Good Friday

For the last several years I have disciplined myself to read an entire gospel on Good Friday.  I broke that tradition this year and read Romans instead.  We had studied Romans in our Women's Bible Study at church and it seemed so fragmented.  So today I sat with the Oxford English Bible and read the epistle in two sections while occasionally highlighting something in my New Revised Standard Version.  It was a good exercise.  It made it seem more like a letter with Paul's personality and concerns and love for his God and the Romans coming through.

As always, I had questions for Jim.  What was the Greek word for "grace" in Romans 4:16?  Was it "sheer grace" as the Oxford translator put it?  No, it wasn't.  That was the translator's interpretation.  And what about the idea of "in Adam we all die but in Christ we are made alive?" (Romans 5 and the Messiah libretto!)  That is mostly Paul's idea and not expressed elsewhere.  Yes, I am always questioning!

Romans was not the gospel story but it was the gospel--"There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." "Who is to condemn?  It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us."


I thought there was going to be a violin-organ performance for Holy Week at the Sacred Heart Basilica at noon today but I was wrong.  I have to learn to read carefully--it was on Wednesday.  So I sat quietly in the basilica and prayed for a while.  Many others were doing the same and even more were lined up on either side to make their confessions. It was a little glimpse into another tradition.

We had our own church's traditional Good Friday service tonight.  I had the joy of being in the congregation and having no responsibilities except to enter into worship.  I felt such a sense of fellowship and unity with our church family as I listened to each reader and I thought how they were people I knew and loved.  We sang beautiful songs and I prayed that it would be true in the words of "O Sacred Head Now Wounded" that I would "never, ever outlive my love for thee."  Our preacher gave a powerful message on the servant passage in Isaiah.  The candles were dimmed one by one and with the last one the strepitus ended in a loud crash. We entered the sanctuary in silence on Good Friday and we left in silence.

Tomorrow it's Holy Saturday.  Two young boys will be baptized with all of us surrounding them at the font.  Jim will be one of the readers. I have to play a few hymns at the organ but that is not enough to cause me any stress--I hope.

Easter Egg fruit plate!

I have played for many Easter services but this year my only responsibility is to sing with the choir.  We'll have a big Easter dinner at friends--with maybe 20 of us eating and taking a long walk afterwards. I miss my children and grandchildren for the holidays.  But I have been told that a few of the young ones at our dinner are counting on Grandma Mary's bunny cake which they will decorate with jelly beans.  I am grateful for a church family when our own is far away.