Good Friday Reflection: Holy Week for the Grieving

With Good Friday, the church enters into the part of Lent and Holy Week that is, or quite frankly should be, grief filled. Of course, through repetition, we know how this story unfolds. The brief period following Good Friday culminates in the celebration of the resurrection on the first day of the week, Resurrection Sunday, when people in churches will celebrate with an affirmation often made since the first decades of the church–“He is risen!” followed by the refrain, “He is risen indeed!”

Since moving to California, I have encountered fewer and fewer church people who are even aware of this early church practice and don’t respond to the first part of it. But that isn’t a big deal. What’s important is the celebration. The point is that on Sunday, in church, we celebrate what most Christians call a historical event: The resurrection.

What I have to say here is not intended to diminish the celebration of Easter week. This is not meant to discourage anyone from practicing their full awareness of Easter Sunday. Nor is it meant to be a criticism. I wish everyone who celebrates this wonder-inspiring season a strong sense of wonder and renewed faith. What I ask here is that we see this from more than just our own vantage point.

Church and Theatre

Consider this: With Holy week, the church engages in a certain level of theatre. This theatre leads followers of Christ through ritual, certainly, but also a powerful story of the passion of Christ.

But it is theatre. What Aristotle said about catharsis that results from our participation and identification with the suffering of the one the story, this can be profound. It can teach us things about our lives and–I am convinced–it can teach us profound truths about our own nature and the nature of God. It can lead us to deepened devotion.

But we should not forget that it is theatre. That means it has a beginning, a middle, and an end. We emerge from the practiced celebration with a sense of joy and peace. We leave the show behind and go on joyfully with our own business.

The point is just this, though, that we leave it behind. The grief and darkness, if we decide to meditate on it, last a little over a day and a half, and then it is done. It is so tidy that we can think that this is how the Christian life should be, one of peace and joy, and we shouldn’t grieve.

The same isn’t true for those who grieve, for those whose real, existential journey has led to the loss of someone.

What if during this Good Friday we reflect on this double awareness we should have, one that moves between the rightness of celebrating the resurrection of Jesus and the coming reality of God, and the loving, daily practice of recognizing the real life grief that so many of those around us must continue to experience and work through? For them, the pain of loss continues long after the diversion of the play is over. There is not some set of magical words or acts that take away the love they feel for someone they have lost. And we should stop thinking that way if we are members of a church. The grieving need our listening presence, not our platitudes or Bible verses taken out of context.

Out of Season

I am writing this as a survivor, as someone who has mourned the loss of my son for three years. I can say that time does not heal anything. What has happened with time is that in living another three years I have gotten used to the idea of life without our fourth child. Certainly, the trauma of losing him to suicide on that first weekend has lessened. But I still face grief almost daily.

But I will note, quite honestly, a change that happened this past Christmas season, another season in the church, also known as Advent. For the previous Christmas and Easter seasons, I will admit that I was too broken to really engage in Christmas or Easter. Both seasons only reminded me of loss. I experienced them as one floating along outside of them, recognizing what was being said and done but not really being able to engage in them. I let them pass.

Then, last Advent, I decided to read a passage on the Advent Calendar from Isaiah to my class of writers (I can do this. I teach at a religious college). I read the passage, and then we all wrote reflectively for a few minutes. I did this more as an act of conformity than anything directly passionate. And my writing was scattered, except for one image that emerged. As I wrote in response to the call in Isaiah, I began to write the statement, “There must be paths.”

This image stayed with me through the Christmas season and beyond. My small act of conformity led to possibility. I kept this freewriting around and began to mess with it.

For this season of Lent, my main act of devotion was engaged with writing the poem that seemed to emerge from the idea of paths in Advent. In fact, during Lent, I wrote an entire Advent poem out of it. I believe that the poem reflects a movement toward faith in the idea of paths.

On this Good Friday, as I did last year, I will try to enter into the darkness that the first disciples must have faced on that first Friday and Saturday, in the absence of all hope. I won’t rush to Sunday. That will come, I suppose, some day. But I think it important not to rush myself or anyone else to that moment.

In their current situation, those who grieve will continue to grieve after the holiday. And this will not be a sin or a reflection of a loss of faith. It is a season, however many years it takes, for them to come to a deepened understanding that we can’t imagine.

Again, I don’t wish for this reflection to lessen anyone’s enjoyment of the season. And I suppose that an alternate thesis to this reflection is that each of us will experience Lent in individual ways.

May your Good Friday be one of true contemplation and lead to a clearer sense of the joy in the resurrection. And may it lead us all to consider more fully the lives of those among us, those we call our neighbors.