“All this flashy rhetoric about loving you. I never had a selfless thought since I was born. I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through: I want God, you, all friends merely to serve my turn.
Peace, reassurance pleasure are the goals I seek, I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin: I talk of love–as scholars’ parrot may talk Greek— But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.
Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack. I see the chasm and everything you are was making My heart into a bridge by which I might get back From exile, and grow a man. And now the bridge is breaking.
For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.”
Drinking red juice in tin cups and eating small crusts of dry bread, the seven children stood in a sepia landscape of dry, thistle-ridden fields, those of the Dirty Thirties. Solemnly they played “Holy Communion,” the only recreation deemed acceptable for Good Friday. My mother, sixth of the seven (their parents having escaped the Bolshevik take-over of Ukraine) told us stories of her childhood Easters spent in a simple unpainted farmhouse. It was a day of quiet and reflection. Her German-Mennonite mother of Ukrainian/Russian heritage dressed in black, sat reading her precious Bible or playing guitar and singing the ancient holy songs of a strangely Anabaptist-Eastern Orthodox mix.
The seven Canadian prairie children enjoyed enacting the solemnity of the weekly sacrament, turning to each other, chins in the air, tragic little faces, nodding to the person on either side, in great gulps they partook.
Fast forward to my own growing up years in Canada. Despite Canada having only one-fifth the regular church attendance of the USA (researchco.ca), my hometown erupted on Good Friday. A national holiday, it began with a wonderful inter-denominational service in the city’s main auditorium. Awe-struck by the solemn pomp and ceremony of the Catholics and Anglicans, roused by the evangelicals, both tearful and joyful with the Pentecostals, and fed by the Mennonites…I wished church could be like this all the time. (Mom assured me heaven would be.) Church bells rang, crosses were carried, Easter Pasche (paski, the sweet bread with anis and honey) was shared. To me, it was the most important day of the year. This was the day, literally, all hell broke loose, a day to remember our loving Creator’s intense suffering in coming to be one of us, that we might become one in love with Him. Breath-taking. Momentous in its mourning….
I also vividly remember sleeping with cousins on the floor of grandma’s little stucco house and gazing at the dominant wall hanging, the one in dark shades of blue with a silver moon, the one of Jesus mourning over his beloved Jerusalem, desiring to nurture and mother them as a hen her chicks, grieving because his people did not understand why he came. So much mourning. And that was just the beginning of his pain.
Here in the USA, I’ve been surprised by how the teaching and tendency is to skip all this and jump to the happy part: the Resurrection. Even the midwest Christian college where I taught for ten years held classes as normal on Good Friday. Not even a chapel! It took years for me to understand when Americans speak of Easter they mean Sunday: a day of celebrating new life with Easter Egg Hunts and brunch reservations. But He came to heal us from brokenness; Good Friday is the important day. The ancient prophecies foretold his sacrifice makes us new,“By his stripes we are healed.” Friday declares, “It is finished.” It’s all about Friday.
(Obviously, death could not hold him. The resurrection is not the surprise here; it’s the fact that he took on all the burden of pain and separation from Love, and he did it for you and me. That is the surprising part!)
As a child, Easter always meant a national holiday and an entire week off school, nine days of lament: first with Mary of Bethany anointing Jesus for burial, then lament that the waving palms were misapplied, then anger at the temple being turned into a house of human rule and moneymaking. First lament and mourning and then healing and joy. There’s no conquering without an enemy. Our enemy is death. He experienced death for us, but the script also says we are to “take part in his sufferings…” For God’s sake, for earth’s sake, for heaven’s sake: we need to be grounded in his suffering to understand the world’s and to process our own. Let’s not avoid it. Let’s not be afraid to suffer. C.S. Lewis says that pain in the world is what makes the good things possible, the downside of love lost exists so that love found has meaning…and so on. Both parts are required. It’s 50-50. As the song goes, “You can’t have one without the other.”
An example from this morning: my beloved neighborhood church came out with the reminder about tonight’s service: “It’s Friday…but Sunday’s acomin’!” Yes it is, and we celebrate that joy all year, even the sheer fact that we meet “on the first day of the week” is an act of celebrating the Resurrection. However, I suggest we have at least one day in the year devoted to mourning and realizing what it took for Love to split the heavens of our fragile planet, to dump all imperfection and brokenness on one person, to quake the earth and sky, to raise the dead, to split the curtain in the temple in half (the curtain which until that moment had divided the holiness from humanity!) and simply love this man, his very physical, sacrificing personhood, the way of Mary Magdalene, and Mother Mary at the cross, like Mary Bethany with the nard.
Some might say I’m knit-picking. (Like what came first, the chicken or the egg, ha.) But doesn’t this issue address the whole of the western culture phenomenon of skipping to the happy part, of the necessity of feeling good, of instant gratification? Because I see it affecting the young by their comments:
“The church isn’t authentic.”
“I never learned that it was okay to be depressed.”
“I was never counseled how to mourn or suffer.”
“If I felt bad it was probably because my faith and prayer life were lacking.”
“If I wasn’t good enough, happy enough, pure enough, it seemed I was suspect.”
“No one in church could give me thoughtful answers about why bad things happen.”
Too many questions to answer here, but one thing is sure, by reflecting on ‘The Way of Suffering’—of the massive cross being dragged along The Via Delarosa, the blood dripping down, the exposed bone in flesh, the screams of agony, the reality of gore aside from lore—in all this we identify with him. We are with him in pain, thus preparing for our own, and perhaps for helping others in theirs. We must understand the unpleasant, the suffering part, to begin to see him in all that he is as the suffering dying God. The Love who made the universe by Wisdom—she who calls us, according to Proverbs. Like the Samaritan woman at the well, we see him seeing us.
Without understanding all this there is no one, I repeat NO ONE, who empathizes with our physical pain, our rejection, our burden, our disappointment, and our grief. He is the only one to fully realize all these “because he himself experienced all that we experience” and more. He’s gone down into the pit, the horror, dwellt in darkness, gasping, fighting to breathe, in dread and thirst and torture.
Grandma shared my bedroom when she came to visit. The only times I witnessed her smile were when she sat yogi-style, on the other twin bed, having removed the inevitable apron, black floor-length skirt and white blouse. Dressed in a flannel nightgown she slowly unwound a long, tightly-braided bun, brushed long, still-dark hair, picked up her guitar and sang German and Russian hymns of Jesus’ love. She had found the secret to “Sunday’s acomin”. It’s the third part of the earth’s over-arcing and eternal narrative, which all good stories reflect; first Creation, then Brokenness, then Redemption and Restoration.
She understood not skipping the broken part. Our lives can be grotesque. Her life had been. Dietrich Bonhoeffer says that the way to be a Christian is to share in the pain, the evil, and brokenness of others. My life is messy. His was messier. Finding splendor in the suffering, I need to see Christ’s sorrows so I can see my own. And sit with others in theirs.
ADDENDUM: I wrote this piece yesterday, Good Friday, and rushed off to help usher at church while folks streamed in. Long after the service began I remained outside the front doors to greet any latecomers. Suddenly a young man bolted toward me, avoiding my attempt at a welcome. There were pain and grief on his face like I’ve rarely seen before. His face crumpled as if he was crying, although in the rain it was hard to see. I called after him, “Sir, are you okay?” He froze, turned and bitterly, “I’ve never been less okay in my life.” Jerking toward the door he disappeared inside. I couldn’t find him. I directed a pastor toward the area where I’d seen him headed. The pastor told me later the young man had a full plan in mind of how he was going to go home and commit suicide.
This, gentle reader, is why Christ died. He’s experienced it all and wants to share our sorrows. He doesn’t necessarily take them away, but even tho’ we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, he is with us. He comforts and guides as only True Love can. We only know this if we get down and dirty, if we deal with our hurt and pain by understanding His. Finding splendor in the suffering, I need to see his sorrows so I can see my own, and sit with others in theirs.
It’s all about the money. Why else are we celebrating “14 acres of guns & gear”?!
Fixed it for you! Texas Monthly Magazine got it wrong, so I’m kindly correcting them and a few other news pieces I’ve encountered today. In front of the NRA Convention, downtown Houston, just a few hundred miles from our horror-stricken community of Uvalde, this was my experience.
Correction #1: Texas Monthly wrote an article last night stating that the GOP did not show up but Democrats “came pouring in.” The latter is not true–they have no way of knowing. Voter cards were not shown. I saw no pro-Democrat signs. The few media vans I saw remained briefly in the shade of the Convention entrance, without reporters venturing into the crowd of 4000+ in the middle of sunny, 100F. Discovery Green Park. I was there for 7 hours. Further, their claim the rally was organized by the Democratic Party is flatly incorrect. In fact, Beto O’Rourke only spoke briefly. With just a couple people accompanying him, he was approachable, warm, humble and sincere. There was nothing “Democratic-Party” about the rally, other than his brief call to vote for change. The organizers were a loosely affiliated group: Moms Demand Action, March for our Lives, Texas-American Federation of Teachers, University of Houston, and other advocacy groups. Speaker included parents of children killed in school gun violence, UH Student Body Pres., Democratic gubernatorial candidate Beto O’Rourke and U.S. Reps. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, and Al Green, D-Houston.
Correction #2: Texas Monthly and other outlets suggest that the protestors were a screaming mob, while the NRA registrants, on the opposite side of the barricaded street, appeared calm and collected. That’s absolutely not true. Yes, of course some of us in the protest were furious, but we simply chanted and shouted occasionally, partly as catharsis, partly as an attempt to shame NRA supporters.
And as for the NRA participants: Yes, I found surprisingly few when I went inside to investigate (where I lingered in the cool A.C., notwithstanding the nauseating ambience). The only ones outside were there to smoke (a surprisingly high number) and sarcastically doff a cowboy hat, pat a beer belly, or give a middle finger to us across the street. There was nothing cool about that.
A couple things surprised me about the long, hot, emotional day
Surprise #1: The police had barricades on both sides of the street; one for protestors and one for “counter-protestors”. The former side was very narrow with protestors jam-packed in the hot sun. The NRA convention side was wide, largely empty, with tables and umbrellas, and lined with dozens of police officers on horseback. I guess they had something very precious to protect.
Surprise #2: The raw emotion and sincere sadness of authentic grievers. I was braced for “hangers-on”–those inevitable other-agenda fringe folk attached to large events, but I saw none (other than two skinny old white gentleman–bless ’em– handing out printouts: one pro-abortion and the other claiming the Ukrainian-Russian war as fake news). Palpable throughout were the testimonies and emotions of mothers and fathers who’ve lost children to school shootings. Inter-faith prayer times for each child by name gave a powerful undercurrent of authentic lament…of fellow-humans coming together to share in tremendous grief. There were more sniffles and wet eyes than shouts, far more prayers than curses, many more hugs than middle fingers. I was honored to be a part of it all.
1600. That’s how many rounds of ammunition the 18-year-old had with him. COMMON SENSE is all we’re asking for. Raise the legal age to possess. Do background checks. Stop proliferating weapons of war. So easy. So safe. People have more regulations for driving cars or drinking than for carrying assault rifles–these “weapons of war.”
1700+ mass shootings since 2019.
600+ children killed or injured in schools since 2000.
200+ mass shootings this year so far.
In 2021, there were three times more federally-licensed gun dealers than Starbucks in the U.S.
(Education Week, Gun Violence Archive)
Cruz was also pressed by a reporter from Sky News earlier this week who questioned why mass shootings, like the one in Uvalde, only happen in America. Cruz accused the reporter of being a “propagandist” and ultimately walked away.
Just two days after the massacre of its youngest, most precious citizens, the Texas NRA’s Convention carried on with speakers like the ignominious Texas senator Ted Cruz and twice-impeached former president Donald Trump. Dancing a little jig, apparently unaffected by the gross inhumanity of the unnecessary slaughter of Innocents, Trump said during his remarks, “Unlike some, I didn’t disappoint you by not showing up.” Haha.
On the rally stage Harris County Judge Hidalgo also called for a special legislative session to regulate the purchase, sale and storage of guns. (State Sen. Roland Gutierrez (D- San Antonio) who represents Uvalde is also calling for a special session.” “If Greg Abbott can call a special session, and a second special session, and a third special session to keep people from voting, surely he can call a special session to keep babies from being murdered,” Hidalgo said. “Our hearts do break,” Hidalgo said to the crowd. “Kids are terrified. Moms are terrified. Dads are terrified. Teachers, school administrators, they’re carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders.”(Texas Monthly)
Tears and Fears–My hairstylist today was very quiet until engaged in a discussion about the Uvalde shootings. She erupted, clearly needing to talk. Still upset, she burst out about the argument she had with her kids, aged 9 and 15, yesterday. She wouldn’t let them go to school because of her fears. “But it’s the last day, Mom! Our friends! Parties!” They spent much of the day in angry tears.
The GOP is holding our children, our families, and our communities hostage to tears and fears.
Mary of Bethany anointed Jesus Christ for burial before anyone else had caught on to what his plan was. His disciple and student–friend and follower–she loved Him with incredible understanding and gratitude.
2. Mother Mary was with him from the Cradle to the Cross and, having initiated his first miracle, she followed Him in ministry and was there at the founding of the early Church (Acts 2). Being commissioned by Jesus to be a mother to the “beloved disciple” John, history and tradition say she was with John in the founding of the church in Ephesus.
3. With Jesus from when He healed her, she was with him at the cross, followed his burial procession to see where he was laid, and early Sunday morning upon returning to the garden tomb, she was the first to see the risen Christ. Mary of Magdala, or “Magdalene,” is mentioned 13 times in the gospels. (Only the disciples Peter and John are spoken of more often.) She followed him from Galilee, along with many other women who funded his entire ministry. (Luke 8) Considered “the Apostle to the Apostles,” Magdalene was the first to see the risen Lord and commissioned by Him to “Go tell the Apostles that I am alive.” She is “the apostle to the apostles.”
Ancient Greek philosophers and their societies, like many still, treated/treat women as inferior, only good for domestic duties. When they were/are allowed to go to houses of worship, they must sit quietly, away from men. One Greek school of thought promoted women as “deformed men.” Other ancients used them as chattel and sold them into temple prostitution.
JESUS CHANGED ALL THAT. Women were His friends, financial supporters, mother, sisters, counsellors and leaders in His Church. They went from temple prostitutes to church saints.
In the middle of Tim Keller’s “Relevant Magazine” piece today, he states:
“…One of the arguments he believed most telling went like this:Christianity can’t be true, because the written accounts of the resurrection are based on the testimony of women—and we all know women are hysterical. And manyof Celsus’ readers agreed: For them, that was a major problem. In ancient societies, as you know, women were marginalized, and the testimony of women was never given much credence. Do you see what that means? If Mark and the Christians were making up these stories to get their movement off the ground, they would never have written women into the story as the first eyewitnesses to Jesus’ empty tomb…”
Jesus Christ is the great liberator of women. No gurus, no imams…no one understands, tenderly loves, respects, and lifts women up like the Divine God made flesh: Jesus Christ.
The city is swollen with a hundred thousand pilgrims for the annual celebration. Colors are bright, the shouts and singing exuberant, the palm branches waiving ferociously, all accompanied by the patter of little children. The Twelve can hardly contain their excitement, laughing and crying out, “Make way! Make way for the King!” Jesus of Nazareth is finally announcing his reign. The crowd is singing the Passover Psalms.
“I’d like to get my hands on one of those sisters; I bet I could make her sing like a bird!” the ruffian growls. Laughing, the Pharisee tells him to keep his voice down. “It’s all being planned. Witnesses are being found who will deny that this fellow ever “raised” Lazarus from the dead.” But a young man hears and innocently, excitedly, exclaims, “I wouldn’t have believed it myself if I hadn’t been there! I tell you! Lazarus drew his last breath a full four days begore the Nazarene ever arrived!” He is shoved from behind and engulfed by the masses.
I step back into the shadows, my head covered as usual, head bent…because I could not emulate their joy. But now I reach for more of the cloth. I knew something was wrong, but now I fear even more.
With the familiar side bend of his bronzed face, hair blowing in the breeze, he looks back over his shoulder as the road curves, and I glimpse his face, and I know. My breath catches, sick dread clutches my heart; there is going to be great pain ahead.
Pulling the scarf over my face, its scent floods my nostrils, and wafts over me. I almost stagger with the power of the memory, but I smile again as if I’m in that crowded celebration, just a few days ago… Suddenly, they become quiet when they hear me break the alabaster jar. The pure nard emanates throughout the room with over-powering honeysuckle, lavender, and muskroot. “Truly heavenly,” Martha quips sarcastically. I’m pleased she’s not really angry. She’s finally learned not to question the Lord when it comes to my walk with Him.
Pouring the perfumed oil over Jesus’ head and then wiping the ointment on his feet with my hair, tearfully and gratefully—over one pound, a year’s wages. Like only a few of the others, I understand when He calls Himself our groom. He is my Divine Love. Could any gift be too much? He gave me back my life and …much more. I am overcome with the love and complete acceptance of his friendship and the freedom and forgiveness his lordship brings.
I can’t say I yet know exactly what will be, but HE did tell us clearly that at Passover he will be handed over for crucifixion. Yet, that day, they continued celebrating–he had resurrected my brother from the grave. Yes, I’m grateful and stunned, but, oh, Yahweh, did they not hear him?? His reference to death–some say it’s just a parable or allegory. But he has said these things many times, and his mother who is also a disciple, she knows. For over 34 years, she’s known.
Some disciples were indignant at the waste, but I will never forget his words,
“Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me… When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. I tell you the truth! Wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”
In many works, Oxford and Cambridge Professor C. S. Lewis references war, wartime, humankind and our propensity for dominance, cruelty and evil–that old-fashioned word, “sin”.
“War creates no absolutely new situation: it simply aggravates the permanent human situation so that we can no longer ignore it.
Human culture has always had to exist under the shadow of something infinitely more important than itself.
If men had postponed the search for knowledge and beauty until they were secure, the search would never have begun.
We are mistaken when we compare war with ‘normal life.’ Life has never been normal.”
–These C.S. Lewis quotes: “Learning in Wartime” from The Weight of Glory
I don’t know much about war, but I do know: “Evil prevails if good men do nothing.” And, along with Jack Lewis’ friend, J. R. R. Tolkien: “There is always hope.” I am doing what I can do to help, and I hope you are too.
Just something to think about here, friends. And those ancestors of mine I mentioned came to North America during the Bolshevik Revolution less than 100 years ago, from the Ukraine.
Love to Ukraine, with many prayers and *hugs*. L.L.
Sometimes technology makes me sad. This is true, especially for the Lenten Season. It makes it nearly impossible for people (of any modern world view) to find soul refreshment so crucial to survival and thriving. Human flourishing cannot occur in a capsule addicted to noise and device. “The inner man must be renewed.” Refreshed, yes, but even more, reborn. Spring and Lent combine to miraculously gift us with nature’s rebirth in music, light, color and song. If we can empty ourselves of the distractions. IF.
Pascal has said that the great problem with modern man is that he cannot sit in a quiet room alone. In a Harvard study, subjects were told to sit in a bare room with an electric shock machine. At the start, they were given one electric shock which each individual confirmed was decidedly unpleasant. Around the 15-minute mark the college-aged men began giving themselves shocks, doing so with shorter and shorter intervals as the 30 minutes drew to a close. (Women did as well but in lower numbers.) We would rather experience pain than sit in stillness and silence.
Silence, Solitude, Stillness, Space, Spirit, Serenity…ok enough with the ‘S’ words, but they are each good for focused intention. Many self-help books and meditational practices are helpful and extremely popular–at some level we all constantly hunger for a filling of joy and peace: how ever you describe this basic human need. Suffice it here to begin with a reminder to return to breath and simplicity: to listen, to relax, to enjoy. And to hear the music of the universe, the song of antiquity, drawing all mankind into It/Himself.
Do The Important Things which have nothing whatever to do with modern technology, or modern-anything-at-all. ‘Modern Conveniences’ have brought modern complications. Media has brought mania. And so on. To Chesterton’s quote above: before 1903 a person spent free time:
playing with a babies
gardening, without air pods
walking in nature, without air pods (listen to the birds, water running, silence)
reading by the fireplace,
sharing tea, coffee or wine with friends,
listening to all kinds of inspirational, reflective, and empowering music,
soaking in works of art,
creating lovely things by hand,
enjoying narrative and theatre,
and flowers…Here, on an early Spring walk, unexpected flowers on my forest walk, reflecting the simplicity and miracle of new birth every time.
Lady Lorraine 