Reflections During Holy Week

I don’t intend for this to become a devotional blog, but I’ve been thinking a lot about holiday traditions and how this pandemic is affecting things this year. As I write this, it is the first day of Passover and Maundy Thursday, the Christian commemoration of Jesus celebrating Passover with his disciples on the night he was betrayed, with Good Friday following tomorrow and then Easter on Sunday. The story of Passover seems more appropriate than ever, with folks huddled at home, straining to hear whether the wings of the Angel of Death will pass over or not. There had been some hope at one point that things would open up and be back to normal here by Easter, even though that was never realistic in terms of the virus’ track record. Easter has always held a special place in my heart though, both in the conventional religious sense and in a wider spiritual/natural context. It’s clear this will be a very different Easter, but much of what makes it special still remains. This isn’t going to focus much (if at all) on the theology side of things, but my memories and feelings around Easter and Christmas/Spring and Winter, which hopefully are relatable whatever your background or beliefs. And looking back through the photographs I’ve taken over the past few months, I’m finding expressions in both word and image.

For most Christians, Christmas and Easter are the foundational, monumental holidays. As a young child, Christmas initially had an edge over Easter for me. I mean, come on, you get presents! But even more than that was the lead up to the actual holiday. In our family, the tree went up the day after Thanksgiving. My dad would kick off the Christmas music season with Elvis Presley’s “Blue Christmas.” My mom would go out and, when I questioned her upon her return about where she went and what she got, she’d smile and tell me this wasn’t the time of year to be asking questions. There’d be parties and gatherings and cookies galore. Christmas lights cast a comforting glow along the snow. We would have a family celebration with aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents on Christmas Eve where we’d sing carols and read the Christmas story, then go to church (which was exciting because it was so late at night), and then the next morning would be more celebrations and gifts and all sorts of joy.

But Christmas always had a tinge of sadness and melancholy and darkness, both literal and figurative. December in Minnesota meant short days and long nights. A number of Christmas carols are in minor keys, for even the joyous occasion of a baby’s birth is taking place in the shadow of the cross. (If you’re looking for examples, “What Child Is This?” is probably the most obvious. One of the verses includes the lines “Nails, spears shall pierce him through/the cross is borne for me, for you.”) Childbirth in general is a fraught time, jumbling together the hopes and excitement of new life and the pain and fear and risk that comes with it as well. The Christmas story adds to that somberness by following with Herod’s order to kill all children under the age of two and the flight of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus to Egypt. The light and dark are entwined and inescapable.

And from a calendar perspective, the end of Christmas and New Years also marks a shift in how winter appeared. In the lead up to Christmas, the snow and cold is another part of the tableau. Think of songs like “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas,” “Winter Wonderland,” “Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!”- snowy blustery days are part of the celebration. Christmas lights mean more things to enjoy as the sun grows weaker and weaker. Somehow, the approach of the winter solstice and the shortest day of the year doesn’t seem to loom over us, but rather serves as another reminder of how close we’re getting to the holidays. But once New Year’s comes and goes, the darkness and cold takes on a new dimension. Even though the days are technically getting longer, it’s hard to notice it. There’s little to look forward to in terms of celebrations and it can feel like we’ll be in winter’s grasp for a very long time. Even now, when we rarely have the same kind of snowy winters, the endless gray and brown and dreariness can get overwhelming.

Into this comes the Lenten season for Christians, which really doubles down on the bleakness. Beginning with the Ash Wednesday reminder that from dust we come and to dust we shall return, Lent is all about deprivation. No more use of the word “hallelujah.” For some, no more meat (though the Friday fish fries were a huge thing when I lived in Wisconsin – one of my college professors had immigrated there from Iraq and he was ecstatic when Lent came around simply because he loved the fish fries). There’s the tradition of giving up something for Lent. I remember as a kid trying to convince my dad that I was giving up vegetables for Lent – it didn’t fly.

Then Holy Week itself. Palm Sunday, which at my church growing up and I think many others, involved a pancake breakfast (not sure where that tradition comes from) and the waving of palm fronds. This becomes a bit more stressful as a parent of young children who get their fronds and then try to spend the rest of the service sword fighting with them. While generally triumphant and celebratory, that foreshadowing and sense of foreboding remains, both in that we know where the story is going and also in the symbolism of that year’s palm fronds being burned and the ashes saved for next year’s Ash Wednesday. Maundy Thursday, Jesus washing the disciples’ feet, the last supper, and the story of Jesus’ time in the garden of Gethsemane, praying to be delivered from the trials to come if at all possible, and then his betrayal, culminating in the literal darkness of Good Friday and the seeming triumph of death. I’m going to miss Good Friday service almost as much as Easter itself. There’s something special about listening to the familiar story as the lights in the sanctuary get dimmer and dimmer and the candles are extinguished, one by one. The cross is shrouded and carried out. There’s no formal dismissal – we sit in silence and leave in our own time.

And then the pure, unadulterated joy of Easter Sunday! The funeral shrouds are replaced with white. Flowers cover the altar area. Brass instruments play and no minor chords are heard. The hallelujahs return triumphant and the tomb is empty. The complete juxtaposition with the silence and darkness of Good Friday makes the sounds and light of Easter morning all the more special. By the time I was a teenager, Easter had eclipsed Christmas as my favorite holiday, mainly for this reason (and sure, also the abundance of chocolate). I’m going to miss it terribly. Live streaming or video worship may help, but part of the joy comes from being in the physical presence of others. It’s a sacrifice worth making though.

From the nature perspective, this is my favorite time of year as well. After months of tromping through mud and dead leaves, I’m now seeing color return. The grass gets greener and greener (no matter what side I’m on), particularly after it rains. Flowers begin pushing their way up through last autumn’s graveyard, as life reasserts its victory over death.

Every day, the sun regains its strength. Something as common as a dandelion becomes a welcome sight, its bright color interrupting the monochrome around it, heralding the return of bees, which in turn will help bring more flowers. The migrating birds fill the air with song. Even dark rainy skies add color and excitement as thunderstorms roll through (sometimes, too much excitement). A feeling of newness and light and life is all around, if we just look for it.

This is perhaps one of the reasons I feel a sense of dissonance right now. We are rightly staying away from large groups (including Easter Sunday services). The news is filled with stories of Covid-19 and the suffering it is wreaking around the world. Despite the warmer weather, I’m more cooped up in my house than I was in even the deepest of winters. As life bursts forth in nature, we remain cloistered for our safety and the safety of others. As Lent ends, we’re all finding ourselves giving up items and activities that we love. But spring, Easter, and Jeff Goldblum remind us that life finds a way. The story of Easter is that death is not the end. I don’t claim to know what happens after, but there is an after of some sort – whether it’s heaven or reincarnation or simply a release of our energy back into the universe. There will be an after to this as well. I continue to hope that a new spring is coming in the wake of this disease, that we will find ways to support and build each other up, to care for one another and for this magnificent world in which we live. Regardless of where I am Sunday morning, I’m determined to revel in that Easter promise and I wish nothing but love, joy, and peace for you all.