Dear People of St. David’s,
One of the pleasures of getting older is chatting with my adult children about their professional lives. Each of my children is engaged in a profession connected to my own career. I began adulthood as a schoolteacher, and my youngest now teaches social studies. Much of my time as a parish priest is spent in spiritual listening and counseling which is adjacent to my middle child’s career as a therapist. Finally, my oldest is a parish priest herself. All three of them are great talkers and my conversations with them reinforce my understanding that our personal stories and our knowledge of the stories of others (even when they are fictional) help us as we grow into the greatest story of all: our lives in Christ.
This Sunday, we begin Holy Week, that one week of the year that is set outside of time, as it remembers the final days of Jesus’ earthly ministry and puts us in the place again of experiencing the fullness of God’s love for us. God does not leave us alone in struggle or in joy but rather experiences it with us and shares with us a taste of what living in God’s love is like.
On Sunday at 8 a.m., 9:15 a.m., and 5 p.m., we will read again the Passion Gospel. It is our custom to break the story into parts, so that it is read by a dozen or so different voices, and this year will be no exception. At the 9:30 a.m. service, we will tell the story by walking through it with our congregation of families with young children, following our famous stuffed, ride-on donkey.
The other day, Julia (or as I call her, Mother Daughter) called with questions about how I remember Palm Sunday as a child. She wondered if reading the Passion Gospel on Palm Sunday was a “new” thing—had it been done before the 1979 Book of Common Prayer? Mother Mom could tell you which pew I was sitting in at Trinity Church, Reno (c. 1968) when we read the Passion Gospel in parts and Father Carroll cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” and I realized that God understood feelings.
My conversation with Julia led me back to the prayer book I received when I was confirmed and while I was not surprised to find that the Gospel appointed for Palm Sunday was a full reading of the Passion, I was surprised to see that prior to 1979, our prayer book set out a full reading of the Passion for every day from Palm Sunday to Easter. If one was following along in the prayer book then, the whole of Holy Week was a remembrance of Christ’s Passion. As a life-long church geek, it is not a surprise that I am convinced telling and sharing and understanding personal stories is a way that we follow Jesus.
I’m not quite sure why the lectionary for Holy Week has changed, and we are “only” assigned the reading of the Passion twice—on Palm Sunday and Good Friday—but if you have been following the “Cover-to-Cover” project, then you have already read the Passion Gospel four times this year, and you will read it again April 26-28. Whatever scheme we use for reading the Bible, we know that telling the story of Christ’s Passion, his suffering and death, is so important that we do it over and over again. We remember that God loves us so much that God became one of us and even suffered our human pain and sorrow. God understands our feelings.
If you attend the Family Service, you know that reading the Bible is not the only way to learn a story. We can watch: Zeffirelli’s “Jesus of Nazareth” is a favorite, but you can search out more recent depictions. Or listen to Bach’s “St. John’s Passion,” or Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Jesus Christ Superstar.” Read a non-biblical version. A current favorite is “The Book of Belonging” by Mariko Clark with pictures by Rachel Eleanor. There are novels in which the Passion is the main or adjacent story. “Ben-Hur” is an old example. There are stories that on the face of it have nothing to do with what we read in the Gospels but can be lenses through which we gain understanding. Get acquainted or re-acquainted with “The Chronicles of Narnia,” “Harry Potter,” or “The Lion King.” I would love to hear from you about your favorites.
We are about to enter the holiest week of our year, the time when our personal stories get folded into the greatest story ever told. This year, take a few hours to experience the story in a new way.
Blessings,
Nancy+
The Rev. Nancy Webb Stroud
Priest Associate
Published April 10, 2025