Okay, darlings, here we go…
Get the suit to the cleaners.
Make sure your white blouses and clericals are laundered and pressed.
Get the housekeeper in or plan a few hours for cleaning, including the fridge.
Shop for food.
Make soup.
Throw out junky snacks — you don’t need all that sugar and sodium and fat clogging your brain and arteries when you need to be super mentally fresh for Jesus.
Get some daffodils — they’re cheap! — and put them around the house.
Launder the bedding and towels.
Shine the shoes.
Line up dog walkers for those days you know you’re going to be sagging, like next Thursday. If you’re washing everybody’s feet, who’s going to wash yours? Get a pedicure. If nothing else, it’s time out to breathe and pray, and it supports someone else’s family.
Make sure you get quiet and rest and lots of it.
Get fresh air.
Clear the ministerial deck of administration as best you can. You need to model what it looks like to put discipleship first.
Dive fully into Jesus.
Check in here, darlings. What’s on your mind? Where are you in the story this year?
I am feeling the enormity of Jesus so much this year, I can barely stand it. EMPIRE. His confrontation with empire, our addiction to violence and wealth and military versions of power and bombastic spectacle in lieu of leadership. Angry masses of people being promised the world if only they will deliver their neighbor to the authorities for deporation. Centurions crucifying the innocent for daring to hold up their heads and ask for humane treatment. God help us, it’s so painfully real. It’s the first century in the 21st century. To think of him intentionally attracting attention with his colt and ass show and street theatre – absolutely wonderful. And then that meal with his most dearly beloved, to say, “Everything horrible is about to go down but I am always with you and I have peace to grant you that the world cannot give.”
Well. As they say, children… YOU BETTER PREACH.
I can’t believe that no one has commented on this yet. So here’s what I think. YES. I know that Holy Week is a lot less demanding on Unitarian Universalist clergy than on our Christian brethren and sistern, but it’s still a demanding weekend at the very least. So chickens, do what Auntie PB says! And schedule yourself for a massage next Monday!
Love, Judy who just has to show up on Sunday and that’s all. (And who won’t even be doing that because she’ll be in the car driving home from Bellingham.)
Ramping up for my first Holy Week in a new parish. I arrived just in time for Lent so the journey has been amazing…lest a horrible cold that is still lingering.
We will be having services every day from Palm Sunday to Easter Day and I’m excited as well as nervous about the whole thing. The rest of this week will be putting together all the service bulletins and props needed for each service. Then there will be grocery shopping, putting a jug of water in the fridge so it’s nice and cold and cleaning the house/vestments/bedding before the marathon week.
While I’m told not to “expect too much” from the congregation, I’m delighted and excited to be where I am. I suspect interest will grow as the week goes on and if, at the end of the day, it’s just me and Jesus, I’m okay with that too.
Massage scheduled for this Friday, chiropractic next Monday and pedicure next Wednesday. My how I love the Lord.
Blessings to you and thank you for your always timely advice.
Kiss of peace,
A+
Trying hard to forget all the issues I’m struggling with—the old shoulder injury that has chosen right now to start bothering me again, the long running struggle toward ordination, the distance between my appointment and my remaining family—and concentrate on this one thing. THIS ONE THING. HOLY WEEK AND EASTER. Then I’m going to sleep for a day or two before picking my burdens back up and running with them again.
God willing, I’m going to make it. Going to wear my new clergy shirt and collar, get a haircut and pedicure, and buy myself some flowers. All shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.
Only once have entered Holy Week wholly unprepared…and I paid for it with putting my back out laying on the floor while my dear partner keep the cats away from my stomach. I was a student in seminary and it all seemed TOO BIG, I wish I could say that experience fixed me..it took a crazy christmas to finally get through to me. Now, I usually have a healing service -(as much for me as for my parishioners) as we enter Holy Week -it seems to help me focus on the reconciling act we are to remember. I tend to take longer baths and take stock of my heart/soul while soaking-the real meaning of soaking prayer.
Thank you PB for reminding me to be mindful of me in order to be present with others.