Holy Thursday
April 5, 2012
J.A. Loftus, S.J.
This evening is an evening of extraordinary intimacy. It was then; it
should be now. Palm Sunday was the day for the great crowds of admirers.
There were mobs of fickle friends and famously forgetful followers. Tonight
is a stark contrast. Tonight is for intimate friends and hand-picked
confidants.
Here at the table recline Peter and James and John. And over there is
Andrew and Matthew. And close-by is another intimate friend, Judas
Iscariot. Ands who knows who else might have been there and not made it
into the “official” record? It would be strange to have a final, celebratory
meal without your mother. Don’t you think? And how about some of the
other women who were so close to him, and to his life and ministry? Who
knows? (Someone once said to me: “There was probably no pizza take-out
in Jerusalem. So somebody had to cook and clean up.”)
All we know is that they were all friends and would-be lovers. It was
nothing new for them. It was about to become everything new for them.
With the 20/20 hindsight of history, and with increasingly complex
theologies to explain this night, and creeds to enshrine the memories, we may
be led to believe that tonight is something tender, something soft and even
teary. We are told to remember the institution of Eucharist, the institution
of priesthood, and the great mandatum to wash each others’ feet. They are
all worthy of our memories.
But I think Timothy Radcliffe is also right when he speaks of our
community being the only one in human history that remembers its own
dissolution, its own death as a starting point for a new memory. This night
shapes the foundational paradox of our life as Christians. This night “is a
story which tells of the moment when there was no story to tell, when the
future disappeared.” It is not very tender or romantic. “We gather as a
community around the altar and remember the night that the community
disintegrated....Our community looks back to when it fell apart.”
God was about to be abandoned and die in order to re-start creation
from the beginning and in order to show again just how much God loves this
world and all its desires and dreams. And that includes all our own desires
and dreams–for ourselves and for our own world today.
It is a painful night as much as it is a tender one. Because our world is
still in pain–and we are still in pain. And Jesus asks the most probing
question of his life: “Do you understand what I have done for you?” It is not
an intellectual question. It is not a liturgical question. It may be the most
important question any one of us will ever be asked. “Do you understand
what I have done?”
Answer quickly at your peril. And please don’t ask me to explain it for
you. I can’t. But this night is not all about tender pastels and soft flowers.
God is about to shatter even death itself. And here will be life in abundance.
That is the Promise Jesus must have struggled to keep in focus this night.
We should do no less. This is the Promise of every Eucharist we celebrate
together.
Do you understand....? Answer slowly. Because someday you and I
will be asked to live the answer we give. Welcome to sacred time!
3
Introduction to Worship
Our sacred Triduum has begun.
This evening begins gathered in bright light and with a full church.
This evening will end in darkness and with a feeling of emptiness.
And the light will not be re-kindled until the Great Vigil.
Nor will the song be sung again until that mysterious moment.
But for now, we begin where we will end: With an ancient hymn of Praise
and Thanksgiving. Gloria in Excelsis Deo.
The Vast Ocean Begins Just Outside Our Church:
the Eucharist
by Mary Oliver
Something has happened to the bread and the wine.
They have been blessed. What now?
The body leans forward to receive the gift from the priest’s hand, then the
chalice.
They are something else now from what they were before this began.
want to see Jesus, maybe in the clouds or on the shore, just walking, beautiful man and
clearly someone else besides.
On the hard days I ask myself if I ever will.
Also there are times my body whispers to me that I have.