Break Open The Story: Approaching Good Friday Anew

A few weeks ago, I was having a classic pre-Holy Week conversation with my rector, one many of you will recognize. It goes something like this: we have designed worship in a way that races ahead of the Holy Week narrative. We tell the Passion narrative on Palm Sunday because most people don’t attend the other Holy Week services – but what is lost in doing so?

While the Palm Sunday Passion reading is just one way that we help our communities enter into the story of Christ’s betrayal, crucifixion, and death, it is certainly one of the most common ways. Combining Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem with the Passion narrative is understandable. And, at the same time, I find myself wondering if, instead of ensuring that everyone hears this critical story, this approach fails Good Friday on closer inspection.

Amidst The Triduum

Good Friday sits in the midst of the Paschal Triduum. By the time we arrive here, we have, collectively, felt the world crack open, beginning these holy days with Tenebrae. We have already taken turns kneeling, washing each other’s feet in service, or perhaps spent a quiet hour at the altar of repose. Now it is time to walk the Stations of the Cross, to recite the Solemn Collects, to venerate the cross. But, if we have already confronted this piece of the story on Palm Sunday, do we need to return to the pain of it all again?

If Palm Sunday’s approach to the Passion skips too quickly through the events of Holy Week, I would propose an approach to Good Friday that reverses the balance. Drawing on the most important rule of telling the crucifixion story to children – we do not leave them at the foot of the cross – this approach lets us linger on the events of Good Friday first. The result is an intergenerational journey through the Stations of the Cross that deepens how people of all ages understand this story, even as it resolves the tension by including the Resurrection.

This is the story of what I do with my community on Good Friday. 

Multi-Sensory Stations Of The Cross: An Intergenerational Offering

The multi-sensory, interactive approach I take to the Stations of the Cross uses the majority of my parish’s physical plant, traditional elements like Taize chant, but opportunities to bodily engage with each Station as we move. If this tradition is meant to remind us of Christ’s journey and the holy pilgrimages that people have made throughout time, circumnavigating the building reinforces that idea, but it’s also the least important part. Rather, the bones are simple:

I read from a succinct text, detailed enough to draw everyone into the details of the story, no matter their age, followed by an invitation to engage their senses. 

Pilate appeases the angry crowd: condemning Jesus to death, but he will not take the blame. Instead, he washes his hands of guilt. If you would like, come forward. Make the sign of the cross on your hand with this water. 

Everyone who wishes to participate takes a turn. They feel the cool water. They pause with this moment of the story until we are ready to move. Together, we begin to sing,

Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kingdom. Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kingdom…

Jesus is put on the cross: nails piercing his wrists. Come, would you like to try? Here is the hammer and the nails. How does it sound? Is it loud? How does it feel when the hammer hits the nail? I risk my fingers holding the nail to the board, offering instructions to the children. So far no one has crushed them.

Jesus, remember me…

Jesus cries out: I thirst. Instead of water, the soldiers offer him sour wine. Would you like to smell this vinegar? How does it smell? You can even taste it if you would like. How do you think Jesus felt when he was offered this sour wine to drink? The grimaces spread throughout the room as they come close to this unfamiliar scent. 

Jesus, remember me…

We cover each Station that a traditional service would, but the final two are special to me.

We enter a dark space: Jesus is laid in the tomb. We slow down to honor this moment. Though in fact Jesus was gone before the women could come to tend to his body, we wait in this small space. I offer up chrism, the opportunity to anoint the grave clothes that stand in for our Lord. The darkness intensifies what we are doing, the profound reality of Good Friday, as the space fills with that distinctive evergreen scent.  

We are not done. If the triumphant entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday softens the subsequent reading of the Passion for adults, then with children, we must always keep going. We must press on to resurrection. There is one more station.

The rocky outline of the tomb stands before us. We are Mary Magdalene and Joanna on Easter morning; we are Peter, rushing to see what has happened. The stone rolls away and balloons burst forth! 

Christ is Risen!

It is still Good Friday and that sacred mourning is not diminished by telling the entire story. Christ’s death is inextricable from his resurrection, and we have entered so deeply into the story, telling it with and through our bodies, experiencing it together, that we could never forget what came before the joy. This is liturgy—the work of the people—broken open so that all people can truly be part of it.