"The Roman Orator, Cicero, summarized the attitude of the ancient world to the cross when he said: ‘Not only let the cross be absent from the person of Roman citizens, but its very name from their thoughts, eyes and ears.’ Two thousand years ago we find no halo of glory, no beautiful associations of history, no nobility, and no thought of heroic sacrifice attached to the cross. How cluttered up is the cross at the present time! Even the unbelieving world now says: ‘The Cross stands for all that is noblest in manhood.’ But is was not so in the beginning. It is not so for us today. As soon as the Cross ceases to be to us, first of all, the place of utmost shame and contempt, we make the Cross of Christ of none effect." [1Corinthians 1:17]
