On Holy Saturday the Church is, as it were, at the Lord's tomb, meditating on his passion and death, and on his descent into hell, and awaiting his resurrection with prayer and fasting. This service of Morning Prayer calls us to reflect on the middle place between Christ's crucifixion and his resurrection. We will also hear together the words of "An Ancient Homily for Holy Saturday," an anonymous sermon from the fourth century.

In the words of theologian Shelly Rambo, "Holy Saturday provides a vocabulary consonant with being a survivor. It is a place of alienation, confusion, and godforsakenness. But it is also a place that is continually covered over, dismissed, rendered unintelligible, and therefore subsumed under operative narratives of the progression of death to life... Attributing theological significance to the middle involves resisting the forward pull of the Christian narrative, from death to life. The middle suspends this forward movement and, in so doing, provides a necessary witness to the struggles of living in the persisting storm of the aftermath." (in Spirit and Trauma: A Theology of Remaining)