Holy Week homilies

[old barmaid]

Why are priests obliged to preach after the reading of the passion on Palm Sunday and Good Friday?
If what we have just heard has not sunk into our hearts and minds how can the words of any priest,
no matter how erudite or eloquent he may be, do any better? All we need is period of silence to meditate
upon the words of the Gospel.
The same might apply at Christmas Midnight Mass.

[VML]

We had a parish priest in the 70s and 80s who simply said, 'There is nothing I can say that could possibly add to that we have just heard.' Exactly..

[Ros Wood]

I think priest preach on Good Friday because there are some memberof the congreagtion there that they won't see any other time of the year (ditto Christmas)

[docmattc]

We had a parish priest in the 70s and 80s who simply said, 'There is nothing I can say that could possibly add to that we have just heard.' Exactly..

A good, brief homily on such days can draw out some aspects of the narratives and be really effective. It is possible to illuminate the passion in a homily.

However if the priest feels that there is nothing he could add, he shouldn't.

I once heard of a homily that started with the words "I can't possibly add to that". The person telling me about it followed with the comment "He then spent 20 minutes proving his point"

[oopsorganist]

We had a very long Homily on Good Friday.

And a very long procession to kiss the cross.

And a very long communion taking.

It all took a very long time.

We were there a very long time. What made it less for me personally is that the readings were read by the same people who always read them and it was too dull. That might be a lack on my part. And as usual the service was insecurely planned. It feels like one to miss next year. What would make it better, how could I help to make it better?

[asb]

We had a very long Homily on Good Friday.

And a very long procession to kiss the cross.

And a very long communion taking.

It all took a very long time.

We were there a very long time.

Our Lord suffered on the cross for a very long time.....

[VML]

It is however true that there are many readers who think they have absolutely nothing to learn about presentation and public speaking.
Good Friday has always been a sombre occasion. I remember the first times I was there: The packed church, women in their fur coats, the solemnity of it all, and the choir divided for the reproaches.
Here we have readers who share the Passion reading, and a different voice for the first reading, also always a male cantor for the psalm and acclamation.
We have, over the years, alternated each year, the Damian Lundy version of the Reproaches: O my people, and a longer hymn sung as often as necessary during the veneration. This year we sang, 'My song is love unknown' and alternated men and women each verse. Not sure it worked as well as it should as not many men sang well enough, and next year I may ask about just saying the Reproaches, each side of the church as in morning prayer.
There was a suggestion this year- before hand- that we might next year drop the tradition of singing unaccompanied between the two Glorias. As it happened, Maundy Thursday went so well and the contrast between the Vigil Exsultet and psalms and the eventual organ burst at the Gloria etc was wonderful.
When a 12 year old Jamaican altar server says after Maundy Thursday 'The singing was really good tonight' we can't be making too bad a noise, and we do have a tradition anyway of singing psalm verses a capella every week and coming in on pitch with the accompanied response.Sorry- Off topic, but I hope it might give oops a bit of support and info.

[docmattc]

If any service seems overly long, then its failing to engage properly. In a former life I went to a 3.5 hour Easter Vigil that was so engaging it felt like we'd only been going half an hour. The cross was undoubtedly a long and painful torture for Our Lord, but that's not a justification for our liturgies to be similarly long and painful.

I think the key to Good Friday is a very dignified simplicity, almost minimalism. There is no substitute for proper plannning so that all involved know what's going on and there's no-one flapping about in confusion. We have just managed to climb out of the rut of having the same people read the Passion every year, and it is much improved for it.

[oopsorganist]

thanks VML
we did sing unaccompanied and that was OK ...... but something was wrong, I don't quite know what and I don't feel I should mess really, which is why I might just leave it next year, far too much responsibility for me to mess with....... playing the organ in the past was better, because I could just opt out of what was happening, especially since I can't see what is happening..... but all the other services went well, not perfect, but genuine and interesting, not challenging at all musically, but I feel our parish does better with mostly routine and very simple things, because of the Rift who will not sing, in a way, they have denied everyone else permission to sing!

I think PP should know what he is doing or what he wants, he wanted "One Bread One Body" for Communion on Good Friday so he got it. It was a bit shocking but good on him because he feels he is including younger people. And before that he sort of shovelled another hymn in quite the wrong place.......... it's not my fault, and yet it might be. We did "This is the wood of the cross and "The reproaches, which went well, and yet, I wonder if it would have been more inclusive to sing the Old Wooden Cross, or other standard. The readings were read by the same old people........ one very angry person of the Rift and she always looks angry when reading (because she really want to lead the singing and won't), and anther bod who has been out of the parish many months and just comes for summer months... and it always worries me when this happens, because it is none of my business who does the readings, but it reminds me of battles and I feel both guilty about them and still fretful for it to be cured somehow just as long as I do not have to work with them! Impossible isn't it?...... to be more clear, if someone only comes to a service in the parish when they are on the reading rota, then what on earth are they doing on the rota, do you see, it is just not right, but if this is their only way back in, then who can deny them. Difficult and blocking people, I just want to hide from them, not stand there leading unaccompanied singing badly!

I didn't know you had been alive before Doc, that' s not usual here. It was noticeably unright that service. Readers do matter, we had lots of different and new readers during Holy Week and it made a big difference to the whole atmosphere. But in our parish it is communication that is the problem. That, and really rubbish planning.

Begs I don't have to sort it out. Begs I don't have to suggest different readers for Good Friday next......... only one job per person, that's the rule, and I am the organist. (Ha!)

And now I know why it felt so long, it was so uncomfortable for me.

[asb]

Oh dear, Oops, you have got problems. You are not alone though, as you know!

Have you suggested planning meetings to your PP, Do you have an MC who could be involved in this? I always used to sit down a few weeks ahead of Holy Week with PP & MC and sort out logistics, until we had it off to a fine art. It can be done if there is willingness all round.

Sorry to disagree on one thing though - you say you did "This is the wood" and the Reproaches. Great! Why, therefore, might it have been better to drop these words which are part of the Good Friday Liturgy, in favour of a dreadful, mawkish hymn (The Old Rugged Cross that you mention) ....? It's not even Catholic!

[oopsorganist]

Ah, I know Asb

thanks .... our MC is 17 and totally so shy. But for Holy Week our ex MC came back from Uni and took over, he did well, and I would not want to put these young people off their stride, and I end up trying to guess what is going to happen next. I rather think they come first, as young people active in the church and playing leading roles, they are quite special. Because who would want to plan for a church that is just elderly people. What we did sing was also mainly led by youngsters as the "choir" which is too grand a word, are average 10 years old.

All the emotional stuff in our parish is about change, but it is necessary. For us the change is singing something that is in the Liturgy/relates even distantly to the readings. But I quite like some of the other stuff and if I had nothing to do with the music I would quite happily sing, O Come and Mourn with me, or O Sacred Head, or Man of Sorrows, I like a good miserable hymn. Well anything really, I quite like singing hymns! It never bothered me what we sang at church before I oopsily got involved. It would have bothered me if I did not know any of the music and I could not get the notes to look at. No, maybe not, as long as there were enough verses for me to get into it.

And if anything happens two years in our parish then it has happened forever.

And the Homily, let's not go there, it was long .......but everyone just smiles at that, except the Rift, they do not like it.