Good Friday: Liturgy of the Lords Death
The darkest hour is the one before dawn…The statues and crosses that were covered in purple lenten cloth have gone. For once a year, all the alcoves and wall spaces are empty. As one of the churchwardens pointed out: ‘You can see how dirty everything is now.’ Amusingly, the church is still locked during the daytime even though there is now nothing left to steal.
It begins with our three priests prostrating themselves facedown on the steps leading to the Altar. It looks very uncomfortable and is a good start to the bleakest service of the year. This is worship filled with silences and prayer. The Passion of St John (sort of ‘I was there and this is what is was like’) is read which has the effect of moving Priest #3 (retired, but brought in for special events. I don’t know his name but he looks kind) and myself to tears. It just seems so sad that everything leads to death. All your hopes, plans, dreams. Only death awaits. Christ knew this and chucked it in our faces. His was the ultimate, Make it Count death. His last moment was someone jamming a sponge filled with vinegar into his mouth. The soldiers who had broken the legs of the other 2 crucifyees in order to kill them quicker (once your legs are gone, suffocation comes quickly on a cross) were sprayed by a mixture of blood and water from the already dead Christ’s wounds,filling them with awe. Meanwhile both Christ’s Mother and possible common law wife, Mary Magdalene were right there beneath Him to share the agony.
Servers bring out a crucifix and balance it on a prayer desk just before the Nave. We all line up and kiss the feet of the body of Christ. Except we all do this in different ways. Some just kiss the bottom of the cross. Some barely touch the wood with their lips. Some actually slobber. The cross is quite wet when this ceremony is over. More prayer. Then we take turns to kneel in front of Priest #1 who give us Holy Wafers. Again, this highlights differences amongst the congregation. Some obviously do not like the idea of kneeling to Father Andrew - even though of course they are not kneeling to him - and simply nod their heads in a curt way. Others are too old to kneel and kind of hunch their shoulders instead. I kneel properly, but get up awkwardly feeling like a pensioner who is taking out some spiritual insurance before it is all over.
Photo reblogged from Got a passion; make it happen. with 23 notes
Well, if you can’t beat them…
Source: weheartit.com
This was one of those heart sinking moments.These pictures are from the first time I went into the storage facility at Essex University. They’d bought a huge church at nearby Cliff Town, gutted it out and then transferred the entire contents into a hanger like shed in their Southend Campus. There it apparently stayed for a few years until we came along. The kicker for us was that the only access was via a long pedestrian precinct - everything (panelling, dozens of doors, 100 odd pews, random huge lumps of furniture) would have to be handballed hundreds of yards to where the truck was parked.
Well,we did it but this was one of those epochal jobs where you ask yourself “Why am I doing this; I’m in my 50’s… I used to be a journalist… I could have been a jewellry dealer”. One of our people, when the job was over, went sick for 2 weeks. Another pretty much had a nervous breakdown and wouldn’t speak to me properly for 1 week. I think he felt that was asked of him was brutal and essentially against his human rights. Young people nowadays,eh?
We’re still sorting everything and I’m sure it’s all worthwhile in the end. However, I have been researching the buying and selling of high quality communion ware. Chalices, plates… that sort of thing.
