The Scriptures tell us plainly that Christ was made to bear the weight of humanity’s sin — not as a symbolic gesture, but as a real and crushing burden He accepted out of love. Saint Paul expresses this with startling clarity: “For our sake, He made Him to be sin who knew no sin” (2 Cor 5:21). In other words, the Father allowed His Son to carry the full consequence of our rebellion, absorbing into Himself the cost of our brokenness. Pope Benedict XVI once reflected on this mystery in his encyclical
