Maundy Thursday

Maundy Thursday

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A philosopher and a theologian sat down for drinks one evening. After staring into the dark liquid conforming to the shape of the highball, and listening to the ice clink against its glass while raising the rim to his lips, the philosopher asked this question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?”

The theologian mimicked the movements of his philosopher friend. Then after some time, and staring out the window into the night’s form answered the philosopher’s question with one of his own, “How does God love?”

The philosopher was taken aback once the second question sank in, for he realized that both questions pointed to the same answer, and although the answer was never plainly put forth that evening both parties spent the rest of the night discussing stories, tales, and heroic feats where the underlining theme pointed always to love.

“Take. Eat. “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”

“Take. Drink. This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

“Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

Tonight is a special night. Tonight, we get to be both philosopher and theologian; and yet, we also get to transcend those labels. We get to remember, remain, and reflect, but we also are invited to participate in something rather than nothing. We get to share in God’s love. This is no easy task, for by remembering and sharing we also are commanded to love one another as Christ loves us. The theologian would then ask, “Then how (indeed) does God love?” Answer: With his substance, and with his very life.

It is in God where we live, move, and have our being. As Christians, we don’t find our way to God so much as we realize that we have been in God and God has been in us from the very beginning. Once this realization takes place, everything around us seems to change. Life is experienced as a gift, and all that we have, and all that we are, and all that we ever will be is experienced (or at least can be) experienced as grace. Grace, we find out, is received. Once received, we want to offer it back up to the one who gifted us with it. God obliges this instinct found within us, takes our offerings and multiplies them, transcending the original gift into one of abundance. And should these acts and attributes of God really surprise us? As catholic Christians perhaps not. After all, this is all played out each week during Holy Communion. We offer up the gifts we have been given symbolically through the bread and the wine. They are then brought to the altar, prayed over, and offered back to God. God takes these ordinary elements of bread and wine and transcends their realities into the very Body and Blood of Christ. This night is special because this is the night we remember how and why God instituted the sacrament of his Body and Blood.

This night is also special because Christ has taught us that he is not only present when we gather in this place, and do these liturgies in remembrance of him, but he is also made manifest when we perform the same acts of mercy that he has performed. Jesus said, “So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.”

Tonight, we not only wash one another’s feet in imitation of Christ, but we also do it to remind us to love our neighbors as ourselves when we take our feet and get up and get out of this place. Where have your feet been this week? Whose house have you visited? What sights did you see? Did your feet take you to places you wanted to be as well as places where God needed you to be? This is the attitude, I believe, Jesus was getting at when he was teaching his disciples. “Remember,” he could have stated, “all the places I have been, and all the people I have seen, healed, taught, dined, conversed, argued, loved, prayed, forgave. These are the same places and faces that you must now go. Do not worry, for I will be with you. Have no fear. Take up courage with your cross, and may your feet follow me – always.”

Finally, tonight is a special night because we remember God’s sacrifice. Theologian Matthew Levering once stated, “In a world gone wrong, there is no communion without sacrifice.” This Lent, we learned that God’s promise to us and to his people is that, “I will be your God and you will be my people.” We also learned that covenants and promises always require sacrifice. After Abraham learned that he would be the Father of many Nations, he made an animal sacrifice in remembrance of this. After Moses gives the law of God to the people, he does the same thing as Abraham. He sacrifices an animal and sprinkles its blood onto the people. God promised King David that his line of descendants will last forever. David’s son, Solomon later built the Temple – a place where sacrifices were made daily. On Palm Sunday, we read and recited Christ’s Passion, and how he like an animal was sacrificed for the sins of the world. Up until this point, all sacrifices to God (at least liturgically) were observed by the people. Bishop Robert Barron has stated that, “After Jesus (and with the institution of the Lord’s Supper) Christians don’t just watch the sacrifice happening, but we eat it and drink it. In other words, we take the sacrifice of Christ within our very bodies; thus experiencing the communion that God desires.” And doesn’t this fit in with our instincts as human beings? Do we not hurt either physically, mentally, or spiritually (sometimes all 3) when sacrifices are made in the short term for some greater glory in the long? In order to do this; however, our egos must be stripped away and left discarded having faith that we will be robed in new garments sometime in the future.

Tonight, we are philosophers and we are theologians, poets and prophets, sacrifices and the sacrificed stripped naked and laid bare before the mercies of God. Tomorrow may we be lovers and forgivers, explorers of truth and beauty, and neighbors who seek out one another just as Christ seeks and has always sought us out…for only in him do we will live, move, and have our being.

*Sermon preached at St. Julian’s Episcopal Church, Maundy Thursday, 2018.

What is Holy Week?

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Holy Week begins Sunday, and is often called Palm Sunday or The Sunday of the Passion. The Passion [of the Christ] biblically follows Jesus’ last moments through Jerusalem, the Roman courts, and the streets on the way to the cross. Holy Week is exactly what it says: It is the holiest season within the Christian calendar.

On Palm Sunday, many congregations will gather outside the doors of the church with literal palms in hand and will welcome The Messiah – Jesus Christ into the city of Jerusalem through a Biblical reading, as well as with songs and shouts of Hosanna’s, King of Kings, and Lord of Lords; but once the congregation enters into the space of the church building the drama will heighten around the reading of the Passion of Christ (This year’s reading comes from the Gospel according to Matthew). Listening to this Gospel, one will quickly notice the joyous Hosanna’s sung outside have turned into angry shouts to ‘crucify him’ on the inside. Although the joys of The Lord’s Supper will continue to be celebrated on this day, the liturgical service will end somewhat solemnly as those gathered remember that our Lord was betrayed [into the hands of sinners].

Next comes Maundy Thursday – the first of three services that make up what is referred to as The Triduum. Although there are three different services on three different days, don’t be fooled into thinking they are separate services. The Triduum is one service divided up into three parts (Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and The Great Vigil of Easter). Think of The Triduum as a three-act play where each act has its own theme, but points to a greater whole.

Act I is Maundy Thursday. Maundy Thursday is the 38th day of Lent, and sets the tone that the end [of Lent] is near, and resurrection is on the horizon. Traditionally, Maundy Thursday celebrates the initiation of the Church’s Holy Eucharist – a.k.a. Holy Communion, and this supper is the last communion before Easter. Maundy in Latin means command, and this day the Church remembers Jesus’ command to his disciples to, ‘Love one another as I have loved you.’ His command ‘to love’ is made explicit in the service of The Lord’s Supper, as well as when those gathered participate in foot washing – a further reminder that Jesus acted as servant to his friends, and asked his followers to never forget this (‘Love one another as I have loved you’). Finally, the evening ends with the stripping of the Altar. All the fashions found in and around the sanctuary will be taken away – symbolic of the clothes and dignity that were stripped away from Our Lord. After the Maundy Thursday liturgy is concluded, some churches hold an all-night vigil until Good Friday morning where the remaining bread and wine that was consecrated (or blessed) on Maundy Thursday will be consumed Good Friday morning. Stations of the Cross (another tradition within the church) usually takes place at Noon, Good Friday. The symbol here recollects the Passion of Christ once more, and the hour in which this liturgy takes place is the traditional hour of Jesus’ time on the cross.

Act II is Good Friday. There is no Eucharist because there is no Lord. Put bluntly: God is dead, and this service is a day of great solemnity, devotion, self-examination, and prayer; however, it is also a day of restrained anticipation, promise, and hope (to paraphrase Bishop J. N. Alexander). It is also a day the Church remembers the cross in all its messiness, and at the same time its glory pointing us heavenward.

Act III is the Great Vigil of Easter, but before this evening service begins a small morning service called Holy Saturday is administered. Holy Saturday is a service asking us to simply slow down and take all of what has happened and is happening into consideration before we participate in the Vigil. The evening Vigil is a long, but a powerful liturgy in 4 parts: 1. There is the Service of Light. 2. The Service of Lessons. 3. Christian Initiation (a.k.a. Holy Baptism). 4. The Holy Eucharist with the administration of Easter Communion. I won’t go into detail about this service, but it is one not to miss. To me, the Vigil captures everything that is good, holy and beautiful about Christianity and Christ’s one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. If you are curious about any of these services, I invite you to read them before hand. They can all be found in the Book of Common Prayer. The Palm Sunday liturgy begins on page 270. A link can be found here.

This is a small introduction to the ceremony, liturgy, drama, and pageantry of Holy Week. It is truly a gift of the Church, but words and descriptions of the services do not do it justice. To truly get a feel for its beauty, you have to participate in it for yourself, and let each day help to mold and make you into who God already knows you to be. May Holy Week remind us all of the mystery of Christ and His Church, and that there is still mystery wrapped up in the world around us.

Remember Holy Week

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Holy Week is upon us. It is the most sacred time of the church year; one filled with great anticipation, hope, and longing. If the Season of Lent has been a time of reflection, reconciliation, and remembering, Holy Week helps build upon these, and asks us to continue remembering in specific ways.

On Maundy Thursday, we remember how Jesus instituted Holy Communion with bread, wine, and the washing of his disciples’ feet. On Holy Friday, we remember the system of violence that killed a man of peace. On Holy Saturday, we remember our grief as we recall life’s transitions from old places to completely new ones. At the Great Vigil of Easter on Saturday night, we remember our baptism, our hope, and the joy of resurrection. The Church remembers all these acts during these most holy times. The challenge of Holy Week is to do your own remembering. To remember the least of these among us, and within our midst, as well as to remember God’s love through our hands, hearts, and minds full of God’s grace and mercy. This week remember alongside the Church, and in doing so, we can leave this place, go among the weak, weary, and torn of the world…and remember them.

#LoveLikeJesus EDA
#HolyWeek