Lenten Meditations: Maundy Thursday

Apr 9, 2020 by Jill

MAUNDY THURSDAY

LITURGICAL THEME FOR THE DAY:  As this liturgy begins, Lent has ended.  Our 40 days of Lent helped us “prepare to celebrate the Paschal Mystery with mind and heart renewed.”  Now we come to three liturgies which help us experience what is offered us in the new Passover.  Each liturgy helps us enter more deeply into the mystery and meaning.  Maundy or Holy Thursday evening takes us to the heart of the gift and to our mission. The name “Maundy” comes from the Latin antiphon Mandatum Novum, meaning “a new mandate.” This new mandate from Jesus is taken from John 13:34: love one another as I have loved you and immortalized in the act at the meal, whereby Jesus took a basin and a towel, and began to wash his disciples’ feet. This seems to have caused some consternation among the apostles as washing the feet of guests seems to be the work of a servant, perhaps even a slave.

Holy Thursday or Maundy Thursday as we call it in the western Liturgical Tradition is also known as Covenant Thursday, Great and Holy Thursday, Sheer Thursday, and Thursday of Mysteries. In the churches with a threefold order for ministry Holy/Maundy Thursday celebrates the institution of the Eucharist as well as the ministry of the priesthood. While various customs occur on this day one of the most enduring are the washing of the feet by the Bishop of Rome and the Maundy Money in the UK. In the UK, the royal family offers alms to help elderly citizens. One man and one woman receive the alms for each year that the monarch has been alive. Each person two purses – one red and one white. The red one will contain money, and the white purse has one penny for each year of the queen’s life. The coins are specially minted just for that day and are called ‘Maundy coins.

MEDITATION OF THE DAY: Every one of us knows what it means to feel a sense of despair as is the tone of Psalm 142. Verses 3 and 4 speaks of being discouraged, suffering and afflicted, that people do not want to notice. They may look the other way not because they are mean but perhaps because it is too much to bear  but that is why we must take root in the Lord God . It’s a blessing  to have friends and family there for us in these challenging times, but now we have people who are cut off from there loved one because of isolation and quarantine and there must be a sense of the presence of  God in the circumstances of our lives. This Psalm goes to the heart of lament but there is hope at the closing of the Psalm when a sense that God’s purposes being accomplished is declared. May those purposes come to us soon O Lord.

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O Lord God, you sent your Son into the world, and before his hour had come, He washed his disciples’ feet as a Servant of All. Help us this day to be your servant and empower us to ask others to let me be their servant too. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

ANCIENT WISDOM/PRESENT GRACE: “How consoling is this mystery of the Eucharist! If we avail ourselves to it, it would suffice to fortify and sustain us. Is there anything sweeter than to have a friend to whom we may at any hour confide our difficulties and our pain?” — –Saint Theodore Guerin (1798-1856)

HOLY WEEK DISCIPLINE – The foot washing is an example of service and humility even performed by royalty on this day. What act in life today cwould evidence your humility and service to another? Consider one in the morning and one act in the evening. If you are considering a sacred fast, consider what is done in parts of Germany, where Maundy Thursday is known as “Green Thursday” and the traditional foods are green vegetables and green salad.

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