The Triduum in Review

The last few days have been busy. Worst of all, I have no idea when I am going to bed tonight due to a couple of analyses I need to do in order to finish my second conference paper. On the other hand, I am enjoying various things that I wasn't doing during Lent. For instance, I am listening to DJ Panda presently.

But let's review what I did this week.

1. Thursday morning Eucharist. I basically had to teach a class on Thursday evening, so I wandered to Eucharist at 7 AM in the morning. Good sermon.

2. Friday Tenebrae. I love this service. It's one of the few services of the year that is entirely run by non-clergy staff, in this case, mainly by a gentleman I like to call "the lay clerk," who I love dearly. It's basically a mix of Scripture readings, Psalm and canticle chanting, and an amazing meditation on shadow that exemplified my favorite kind of preaching. And, of course, we have an earthquake that while technologically simple probably was designed by a Hollywood sound effects artist.

3. After Tenebrae, I stuck around for the Friday-Saturday portion of the Holy Week vigils. It was an opportunity for me to do a bit of reading. I read Bede's Holy Week sermons, Donne's Essays on Divinity (which have some long-winded but fascinating prayers), and some favorite parts of the Bible. Every hour, those watching gather for prayer. About 11 PM, one of my friends came to me, pointed at her watch, and said, "What should we do?" So we gathered and read the great Hallel , Psalm 136. I officiated at Compline at midnight, went to sleep, sang very quietly Psalm 104 as a first office (can anyone guess why?), and then officiated at the Holy Saturday Office in the form of Morning Prayer. It is always good to pray with other people, but I really need to be careful to mention page numbers at all times.

4. I then returned home and ended up getting a fauxhawk, since I really don't have enough hair for a decent mohawk at present. I apparently now have the hairstyle of a fashionable actor my age.

5. Then I returned to church for Easter Vigil. The Liturgy of the Word was done in an odd way. Each section began with one of the traditional readings concerning God's saving deeds in history, then followed a psalm or canticle, then there was a reading from some source outside of the Holy Scriptures (not the Acts of Phillip the Fair, though ;) ) about some sort of political issue related to the subject of the Scripture reading. For instance, the first section was Genesis on the creation of the world, then Magna et mirabilia (confusing me no end, because that's an apocalyptic canticle), and then we heard a portion of a speech by Al Gore in An Inconvenient Truth (possibly explaining Magna et mirabilia ). Father Haller likely will be dismayed (or not, I could be wrong) to hear that an excerpt from an old sermon of his, "Nothing Will Be Lost" was read to complement "Salvation Freely Offered to All." The complement to "the Valley of the Dry Bones" was a very powerful and very Scripturally infused speech by one of the Lost Boys of Sudan. The baptismal creed was the Creed of John Sentamu. (5 adult baptism, 47 new previously baptized members.)

6. Finally I returned to church on Easter morning. It was packed. The church was full for the late morning service with an overflow of 300. I think that's ~1500 people, making more than 3000 people for all four services. The subject of the sermon was how evil substitutionary atonement is. I kid you not. There were two very funny jokes at the beginning that had nothing to do with the subject of the sermon. I really don't understand it. You have a congregation at each principal service of Easter Sunday on the order of your ASA and you proclaim that "Jesus didn't die for our sins, He died because of them?" Quidem propter iniquitates et quoque pro iniquitatibus, sed resurrexit tertia die secundum Scripturas. . There was no Creed on this day, per normal .

He is risen! Alleluia!