The Friday before Easter Day, on which the church commemorates the crucifixion of Jesus. It is a day of fasting and special acts of discipline and self-denial. In the early church candidates for baptism, joined by others, fasted for a day or two before the Paschal feast. In the west the first of those days […]
The Thursday in Holy Week. It is part of the Triduum, or three holy days before Easter. It comes from the Latin mandatum novum, “new commandment,” from Jn 13:34. The ceremony of washing feet was also referred to as “the Maundy.” Maundy Thursday celebrations also commemorate the institution of the eucharist by Jesus “on […]
Only three more days left in Lent. For those of us quarantined in our homes, time “doesn’t fly,” to paraphrase the familiar quote. But in reality, what is time really? During Holy Week, we are not simply recalling some historic events which happened a long time ago in Jerusalem. Nor, under normal circumstances, do we […]
I’ve never lived in an enemy occupied territory. There are people still alive today who might have lived in Nazi occupied Europe, or in politically suppressed parts of Africa or Asia. In a spiritual sense, we currently live in enemy occupied territory, like the residents in C.S. Lewis’ Narnia Chronicles, that mythical place of talking animals and […]
