A blessed Holy Week, Passover, Ramadan to each and all celebrating!
As siblings in faith, it is a tender joy that our observances of Passover, Holy Week, and Ramadan correspond again this year and in such a special way this Thursday, April 6. Each of our traditions variously seek to follow the one God on paths of liberation, justice, and love, and we celebrate this sacred time of year through fasting, remembrance, prayer and the sharing of holy stories and meals.
Beautifully, there will be a special confluence this Thursday as, in our homes and places of worship, we will respectively set our tables for Passover seders, Ramadan iftars, and Holy Week agape and communion meals.
In Christian tradition, we refer to the Thursday of Holy Week as Maundy Thursday, maundy from the Latin mandatum, meaning “command.” Jesus, we believe, commanded his followers to love as he loved us, following in the way of the prophets and by the example he set when he fed the multitudes, stood against the injustice of Rome, and washed the feet of his followers. He ate with his friends as he prepared to lay his life down for them.
I think most of us across faith and nonfaith traditions, alike, recognize something sacred and inviting in the table. Says Joy Harjo, internationally renowned writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, in her poem “Perhaps the World Ends Here” (1994),
The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.
The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.
… It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.
… At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.
Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.
Let each and all of us find special blessing and nourishment at our tables this Thursday and be inspired to join bring our many gifts together to seek peace, do justice and serve our hurting world. Pesach Sameach! Ramadan Mubarak! Blessed Holy Week!
Note: All are warmly invited to join us for worship at St. John’s Bridgeport for Maundy Thursday (April 6 at 7 p.m.) and with us at Christ Church (59 Church Road) for Good Friday (April 7 at 12 p.m.) and Easter Sunday (April 9 at 9:30 a.m.; to be followed by our annual Easter Egg hunt!
