To Save Our Souls!
Jesus’ Great Sufferings,
Death, and Resurrection

Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich

Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich was a German peasant woman who bore the five stigmatic wounds of the Passion of Christ on her hands, feet, and side, as well as the bleeding Crown of Thorns on her head. She was told by Our Lord that her gift of seeing the past, present and future in mystic vision was greater than that possessed by anyone else in history. Born in Germany, on September 8, 1774, she became a nun of the Augustinian Order at Dülmen.  During the last 12 years of her life, she ate no food except Holy Communion, nor took any drink except water, subsisting entirely on the Holy Eucharist, the body of Jesus Christ. From 1802 until her death in 1824, she bore the wounds of the Crown of Thorns and from 1812, the full stigmata of Our Lord, including the wound from the lance and also a cross over her heart.

During the last five years of Sister Emmerich’s life, the day-by-day transcription of her visions and mystical experiences was recorded by Clemens Brentano, poet, literary leader, and friend of Gothe and Görres, who, from the time he met her, abandoned his distinguished career and devoted the rest of his life to this work. The immense mass of notes preserved in his journals forms one of the most extensive case histories of a mystic ever kept and provides the source for all of the material found in this article.

The decree affirming that Anne Catherine Emmerich had lived a life of heroic virtue was promulgated at the Vatican on April 24, 2001. On October 3, 2004, Pope John Paul II beatified her on the basis of her personal sanctity and virtue.

The following article is a condensed version of the great sufferings, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ as told and seen by Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich in great apparitions. Heaven should be the final destiny of all of us! Follow the Way, Truth, and Life of Jesus Christ, Our Lord and Savior. All events in this article took place on Good Friday, the great sufferings and death of Jesus.

The Scourging of Jesus

The Lord was offering no resistance whatever, yet they struck Him with their fists and ropes and with frantic rage dragged Him to the pillar. Jesus shuddered before the pillar. His most afflicted Mother was standing with the holy women in a corner of one of the porches around the square, not far from the scourging place.

Jesus said: “Turn thine eyes from Me!”

I beheld her turning away and sinking into the arms of the holy women who surrounded her.

And now Jesus clasped the pillar in His arms. The executioners, with horrible imprecations and barbarous pulling, fastened His sacred, upraised hands, by means of a wooden peg, behind the iron ring on top. In thus doing, they so stretched His whole body, that His feet, tightly bound below at the base, scarcely touched the ground. Two of the bloodhounds began to tear with their whips the sacred back from head to foot.

Our Lord and Saviour, the Son of God, true God and true Man, quivered and writhed under the strokes of the criminals’ rods. He cried in a suppressed voice, and a clear, sweet-sounding wailing, like a loving prayer under excruciating torture.

Many voices cried out together: “Away with Him! Crucify Him!”

They had been at work about a quarter of an hour when they ceased to strike, and joined two of the others in drinking. Jesus’ body was livid, brown, blue, and red, and entirely covered with swollen cuts. His sacred blood was running down on the ground. He trembled and shuddered. Derision and mockery assailed Him on all sides.

The second pair of scourgers now fell upon Jesus with fresh fury. The swollen welts on Jesus’ sacred body were torn and rent; His blood spurted around so that the arms of His tormentors were sprinkled with it. Jesus moaned and prayed and shuddered in His agony.

The last two scourgers struck Jesus with whips consisting of small chains, or straps, fastened to an iron handle, the ends furnished with iron points, or hooks. They tore off whole pieces of skin and flesh from His ribs. Oh who can describe the awful barbarity of that spectacle!

But those monsters had not yet satiated their cruelty. They loosened the cords that bound Jesus and turned His back to the pillar. They bound him to it. Like furious bloodhounds raged the scourgers with their strokes. One held a slender rod and with it struck the face of Jesus. There was no longer a sound spot on the Lord’s Body.

The terrible scourging had lasted fully three-quarters of an hour when an obscure man, a stranger and relative of that blind Ctesiphon who Jesus had restored to sight, rushed indignantly to the back of the pillar, a sickle-shaped knife in his hand, and cried out: “Hold on! Do not beat the innocent Man to death!”

Mary during the Scourging of Jesus

I saw the Blessed Virgin, during the scourging of our Redeemer, in a state of uninterrupted ecstasy. She saw and suffered in an indescribable manner all that her Son was enduring. Her punishment, her martyrdom, was as inconceivably great as her most holy love. Her eyes were inflamed with weeping.

Jesus crowned with thorns and mocked

Now they dragged Jesus to the stool covered with stones and potsherds, and violently forced His wounded, naked body down upon them. Then they put upon Him the crown of thorns. It was two hands high, thick, and skillfully plaited, with a projecting edge on top. In plaiting the crown, as many of the thorns as possible had been designedly pressed inward.

Next they placed in Jesus’ hand a thick reed with a tufted top. All this was done with mock solemnity, as if they were really crowning Him king. Then they snatched the reed from His hand and with it struck the crown violently, until His eyes filled with blood. They bent the knee before Him, stuck out their tongue at Him, struck and spat in His face, and cried out: “Hail, King of the Jews!” With shouts of mocking laughter, they upset Him along with the stool, in order to force Him violently down upon it again.

The poor Savior. Ah! His thirst was horrible, for He was consumed with the fever of His wounds, the laceration caused by the inhuman scourging. He quivered. The flesh on His sides was in many places torn even to the ribs. His tongue contracted convulsively. Only the sacred Blood trickling down from His head laved, as it were in pity, His parched lips which hung languishingly open. Those horrible monsters turned His mouth into a receptacle for their own disgusting filth.

His blood be upon us!

The trumpet sounded to command attention, for Pilate was going to speak.

He said: “Behold! I bring Him forth to you, that you may know that I find no cause in Him!” He then went up from the assembled multitude, among whom were people from all parts of Palestine, the horrible, the unanimous cry: “His blood be upon us and upon our children!”

For not one moment were the Savior and His Mother angered by all their horrible maltreatment. I see the entire Passion of the Lord under symbols of the most malicious, the most barbarous torments, the basest and most insolent mockery and fury.

But I see Jesus enduring all, till His last gasp, in constant prayer, in constant love for His enemies, and constant supplication for their conversion.

Jesus condemned to death on the cross

Pilate, who was not seeking the truth but a way out of difficulty, now became more undecided than ever.

His conscience reproached him: “Jesus is innocent.”

His wife said: “Jesus is holy.”

His superstition whispered: “He is an enemy of thy gods.”

Through fear he delivered to the Jews the blood of Jesus.

The Sentence of Condemnation

From that moment Pilate spoke no word for nor with Jesus. He began the sentence of condemnation.

“Shall I crucify your King?” said Pilate.

“We have no king but Caesar!” responded the High Priests.

Pilate found the sentence of the High Priests just, and ended with the words: “I also condemn Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, to be nailed to the cross.”

The most afflicted Mother of Jesus, the Son of God, on hearing Pilate’s words became like one in a dying state, for now was the cruel, frightful, ignominious death of her holy and beloved Son and Savior certain. John and the holy women took her away from the scene.

Jesus carries his cross to Golgotha

He was forced to take the heavy beams upon His right shoulder and hold them fast with His right arm. I saw invisible angels helping Him, otherwise He would have been unable to lift the cross from the ground.

The crown of thorns, which it was impossible to leave on during the carrying of the cross, was taken from Christ’s head and placed on the end of a pole, which this lad now carried over his shoulder. The crown of thorns would be put again and pushed down very hard on His head before the Crucifixion, causing many new wounds!

And next came Our Lord and Redeemer, bowed down under the heavy weight of the cross, bruised, torn with scourges, exhausted, and tottering. Since the Last Supper of the preceding evening, without food, drink, and sleep, under continual ill-treatment that might of itself have ended in death, consumed by loss of blood, wounds, fever, thirst, and unutterable interior pain and horror, Jesus walked with tottering steps, His back bent low, His feet naked and bleeding. His face was covered with blood and swellings.

The Most Sorrowful Mother

After falling for the first time, Jesus met the most sorrowful mother. She rushed to Jesus then fell on her knees with her arms around Him.

“My Son!” ㅡ

“My Mother!”

A tall, elegant-looking woman rushed forward to meet the procession. It was Seraphia, the wife of Sirach, one of the members of the Council belonging to the Temple. Owing to her action of this day, she received the name Veronica from vera (true) and icon (picture, or image). She gave her veil to Him which Jesus placed over his face. That veil was kept for showing to the public in St. Peter’s in Rome until 1850, with the distinct image of Christ’s face.

The Crucifixion of Jesus

Upon reaching Calvary for Crucifixion, above the Lord, I frequently saw during the Crucifixion great figures of weeping angels and, in a halo of glory, little angelic faces. I saw similar angels of compassion and consolation hovering above the Blessed Virgin and all others well-disposed to Jesus, strengthening and supporting them.

The Son of Man, trembling in every limb, covered with blood and welts; covered with wounds, some closed, some bleeding; covered with scars and bruises! He still retained the short woolen scapular over His breast and the tunic about His loins. The wool of the scapular was dried fast in His wounds and cemented with blood into the new and deep one made by the heavy cross upon His shoulder. This last wound caused Jesus unspeakable suffering. The scapular was now torn ruthlessly from His frightfully lacerated and swollen breast. His shoulder and back were torn to the bone.

A man, who has run from the city gate and up through the crowd thronging the way, rushed breathless, his garments girded, into the circle among the executioners, and handed Jesus a strip of linen, which He accepted with thanks and wound around Himself.

There was something authoritative in the impetuosity of this benefactor of his Redeemer, obtained from God by the prayer of the Blessed Virgin. With an imperious wave of the hand toward the executioners, he said only the words:

“Allow the poor Man to cover Himself with this!”

And, without further word to any other, hurried away as quickly as he came. It was Jonadab, the nephew of St. Joseph, from the region of Bethlehem. Jonadab’s action was the fulfillment of a prefiguring type, and it was rewarded.

Jesus Nailed to the Cross

Jesus was now stretched on the cross by the executioners, who rudely drew His right hand to the hole for the nail in the right arm of the cross, and tied His wrist fast. One knelt on His sacred breast and held the closing hand flat; another placed the long, thick nail, which had been filed to a sharp point, upon the palm of His sacred hand, and struck furious blows with the iron hammer. A sweet, clear, spasmodic cry of anguish broke from the Lord’s lips, and His blood spurted out upon the arms of the executioners. The Blessed Virgin sobbed in a low voice, but Magdalen was perfectly crazed.

After nailing Our Lord’s right hand, the crucifiers found that His left, which also was fastened to the crosspiece, did not reach to the hole made for the nail, for they had bored a good two inches from the fingertips. They consequently unbound Jesus’ arm from the cross, wound cords around it and, with their feet supported firmly against the cross, pulled it forward until the hand reached the hole. Now, kneeling on the arm and breast of the Lord, they fastened the arm again on the beam and hammered the second nail through the left hand. The blood spurted up and Jesus’ sweet, clear cry of agony sounded above the strokes of the heavy hammer. Both arms had been torn from their sockets, the shoulders were distended and hollow, and at the elbows one could see the disjointed bones.

The Blessed Virgin endured all this torture with Jesus. She was pale as a corpse, and low moans of agony sounded from her lips.

On account of the mistake made in the holes in the crosspiece, the sacred feet of Jesus did not reach even to the block. When the executioners saw this, they gave vent to curses and insults.

“He will not stretch Himself out, but we will help Him!”

Then they tied ropes around the right leg and, with horrible violence and terrible torture to Jesus, pulled the foot down to the block, and tied the leg fast with cords. Jesus’ body was thus most horribly distended. His chest gave way to a cracking sound, and He moaned aloud:

“O God! O God!”

They tied down His arms and His breast also that His hands might not be torn away from the nails. The abdomen was entirely displaced, and it seemed as if the ribs broke away from the breastbone. The suffering was horrible.

With similar violence the left foot was drawn and fastened tightly with cords over the right; the instep was bored with a fine, flathead piercer, much finer than the one used for the hands. Then seizing the most frightful-looking nail of all, which was much longer than the others, they drove it with great effort through the wounded instep of the left foot and that of the right foot resting below. With a cracking sound, it passed through Jesus’ feet into the hole prepared for it in the footblock, and through that again back into the trunk of the cross, one nail passing through both feet. The nailing of the feet was the most horrible of all, on account of the distension of the whole body.

I counted thirty-six strokes of the hammer amid the poor Redeemer’s moans, which sounded to me so sweet, so pure, so clear. Jesus’ moans were purely cries of pain.

The position of the sun at the time of Jesus’ Crucifixion showed it to be about a quarter past twelve, and at the moment the cross was lifted, the trumpet of the Temple resounded. The Paschal lamb has been slaughtered.

Many a hard heart shuddered and thought of John the Baptist’s words:

“Behold the Lamb of God, who hath taken upon Himself the sins of the world!”

Jesus Crucified, the two thieves also.

The terrible concussion caused by the shock when the cross was let fall into the hole prepared for it drove the precious blood in rich streams from Jesus’ thorn-crowned head, and from the wounds of His sacred feet and hands. The blood, now with new force, owing to the loosening of the cords and the upright position, resumed its course. Jesus’ torments were, in consequence, redoubled. For seven minutes He hung in silence as if dead, sunk in an abyss of untold pain. The sacred face, on account of the immense crown, could be uplifted only with unspeakable pain. Jesus’s limbs had been so violently distended, His muscles and torn skin so pitifully stretched, that His bones could be counted one by one.

Dismas, one of the two thieves on either side of Jesus, was that leprous boy who, on Mary’s advice, was washed by his mother in the water used for bathing the Child Jesus and instantly healed by it.

Now Jesus’ hair was almost all torn off, and what was left was matted with blood. His body was wound upon wound, His breast was crushed and there was a cavity visible below it.

And now Jesus, raising His head a little, exclaimed:

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!”

Dismas, was deeply touched at hearing Jesus pray for His enemies. Dismas, the thief on the right, received by virtue of Jesus’ prayer an interior enlightenment. When the Blessed Virgin came hurrying forward to Jesus, he suddenly remembered that Jesus and His Mother had helped him when a child.

“How is it possible that ye can revile Him when He is praying for you! He has kept silence and patience, He prays for you, and you outrage Him! He is a Prophet! He is our King! He is the Son of God!”

Dismas confessed his crime to Jesus, saying:

“Lord, if Thou dost condemn me, it will be just. But have mercy on me!”

Jesus replied:

“Thou shalt experience My mercy.”

At these words Dismas received the grace of deep contrition, which he indulged for the next quarter of an hour.

The sun obscured. The Second and the Third Words of Jesus on the Cross

The sun was enveloped in fog, and the moon came sweeping up before it from the east. The sky became perfectly dark, and the stars shone out with a reddish gleam. Terror seized upon man and beast.

Dismas said: “Remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!”

Jesus replied to him: “Amen, I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise!”

Jesus, turning His eyes toward John, said to her, His Mother: “Woman, behold this is thy son! He will be thy son more truly than if thou hadst given him birth.”

Then He praised John, and said: “He has always been innocent and full of simple faith. He was never scandalized, excepting when his mother wanted to have him elevated to a high position.” To John, He said: “Behold, this is thy mother!”

So on such an occasion one is not at all surprised to hear Jesus addressing the Blessed Virgin, not as “Mother,” but as “Woman”; for one feels that in this hour in which, by the sacrificial death of the Son of Man, her own Son, the Promise was realized. Mary stood in her dignity as the Woman who was to crush the serpent’s head.

Mary is the Mother of the Eternal Word Incarnate

Now she understood from her dying Son that she was to be the spiritual Mother of another son, in the midst of her grief at parting and still humbly obedient, again pronounced, though in her heart, the words: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord! Be it done to me according to Thy word!” I felt that she took at that moment for her own children all the children of God, all the brethren of Jesus.

I heard these words as if coming from His lips: “We should, by all means, teach the people that Jesus, more keenly than any human being can conceive, endured this pain of utter abandonment, because He was hypostatically united with the Divinity, because He was truly God and man. Being in His Sacred Humanity wholly abandoned by the Father, He felt most perfectly that bereavement, He drained to the dregs the bitter cup of dereliction, He experienced for the time what a soul endures that has lost its God forever.

Toward the third hour, Jesus cried in a loud voice: “Eli, Eli, lamma, sabacthani!” which means: “My God! My God! Why hast Thou forsaken Me!”

When the most afflicted Mother heard the voice of her Son, she could no longer restrain herself. She again pressed forward to the cross, followed by John, Mary Cleophas, Magdalen, and Salome.

Jesus Dies on the Cross

Jesus was now completely exhausted.

With his parched tongue, He uttered the words: “I thirst!”

Jesus spoke: “It is consummated!” and raising His head He cried with a loud voice: “Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit!” The sweet, loud cry rang through Heaven and earth. Then He bowed His head and gave up the ghost! I saw His soul like a luminous phantom descending through the earth near the cross down to the sphere of Limbo. John and the holy women sank, face downward, prostrate on the earth.

The earth quaked and the rock between Him and the thief on His left was rent asunder with a crashing sound. It was consummated! The soul of Our Lord had left the body! A sharp sword of sorrow pierced the hearts of those that loved Him.

“Truly, He is the Son of God!” said Abenadar, who was now a changed being, a man redeemed, after his public homage to the Son of God would no longer remain in the service of His enemies. He turned his horse toward Cassius, the subaltern officer, known under the name Longinus, dismounted, picked up his lance, presented it to him and addressed a few words both to him and the soldiers. Cassius mounted the horse and assumed the command. 

The veil of the Temple was on the instant rent in two, the dead arose from their graves, while mountains and buildings were overturned in many parts of the world.

When the loving Lord of life, by a death full of torture, paid for sinners their debt, as man He commended His soul to His God and Father, and gave His body over to the tomb.

When Jesus’ hands became stiff, His Mother’s eyes grew dim, the paleness of death overspread her countenance, her feet tottered, and she sank to the earth.

When that most loving, that most afflicted Mother arose from the ground, she beheld the Sacred Body of her Son, whom she had conceived by the Holy Spirit, the flesh of her flesh, the bone of her bone, the heart of her heart, the holy vessel formed by the divine overshadowing in her own blessed womb.

She beheld that beloved Son crushed, maltreated, disfigured, and put to death by the hands of those whom He had come in the flesh to restore to grace and life.

Who can conceive the sorrow of the Mother of Jesus, of the Queen of Martyrs!

It was just after 3 p.m. when Jesus expired.

The Earthquake. Apparitions of the Dead in Jerusalem.

About one hundred deceased, belonging to all periods of time, arose in body from their shattered tombs both in Jerusalem and its environs.

I saw that the darkness and earthquake were not confined to Jerusalem and its environs. They extended throughout other regions of the country, yes, even in far distant places they spread terror and destruction.

I saw numerous houses belonging to the Pharisees who had persecuted the Lord most violently, toppling down over wife and child, while they themselves were away at the feast. Nicodemus had gone to buy linen and spices for preparing the body for burial, and he was now waiting for Joseph.

Joseph of Arimathea found Pilate very anxious and perplexed. He begged openly and fearlessly that he might be allowed to take the body of Jesus, the King of the Jews, down from the cross, as he wanted to lay it in his own sepulcher.

The soldiers used iron bars for breaking the bones of malefactors. Dismas moaned feebly, and expired under the torture. He was the first mortal to look again upon His Redeemer.

Cassius, the subaltern officer, afterward known as Longinus, twenty-five, had weak, squinting eyes which often exposed him to the ridicule of his inferiors, and all combined to make of him the fulfiller of a prophecy. His lance, which was shortened by having one section run into another, he drew out to its full length, stuck the point upon it, turned his horse’s head, and drove him boldly up to the narrow space on top of the eminence upon which the cross was planted. There was scarcely room for the animal to turn. Cassius grasped the lance with both hands, and drove it upward with such violence into the hollow, distended right side of the Sacred Body, through the entrails and the heart, that its point opened a little wound in the left breast. When with all his force he drew the blessed lance from the wide wound it had made in the right side of Jesus, a copious stream of blood and water rushed forth and flowed over his up-raised face, bedewing him with grace and salvation. He sprang quickly from his horse, fell upon his knees, struck his breast, and before all present proclaimed aloud his belief in Jesus.

Mary, as if the thrust had transfixed her own heart, felt the sharp point piercing her through and through, fulfilling the prophecy of Simeon when Jesus was just a baby in her arms. Simeon said she would be pierced through by a sword. She sank into the arms of her friends, while Cassius, still on his knees, was loudly confessing the Lord and joyfully praising God. He was enlightened; he now saw plainly and distinctly. The eyes of his body, like those of his soul, were healed and opened.

Cassius had received perfect sight and from the wide opening of Jesus’ right side blood and water was copiously streaming. It fell upon the clean stone, and lay there foaming and bubbling. The friends of Jesus gathered it up with loving care, Mary and Magdalen mingling with it their tears. The executioners meanwhile had received Pilate’s order not to touch the body of Jesus, as he had given it to Joseph of Arimathea for burial.

The soldiers forced out the three nails from Jesus’ hands and feet. Cassius reverently picked up the nails as they fell and laid them down together by the Blessed Virgin. As soon as the Sacred Body was taken down, the men wrapped it in linen from the knees to the waist, and laid it on a sheet in His Mother’s arms which, in anguish of heart and ardent longing were stretched out to receive it.

The Body of Jesus Prepared for Burial

The men gave Mary and Magdalen clear water and fresh sponges, according as required, for the burial preparation.

The Blessed Virgin’s courage and fortitude, in the midst of her inexpressible anguish, were unshaken and so she immediately began earnestly and carefully to wash the Sacred Body and purify it from every trace of ill-usage. With great care she opened the crown of thorns in the back and, with the assistance of others, removed it from Jesus’ head. Some of the thorns had penetrated deeply; they had first to be cut off to not enlarge the wounds. Mary drew from the wounds the long splinters and sharp thorns still sunken in the Lord’s head, using a pincers to do so and showed them sadly to the compassionate friends standing around. Mary washed the head and face and soaked the dried blood from the hair with sponges.

The men laid the Sacred Body on a sheet spread upon the Mother’s lap. The adorable head of Jesus rested upon her slightly raised knee, and His body lay outstretched upon the sheet. Love and grief in equal degrees struggled in the breast of the Blessed Mother. She held in her arms the body of her beloved Son, whose long martyrdom she had been able to soothe by no loving ministrations; and at the same time she beheld the frightful maltreatment exercised upon Him; she gazed upon His wounds now close under her eyes. She pressed her lips to His blood-stained cheeks, while Magdalen knelt with her face bowed upon His feet.

The holy women helped in various ways, presenting when necessary vessels of water, sponges, towels, ointment, and spices. Mary Heli, the Blessed Virgin’s elder sister, and who was already an aged matron, was sitting apart on the earthwall of the circle, silently looking on.

When the sacred head had been thoroughly cleansed, the Blessed Virgin kissed the cheeks and covered it. Her care was next directed to the neck, the shoulders, the breast, and the back of the Sacred Body, the arms and the torn hands filled with blood.

The shoulder upon which Jesus had borne the heavy cross was so lacerated that it had become one great wound.

There was a small wound in the back of the left breast where the point of Cassius’ lance had come out, and in the right side was opened that great, wide wound made by the lance, which had pierced His heart through and through. Mary washed and purified all these wounds, while Magdalen, kneeling before her, frequently lent assistance, though for the most part she remained at Jesus’ feet, bathing them for the last time, more with her tears than with water, and wiping them with her hair.

When the Blessed Virgin had anointed all the wounds, she bound up the sacred head in linen, but the covering for the face, attached to that of the head, she did not as yet drawn down. With a gentle pressure, she closed the half-broken eyes of Jesus, and kept her hand upon them for a little while. Then she closed the mouth, embraced the Sacred Body of her Son, and weeping bitter tears, allowed her face to rest upon His. Magdalen’s reverence for Jesus did not permit her to approach her face to His. She pressed it to His feet only. After John got permission from Mary to ready His Body for the tomb, the men carried His Body reverently to the tomb.

Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea knelt down and, under cover of this upper cloth, loosened from the lower part of Jesus’ body the bandage that they had bound around it from the knees to the hips when taken down from the cross. They removed likewise that other covering, which Jonadab, the nephew of His foster father Joseph, had given Him before the Crucifixion, as we see Him on the cross today in churches around the world. Thus with great regard to modesty, they sponged, under cover of the sheet held over it, the lower part of the Lord’s body.

Lastly, they laid the Lord’s body on the large sheet that Joseph of Arimathea had bought, and wrapped it closely around it. The Sacred Body was laid on it crosswise. Then one corner was drawn up from the feet to the breast, the opposite one was folded down over the head and shoulders, and the sides were doubled round the whole person.

While all were kneeling around the Lord’s body, taking leave of it with many tears, a touching miracle was exhibited before their eyes: the entire form of Jesus’ Sacred Body with all its wounds appeared, as if drawn in brown and reddish colors, on the cloth that covered it.

Their astonishment was so great that they opened the outside wrapping, and it became still greater when they found all the linen bands around the Sacred Body white as before and only the uppermost cloth marked with the Lord’s figure. It was a miraculous picture, a witness to the creative Godhead in the Body of Jesus.

At the prayer of holy men, three impressions of the holy image were taken off, both the back and the picture formed on the folds of the front. These impressions were consecrated by contact with the original and the solemn intention of the Church. They have even effected great miracles. I have seen the original, somewhat damaged, somewhat torn, held in veneration by some non-Catholic Christians of Asia. I have forgotten the name of the city but it is situated in a large country near the home of the Three Kings. In those visions I also saw something connected with Turin. The burial cloth of Christ is now called the Shroud of Turin.

Regarding Simeon’s and Anna’s prophecies, Our Lady wept bitterly, for the prophecy had been fulfilled; the sword has pierced her soul.

Just in front of Limbo, there was a bright, cheerful tract of country clothed in verdure. It is into this that I always see the souls released from Purgatory entering before being conducted to Heaven.

When the gates of Hell were swung open by the angels, one beheld before him a struggling, blaspheming, mocking, howling, and lamenting throng. I saw that Jesus spoke some words to the soul of Judas. Some of the angels forced that multitude of evil spirits to prostrate before Jesus, for all had to acknowledge and adore Him. This was for them the most terrible torment. This took place by the Divine Decree. I heard that Lucifer (if I do not mistake) will be freed again for awhile fifty or sixty years before the year 2000 A.D. I saw that, every year on the solemn celebration of this day (Good Friday) by the Church, Jesus casts upon Purgatory a glance by which many souls are released.

The Eve of the Holy Resurrection

I saw an angel appear to the Blessed Virgin. He announced to hear that the Lord was near.

It may have been almost nine o’clock when, floating down toward her in the midst of a great multitude of the souls of the ancient Patriarchs, I saw the most holy soul of Jesus, resplendent with light and without trace of wound. Turning to the Patriarchs and pointing to the Blessed Virgin, He uttered the words: “Mary, My Mother!” and appeared to embrace her. Then He vanished. The Blessed Virgin sank on her knees and kissed the ground upon which He had stood. She left the impress of her knees and feet upon the stone. Inexpressibly consoled, she hurried back to the women. She did not tell them what had happened, but she consoled and strengthened them in faith.

The Way of the Cross, started by Mary

It was about eleven o’clock at night when the Blessed Virgin, moved by love and ardent desire, could no longer remain in the house. She rose, wrapped herself in a gray mantle, and went out alone. I saw her going sadly to the house of Caiaphas and then to Pilate’s palace, which was a long way back into the city. And thus she traversed alone the whole way passed over by Jesus bearing His cross. She went through the deserted streets and paused at every spot upon which some special suffering or outrage had befallen the Lord. She went on until she approached Mount Calvary when she stood quite still. She saw her Son in an apparition.

Jesus bade her await Him near Mount Calvary, on the stone upon which He had fallen. Then I saw the apparition going to the city, and the Blessed Virgin kneeling and praying on the spot indicated by the Lord. It may now have been past twelve o’clock, for Mary had spent a considerable time in the Way of the Cross.

The Resurrection of the Lord

I saw the sacred limbs moving beneath the swathing bands, and the dazzling, living body of the Lord with His Soul and His Divinity coming forth from the side of the winding sheet as if from the wounded Side.

Now I saw the Lord floating in glory up through the rock. The earth trembled, and an angel in warrior garb shot like lightning from Heaven down to the tomb, rolled the stone to one side, and seated himself upon it.

The holy women, when the Lord arose from the dead, were near the little gate belonging to Nicodemus.

Outside the tomb the stone was rolled to the right, so that the doors, which were merely lying to, could now be easily opened. The linens in which the sacred body has been enveloped were in the tomb in the following order: the large winding sheet in which it had been wrapped lay undisturbed, only empty and fallen together, containing nothing but the aromatic herbs; the long bandage that had been wound around it was still lying twisted and at full length just as it had been drawn off, on the outer edge of the tomb; but the linen scarf with which Mary had enveloped Jesus’ head lay to the right at the head of the tomb. It looked as if the head of Jesus was still in it, excepting that the covering for the face was raised.

The head covering has been in a church in Oviedo, Spain for many years.

Mary Magdalen sees the Risen Jesus

At the words: “Whom seekest thou?”

Magdalen at once answered: “Sir, if thou hast taken Him hence, show me where thou hast laid Him! I will take Him away!” And she again glanced around, as if to see whether he had not laid Him someplace near.

Then Jesus, in His well-known voice, said: “Mary!”

Recognizing the voice, and forgetting the crucifixion, death, and burial now that He was alive, she turned quickly and, as once before, exclaimed: “Rabboni!” (Master!).

She fell on her knees before Him and stretched out her arms toward His feet. But Jesus raised His hand to keep her off, saying: “Do not touch Me, for I am not yet ascended to My Father. But go to My brethren, and say to them: I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and to your God.”

I (always refers in this article to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich) was told that He had not yet, since His Resurrection, presented Himself to His Heavenly Father, had not yet thanked Him for His victory over death and for Redemption. I understood by those words that the first fruits of joy belong to God. It was as if Jesus had said that Magdalen should recollect herself and thank God for the mystery of Redemption just accomplished and His conquest over death.

Scarcely had she left the garden when John approached, followed by Peter. John stood outside the entrance of the cave and stooped down to look, through the outer doors of the sepulcher, at the half-opened doors of the tomb, where he saw the linens lying. Then came Peter.

The linen that had covered the sacred face was lying to the right. It too was folded. John now followed Peter to the tomb, saw the same things, and believed in the Resurrection. Peter took the linens with him under his mantle.

Later, Jesus appeared to His Apostles. He also appeared to a great crowd of 500, some of whom saw Him crucified and die on the cross.

Thomas, the Apostle, at first refused to believe that Jesus had risen. He said that unless he could put his hand in his side and finger in the holes in his hands, he would not believe. He was not with the other Apostles when Jesus appeared to them the first time. The second time is when he saw the Lord Jesus with his fellow Apostles.

Thomas, very much frightened at the sight of the Lord, timidly drew back. But Jesus, grasping his right hand in His own right hand, took the forefinger and laid the tip of it in the wound of His left hand; then taking the left hand in His own left, he placed the forefinger in the wound of His right hand; lastly, taking again Thomas’ right hand in His own right, He put it, without uncovering His breast, under His garment, and laid the fore and middle fingers in the wound of His right side. He spoke some words as He did this. With the exclamation: “My Lord, and my God!” Thomas sank down like one unconscious, Jesus still holding his hand. The nearest of the Apostles supported him, and Jesus raised him up by the hand.

Jesus said, “You’ve believed because you’ve seen Me; blessed are they who haven't seen Me yet have believed.” (John 20:29)

For Our Readers

The Lord bless you and keep you!

The Lord let His face shine on you and be gracious to you!

The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace!

Note: If you want to read much more on Jesus Christ, His Life, Words and Miracles, read the four Gospels in the Bible — Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

To read more of Blessed Anne Emmerich’s visions of Jesus Christ’s Life, order all four volumes from www.tanbooks.com, or just Volume 4 if you want even more details than those compiled in this article on Jesus’ Sufferings, Death and Resurrection. The cost is $99.95 for all four volumes or $25 for volume 4 only.