Today is Holy Saturday, the empty day in the Christian calendar, a day of ambiguous silence. After his execution, Jesus’ friends were grief-stricken. They had no awareness of any future other than loss and fear.
On the other side of their experience, we wait with our questions, anticipation, and wonder. Holy Saturday is the day that we hold our breath. Will Easter come?
Until that new day breaks, I offer the five readings from this week (all linked below in this single post) as the arc of the story through which we’ve been walking. The final gospel selection is below, with an extended quote from British writer, Francis Spufford. There is no poetry today.
Monday: Hidden in Plain Sight
Mary anoints Jesus for his death
Tuesday: Grain of Wheat
The gift of falling into the earth
Wednesday: Betrayal
Are we the betrayed — or the betrayer?
Thursday: Foot Washing and a Holy Revolution
Jesus washed Judas’ feet. And the first feast of a new world
Friday: The Crossbeam
The open arms of love
A reading for Holy Saturday
John 19:38-42
Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the Jews, asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him permission; so he came and removed his body. Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds. They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews. Now there was a garden in the place where he was crucified, and in the garden there was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. And so, because it was the Jewish day of Preparation, and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.
On Holy Saturday, from Francis Spufford, Unapologetic.
“He cannot do anything deliberate now. The strain of his whole weight on his outstretched arms hurts too much. The pain fills him up, displaces thought, as much for him as it has for everyone else who has ever been stuck to one of these horrible contrivances, or for anyone else who dies in pain from any of the world’s grim arsenal of possibilities. And yet he goes on taking in. It is not what he does, it is what he is. He is all open door: to sorrow, suffering, guilt, despair, horror, everything that cannot be escaped, and he does not even try to escape it, he turns to meet it, and claims it all as his own. This is mine now, he is saying; and he embraces it with all that is left in him, each dark act, each dripping memory, as if it were something precious, as if it were itself the loved child tottering homeward on the road. But there is so much of it. So many injured children; so many locked rooms; so much lonely anger; so many bombs in public places; so much vicious zeal; so many bored teenagers at roadblocks; so many drunk girls at parties someone thought they could have a little fun with; so many jokes that go too far; so much ruining greed; so much sick ingenuity; so much burned skin. The world he claims, claims him. It burns and stings, it splinters and gouges, it locks him round and drags him down…
All day long, the next day, the city is quiet. The air above the city lacks the usual thousand little trails of smoke from cookfires. Hymns rise from the temple. Families are indoors. The soldiers are back in barracks. The Chief Priest grows hoarse with singing. The governor plays chess with his secretary and dictates letters. The free bread the temple distributed to the poor has gone stale by midday, but tastes all right dipped in water or broth. Death has interrupted life only as much as it ever does. We die one at a time and disappear, but the life of the living continues. The earth turns. The sun makes its way towards the western horizon no slower or faster than it usually does.”
Something strange is happening – there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep.
― Anonymous
A NOTE ABOUT THE COTTAGE AND TWITTER
It has been a banning sort of week.
On Friday, Twitter blocked sharing The Cottage and all newsletters from writers who use this platform, Substack, from sharing links, commenting on posts, liking essays, or otherwise putting our words into the public square of social media. While there is still some minimal functionality there, we’ve effectively been banned from Twitter.
This Holy Saturday reminds me that while silence is good for the soul, being silenced is an affront to human dignity.
Twitter is trying to force writers off of its platform who have chosen to write here.
If you click a link from the Cottage at Twitter, Twitter smacks a WARNING LABEL on the beautiful essays and conversations stating that the Cottage “may include” malicious spam and unsafe content. Your friends won’t want to click through to the post. Heck, you may not click through. Frankly, when I read the label, I’m scared to click through!
Unless this changes, it means you won’t be able to share the work of many authors you love via Twitter.
If you are on Twitter, I urge you to protest this policy online.
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Silence may be good on Holy Saturday, but being silenced isn’t good for democracy.
Don’t let the bad guys win.
WHY HAS THIS APP BEEN SILENCED ON MY ACCOUNT? I received texts but cannot open them???
And what if everything had just stayed this way?