Tag: Holy Week

01Apr

Maundy Thursday: “A New Commandment”

Today the church remembers the occasion when Jesus washed the feet of his disciples. He gave his disciples (and us) a “new commandment”, to love one another in the same way that he loved them. The Gospel lesson according to the Revised Common Lectionary is John 13:1-17 and 31-35:

Now before the feast of the Passover, Jesus, knowing that his time had come that he would depart from this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. During supper, the devil having already put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he came from God, and was going to God, arose from supper, and laid aside his outer garments. He took a towel and wrapped a towel around his waist. Then he poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. Then he came to Simon Peter. He said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?”

Jesus answered him, “You don’t know what I am doing now, but you will understand later.”

Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet!”

Jesus answered him, “If I don’t wash you, you have no part with me.”

Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head!”

Jesus said to him, “Someone who has bathed only needs to have his feet washed, but is completely clean. You are clean, but not all of you.” For he knew him who would betray him, therefore he said, “You are not all clean.” So when he had washed their feet, put his outer garment back on, and sat down again, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call me, ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord.’ You say so correctly, for so I am. If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should also do as I have done to you. Most certainly I tell you, a servant is not greater than his lord, neither is one who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them. 

… When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and he will glorify him immediately. Little children, I will be with you a little while longer. You will seek me, and as I said to the Jews, ‘Where I am going, you can’t come,’ so now I tell you. A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Gospel reading for Maundy Thursday, from Librivox

Music: “I give you a new Commandment” by John Sheppard (1515-1558). This was performed by Greensboro Early Music, October 14, 2011. It was uploaded to YouTube by Andy Bonner, and is used here in accordance with the Creative Commons license.

Sheppard – “I Give You A New Commandment”

28Mar

Palm Sunday 2021-A Celebration of the Passion of Christ

Palm Sunday 2021
  1. Prelude: “All Glory Laud and Honor,” performed by Diane Bish on the organ of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, from the Joy of Music program “Hymns and Spiritual Songs of Easter,” used in accordance with Creative Commons License.
  2. First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-9a, King James Bible.
  3. Psalm 31:9-16 
  4. Second Reading: Philippians 2:5-11, World English Bible.
  5. Hymn: “O Sacred Head Now Wounded”, Immanuel Congregational Church in 2013, available in the public domain at Archive.org.
  6. A Reading of the Passion Narrative from Mark 14:1–15:47, World English Bible.
  7. The Lord’s Prayer: From Luke.
  8. Blessing: The “Aaronic blessing” From Deuteronomy.

The Bible passages were recorded by Librivox, and are in the public domain. Readings correspond to the Revised Common Lectionary. All audio files are given with attribution where known.

12Apr

Reflections Around the End of Lent

Today is the Friday before Palm Sunday, and it is a day that as far as I know has no particular name on a church calendar. It is just another day in Lent, that season of fasting and penitence that in many traditions of Christianity precedes Easter. In exactly one week we will have one of those days which does have a famous name, “Good Friday”, which will commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus. The great pageants and commemorations coming in the next week will be a liturgical—and potentially emotional—roller coaster for Christians around the globe.

Palm Sunday looks back to “The Triumphal Entry” of Jesus into Jerusalem, just before his death, when adoring crowds waved palm branches and shouted “Hosanna!” as Jesus entered the city. In many churches these ceremonies take on almost a cheerful and festive tone, a kind of foretaste of Easter. The rest of Holy Week reverts back to the solemnity of Lent, with Good Friday being a focal point—we look back through the corridor of time to Jesus lifting his bloodied head one last time as he hangs from those dreadful crossed planks; He cries out in a loud voice as he slumps into death, and the land is covered in an eerie blackness. By Easter Sunday, the tomb of Jesus is empty and churches explode into full-on celebration. Even fairly dormant mainline Protestant churches will, for one glorious day, be overflowing with people. Some of their left-leaning pastors will even deign to choke out an orthodox sermon for the occasion.

A part of me is glad for the coming of Easter. Austerity, discipline, and penitence are not always fun. I am sitting here at what could be “happy hour”, sipping tea in place of my usual Manhattan or Gin and Tonic, because one of my own Lenten observances is to give up alcohol; in just over a week I’ll permit myself to enjoy those libations again.

Lent is, of course, a voluntary observance. It’s not something you’ll find in the Bible. You can have Christianity without it, and many people do. Still, I appreciate Lent. It may not be “fun”, but it is spiritually enriching. I embrace it willingly, and even look forward to it. I feel that I get an enhanced sense of clarity and perspective, even joy, from the increased attention to my spiritual well-being. Even though the Christian life is a 24 hr/day, 365 day-per-year endeavor, I yet find it useful to have seasons that focus our energies in particular ways.

By not drinking that Manhattan, my mind is almost forced to obey the command of Colossians 3:2: “Set your affections on things above.” It must be something akin what a runner feels when training—All that exercise and giving up sweets has had its benefits.

So, I will raise my glass of ice tea to you as a toast. There’s still some time to fast and pray, if you feel so moved, before the dawn of Easter.

04Apr

Allegri’s “Miserere Mei” sung by the Tallis Scholars

In honor of Holy Week:

This beautiful piece was composed by Gregorio Allegri (1582-1652), for performance in the Sistine Chapel on Wednesday and Friday of Holy Week.  For a time, according to the oft-told mythical story, the song was the well guarded secret of the Vatican, which forbade its publication, until a 14 year old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart visited on Good Friday 1770 and later transcribed the entire piece from memory.  This is probably not true, but makes a great story (for a full debunking, read Ben Byram-Wigfield’s 1996 essay, “MISERERE MEI, DEUS, GREGORIO ALLEGRI: A Quest for the Holy Grail?”, pg 16, online here).  There was certainly a mystique about the music that led such as person as Mary Shelley to gush:

But a thousand times over I would go to listen to the Miserere in the Sistine Chapel ; that spot made sacred by the most sublime works of Michael Angelo … The music, not only of the Miserere, but of the Lamentations, is solemn, pathetic, religious – the soul is rapt – carried away into another state of being. Strange that grief, and laments, and the humble petition of repentance, should fill us with delight – a delight that wakens these very emotions in the heart – and calls tears into the eyes, and yet is dearer than any pleasure.
(From Mary Shelley: Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842 and 1843. Vol 2. London, Edward Moxon, 1844), Vol 2, 230–31; as cited in Graham Kelly’s essay for the University of York Dept of Music, “A unique singers’ manuscript from the 19th century: Domenico Mustafa’s version of the Miserere of Tommaso Bai and Gregorio Allegri”, which can be found online here.)

The version heard commonly today is not likely what a guest to the vatican would have heard in Mozart’s time.  The “top C” version we all know and love turns out to have been the happy result of an error.  For you musicologists out there, the Wigfield essay mentioned above explains this in detail:   The received version, as it is widely held today, is a mix of Burney’s first choir with a bizarre second choir, congealed into life in the first edition of Grove’s Dictionary of Music & Musicians in 1880. As an illustrated example, W.S. Rockstro showed the first half of the four-part verse as indicated by Alfieri, but then sticks Mendelssohn’s 1831 record of the first half —up a fourth— on the second half of the verse. Ivor Atkins, for his edition of 1951, took Burney’s first choir and final verse, adding this second choir from Grove’s. The problem is that the Mendelssohn abbellimenti is also a record of the first half, apparently sung a fourth higher than written at the time of his visit. It is this that causes musicologists to squirm with the bass jumping from an F# up to a C, followed by the swift gear change into C minor. This error has been repeated in two subsequent editions, produced by respected academics. The result is strangely beautiful, and probably here to stay. It is, after all, one of the most popular pieces of sacred music. However, it is neither a representation of the performance practice of the Sistine Chapel choir, nor a true reflection of how the piece was ever sung there.

A theological point can be made here, and perhaps I’ll embellish it down the road: Sometimes God uses our mistakes to His greater glory.