Scourging at the Pillar

(photo credit)

Chartres Cathedral Stained Glass, France
Passion of Christ Window (c.1150): Scourging

PILATE, perceiving the obstinacy of the people in requiring that Jesus should be crucified, sentenced Him, in the first place, to the shameful punishment of scourging, and consigned Him to the hands of the soldiers, that his orders might be executed.

Jesus is scourged, for no crime of His own, but to expiate, in His innocent flesh, those sins of impurity with which you have so often defiled your body. Contemplate Jesus at the pillar, bleeding and lacerated from head to foot, and learn hence all that your sins of impurity have cost Him. Beseech Him to cleanse all the stains of your soul with His Divine Blood.