This year at St. James, we are doing a few things differently in our observance of Holy Week. Some of the changes are so subtle you might not even notice them. I want to call them to your attention, so that you might be open to receive them and see how they land with you.
The first change is on Palm Sunday. In our liturgical year, this Sunday is actually called “The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday.” The blessing and procession of palms on the Sunday before Easter began in Jerusalem in the 4th Century and by the 12th Century had spread throughout Christendom. The earliest celebrations marked Jesus’ “triumphal” entry into Jerusalem. Only later, for example in the 11th Century Sarum Rite in England, was the passion (crucifixion) narrative added to the Palm Sunday celebration, anticipating Good Friday.
This year, we will be returning to the early practice of focusing on Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. In addition to the Palm Gospel reading (Luke 19:29-40) during the blessing of the palms, the Gospel reading for the Holy Eucharist will be Luke 19:41-48, which continues and concludes the account of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. Only in Luke’s Gospel do we learn of Jesus’ weeping over the city as he makes his way there. This is an evocative scripture passage that we otherwise would never hear read in the Sunday lectionary cycle, and gives us a different vantage point on the beginning of Holy Week.
On Maundy Thursday, we will be observing the usual rite, including the ritual washing of feet following Jesus’ example recorded in John 13:1-15. It is a beautiful reminder that, in the words of Cynthia Bourgeault,
Jesus is not particularly interested in increasing either your guilt or your devotion, but rather, in deepening your personal capacity to make the passage into unitive life. If you’re willing to work with that wager, the passion begins to make sense in a whole new way. (The Wisdom Jesus, p. 106)
As Jesus makes clear in his final discourse to his disciples in John’s Gospel, his voluntary suffering is in the service of transfiguring and transcending our ego-consciousness to embrace a larger consciousness of our union with God and God’s creation. We are invited to imitate Jesus by living compassionate and joyful lives in recognition of our profound communion with reality in all of its mystery: abiding in love; even when to do so requires self-sacrifice (never the sacrifice of others).
To emphasize this note, we will conclude the Maundy Thursday service with a reading of John chapter 14 during the stripping of the altar: beginning with do “Do not let your hearts be troubled” and concluding with “Rise, let us be on our way.” I encourage you to read and meditate on the whole of John chapters 13 – 17 as the lens through which you interpret the meaning of Holy Week.
On Good Friday, the noon service will be the traditional Solemn Liturgy of Good Friday. At 7 p.m., Pastor Ron Willis and Deacon Catherine Manhardt will be curating a meditation on the seven last words of Jesus through homiletic and musical reflections:
“Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” – Luke 23:34
“Truly I tell you, today you shall be with me in paradise.” – Luke 23:43
“Woman, here is your son! ... Here is your mother.” - John 19:26-27
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” – Matthew 27:46
“I am thirsty.” – John 19:28
“It is finished.” – John 19:30
“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” – Luke 23:46
You will be invited to deepen your contemplation of the passion through engagement with several prayer stations. Father Thomas Keating, in his beautiful meditation on the passion, invites us to consider the vulnerability of love.
The love of Jesus manifested itself in his sheer vulnerability. The crucifix is the sign and expression of the total vulnerability of Jesus: the outstretched arms, the open heart, the forgiveness of everything and everyone. This sheer vulnerability made him wide open both to suffering and to joy . . . Divine love is sheer vulnerability – sheer openness to giving. Hence, when it enters the world, either in the person of Jesus or in one of his disciples, it is certain to encounter persecution – death many times over. But it will also encounter the joy of always rising again. (The Mystery of Christ, p. 62).
May our observance of Holy Week deepen our capacity to realize unitive life through the vulnerability of love.
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