I have always been particularly drawn to the traditions of Holy Thursday evening. As we gather in community, we encounter deep connection, humility and service alongside frailty, vulnerability and betrayal.
By Monica Dutton
I didn’t make it to the Holy Thursday liturgy this year.
The Easter Triduum, the highpoint of the Christian calendar, has long held claim to the most beautiful and poignant rituals of the liturgical year. The one continuous celebration over three days has evolved over time and place, reflecting the vagaries of two millennia and innumerable cultural adaptations.
I have always been particularly drawn to the traditions of Holy Thursday evening. The rituals are fervent and potent, and as we gather in community to remember and re-enact the events that unfolded, there is something that speaks profoundly of intimacy and the human condition. We encounter deep connection, humility and service alongside frailty, vulnerability and betrayal.
The intimacy of human touch in washing the feet of another opens the door to both community and humility. We need to be in communion with others and with our world to acquire an orientation of empathy and compassion.
The very essence of community lies in contemplating the question of service. If we are not in communion with others, whose feet do we wash? And just as importantly, who washes our feet? Humility in attending to the needs of others is often a much easier cloak to wear than the humility of graciously accepting care for ourselves. In the very act of washing the feet of the disciples, Jesus offers a compelling symbol of radical inclusion and the imperative to love one another.
Sharing a meal is also a singularly intimate human encounter. We break bread in unity with those we know and love, and that simple action nourishes and sustains us both physically, and through community and connection. In the events of Holy Thursday, life’s journeys shared through the supper invitation continue to unite us with the presence of the triune God in all our brokenness and fragility.
Pivotal to the events of Holy Thursday night are the complexities of human relationships. Intimacy and betrayal are deeply entwined, and even in his last hours, Jesus is beset by the human failings of fear, greed and frailty. The betrayal by those closest to him through denial, a kiss and the incapacity to stay awake, led to his complete abandonment.
As much as we would like to think we would or could have risen above these very human traits and remained with Jesus, the commemoration of Holy Thursday is a stark reminder of our own capacity for nurturing relationships and seeking forgiveness, while acknowledging our personal weakness and vulnerability.
I have been touched by the richness of the elements of this beautiful ceremony over many years – but not this year.
This year was spent looking after two of our delightful grandchildren – a very energetic three-year-old and a five-year-old – whose bedtime is way before the Holy Thursday ceremonies begin.
Their parents are frontline medical professionals who had been held up at work due to the impact of the beginning of the four-day Easter break. And so, it became our joy and delight to look after these little ones on Holy Thursday night.
To spend time with them and to see the world through their eyes is both a reminder and a revelation. It is all about recapturing joy, excitement and simplicity.
The complexities of the geopolitical situation engulfing the world at present are overtaken by such things as the exquisite discovery of the tiniest ladybird on a leaf, or in following a periwinkle trail across the sand. Why do I never notice these wondrous treasures, while children are so attuned to them?
My belief is, that as they have so recently come from God, they have not yet lost the mystic sense of wonder and awe in the gift of all creation. Their experience of the divine is personal, spontaneous and uninhibited.
After being re-educated in the ways of the world and these little wisdom figures were sound asleep, it became clear that the intimacy and humanness of the evening had in many ways, mirrored the celebrations in the churches.
We had read, and discussed at length, aspects of the Easter story. I had washed their little feet. We had shared a meal together, and like the disciples, they had been unable to stay awake. All very simple and all very human. In all of this, however, I was profoundly aware of the deep spiritual connectedness in the middle of the ordinariness.
From the ordinariness and dailiness of bread and wine, the remembrance of Holy Thursday transcends time and place. Divinity touches humanity. The powerful meditation on humility, service and community is a revelation of human intimacy in all its rawness and vulnerability.
There was a time when missing Holy Thursday would have triggered some sense of regret. There were no such misgivings this year. Spending time with the little ones provided a catalyst for an otherwise untapped opportunity for quiet reflection later, and the clear and present realisation that we are just as often called to be Martha as we are to be Mary.
As we wander through these post-Easter days, may we be blessed with the inexpressible delight of the child-mystics among us, and may our encounters with the divine be as personal, spontaneous and uninhibited as theirs.
