From the Roman Missal service for Holy (Maundy) Thursday:*
38. A procession is formed in which the Blessed Sacrament, accompanied by torches and incense, is carried through the church to a place of repose prepared in a part of the church or in a chapel suitably decorated. […] When the procession reaches the place of repose, the Priest, with the help of the Deacon if necessary, places the ciborium in the tabernacle, the door of which remains open. Then he puts incense in the thurible and, kneeling, incenses the Blessed Sacrament, while Tantum ergo Sacramentum or another eucharistic chant is sung. Then the Deacon or the Priest himself places the Sacrament in the tabernacle and closes the door. […] After a period of adoration in silence, the Priest and ministers genuflect and return to the sacristy. […] The faithful are invited to continue adoration before the Blessed Sacrament for a suitable length of time during the night, according to local circumstances, but after midnight the adoration should take place without solemnity.
This is the basic construct of one of the simplest and most rewarding liturgies in the Anglo-Catholic-Orthodox trunk of Christianity; the Night Watch. It follows the service for Maundy Thursday which commemorates the Last Supper and institution of the Eucharist as the central aspect of public worship. In the Angilcan/Episcopal tradition, it follows the service of Foot Washing and begins with the Sacrament being carried to a chapel or side altar. After transferring the Sacrament, that other altar, the Altar of Repose, is dressed with some of the materials that are stripped from the main altar. As the main altar is laid bare, a stark harbinger of the lonely cross we’ll join the following day, the Altar of Repose is adorned with candles and palms and creates something vaguely resembling the Garden of Gethsemane, the place of Christ’s penultimate agony and his arrest. St. Luke tells the story this way:
When he reached the place, he said to them, ‘Pray that you may not come into the time of trial.’ Then he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, knelt down, and prayed, ‘Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done.’ [[ Then an angel from heaven appeared to him and gave him strength. In his anguish he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down on the ground.]] When he got up from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping because of grief, and he said to them, ‘Why are you sleeping? Get up and pray that you may not come into the time of trial.’**
Many churches hold a Night Watch that extends from the moment the Altar of Repose is established until the Good Friday service begins the following day. Working in 1-2 hour shifts, parishioners will sit before the altar and pray. Some will read psalms, or recite the rosary, or just sit in reverence and silence. At times its feels as though we’re trying to succeed where the disciples failed and at other times it feels like a recognition that we so often fall asleep despite his pleas that for one night, we would do our best to sit up with him.
Of all the Holy Week liturgies we’re missing this year, the Night Watch is the one that eats at me the most. I haven’t always kept the Watch. In fact, most of the parishes I’ve served have been too small to even fill the rota to cover all the hours. And, to be honest, when I have been a part of the Watch, I’ve always been uncomfortable. I start with good intentions, but after some time my mind and heart begin to wander and I struggle to “stay with him” for even an hour. Eventually, my hour nears its end and I rally, looking suitably pious before the next soul comes in to take their shift. And that’s why I’m anxious about missing the Night Watch this year.
Because in the liturgy, there is a definitive end to the Watch.
In many ways, the current state of the Church and the world feels like a perpetual Night Watch. We long to connect with Him and with each other, but we keep dozing off, being pulled back into ourselves as our fears and anxieties mount. We begin “sleeping because of grief” and as our minds and hearts wander, there is no discernible end in sight. No end to our hour at this strange Altar of Repose. No fellow soul coming to take over the watch for us. We are stuck, indefinitely, in that moment of feeling isolated, distant from God and his people, knowing that what is to come might be quite horrible, and losing sight of the graces right in front of us. We ask our Christ to “remove this cup,” and the reply is an eerie silence that fills our empty streets. We are filled with emptiness.
But even now there is hope.
Despite how it might feel, there is hope. We will, at some point, walk out of this garden into the greater world again. Make no mistake, it will be different; just as the disciples walked from the garden into a world that seemed as though it had lost its greatest light, we will enter the world again and find it strange compared to what we’ve known. But, like them, we will rekindle that light in our hearts and spread that new fire wherever we can. Even now, there are doctors and nurses providing kindling. There are police and first responders whose daily efforts fan the flames. In time, the Church will do the same. What now might feel like abandonment, will soon enough give way to greater opportunity and we will be called to find ways to make the old new. For now, we should hold hope in our hearts, but not deny the grief, the sadness, or the isolation. It is from these that the disciples found their greatest strength in the days that followed their slumber in Gethsemane. Like them, we will soon find that Christ has Risen and remains with us, even to the end of the age.
*Excerpt taken from the Roman Catholic Sunday Missal for Holy Week (pg. 72-3)
**Luke 22:40-46
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