Archive for the ‘Maundy Thursday’ Category

Washing our dirty feet – Maundy Thursday

April 17, 2025

Maundy Thursday – 2025

John 13:1-17, 31b-35

Marian Free

In the name of God who breaks into our world, shatters our comfort zones and insists on intimacy with us. Amen.

I like to hold dinner parties. Inviting friends, poring over recipe books, getting out the good china and silver and then of course the meal itself – good company, good food and good wine. I hope that I am a good host and that I have given careful thought to the meal and that I have considered the tastes and the allergies of my guests. I also hope that I can enable them to feel relaxed and comfortable.

What I have never, ever done, or even considered doing, is leaving the table, getting towel and water and washing the feet of my guests. I cannot imagine anything better designed to cause acute discomfort and embarrassment.  In fact, I am confident that many of my friends might decline future invitations for fear of what socially inappropriate and mortifying behaviour I might indulge in next.

Yet, we read tonight’s gospel and don’t even blink.  None of us sit up in horror and wonder what on earth Jesus is doing by embarrassing his friends and humiliating himself in this way. None of us condemn Jesus for his social faux pas, none of us consider how we would feel if, should we be fortunate enough to sit at table, we found Jesus at our feet – touching us, washing us! No, we save all our criticism for the hapless Peter who is simply trying to save Jesus from further embarrassment. Peter, who understands the social cost to Jesus of his actions. Peter who is behaving, dare I say, in the way that most of us would have behaved. 

In this, possibly the most confronting of Jesus’ actions, Jesus ignores social niceties and the disapprobation of his peers. There is no other way that he can demonstrate his love for and his desire for closeness with his disciples. 

John differs from the other gospel writers in that he records the timing of Jesus’ last meal as the night before Passover, meaning that the meal was probably an informal occasion – Jesus and his disciples.  Whether or not it was a formal occasion, certain protocol would still have been observed – where people sat, who was served first and so on. In some households (or so we believe) servants or slaves would have washed the dirty feet of the guests as they came in. We do not know where this dinner was held but it was certainly not in the home of one of the twelve. They, like Jesus, came from Galilee and this night they are in Jerusalem as they have presumably been for most of the previous week. 

What the customs were in settings other than a home is not clear. In any case, feet have not been washed when the group of friends gathered, and Jesus has waited till mid-meal to wash the feet of his disciples – making it even more shocking, and making it clear that this a symbolic not a cultural act as Jesus goes on to explain. Jesus tells the disciples that he is setting the example for how they are to live together – not as servants and masters but as servants of one another. 

Jesus’ action is also symbolic of intimacy, the intimacy that he desires with his disciples, the intimacy that he seeks with us.  

Jesus’ washing of his disciples’ feet also serves as a metaphor for the incarnation. God, in Jesus, breaks into our world, invades our personal space, claims intimacy with us, ignores our discomfort and insists on our attention. 

Despite that, it is often the case that we try to keep God at arm’s length, either because we see God as aloof and ourselves unworthy of God’s notice OR because we seek to keep God one step removed from the messiness of our lives. We kid ourselves that if we keep a certain amount of distance between ourselves and God that maybe God won’t see our dirty laundry – our dirty feet. BUT of course, God does see, and despite our sense of unworthiness and all our efforts to build barriers, God does want to be intimately involved with our dirty, messy lives, and God, in Jesus kneels at our feet to wash the dirt away.

Tomorrow we come face-to-face with Jesus’ humanity, Jesus’ willingness to be engaged with every part of human existence – including the ugly, and the messy. In facing the cross, Jesus let down all his defences – between his divinity and his humanity, between himself and us. He was vulnerable, weak and human.

Tonight, as we contemplate Jesus’ great love for us, Jesus’ willingness to show that love by becoming one of us and by enduring the cross for us, can we also contemplate letting down our defences and let Jesus into our lives as one who seeks such an intimacy with us that he would place himself at our feet, our dirty feet, take them in his hands and wash them?

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If Friday is “Good” do we need the resurrection?

March 30, 2024

Easter Day – 2024

Matthew 28:1-18

Marian Free

In the name of God, who in Jesus shows us how to be truly free – of our fears, our anxieties and our insecurities. Amen.

Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed!

If Friday is Good, if on the cross Jesus defeated evil and death and deprived them of their power why did he need to rise? What can the resurrection do that the cross has not done?  

If you have been a part of our liturgical celebrations over the past few days, you will know that they are of one piece. During the Last Supper, Jesus turned convention on its head and demonstrated that there was another way to do things. He showed that powerlessness was not weakness, that service was not enslavement and that death, and the powers of this world were not to be feared.

On the cross, Jesus exposed the ineffectiveness of worldly power and authority. By submitting to a wrongful arrest, false accusations and an unjust punishment, Jesus denied them their ability to coerce and deprived them of their ability to force him to their will. By refusing to fear death, Jesus rendered death incapable of exerting power over him.

But there was still more to do. If Jesus’ death on the cross signalled the defeat of evil and death, then the resurrection provided proof positive that the refusal to engage with the powers of this world renders them impotent, and that when we hold fast to the values of the kingdom, instead of being seduced by the false values of this world we open the doorway to a different ending to the story,  a story in which evil and death do not have the final say and do not determine our response to life’s circumstances. Jesus’ resurrection is evidence that in the final analysis love will triumph over hatred, that vulnerability freely chosen is stronger than force, that meeting violence with non-violence strips violence of its power and that true freedom is won when one seeks not one’s own well-being but the well-being of all people.

Conversely, the resurrection demonstrates the futility of using force to kill love, the foolishness of using the law to suppress goodness, and the uselessness of relying on oppression to quench the thirst for freedom or the desire for justice. The resurrection makes it clear that ultimately love cannot be extinguished, that freedom will not be denied and that in the end good will triumph over evil. 

Jesus’ resurrection is proof positive that we can choose not to be consumed by worldly values, a desire for wealth and power, the need for external recognition or the protection of our personal safety and comfort. Jesus’ resurrection informs that we, and therefore the world, will only be truly free when we, like Jesus, refuse to be bound and limited by hatred, greed, bitterness, resentment, anger and unhealthy relationships. Jesus’ resurrection is a reminder that if we resist the urge for external affirmation or gratification and if we rise above the pettiness of human existence then we, like Jesus, will be truly free and the powers of this world will have no power over us. We with him will be raised from the sordidness of competition, ambition and desire, freed to be truly ourselves – created in the image of God.

The resurrection means that we are:

free to truly live – unconstrained by all those things that bind and limit;

free to embrace our own divinity – unfettered by those things that threaten to overwhelm our true nature;

free to step into the future – released from all those things that would threaten to hold us to the past; and

free to love selflessly and unconditionally – unencumbered by all those things that separate us from each other.

Friday is Good, because death and sin are defeated and the resurrection is proof that the only power they have over us is the power that we give them. 

So let us claim the victory of the cross and live in the power of the resurrection.

Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed!

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Maundy Thursday – modelling resistance

March 30, 2024

Maundy Thursday

John 13:1-17, 31b-35

Marian Free

In the name of God whose thoughts are not our thoughts and whose ways are not our ways. Amen.

In a recent tweet, the Archbishop of Canterbury commented “Jesus doesn’t wash his disciples’ feet despite having power, but because of it. Jesus’ power finds its fullest expression when he gives it away. Something we’ll see again on the cross.” (@JustinWelby)

Tonight begins the observation of the Triduum, the three days from the Last Supper and Jesus’ arrest to the Resurrection.  Not everyone takes advantage of the liturgical observance of these events, but they are of one piece – each event in the Passion of Christ shedding light on and expanding another. Jesus begins by demonstrating what it means to be free of human desires, to have the confidence to overturn and reject human conventions and the courage to face death. On the cross, he exposes futility of trying to maintain power by force. On the first day of the week, Jesus’ resurrection proves that freedom is won, not by making compromises with the devil (however that is represented), but by standing firm and resisting evil (in whatever form that takes).

Tonight, John’s gospel tells us that: “Jesus knew that his hour had come.” He knew too that: “The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him.” Knowing that he was to die and knowing that one of his inner circle had already determined to hand him over to the authorities, Jesus held fast.  He refused to let his behaviour be determined by the values of this world – self-preservation, anger, bitterness, resentment, or disappointment. Jesus held fast to kingdom values, selflessness, love, forgiveness and acceptance. 

On this night, Jesus did not “rage, rage against the dying of the light”[1]. He chose not to fight the forces of this world on their terms – by force, oppression, injustice, suppression and self-protection. Jesus showed another way, the only way to defeat evil and to allow love to triumph. He tied a towel around himself, took on the role of a servant, and washed the feet of the disciples. He washed the feet of Judas, who had already made up his mind to hand Jesus over to the authorities and he washed the feet of Peter who was blinded by human pride, and he washed the feet of those who would abandon him.

Jesus’ simple action of footwashing speaks volumes. With his disciples he showed that it was possible to rise above the pettiness of human fears and jealousies.

In willingly facing his opponents, submitting to arrest and torture, Jesus demonstrated the powers of this world will not be defeated by force, that using the  tools of the enemy makes us no better than them, that vulnerability freely chosen is not weakness but strength,  that courage is stronger than fear and above all, that love is stronger than hate.

And so, having shown by example that he will not engage in the power struggles of this world, Jesus goes out to let them do their worst.

[1] Dylan Thomas Do not go gentle into that good night.

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Jesus kneels at our feet

April 5, 2023

Maundy Thursday – 2023
John 13:1-17, 31b-35
Marian Free

In the name of the God who kneels at our feet. Amen.

Different religious orders have different ways of reading scriptures. A characteristic of Ignatian Spirituality is an invitation to enter into the events of Jesus’ life – to envisage the scene – the sights, the smells, and the people – to notice what Jesus says and does, and, when you are familiar with the setting, to take on the role of one of the characters or of an imagined observer. If for example, you were reading Luke’s account of Jesus’ birth, you might imagine yourself as a maid from the inn who has brought something into the stable. As a bystander, you would notice the acrid smell of the animals, feel the straw scratching your arms and legs, and notice how exhausted Mary and Joseph are. You might even hear Mary’s cries as she gives birth and the first cry of the infant Jesus.

Tonight, I’d like you to enter the scene of Jesus’ last supper. Imagine that you have a place at the table. You are relaxed and comfortable and among people whom you have come to know and trust.

Without warning, Jesus gets up, takes off his robes and wraps a towel around him. You are surprised, shocked even, not to mention a little embarrassed for him. THEN, he kneels at your feet!

This is awkward – your host and teacher on the ground before you.

But it is about to get even worse. As you squirm, Jesus reaches for a bowl of water and begins to wash your feet. This is highly irregular. Only a servant would wash someone’s feet and then when you arrived at a home – not in the middle of a meal.

Never-the-less, Jesus gently takes one foot and then another, gently places them in the water, carefully and tenderly rubbing the dust from the soles of your feet, from between your toes. Then, one at a time, he takes your feet from the bowl and caresses them gently with the towel, before placing them back on the floor and moving to the person sitting beside you.

Can you picture it, Jesus kneeling at your feet, holding your feet in his hands? Can you imagine anything so intimate? His hair falling on your feet – you could bend down and brush his head with your lips. Can you feel the love flowing from him to you – love that doesn’t judge, love that makes no demands but only wants you to know that you are loved?

“Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end” (Jn 13:1,2).

This scene encapsulates the gospel as much as does the cross. On this night, the night Jesus knows will be his last, Jesus doesn’t remonstrate. Instead, he shows his love in an unequivocal way. Knowing what Judas is about to hand him over, Jesus kneels before him and washes his feet. Knowing that Peter will deny him, Jesus takes Peter’s feet in his hands and washes them. Understanding that his disciples will not have the courage to stand by him, Jesus kneels before them all and washes their feet.

This is how Jesus loves the flawed, the faithless, and the turncoat. It is how Jesus loves us.

Love is at the heart of the gospel.

Jesus kneels at our feet, vulnerable and exposed and we know then, if we did not know before, that we can do nothing to deserve that love and that there is nothing that we need to do. Jesus is already there on his knees before us.

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Love without question

April 14, 2022

Maundy Thursday – 2022
John 13:1-the 17, 31b-35
Marian Free

In the name of God whose heedless, extravagant love draws us to love extravagantly, heedlessly. Amen.

“Jesus got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.” Sound familiar? Or perhaps you have never made the link. Just six days ago (Johanine time) Jesus was at a dinner party with his friends when Mary got up from the table and took a pound of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet and wiped them with her hair. Loving farewell actions – Mary apparently preparing Jesus for his burial and Jesus preparing the disciples for his departure.

On this night, we focus on Jesus’ actions, but it is important to remember that they were pre-figured by those of Mary. Mary’s action was extravagant, dramatic (wiping Jesus’ feet with her hair!), generous and almost certainly impetuous. In contrast, Jesus’ action appears to be considered and careful. Neither actor seemed at all concerned by how others might react to their actions – actions which contravened the cultural norms of the time. Neither seemed to give a moment’s thought to the offense that they might cause and the censure that they might receive. They were in the moment, totally heedless of the consequences for themselves. Perhaps the presence of death moves them to do what they otherwise might not have done.

Love (extravagant in Mary’s case, absolutely unconditional in Jesus’ case) determines their behaviour. It matters not to Mary that she should not touch Jesus, or that wiping his feet with her hair is something so intimate and sexual that (even today) is quite beyond the bounds of proper behaviour. If she anything does go through her mind it might be: “Let them think of me what they will!”

We already know that Jesus doesn’t care about the social norms of his day. After all he has spoken to a woman from Samaria, a woman rejected by her own society and he has taken refreshment from her hand. He has healed on the Sabbath Day and he has allowed Mary to touch him in the most familiar and public way. If he thinks anything at all it is likely to be that living out God’s will and demonstrating God’s unconditional love overrides any concern about what people might think of him.

Jesus takes on the role a servant and washes the feet of all the disciples, even those of Judas who would hand him over, Peter who would deny him and the others who would abandon him. In so doing he provides a model for all who would claim to follow him. We are to love – heedlessly, extravagantly, selflessly, with no thought for the cost, no consideration of what others might think of us and no judgement about the frailties and faults of the other.

If only we could love as Jesus’ loved, if only we could love as God loves, the world would be healed.

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A frightened, angry Jesus

April 9, 2020

Maundy Thursday – 2020
John 13:1-17,31b-35 (1 Cor 11:23-26)
Marian Free

In the name of God, Earth Maker, Pain Bearer, Life Giver. Amen.

Several years ago, I came across an extraordinary video titled Coach Trip to Calvary. The video followed a mixed group of travellers in the Holy Land and their Palestinian driver. As the small tour group visited the sites of some of the biblical stories, they became a part of the story. In other words, there were two parallel narratives – that of the tourists and that of the events of Jesus’ life – but the characters remained the same. The biblical story was transported into the present and the tourists entered into it as themselves which made the story incredibly real, if a little confusing.

The scene that remains with me is that of the last supper. In this scene the Palestinian bus driver takes on the role of Jesus and the tourists the role of Jesus’ disciples. The group are in a cheap café, seated on benches at a trestle table. The lighting is low, and the meal consists of shared plates, pita bread and wine. Without warning, the driver (who has morphed into Jesus), takes the bread and violently tears it. “This is my body which will be given for you”, he says angrily, handing the bread to the surprised disciples. It is a confronting scene – a far cry from the peaceful domesticity depicted by such artists as Leonardo da Vinci. As I watched, I cringed, whether from embarrassment, discomfort or fear I’m not sure, but this was not the Jesus I knew, the Jesus with whom I was comfortable, the Jesus whom the gospels describe as going quietly to his death. The Jesus presented here was an angry, hurting Jesus, an all too human Jesus, Jesus who knew what lay ahead and who was expressing his fear and anguish that it had come to this.

I suspect that my discomfort lay here. I had allowed myself to think that while Jesus did have some qualms he was relatively accepting about his fate, willing to do what was required (or willing to accept the consequences of his actions). The very domestic setting of the last supper in the gospels lulled me into the belief that Jesus’ final meal with his friends was relatively calm. My reading of the text and my experience of the Eucharist had conveniently ignored the sense of foreboding at that meal and the hint of the violent and the gruesome death that would follow. Witnessing Jesus’ angry, violent tearing of the bread shocked me into a recognition of my complacency and of my comfortable, armchair view of Jesus’ trial and persecution.

I was brought up short and I cannot help but wonder why the disciples were not so moved by Jesus’ distress that they were able to stay awake, to stand by him, to be identified as a disciple and if need be to share his death.

Tonight, we remember that night. We are challenged to hear Jesus’ pain, to stay awake, to watch while he prays and, if need be, to walk with him to the cross.

 

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How will you die?

April 20, 2019

Maundy Thursday

 

In the name of God, Earth-Maker, Pain-Bearer, Life-Giver. Amen.

 

How will you die?

Some time ago I heard the story of a nurse – I think she was the nurse nicknamed “the rose of no-man’s land”. This woman was a nurse on the battle front during World War 1. During lulls in the fighting she would venture into no-man’s land to try to help the wounded. It was during one such foray that she was captured by the Germans who thought that she was a spy. She was condemned to death. The night before she died she received a visit from a local priest who reported that after they spoke she asked to sing “Abide with me”. I cannot sing that hymn without thinking of her and of her courage and faith in the presence of death.

 

How will you die?

As a priest, I have journeyed with many people who have known that they were dying. Some fight death every inch of the way, believing the modern myth that cancer/heart disease of other terminal illnesses can be defeated if only we fight hard enough. Others, and hear I think of two young mothers, both of whom know that they will die before they see their daughters reach school, who are pragmatic and accepting. While there is life, they will live as well as they can, but they know that life will be short and that it is better to live within the constraints that they face, to enjoy their husband and their child rather than to be constantly desiring that things would be different.

 

How will you die?

I have heard from hospital chaplains that there are some for whom death is more drawn out and difficult than it need be, because they carry within them unresolved issues that they are either too stubborn to face or too incapacitated to deal with.

 

How will you die?

Whether you are young or old or somewhere in between, it is important to recognise that ultimately death cannot be avoided and to consider how we might face death. Will we hold back because we still have things to do? Will we feel afraid because we haven’t learned to trust in God’s loving forgiveness? Or will we be able to make peace with the situation because we have no regrets and because we are confident that death for us is not the end?

 

How will you die?

On the night before he died, Jesus did not spend time wallowing in regret, nor did he take the opportunity to run away. Jesus was not afraid that he had not lived up to an imaginary standard that God might have set, but sufficiently confident in his relationship with God that he trusted God as much in death as he had in life.

On the night before he died, Jesus ate a meal with his friends. Instead of worrying about himself, Jesus thought only of them. He knelt before them and washed their feet, he encouraged them to love one another, he told them what to expect and assured them that they would not be alone.

On the night before he died, Jesus was ready, at peace with God, with himself and with the world.

 

How will you die? It is never too late to make peace with God, with yourself and with the world.

 

Intercessions:

 

God of life and death, breathe life and peace into situations of horror and trauma. Be a presence for good in places of despair. Give hope to all those for whom life is a daily struggle.

 

God of life and death.

Hear our prayer.

 

Holy God, help us to so trust in you that we may confidently face any difficulties in this life and meet death without fear.

 

Holy Trinity, draw us deeper into communion with you that our lives may be one with the community of love that unites you Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier.

 

God who is immersed in human suffering, teach us not to fear illness and mortality, but to graciously accept the frailty of the human form.

 

Jesus who conquered death, bring us daily to newness of life. May we be so transformed by our little deaths, that at the last we are ready for our final journey from life to death to life eternal.

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Loving our bodies – Maundy Thursday

March 29, 2018

Maundy Thursday – 2018

Some thoughts and prayers

Marian Free

In the name of God who loved us enough to take on human form. Amen.

Bodies are interesting things – they come in a myriad of shapes and sizes. They can be strong and straight or twisted and misshapen. They can function as we hope and expect or they can rebel and resist. They can be well and whole or they can be eaten away by age, cancer or degenerative disease. They can attract or repel. They are extraordinarily resilient and yet easily broken.

By and large our bodies serve us well, yet many of us have an ambivalent attitude towards them – they are not thin enough, muscular enough, pretty enough. We wish that one bit or another were smaller or larger, smoother or prettier.

Our ambivalence towards our bodies is demonstrated in the way we respond to those whose bodies are damaged, disfigured or aged. We turn our heads away. We are reluctant to touch or to hold those whose skin is not smooth and unblemished, whose limbs are not straight and strong.

God has no such problem with the human form or its functioning. None of the considerations that cause us anxiety or dismay, held any fear for God when God in Jesus chose to inhabit our human form. The one who created us, showed absolute confidence in God’s creation – risking everything to be born and to live as and with us.

Nor did Jesus show any dismay or distaste for the bodies of others. He was not afraid to touch and be touched– touching the blind, the lame and the leper, allowing himself to be touched by the woman with a hemorrhage, the women who anointed him, and ultimately those who flogged him and nailed him to the cross.

At the Last Supper, Jesus did what no self-respecting person would do – he took on a role reserved for a slave. Kneeling before his friends, he took in his hands their dirty, calloused and cracked feet, tenderly touching, washing and wiping them.

The Incarnation is all about bodies – our bodies and God’s body.

Imagine God in human form. Imagine your body as God’s body. Imagine God stooping to wash your feet, touching you caressing you, loving you in all your physicality.

 

Maundy Thursday Intercessions

Loving God, who in Jesus was not afraid to take for Godself human form, open our eyes to see you in the wounded and dispossessed, in the despised and ill-treated, the refugee and the prisoner. Seeing you in others may we reach out in love and strive to build with you a world of justice and peace.

Word made flesh.

Hear our prayer.

 Servant God, may we as your church reach out to the marginalised and distressed in our own communities. May we never seek to meet our own needs, but only the needs of others.

Word made flesh.

Hear our prayer.

Jesus our friend and companion, help us to reach out to those who never experience the gentle, loving touch of another – children abandoned by parents, children, the disabled and the aged cared for in institutions in which there is often not enough love to go around, those whose damaged or deformed bodies cause us to turn our gaze away, and all whose age, frailty or disability confine them to a life of loneliness.

Word made flesh.

Hear our prayer.

Wounded God, bind up the broken hearted, support those who struggle, comfort those who mourn, heal those who are stricken in body, mind or spirit and hold in your loving arms, those who are dying.

Word made flesh.

Hear our prayer.

Jesus, who faced death with fortitude if not courage, give us the grace to accept our own frailty and mortality and to understand that death is the gateway to something so much more.

 

 

 

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