Maundy Thursday, April 6, 2023
from 8pm to 7am in the Lady Chapel
One of our special Holy Week traditions at Trinity Church is the overnight vigil in the Lady Chapel from Maundy Thursday to Good Friday. If you would like to spend an hour in contemplation and prayer, see this link to sign up for a time
This Sunday is one of those marvelous pivots of the church year. We’ve come almost to the end of Lent proper, and we start to look towards the momentous events of Holy Week. In about a week’s time, we will sing Hosanna and hear the passion of our Lord being read. To riff a little on T.S. Eliot’s words in The Waste Land, we are in that space:
Before the torch-light red on sweaty faces
Before the frosty silence in the gardens
Before the agony in stony places
The shouting and the crying
Prison and place and reverberation
Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
Great things, terrible things, world changing things, are about to happen.
If we’re honest with ourselves, we know that don't want to look at death. It's hard to face the reality of the cross in our religious lives. I know that I would much rather stay on the mountain peaks, in any place where I am not pierced to the core by horror and sorrow, where I am not faced with the reality of the human condition - quite especially my own. And yet here we are.
Here we are, standing at the pivot between the sign of the Easter to come that we hear on Sunday in the story of Lazarus, and the darkness of Holy Week that we walk through first. Christ is the one who in that darkness is raised up as the hope of the world. He is the rejected one, the one who will travel down into the shadows of the dead, the one who will walk in the company of the dead and the lost and yet will not be destroyed. He is the one who takes death within himself, the one who offers new life and hope.
“I am about to do a new thing,” he says.
Just wait.
Yours in Christ,
The Rev. Cn. Dr. Kara Slade, Associate Rector
P.S., Consider this also my yearly reminder to make attending Holy Week services a priority. The liturgies of the great three days — Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and the Easter Vigil — are the very best of our tradition, and the story these services tell is life-changing and life-giving.
P.P.S., on a more personal note, I recently recorded a podcast on Karl Barth and you can listen to it on my publisher Wipf & Stock’s website at the link below.
“Making church more queer and more inclusive of queer folks is a project that includes everyone and benefits everyone! Because the work of making churches more inclusive is a group project, this is an event for ‘church people’ — whether you sit in the pews, stand at the front, or maybe a little of both. Whether you’re familiar with the latest lingo and research on religion and gender, or whether you feel a little overwhelmed by it, we want you to come!”
“Gracious Father, whose blessed son Jesus Christ came down from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world: evermore give us this bread, that He may live in us, and we and Him; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.”
What does it mean for us to name Christ as the true bread which gives life to the world? Three thoughts come to mind: Literal bread, daily bread, and the broken bread of the Eucharist.
Consider literal bread: There are places in our community, our country, our planet where the Lord’s promise to be bread needs to be taken in the most literal way. Any lack of availability of bread for the hungry is a sign, a signal, a plea for justice in the allocation of resources in our world. We can help, or we can hinder. Do we use resources well? Wastefully? Selfishly? Sparingly? Responsibly? Do we nourish the world we live in, or do we run the risk of contributing towards its impoverishment? Are we “consumers” of the world’s bread? Or might we be those are who share liberally from the abundance that we have?
Consider daily bread: Remember the manna in the wilderness? The people of Israel were charged to gather only as much as they needed for one day. To hoard God's gift was to watch it rot. It was simply daily bread. There is so much that nourishes spiritual and physical life that must happen daily. Bread. Exercise. Prayer. Sleep. Scripture study. Community. It is the dailiness of such commitment that is the bread of life.
Consider the bread of the Eucharist: In that upper room on the evening that we now call Maundy Thursday, Jesus bound himself once and for all to all his disciples by the simple symbol of bread — literal bread, daily bread. Now we are invited to take, eat, embrace, embody, the true bread that gives life to the world. What an exrtraordianry promise in ordinary bread.
The paradox is this: Only when we receive this true bread within us can we live in the Lord who exceeds us. The presence of Christ in us, among us, around us, and beyond us — this is the bread’s purpose. Breaking the bread reveals its power, for its power is in being shared. Come to the table and take your part, be a portion of the True Bread that gives life to a hungry world.
Amen.
Trinity’s Easter Egg Hunt takes place on Holy Saturday at 11am on Stockton Lawn is covered with colorful, candy and treat-filled eggs. Beforehand, we gather at the church entrance for a blessing. Bring your baskets and get ready to hunt for eggs. During the hunt, keep an eye peeled for the Easter Bunny, who loves to pose for photos. Come back for the Easter Vigil at 7pm or on Easter Morning to celebrate our Risen Lord!
We are seeking a group of Trinity volunteers to help pack grocery bags for Arm in Arm’s mobile pantry food truck distribution throughout Trenton. Arm in Arm, one of Trinity’s local ministry partners, delivers food to several sites in Trenton to communities where there is great need. This service day is suitable for adults and families with children 8 years and older. It is a great way for teens to get community service credits for school.
We will be working inside at their Mill One location in Hamilton and there is ample off-street parking. We will gather on the circle at Trinity Church by 9:30am and can drive down to Mill One together. If you need a ride please let us know.
Please contact Phil Unetic at phil.unetic@gmail.com or 609-844-0801 if you would like to join!
