Alex Swain

Beloved,

Maundy Thursday is begun, initiating in Holy Mass this evening the Paschal Triduum, the three holiest days of the year reaching fulfillment on Sunday evening.

I seem to have a penchant to consistently forget the etymology of the word maundy. It is derived from the Latin mandatum meaning “command.” It is from the passage of the Gospel according to St. John, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” (13:34)

I urge us to spend time contemplating this command. Let us go about the day and feel what we imagine to be love, and then say to each human and each animal and each thing and each object, all created and all of God, “I love you as God loves you,” and let the Spirit do Her work in our souls.

Let tenderness and compassion and loving-kindness, which God outpours, fill our hearts on behalf of the world. In so doing, we pray that our hearts may ever more take shape to be a dwelling for God Almighty.

And as we feel and fill with this love, imparted by grace into our open hearts, may we be better prepared to enter solemnly, and with holy grief, Good Friday - the day the world crucifies God who is Jesus Christ.

Then, having been filled with such tenderness and compassion and loving-kindness through loving one another as Christ loves us, may our hearts break on Good Friday. Through such shattering may these tender and holy loves pour forth upon a broken world.

For we know that this grief will not last forever, but for a time, let it be.

May we love one another, just as Christ loves us.

Amen.

Alex Swain