March 21st, 2008 – Good Friday Service - Darkness

Dusk. Twilight. Evening. Night. The Darkest Hour. The divisions of the Good Friday service are emphasized by the levels of darkness we experience throughout the worship. We start with sun still up and end in that profound darkness that can, and does, sometimes make us tremble.

Everything draped in purple the night before now is covered in black material. The platforms that invited us in to the worship space now form a circle where the prayer corner was set up before. The appearance of this ring of black is ominous, like it is a fortification against danger.

The congregation sang Were You There? and this evening the line sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble resonated within me. Questions about being there, questions within ourselves, and to each other. Questions and then the realization sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.

Does the tremble come from fear of the world as it is and the capability of evil? Or do we tremble at the overwhelming power of Christ on the cross? Am I afraid or is this tremble our first emotional response to the power of Easter? And sometimes then becomes a pivotal word. Am I not afraid at the other times when I don’t tremble, or are there times when I don’t feel the power of Easter? Should the times I don’t tremble cause me to tremble?

The choir sang two pieces, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross and Ave verum corpus. Each came from different places of the heart. The atmosphere created by Ave verum corpus had a fragile beauty. Singing in Latin connected with a tradition. There were layers of accessibility.

The process of learning the piece came flooding back for me during the performance. First, Kelly taught the choir how to pronounce the words. After that we learned the translation of the words and another power in the piece was revealed. Learning that Mozart wrote this piece using an older text and that that it was Mozart's final completed sacred work made the piece that much more powerful.

We left again in silence but it was not the shattering silence of Thursday’s service. It was more a reverent silence that is best reflected in the words from the Taize community's Within Our Darkest Night:

Within our darkest night, you kindle the fire that never dies away.