A note about Holy Week
Easter Sunday is often the highest attended day of our church calendar. That’s no accident because the resurrection of Jesus is central to our theology and our understanding of who Jesus really is and why he’s important to us. However, if we only attend church on Easter Sunday, we’re missing a little context for the magnificence of that day. It would be akin to watching Return of the Jedi without first watching Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back. The services offered in Holy Week set the stage for the importance of Easter. Please read about them and as much as your calendar allows, join us in this journey through Holy Week.
Our Holy Week services begin with Palm Sunday: The Sunday of the Passion, a liturgy that remembers Jesus’ procession into Jerusalem for the Passover, which Jesus, a Jew, would have celebrated with his friends. Jesus timed his arrival on one side of the city to coincide with the Imperial procession of Pontius Pilate on the other, foreshadowing the clash that would come. And it is that clash, and Jesus’ Passion to which it would lead, that Palm Sunday is really concerned with. The liturgy functions as a kind of “thesis statement” to the rest of Holy Week, with a full Passion narrative, as we prepare to walk this journey with Christ.
Walk to the Cross is a new service offered. This is geared towards children, but open to all ages so families can experience the service together. This interactive service is a variation on the stations of the cross, so together we will journey from the triumphal entry into Jerusalem through the last supper and the cross and into the joy of the resurrection.
Maundy Thursday begins the three holy days with the commemoration of Jesus’ command to love and serve one another by the washing of feet. This action leads directly into the final Eucharistic celebration before Easter, a true “meal of love” among Jesus and his disciples. After communion, the Reserved Sacrament is moved to the Altar of Repose while the main altar is stripped as a symbol of Jesus’ humiliation that is to come after his betrayal. Just as Jesus asked his disciples on that fateful night, “Could you not watch with me one hour?,” we are invited to “watch” in prayer with Jesus, made present to us in the Sacrament, at the Altar of Repose before leaving, in our own time, in silence.
When we gather for the Good Friday liturgy, it is again in silence. After a detailed narration of the Passion of Christ, we pray the “Solemn Collects” before the Veneration of the Cross. A wooden crucifix is processed down the center of the church with the words, “Behold the wood of the cross on which was hung the world’s salvation,” repeated three times. Congregants may then “venerate” the cross as the representation of our own salvation by bowing or kneeling before it, or kissing the feet of the Crucified. The service concludes with communion from the Reserved Sacrament. There is no dismissal.
On Easter Eve, we gather in the garden for the start of The Great Vigil of Easter, the first Easter celebration. This service unfolds before us the great story of redemption as we move from darkness to light, from silence to joyful proclamation, from death to life. The Paschal candle, like the cross before it, is processed through the church, with the words, “The Light of Christ – Thanks be to God!” At this service we see and experience first-hand the resurrection of our Lord. We welcome the “happy morning” with a renewal of our Baptismal Vows (and, in some years, actual baptisms), the proclamation, “Christ is risen, the Lord is risen indeed!” and the celebration of the first Easter Eucharist and communion together. The liturgy ends with a joyous dismissal.
Of course, if, after the Easter Vigil, you can manage to wake up early enough on Sunday morning, our regular Eucharistic celebration will take place at 8:00 and 10:30 a.m on Easter Day. After the 10:30 service (around 12:15) an Easter Egg will happen, hosted across the street at Soul Sidekick boutique. All are welcome!
