Happy Easter! I hope you are Eastering well.
Below are my reflections for Holy Week and Easter Sunday this year.
Most years I find and follow a thread through Holy Week to Easter. This year the thread was protest.
I don’t mean protest in the sense of simply being a dis-agreer. To protest is to bear witness to injustice, pains, wrongs. We are declaring that there is a different way. Our protest is a prayer for the kingdom to “come on earth as it is in heaven.” Protesting is as much a declaration of what we are for as it is what we are against.
I invite you to follow the thread and see where it takes you, what it asks of you, and what it offers you.
- Palm Sunday: The triumphal entry is a peaceful march and a cry for liberation. It is a protest against and a contrast to imperial power and domination.
- Maundy Thursday: With the last supper and foot washing Jesus is overturning a worldview structured by hierarchy and domination. He is offering a communion paradigm.
- Good Friday: Jesus’ death on the cross is not an appeasement, payment of a ransom, or satisfaction of a debt. It is the consequence of opposing the powers that be. It is a protest against injustice, violence, and abusive power.
- Holy Saturday: Sometimes we are powerless to prevent injustice but we must never fail to protest. Protest is an act of hope. It holds open the door to the future.
- Easter Sunday: Wherever there is oppression and domination, whether by an individual, a group, or a government, there is death. Sometimes it’s physical, sometimes it’s not. The empty tomb is God’s protest against every act of oppression and domination. To live a resurrected life is to live a life of protest.
Though Holy Week and Easter are celebrated in the Church, they are lived in the world. They are not simply days on the Church’s calendar or historical events in the life of Jesus. They are events and circumstances in our lives and world.
May we always show forth in our lives what we profess by our faith. (Book of Common Prayer, 223)
Alleluia. Christ is risen.
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No Kings – A Palm Sunday Reflection
This Saturday, March 28th, is the third No Kings Day protest and Sunday, March 29th, is Palm Sunday, but here’s what I wonder: What if Palm Sunday was the original No Kings protest? What if Jesus, the disciples, and the crowd that follows Jesus are protesting violence, injustice, and imperial power? Instead of protest songs…
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What’s New About Love? – A Maundy Thursday Reflection
“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another” (John 13:34.), Jesus said after washing the feet of his disciples. (John 13:1-17, 31b-35) So, what’s new about love? What makes this commandment, this love, new? Love is not an idea original with or unique to Jesus and he wasn’t the first to command…
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Maybe The Cross Is What It Is – A Good Friday Reflection
I don’t know how to explain the cross and the crucifixion of Jesus. It makes no sense to me. I understand the theories of atonement, but not the cross or why “Jesus had to die.” Though I understand the many explanations, I find them less and less convincing or helpful. Maybe there is nothing to…
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Feeling Overwhelmed And Powerless? – A Holy Saturday Reflection
Overwhelmed and powerless. I’ve had days like that, you probably have too. What were they like for you? What happened? What were the conversations in your head? What feelings, memories, hopes did you carry in your heart? On those days I feel small and insignificant. Circumstances feel large and heavy. I feel pressed down and…
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Resurrection: A Life Of Protest – An Easter Sunday Reflection
Alleluia. Christ is risen. The Lord is Risen indeed. Alleluia. Sweet words that roll off the tongue. Familiar words we speak with ease. We say them every year, every Easter. It’s always the same. And I never want it to change. Alleluia. Christ is risen. What does that mean? Is Easter simply the happy ending…
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Image Credit: Photo by Priscilla Gyamfi on Unsplash.
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