An Eastertide Missive from our Priest, March 2019

HOLY WEEK AND EASTER 2019

Dear Members and Friends!

I write to you during what my priest’s calendar terms “Mid-Lent,” but not as one with a long face as in mourning, or wearing “sack cloth and ashes.”  Rather, I write to you as one filled with great joy, not a joy based on the realization that the Season of Lent, forty days and forty nights, with its often self-imposed disciplines, is half over.

What, you may well ask, causes me to greet each day in Lent with a smile and a prayer of thanksgiving?  My answer is a simple one:  It is in great expectations of a feast, Easter.  Though, let us not forget: Easter is with us, each day, even in the Season of Lent.  The Grace of God, the Great Creator, is manifested each day to you and to me in ways far too numerous and often unseen, for us to recognize.  God’s Grace: the Easter of the Resurrection was unique, not an item for which we qualified, not an item to be checked off as done, and most assuredly not an item, the value of which we can ever repay.  And that calls for a fine celebration!

That said, I invite you to observe with us this most unique and sacred event in the history of humankind and, in so doing, to assure you that you will be greeted warmly at St. James.  Join with us as we reflect on this gift of God to all humankind and pray in thanksgiving to the Eternal God that we may be found worthy of the stewardship which has come down to us. It is in that spirit, in anticipation of the Great Celebration of the Resurrection, I invite you to the solemnity of HOLY WEEK.

+ Palm Sunday, 14 April, 10:00 a.m.
Liturgy of the Palms with Procession and the reading of The Passion Gospel of Luke

+ Maundy Thursday, 18 April, 7:00 p.m.
Participate in an Agape Meal at 6:00 p.m.
A Commemoration of Our Lord’s Last Supper and the Stripping of the Altar

+ Good Friday, 19 April, 7:00 p.m.
A solemn reflection on the Crucifixion and the reading of the Passion Gospel of John

+ Easter Day, Sunday, 21 April, 10:00 a.m.
A festal celebration of Christ’s Resurrection
A light Easter brunch
An Easter Egg Hunt for the younger generation

Come.  You are welcome at all times at St. James, but especially during this holy season.

The Rev. Clarence E. Butler
Priest-in-residence