It can be difficult to return to normal after Holy Week and Easter. For weeks, many of us have been preparing for the complex liturgies of the Triduum (Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and the Great Vigil of Easter). And there is a naturally felt movement to a climax in celebrating Easter with all its pomp and glory. It seems somewhat anti-climactic to return to “normal.” But Easter is only just beginning.
It’s wholly unfortunate that the Second Sunday of Easter is treated as “Low” Sunday. No Sunday is “Low,” and certainly no Sunday is unimportant. In fact, there may be no more important Sunday for keeping the momentum of Eastertide going than the Second Sunday of Easter. This Sunday, then, is the Sunday for launching us fully into the rest of the Great Fifty Days of Easter.
Historically, in the ancient Church, the Great Fifty Days was a time in which the newly-baptized were integrated into the life of the Church. Heretofore, they had only participated partially in the Sunday Masses as preparation for their baptism. But with their baptism at Easter, they were now members of Christ’s Body. Baptism was not an endpoint; it was a beginning. And so it is with all of us who have been baptized. Easter reminds us that our life and work in Christ are only just beginning.
Admittedly, around campus this week, things seems a bit quiet. It was a blessing to have guests with us in our retreat house for Holy Week and Easter, including our preacher for the Triduum, Mother Sarah Coakley, as well as Deacon Durango Jenkins, visiting from Virginia Theological Seminary. I’m grateful for their presence in enriching our liturgies. I also am deeply thankful for the hard work of our staff, choir, acolytes, lectors, those who assisted with retreat house hospitality, and all others who helped in various ways as we prepared for Holy Week and Easter.
For me, this past Holy Week and Easter were a glimpse into what Good Shepherd, as a parish, can be. We were able to celebrate last week’s important liturgies with three sacred ministers (priest, deacon, and subdeacon), a longstanding tradition at Good Shepherd but largely impossible these days because I’m the only cleric here. Attendance was better than it’s been in many years. The retreat house was full. And so the temptation is to feel a letdown after such excitement. But now, as we’re only beginning the Great Fifty Days of Easter, is a time to let that excitement propel us into our new future as a parish. What might this look like for us?
For some of you, perhaps it was your first Holy Week and Easter here. How were you changed? In what ways are you being called, like the early Church’s newly baptized, to use your gifts for ministry in building up the Body of Christ? For others, what dreams do you have for this parish, having witnessed it at “full steam”? What did the Holy Spirit teach us during Holy Week and Easter that beckons us into our new future at Good Shepherd? These are the questions that we are only beginning to explore as we approach the Second Sunday of Easter, not “Low” Sunday, but a Sunday that energizes us into the new creation that God is preparing for us.
Easter is a time of newness. But remember that when the Risen Christ appears to his disciples after his resurrection, he still bears the mark of his wounds. As we at Good Shepherd move into a new future, our wounds are not erased. We still bear them, but we and the wounds are changed. The wounds no longer define our identity. The resurrection means that Jesus was physically raised from the dead, as we, too, shall be, but it also means that life as we once knew it has changed. We’re living in a new reality. There are many weeks ahead in which we are being called to explore that new reality, intentionally, as we journey towards Pentecost. May this Eastertide be a blessing to you, and may you prayerfully discern how God is calling you to be a part of Good Shepherd’s newness as we daily rise from the dead to new life.
Yours in Christ,
Father Kyle