The Very Reverend Michael
J. Pitts
Greetings from the Dean,
Thank you for taking interest in our Web site. I hope
you are finding what you are searching for. I hope also we may be tempting
you to come and join us in person in the Cathedral, especially as we celebrate
this very special time of the Passion, Death and resurrection of Jesus.
These events, which lie behind our celebration of Holy
Week and Easter, form the very core of our Christian Faith. Jesus and
the disciples cross the Jordan River, and they make their way up the steep
sides of the valley, through Jericho to Jerusalem. There, Jesus’ presence
divides the community. On the one side, the peasants, the artisans, and
the dispossessed go wild with excitement at the possibility of the coming
reign of God. On the other side the secular and religious authorities
are deeply suspicious, and connive with the Roman imperial authorities
to get Jesus out of the way. His death, however, results in the outpouring
of God’s new life for the whole of humanity. When we cry "Jesus is
risen", we speak of this new life not just for him, but for ourselves,
for our society and for our world. For us to receive this new life, however,
we have to face, with Jesus, the denial and the death. We have to take
up the cross and follow our teacher. Our new life and the new life of
the world, come only through struggle and suffering.
This is the story which, each year, becomes the drama
of the liturgy of Holy Week and Easter. This year at Christ Church Cathedral,
it will begin in a particularly spectacular way. On Palm Sunday as well
as the procession of Palms, and the reading of the Passion Story, some
of our young people will be baptised and confirmed. They will thus, in
what I hope will be a memorable way for them, be part of the drama, representing
the crossing of the Jordan through the water, which symbolizes the life
giving struggle with the forces of death and destruction in ourselves
and in our world. Maundy Thursday and Good Friday then represent for us
Jesus’ gift of the life-bestowing Eucharist, his Passion of Arrest, Trial
and Crucifixion, leading to the celebration of his and our New Life on
Easter Day.
The Liturgy is a drama in which we are all participants
in many different ways. Please come to join us in the processions, in
the hymn singing, in the prayers of the Maundy Watch, in the meditation,
in the creative listening to the proclamation of the Word of God, and
the choral music.
All the services
are listed on the home page. Please note that the Palm Sunday worship
begins at 9.45 am. For those who may be shut in, you can hear the
music and meditation of 1.00 pm to 2.00 pm on Good Friday, and Choral
Evensong at 4.00pm on Easter Day on Radio-Ville-Marie
91.3FM. Also these services will be streamed live on the Internet.
I wish you a happy and Blessed Easter.
Yours sincerely,
Michael J. Pitts
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