This is a lightly-edited version of my Holy Week post from 2022, with updated dates and some changes to the opening reflection. If you remember reading it back then, kudos! Your memory is better than mine.

I’ve experienced many strange things as a priest, but by far the strangest was being mocked by a man wearing tights and carrying a musket for shamelessly going around outside without wearing a hat.

It was a Monday morning in mid-April, and I was at the Old Burying Ground in Lincoln, where I had been invited to offer prayers for the fallen British regulars who’d been buried there after the Battle of Concord in 1775. (The Congregationalist minister was invited to pray for the fallen colonial militia. Go figure.) Except for the two clergymen and a rather-uncomfortable representative from the British Consulate, the event consisted entirely of historical reenactors: men dressed in the uniforms of the British Army or the humble clothing of the Minute Men, shooting off blanks from authentic flintlock muskets in memory of the events of the past.

Our Holy Week can sometimes like feel an historical reenactment of the same kind, as we remember the events of the last week of Jesus’ life and act them out: waving palms, washing feet, breaking bread, and even giving voice to the main characters of the story in dramatic passion plays.

But Holy Week is not quite a historical reenactment. We don’t try to replicate the details of clothes or tools. We don’t dress in ancient garb or use first-century towels to dry our feet. Ours is a symbolic reenactment, pulling out a few key practices and moments from the events of Holy Week and reshaping them into the form of our liturgies.

But we share the same simple idea: that human beings are more than disembodied minds. By reenacting what has been, we learn from and experience the events of the past and allow them to shape us in the present and for the future. By reenacting the struggle for freedom, we strive to remain a free people. By reenacting Jesus’ acts of love, we allows ourselves to be formed into more loving people.

The services of Holy Week are always quieter and more intimate than our larger Sunday liturgies. It can be hard to fit them into an otherwise-busy week. But I want to invite you to join us this year, even for just one or two, and to allow yourself to reenact, for a moment, one part of the story of God’s love for you.

Palm Sunday — April 13 — 10am

We celebrate Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem with a parade of palms, and remember the crushing disappointment of his betrayal, arrest, and death with a reading of the Passion According to Luke.

This year’s service will begin in the Sanctuary with a celebratory anthem from the Junior Choir.

Maundy Thursday — April 17 — 6pm

As Jesus gathered with his disciples for a Last Supper together, we share a simple meal. As he taught them his “new commandment” to love one another as he loved them, and then humbly knelt to wash the dirt from their feet, we wash one another’s feet. As darkness fell and he went out to the Garden to pray, we strip the decorations and ornaments from our sanctuary and bring the Blessed Sacrament to rest in a Garden of Repose.

The service begins around the table in the Parish House, and moves to the Sanctuary for foot-washing and the Eucharist. (Participation in foot-washing is completely optional!)

Good Friday — April 18 — 7pm

We remember again the events of Jesus’ betrayal, arrest, trial, and death with a solemn service of readings and prayers, and venerate the cross on which he died and through which he destroyed the power of death.

Holy Saturday — April 19 — 12pm

One of the simplest, most austere, but most moving services of the year, the Liturgy of the Word for Holy Saturday reflects on the day in which Jesus rested in the tomb, and offers prayers drawn from our funeral services.

This is a short service of prayer and reflection, with no music.

The Great Vigil of Easter — April 19 — 7pm

Our celebration of Easter begins with the kindling of a new fire and the retelling of the whole story of salvation, stretching from the moment of creation through Easter morning, followed by a festive celebration of the first Eucharist of Easter.

The Easter Vigil is the first celebration of Easter, so we follow it with a festive champagne and chocolate reception to break the Lenten fast!

Easter Sunday — April 20 — 10am

We journey with the women who followed Jesus to the door of his empty tomb, and see their astonishment to find him risen, crying aloud our words of praise: “Alleluia! Christ is risen!”

This is a large and celebratory service, followed by an Easter Egg Hunt in the Garden for our kids!