A Message

On Maundy Thursday we will officially leave the Season of Lent and enter the Easter Triduum. That mysterious name simply means the three days before Easter. We have climbed to the Summit of the Church year. This Holy Week marks the observance of Christ’s passion and death.

On Maundy Thursday evening we gather to commemorate Jesus’ last supper with his disciples. He gave them a new commandment --(in latin it is “mandatum novum”) – Love one another and he bent to wash his friends’ feet. How amazing would it be if our political leaders went to wash the feet of their constituents? Maybe that would be the antidote to the lust for power and the drunkenness it engenders in the powerful. It could be the medicine our society needs.

Love can seem an overused word, but this is not the hallmark card love we are accustomed to. To love one another as God loves us is not simply to have a fleeting feeling, it is a commitment. The commitment is to not give up on yourself, on each other, on the world. The commitment is to see the world differently – to see it as it could be – a world of kindness and justice. And to live that way.

We are on pilgrimage this week, and especially these three  days, alongside our God who did not grasp for divinity but chose instead to walk the way of the cross in solidarity with us. This emptying reaches its own conclusion at the Cross which we venerate on Good Friday. What if we could put aside our fears and our self-protective instincts and be really open to one another?

Holy Saturday is the most silent of Sabbaths for this is the day that God sleeps in the earth. Jesus is in the tomb. But Jesus is still active even in the tomb, for he descends to the abode of the dead, he descends to hell and unlocks the gates freeing those who are bound there.Death is not the end of this story.

For early on Sunday morning, before the sun rises we will gather one more time to light the new fire. That fire will light the Paschal Candle and we will announce the resurrection. We will say again at long last – Alleluia, Christ is Risen!
Rev. Rick

For seekers: If you are searching for a loving, accepting, active church home, please, “Come and see.”