What Child Is This, Who Laid To Rest...Good Friday

"What Child is this, who laid to rest, in Mary's lap, is sleeping?"

     While a Child to us, He was no more, to Mary, He was still. If I said Good Friday is my favorite day out of the whole liturgical year, that makes me out to be some kind of pessimistic, narcissistic, crazy girl. And yet, Good Friday is my favorite day of the liturgical year. While "favorite" might not be the ideal word to describe my feelings for the day, I have no other word (the English language is such a slacker). OK, now that that is over, why Good Friday?

      Many people I've met tell me I'm a very sensitive person. Spiritual directors hold onto the idea that because I am so sensitive, I gather a lot of other people's emotions. In addition, as sensitive as I am, I rarely cry openly in front of people...except on Good Friday. Good Friday was my favorite day to cantor, because the Psalm for the service is "Father, into Your Hands, I commend my spirit." It is sung in minor key (my FAVORITE) and although technically, we're not supposed to scoop our notes and vowels, if one can properly scoop for this Psalm, the emotion one can find and provide for the congregation while singing it, is immense. I would have to practice at least a hundred times so I wouldn't cry while singing it. And yet, if Good Friday makes me cry, and I don't like crying in front of people, why is it my favorite? Well, because it does just that! It fills my heart with such emotion I can only experience with the Passion, the way of the Cross, the day Christ died for me.

        Since I'm home from school for Easter break (Catholic school perks), I've been visiting all the various churches nearby to see the sisters, who double as my friends. So, yesterday for Good Friday service, I drove a good twenty minutes (maybe longer thanks to the SEPTA buses I was driving behind) to be with some of the Sisters. That service, out of any Good Friday service I had ever been to, was the most peaceful and most thought-provoking. At all the services I had ever been to growing up, during the veneration of the cross, I have only seen a little cross; too big to hang on your wall at home, but way too little to hang on the church wall above the altar. Of course, this cross also had on it, the body of Christ. However, the cross this year, was a basic wooden cross, put together by two Parish men, and there was no Jesus. Also, it was so large that both the priest and the altar server girl had to hold it together. It made me think: my favorite Rosary is made of wood and has no corpse on it; my favorite necklace also has no corpse. How many times have I reflected that the reason I love them so much is because they remind me that not only has Christ risen, but that I must now take the place of Christ on the cross in my life. That large, beat up, ages-old, empty cross did that for me and right away I felt such emotion and such gratitude for Jesus' death.

     A few hours later, at my church, some Parish members were putting on the Passion of Christ/the Living Stations in the voices of Via Dolorosa. While I sat in a side pew by myself (my little sister beat me out of the spot next to Daddy...) I really began to reflect on how I would have behaved if I had been present. One of the first things the narrator of the story told us was that during the play, the soldiers call out to members in the congregation asking if they are a Christian. She said for us not to be afraid and to answer "Yes", to go along with it. For some reason, I immediately got so nervous that I would be the one they called out to. What on earth was going on inside of me? I knew all the players; grew up with them, even. So, if one of them called out to me, why would I be so scared? I reflect a lot of what it means to "die to self and for Christ" during the Lenten days and yet, I'm OK with it. But honestly, this would not be something I planned to give up, but what Christ planned. And immediately, I realized, I have to do what He wants when He asks me. I understood that maybe I am scared of what He wants from me, but that because He wants it, there is no denying Him. 

      When I came to terms with that, it turned out that I wasn't going to be the one who called was called out to. So, then I was able to reflect on the actual Passion. I realized that if I had been there that day with Jesus and the crowd, I would have been the one who cried into her robe silently, in the back corner of the crowd. I would have been the one the weeping women turned around to face after meeting Jesus and I would have comforted them, telling them it would be OK and trying to be optimistic. My tears wouldn't exist at that moment. Then later, at the foot of the Cross, when I was left only with Mary and the Beloved disciple and a few others, I would have broke down and hysterically cried for my Lord. 

       When I found myself crying immense amounts of tears during the actual play, I realized I had been sucked into the reality of it. I was crying as Mary sang about her boy child, while holding Him in her arms. And when she stopped singing, in the silence that followed, "What child is this" was continually looping through my brain. How perfect that song, written for the birth of Christ, fit for the death of Christ. Yes, our faith made full circle. What Child was this? The One who came from Heaven to earth to love us and save us.