Palm Sunday
Holy Week begins with Palm Sunday, when the Church recalls Jesus’ triumphal arrival at the gates of Jerusalem just a few days before the Passover was due to be held. He was the Messiah come to his own people in their capital city, and yet he came in humility, riding on a young donkey, not in triumph, riding on a war-horse.
Maundy Thursday
The word Maundy is derived through Middle English, and Old French mandé, from the Latin mandatum, the first word of the phrase “Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos” (“A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you”), the statement in the Gospel of John (13:34) by which Jesus explained to the Apostles the significance of his action of washing their feet. The ceremony of the washing of the feet became an important part of the liturgy of the medieval church and is still done during the Celebration of the Lord’s Supper. John’s gospel makes it clear that the Last Supper took place the evening BEFORE the regular Passover meal, and that later Jesus died at the same time that the Passover lambs were killed.
Good Friday
Good Friday, the most solemn day in the Christian year is widely marked by the removal of all decorations from churches. In Lutheran churches, the day was marked by the reading of the passion narrative in a gospel, a practice which lies behind the ‘passions’ composed by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750). Both the St Matthew Passion and the St John Passion have their origins in this observance of Good Friday. The custom of observing a period of three hours’ devotion from 12 midday to 3 pm on Good Friday goes back to the 18th century. The Good Friday Liturgy incorporates a reading of the Passion with communion using only wafers consecrated at the Maundy Thursday service.
EASTER
The question most often asked is: Why does the date move around so much? The answer lies in Judaism, from which Christianity developed. Most people will tell you that Easter falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox, which is broadly true. But the precise calculations are unbelievably complicated and involve something called an ‘ecclesiastical full moon’, which is not the same as the moon in the sky. The earliest possible date for Easter in the West is 22 March, which last fell in 1818 and won’t fall again until 2285. The latest is 25 April, which last happened in 1943 and is next due in 2038.
Sir Isaac Newton was one of the first to use the Hebrew lunar calendar to come up with firm dates for Good Friday: Friday 7 April 30 AD or Friday 3 April, 33 AD, with Easter Day falling two days later.
Why the name, ‘Easter’? In almost every European language, the festival’s name comes from ‘Pesach’, the Hebrew word for Passover. The Germanic word ‘Easter’, however, seems to come from Eostre, a Saxon fertility goddess mentioned by the Venerable Bede. He thought that the Saxons worshipped her in ‘Eostur month’, but may have confused her with the classical dawn goddesses like Eos and Aurora, whose names mean ‘shining in the east’. So Easter might have meant simply ‘beginning month’ – a good time for starting up again after a long winter.
Fair Linen to celebrate Easter
The altar will have been carefully prepared for this very special occasion. There will be a white or gold frontal to reflect the church’s season. On the top of the altar will be laid a white ‘Fair Linen’ cloth. The fair linen symbolises the burial cloth of Jesus and normally extends the whole width of the altar and down on both sides. The fair linen should be plain with only five flat crosses embroidered on it to remind the worshiper of the five wounds that Christ received for us. These, when they exist, are usually sewn in white, so they do not contrast, and are placed where the Bishop when consecrating the altar itself would have signed with a cross: the four corners and the centre.
The fair linen cloth is meant to be kept ‘spotless’ and great care is normally taken to make sure this is so. Hence the care needed when lighting and extinguishing candles. Some churches remove and store it after each service, while others leave it on the altar but cover it with a different coloured cloth to protect it. In order to keep it spotless and creaseless the fair linen cloth is always rolled after laundering rather than folded.
Finally, why Easter eggs? On one hand, they are an ancient symbol of birth in most European cultures. On the other hand, hens start laying regularly again each Spring. Since eggs were forbidden during Lent, it’s easy to see how decorating and eating them became a practical way to celebrate Easter.
What does it all mean?