Vicar's letter

We are soon to celebrate again those momentous events surrounding the death and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. In the late 4^th century, a Spanish nun called Egeria visited the Holy Land and wrote letters home describing the services she experienced in Holy week in Jerusalem. She describes three processions which we also follow today. On Palm Sunday there is the procession from the mount of Olives into Jerusalem; on Good Friday there is the procession to venerate a cross set up at the place where Jesus was believed to have been crucified and on Holy Saturday there is the procession from the new fire lit outside the church into the great church of the Resurrection where Jesus had been laid in the tomb. Egeria also describes other services: the Last Supper celebrated in the upper room, the watch in the Garden of Gethsemane.

We are not in Jerusalem; we cannot go to the actual places where these things happened but we can remember these events in our own church. We have the Psalm Sunday processions, on Good Friday at All Saints, some of us process to venerate the cross placed at the head of the nave. On Holy Saturday we gather around the new fire placed in the quiet space just outside the west door of All Saints and then process into the great church with our candles lit from that new fire.  Just as on Maundy Thursday we recall the last supper, we wash feet, we watch as in Gethsemane. This year we have another help: All Saints Choir singing Stainer’s ‘Crucifixion’ at 3.30pm on Palm Sunday. 

I do hope as many of our congregations as possible will come to these services to immerse ourselves into the heart of our faith; these events which changed the life of the world and change our lives. We are all different, we cannot say exactly what these things will mean to us, but the experience of those who follow these ways is that often in a manner quite unexpected they speak to us and our situation; they help us more deeply into the mystery that is Christ, and his church and his mission. In particular they help us with our joy, our service, our suffering, our watching, and our renewed lives.

I do wish everyone a most fruitful Holy Week and Easter hoping that entering into these great events will bring that fuller life we share with our risen Lord.

Christopher Morgan-Jones

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