I've been trying to keep my heart in tune with Holy Week, with mixed success. It's hard to know how to feel on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. So I'm excited that we are finally here at Maundy Thursday, remembering the last meal Jesus shared with his disciples, the way he washed their feet and gave them a new commandment: to love one another as he had loved them.
Maundy Thursday is named for that new commandment (mandatum in Latin, mande/ in French), and the more I think about it, the harder it seems to do. It seems to require even more than "Love your neighbor as yourself." Because I think Jesus was better at loving people than most (all?) of us are at loving ourselves.
Last year was my first Holy Week at Cleveland Park Church, and one of my favorite parts (I have lots of favorites...) was the service that we will have again tonight, which begins with communion and then goes into Tenebrae, the service of shadows that remember the events around Jesus' arrest, and end with "then they led him away to crucify him." The service ends in silence, and it is a powerful lead-in to Good Friday.
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