I have just had the most curious discussion with a friend.
She is not Christian but seeks a spiritual life attached to no particular religion or faith. I find talking to her often refreshing and exciting - she opens my mind to other perspectives that I might not have seen otherwise. But for all that I haven't realised before that she has no sense of the discipline and protection to be had within a religious faith or that she has real difficulty in seeing religious faith as spiritual. Hers is a very lonely belief, I think and not one I would chose.
She asked what Holy Week was all about and why I would celebrate it year after year. Didn't I get bored?
I did my best, but after a bit it became clear that never having been part of corporate worship she could not comprehend the nature of the Liturgy and how it is important. And I didn't have the words or concepts to explain, only a deeply felt experience.
Perhaps you could tell me how the Liturgy of Holy Week helps you?
I love the liturgy of Holy Week, the contrast between the pomp and circumstance of Palm Sunday, the starkness of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday and the bright joy of Easter. It helps me feel again the power of this transition from the false and pompous ceremonial surface of Palm Sunday through the humbling of the garden and the agony of the cross to that wonderful open feeling of rejoicing at Easter... I hear the echoes of my own transitions and am restored to hope.
ReplyDeleteA few years ago, a friend of mine made much the same complaint about Advent. She couldn't understand why we focus on these old and meaningless stories about forgotten people instead of on our own. I've often thought about that conversation, and wished I had been able to articulate something about the universality of the stories we re-tell and re-enact.
ReplyDeleteThis is a really good question overall. I am still finding these liturgies to be a struggle -- I simply skipped Palm Sunday. But I am planning to make it through a Maundy Thursday service, and see from there.