BY BRUCE EPPERLY

Holy Week is a lifetime in miniature.  All the seasons of life – indeed, the hopes and fears of all the years – are found in the adventures of Holy Week. It goes from celebration to conflict, betrayal, suspense, and then back to a celebration that lasts a lifetime.  As the commercial says, “life comes at you fast,” and so does Holy Week. Like Christian, a lifetime experience is compressed into a brief capsule.  We almost need a month to let the events of Holy Week sink in spiritually and emotionally. When everything seems to be going well in your life, out of the blue, you or a loved one receives the diagnosis of a life-threatening illness.  Without warning, you lose your job and wonder how you’ll ever reclaim your former professional or economic status. We all eventually live a Holy Week, whether in terms of the first or twenty-first centuries.

In his discussion of the Psalms, Walter Brueggemann describes the rhythm of our lives in terms of orientation, disorientation, and reorientation, all of which occur during Holy Week.  It is easy to go from waving palms and shouting “Hosanna” to singing “Christ the Lord is Risen Today, Alleluia!” without taking account of religious conflict, betrayal, injustice, agony, and hopelessness that accompany our Easter celebrations.  That’s why a holistic pilgrimage through Holy Week is an essential diet for persons of faith and seekers.  We can go beyond dogma to experience the many moods of Holy Week and see ourselves in the conflict and celebration of the week.

Holy Week can forever change us if we embrace the seasons of the week and the seasons of our lives, both the sunshine and the shadow and the celebration and desolation.  Life’s greatest challenges can also be the womb of life’s greatest possibilities.

PALM SUNDAY

Most congregations join both palms and passion on what was traditionally called Palm Sunday.   The rationale is that we won’t skip over the pain of betrayal of Maundy Thursday and the abandonment of Good Friday on our way to Easter. 

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/livingaholyadventure/2024/03/a-journey-through-holy-week/