Maundy Thursday: Wash, Pray, Love

Lent

Out of ashes 

- an invitation to a holy season -

From which we have journeyed 

over  rough and rugged terrain.

It always is. 

rough. 

rugged. rocky. 

Because life is.

At least life can be. And yet, through the rocky places

Jesus walks with us, God is present, love come down, 

and we journey through.

So here we are. The Holiest of Weeks

and now, an invitation to sit.

To wash feet and be washed

to remember that Jesus did too.

But first, before Jesus washed feet

Mary of Bethany washed Jesus' feet.

She burst into a room full of men eating dinner

and plunged herself to the floor, embracing Jesus' foot

in her hands. She anointed the gnarled toes. 

She gently smoothed the  calloused heels 

and massaged the aching arches.

She held his feet in her hands, 

and rubbed them with an ointment

so fragrant that the residue must have lingered for days.

On his feet. On her hands. 

And so, when he washed the feet of his disciples,

wafts of Mary's fragrant ointment, her symbol of love

would waft through the water, the movement

of hands and towels

and remind them all that Mary

understood then

what they all were just beginning to grasp.

The love of God in Jesus is deep. It is a love

that heals all wounds, a love that does not require suffering 

of anyone. No, this love reaches into the suffering places

and seeks to anoint the wounded with a balm of heavenly grace.

There is tragedy ahead. Jesus knows it. Mary knew it. 

The disciples will see it and run away.

Jesus will face into the violence and the women

will walk with him, all the way. 

They hold his eyes in theirs and love him through his pain.

But that comes later.

Now, for now, Jesus is washing feet

and then sharing a meal,

and talking about 

re-membering

love.

I think I am going to reflect on Mary of Bethany tonight and how her fragrant love permeates the love that Jesus shows to his disciples when he washes their feet. How the fragrance must have lingered for days, the essence of which reminding Jesus of the tenderness of love, the bravery of love, the strength of love, the power of love. 

No doubt that love gave him strength. No doubt God's love in Jesus gives us strength too. 

What are your thoughts for this Holy Week? For this Maundy Thursday? Are you going to have supper? Are you going to wash and be washed? Are you going to sit and pray at an all night vigil?

 Not exactly a preacher party, but a time for us to share ideas, pray, and be present through this day.

Holy Monday Musings

One of the beauties of our ecumenical webring is learning from the different ways we observe our holy days and the practices and traditions that may appear in varied forms or not at all depending on our denominations or local habits and preferences.


On Holy Monday, looking ahead to the rest of the week, what do you anticipate particularly? Is there some practice you love or perhaps something you miss from an earlier time in your life? Anything in your current church that has surprised you or added to your experience of Holy Week?


Please share your thoughts in the comments. 

Seeking Wholeness in this Holiest of Weeks...

Monday Morning in Holy Week is, for me, and perhaps for many of you, a day of standing on the precipice looking into a chasm of holy busy-ness. Actually the Saturday before Palm/Passion Sunday is really the day to stare into that abyss. Now, today, one of the Holy Week days is already over, gone like the palm branches we blessed and waved, lingering in the aftermath of a Gospel reading that points us to what lay ahead.

And, so while Palm/Passion Sunday is over, and I try to claim some brief respite on my day off, I wonder, "How will this week go?" "Will the rehearsals help us have flawless liturgy?" (Not likely, but is perfection really the goal? Alas, I hope for it anyway).

"Will the people come to the Triduum, that service that lasts for three days and begins with Maundy Thursday, includes a prayer vigil through the night ending at the Good Friday service, continues with a brief Holy Saturday morning service and concludes with the Great Vigil, or Easter Vigil as it is also known?" In my mind, if people came to no other worship service all year, they should come to the Triduum.

...Ok, maybe that is overstating it a bit, and asking too little of people....but really the Triduum tells our salvation story with drama, passion, love - what more could a person ask for?

And, of course I wonder, will the Easter Day services be as full this year as last? Will they energize people and leave them feeling like Christ has risen, and that is Good News we should proclaim to all we meet? Sigh. Yes, on this Monday morning I have high expectations for the week ahead.

I leave you with this song from "Owl Woman" a healer of the Papago tribe in the desert Southwest, the region I live in. Also an image of a Navajo sand painting for healing, which hangs in my home office and yoga studio. It seems to me that the underlying theme of Holy Week is, will we be healed of our sins when the Easter sun rises?



How shall I begin my song
In the blue night that is settling?

In the great night my heart will go out,
Toward me the darkness comes rattling.
In the great night my heart will go out.

Brown owls come here in the blue evening,
The are hooting about,
They are shaking their wings and hooting.

Black Butte is far.
Below it I had my dawn.
I could see the daylight
coming back for me.

The morning star is up.
I cross the mountains
into the light of the sea.

(Owl Woman, from Women in Praise of the Sacred, translated by Frances Densmore, edited by Jane Hirshfield, HarperPerennial publisher, 1995)

What are your hopes for whole-ness for this holiest of weeks? Leave a comment in the comment section or a link to your blog.

(Meet and Greet will return in two weeks)

Thursday Not Ask the Matriarch: Maundy Thursday Reflections

(Ask the Matriarch will return next week)


This year, we are having a foot-washing for part of our Maundy Thursday service. We are asking the children to come and have their feet washed, as we think they may be the ones who will actually dare to do it. Most adults are too shy to expose their feet. Also, it gives the children some way to participate in the service.


There's something different about Holy Week services, at least in my tradition. Most of the time we are pretty wordy. We are people of the Word, after all. But Holy Week is different, more holistic. During Holy Week there are words, but not just words: there are sights and sounds and smells and movements. There is the sight of the altar being stripped, and the experience of foot washing. There is the loud sound of the tomb closing on Good Friday, and there are the flickering candles as each one is snuffed out. There are pilgrimages, too: as people walk the way of the Cross.


I remember one Friday walking the Stations of the Cross not in a sanctuary, but out on the streets of an inner city neighborhood. We stopped at different places that offered hope to hurting people, and remembered what Jesus bore on his way to the cross. We stopped at a Black Pentecostal church and at a homeless shelter and at a food shelf. We finished out with soup at a Catholic church that ministered to immigrants. We were cold by then, even though it was April.


Here also is a poem I found in Imaging the Word, Vol. 3


The Foot-Washing


I wouldn't take the bread and wine if I didn't wash feet."
Old Regular Baptist


They kneel on the slanting floor
before feet white as roots,
humble as tree stumps.
Men before men
women before women
to soothe the sourness
bound in each other's journeys.
Corns, calluses, bone knobs
all received and rinsed
given back clean
to Sunday shoes and hightops.


This is how to prepare for the Lord's Supper,
singing and carrying a towel
and a basin of water,
praying while kids put soot
in their socks--almost as good
as nailing someone in the outhouse.
Jesus started it: He washed feet
after Magdalen dried His ankles
with her hair. "If I wash thee not,
thou hast no part with me."
All servants, they bathe
flesh warped to its balance....
Lord of the bucket in the well.


-George Ella Lyon

Wednesday Not-Festival

We had a few nominations, so I'll share those with you all, and then close with a thought about Wednesday in Holy Week, and an invitation.

Mitch shares about the littlest usher in his church, or, as he says, a "Protestant altar boy."

1-4 Grace shares a little something to bring a smile...

Lorna's been to see a thought-provoking play and reading and thinking about waiting. Such an appropriate theme for the week...

and Rachel at SwanDive is sharing this week the beautiful and heartbreaking story of how her mom went missing. Lord, we remember and honor Anne Elizabeth White, whose birthday was on Good Friday. May she rest in eternal peace, and let light perpetual shine upon her. The first installment is here.

****************************************

From In The Agora:

"Holy Week - Wednesday: "Some scholars will dispute the precise days
certain events occurred in the Holy Week, in part due to differences in
calendars. Some believe that Judas agreed to betray Jesus on Wednesday,
rather than Tuesday evening. Some even believe that Jesus was actually
crucified on Wednesday. Nevertheless, the most convincing traditions call
this "Silent Wednesday" because the Bible tells us very little about Jesus'
actions on this day. In the Catholic tradition, this is also called Dark
Wednesday or the Wednesday of Darkness, to underscore the loneliness of
Jesus.

"Luke does say that, "each day Jesus was teaching at the Temple...and
all the people came early in the morning to hear him." Presumably Jesus
stayed in Bethany, where He had been before."

I have been struggling greatly this year with the Stations of the Cross. For some of you, they are as second nature as showing up for church; for some, they are entirely unheard of. I fall in the low middle somewhere...I am a "cradle Episcopalian" but was raised in a very "low church" diocese. The church I belong to now is the first in my denomination where I have ever seen Stations displayed, much less participated in the service.

I find walking the stations to be exceptionally moving and even overwhelming, and it encapsulates Holy Week amazingly. I will be going tonight, and I wish I could take you all with me. Failing that, though...

Even if it is an entirely foreign concept to you, I invite you to visit my church's virtual Stations of the Cross. Take some quiet time and ponder the mystery of Christ's death and passion in this most Holy of all Weeks.

If you wish, share your thoughts with us in the comments.

Pax vobiscum.

On Good Friday

V
If the lost word is lost, if the spent word is spent
If the unheard, unspoken
Word is unspoken, unheard;
Still is the unspoken word, the Word unheard,
The Word without a word, the Word within
The world and for the world;
And the light shone in darkness and
Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled
About the centre of the silent Word.

O my people, what have I done unto thee.

Where shall the word be found, where will the word
Resound? Not here, there is not enough silence
Not on the sea or on the islands, not
On the mainland, in the desert or the rain land,
For those who walk in darkness
Both in the day time and in the night time
The right time and the right place are not here
No place of grace for those who avoid the face
No time to rejoice for those who walk among noise and deny the voice

Will the veiled sister pray for
Those who walk in darkness, who chose thee and oppose thee,
Those who are torn on the horn between season and season, time and time, between
Hour and hour, word and word, power and power, those who wait
In darkness? Will the veiled sister pray
For children at the gate
Who will not go away and cannot pray:
Pray for those who chose and oppose

O my people, what have I done unto thee.

Will the veiled sister between the slender
Yew trees pray for those who offend her
And are terrified and cannot surrender
And affirm before the world and deny between the rocks
In the last desert before the last blue rocks
The desert in the garden the garden in the desert
Of drouth, spitting from the mouth the withered apple-seed.


O my people.

--T.S. Eliot

Maundy Thursday/Holy Thursday

Today as revgalblogpals continues to take a sabbatical from its regular postings, we come to Maundy Thursday, the beginning of the Easter Triduum. Once again the mysteries of Jesus' final hours are with us again, his passion, his suffering, and his rising from the dead. We discover the answer to age old questions: "Does God love us?" "Is God merciful?" "Does God care for us?"; from the events remembered these days, so sorrowful and so joyful. We learn deep lessons if we allow ourselves in the rites and words.

The scriptures for this day are; Exodus 12:1-4, (5-10), 11-14 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 John 13:1-17, 31b-35 Psalm 116:1, 10-17

I did not grow up in a tradition that Holy Thursday was commemorated with the last Supper, Passover, Seder, and/or foot washing. I learned about these events and their meanings much later in life. And they have become very meaningful to me. Perhaps that is true for you as well. Tonight as we once again perform these rites may you experience the answers to those age old questions. Let someone wash your feet, serve you the cup and bread, or the Seder meal.

It is the high point for many of us who serve in churches of the "Holy Week Rush"; a busy time, a pressured time, and a demanding time. There may be no slowing down, no resting time, and no time for meditation, quietness and stillness. So on this day, before the evening's worship, I invite you to continue what Mary Beth offered yesterday in her profound post, "Radical Self Care" perhaps it will set a pattern for the next days and our ministry as well.

The new commandment Jesus gave us in John 13: 34 is "that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. ³⁵By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

How do we love the Jesus within ourselves and in others this week?

Have you let Jesus wash your feet? If not will you?

Try taking some time away to think of your love of Jesus, Jesus love for you, and your love for others.

Try not to be the sacrificial lamb this season, instead remember who is the sacrificial lamb.

Holy Wednesday: Anointing

The Wednesday Festival is taking a sabbatical for Holy Week. If you nominated posts for this week, please be assured that they will appear in the next week's festival - a double edition! - on April 11.

According to tradition, Wednesday in Holy Week is the day that Jesus was anointed with the contents of an expensive alabaster jar by the woman at Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper (Matt 26:6-13; Mark 14:3-9; John 12:1-19).

While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table.
When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. "Why this waste?" they asked. "This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor."
Aware of this, Jesus said to them, "Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. I tell you the truth, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her."

(Matt 26:6-13)

How do we anoint the Jesus within ourselves and in others this week? Our walk through Holy Week prepares us for our own burial, in a way; and while some of us choose physical self-mortification (penance, fasting) during the week, I think there is also an argument for some radical self-care.

Try taking some time away to think of your love of Jesus and the mystery that His sacrifice means for each of us.

Know how much you are loved.

Monday of Holy Week: The Day After

The walk toward Jerusalem is over. The disciples are in the city with Jesus, taking in the sights, hearing his words, wondering what will happen next. Perhaps they remember the words of Isaiah:

"Take a good look at my servant.
I'm backing him to the hilt.
He's the one I chose,
and I couldn't be more pleased with him.
I've bathed him with my Spirit, my life.
He'll set everything right among the nations.
He won't call attention to what he does
with loud speeches or gaudy parades.
He won't brush aside the bruised and the hurt
and he won't disregard the small and insignificant,
but he'll steadily and firmly set things right.
He won't tire out and quit. He won't be stopped
until he's finished his work—to set things right on earth.
Far-flung ocean islands
wait expectantly for his teaching."
God's Message,
the God who created the cosmos, stretched out the skies,
laid out the earth and all that grows from it,
Who breathes life into earth's people,
makes them alive with his own life:
"I am God. I have called you to live right and well.
I have taken responsibility for you, kept you safe.
I have set you among my people to bind them to me,
and provided you as a lighthouse to the nations,
To make a start at bringing people into the open, into light:
opening blind eyes,
releasing prisoners from dungeons,
emptying the dark prisons.
I am God. That's my name.
I don't franchise my glory,
don't endorse the no-god idols.
Take note: The earlier predictions of judgment have been fulfilled.
I'm announcing the new salvation work.
Before it bursts on the scene,
I'm telling you all about it."
(Isaiah 42:1-9, The Message)

Look for the Meet and Greet next Monday, and have a blessed Holy Week.

Head of Christ attributed to Rembrandt.

A Prayer for Holy Week

Lord Jesus Christ,
in this sacred and solemn week
when we see again
the depth and mystery of your redeeming love,
help us to follow where you go,
to stop where you stumble,
to listen when you cry,
to hurt as you suffer,
to bow our heads in sorrow as you die,
so that, when you are raised to life again,
we may share in your endless joy. Amen.

(from the United Church of Canada worship resource, "Celebrating God's Presence" UCPH, 2000)