Here in the County and across Canada we recently changed our clocks. We sprung forward to Daylight Savings Time, which meant we had to figure out how to change all the bleeping clocks–on our watches, our microwaves, our ovens, in our cars, and worst of all, in our heads. Everybody blames the farmers for the time change, but farmers have told me it doesn’t help them one bit.
If you don’t attend church often you might not know that once a year the churches change their clocks too. But in a different way. Most of the time churches go week-by-week, Sunday-to-Sunday to be specific. But for the week before Easter, we slow down dramatically to go day-by-day, until we move even slower to go hour-by-hour, then moment-by-moment. This time is called “Holy Week.” Holy Week remembers the last 7 days of the life of Jesus, the last 7 days that changed the world.
When something very significant happens in our lives it can feel like time slows down. We often remember every moment and every detail. Maybe you remember the smell of your first car, the look in your spouse’s eyes on your wedding day, or the joy of meeting a new baby for the first time. Or, maybe time stood still on the day you lost your job, or the day you got bad news. We may all have vivid memories of the days and hours when the Twin Towers were hit by an airplane. Moments like these (good and bad) make time stand still. Time moves more slowly as we take it all in.
This is the reason we slow down during Holy Week. It’s because something very significant happens every year as we remember how low humanity sank when we abandoned the blameless healer and holy man Jesus to suffer and die. We slow down to connect-the-dots, as we ask: Are we sinking low in our time too? Who or what are we abandoning today? What is the burden of neglect, rejection or apathy… and who carries that burden? How do we live with that? How might we ask God’s guidance to change ourselves and our society for the betterment of one and all?
These are feeling questions. Feelings and emotions take time to recognize and process. So we go slow. In these last days before Holy Week, may we allow the ancient wisdom of the faith to reach us today, even in our lowest places. So that we might rise again with Jesus on Easter morn to new life, a new way.
Seeing Words 