by such a host of nobles bishops and knights that Bernard tore his garments into strips to supply the enthusiasts with the insignia of their new devotion. Similar scenes were enacted throughout France wherever the saint appeared. Eye witnesses do not hesitate to tell of miracles wrought by his hands emblazoning his mission with the seals of heaven.
--
James Meeker Ludlow, ibid., p.167

 

Bernard of Clairvaux

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Pope Honorius delegated Bernard to preach throughout France and Germany the renewal of the holy war. Drawn as much by the fame of the monk as by the mandates of the king and the Pope, a vast assembly of prelates and nobles gathered at Vézelay in Burgundy. A large platform was erected on a hill outside the city. King and monk stood together, representing the combined will of earth and heaven. The enthusiasm of the assembly of Clermont in 1095, when Peter the Hermit and Urban II launched the first crusade, was matched by the holy fervor inspired by Bernard as he cried, "O ye who listen to me! Hasten to appease the anger of heaven, but no longer implore its goodness by vain complaints. Clothe yourselves in sackcloth, but also cover yourselves with your impenetrable bucklers. The din of arms, the danger, the labors, the fatigues of war, are the penances that God now imposes upon you. Hasten then to expiate your sins by victories over the Infidels, and let the deliverance of the holy places be the reward of your repentance." As in the olden scene, the cry "Deus vult! Deus vult!" rolled over the fields, and was echoed by the voice of the orator: "Cursed be he who does not stain his sword with blood."

 

Bernard of Clairvaux

 

What is the "extraordinary"? It is the love of Jesus Christ himself, love that goes to the cross in suffering obedience. It is the cross. The peculiar feature of Christian life is precisely this cross, a cross enabling Christians to go beyond the world, as it were, thereby granting them victory over the world. Suffering encountered in the love of the one who is crucified — that is the "extraordinary" in Christian existence.
The Extraordinary is without doubt that visible element over which the Father in heaven is praised. It cannot remain hidden; people must see it.

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

 

A fragment comes and lingers from an old Christian hymn, "You've got to cross that lonesome valley." It carries him forward. "You've got to cross it by yourself." It seems a Western hymn that belongs out in Montana.
"No one else can cross it for you," it says. It seems to suggest something beyond. "You've got to cross it by yourself."
He crosses a lonesome valley, out of the mythos, and emerges as if from a dream, seeing that his whole consciousness, the mythos, has been a dream and no one's dream but his own, a dream he must now sustain of his own efforts. Then even "he" disappears and only the dream of himself remains with himself in it.

 

Robert M. Pirsig

 

Prostrate, see Thy cross I grasp,
And Thy pierced feet I clasp;
Gracious Jesus, spurn me not;
On me, with compassion fraught,
Let Thy glances fall.
Thy cross of agony,
My Beloved, look on me;
Turn me wholly unto Thee;
"Be thou whole," say openly:
"I forgive thee all."

 

Bernard of Clairvaux

 

"This is why we call people exes, I guess -- because the paths that cross in the middle end up separating at the end. It's too easy to see an X as a cross-out. It's not, because there's no way to cross out something like that. The X is a diagram of two paths."

 

John Green