Maundy Thursday

When: Thursday before Easter

Observance: The Last Supper of Jesus

Biblical reference: John 13-17

Within the midst of the Easter season, Maundy Thursday is one Christian holy day that many Christians and even many churches often overlook, yet it symbolizes a critically important truth of the Christian faith – Jesus as a suffering servant and the call for his followers to do the same. It also draws a connection between the Passover sacrifice, a Jewish tradition, and Jesus Christ’s sacrificial role on the cross.

The night before Jesus was crucified, he had a Passover supper with his disciples. (Passover is a Jewish holy day that celebrates God’s deliverance of the Israelites from their slavery in Egypt.) After supper, Jesus knew that this would be his final opportunity to instruct his disciples before the crucifixion, so he talked at length about his purposes, what his followers should do in response, and the promise of the Holy Spirit to come. He then washed his disciples’ feet in an incredible demonstration of humility and servanthood. Finally, he gave bread and wine to his disciples and asked them to partake of it in remembrance of him. The act of partaking of bread and wine is called Communion (or the Last Supper) today (see Chapter 8).

The word Maundy (pronounced mawn-dee) comes from the Latin word mandatum, which means “command.” The command that this holy day refers to is the one that Jesus gave to his disciples during the Last Supper:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, just like I have loved you; that you also love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

-John 13:34-35

Along this line, many churches perform foot-washing services on Maundy Thursday as a way to remember Jesus’ command. I remember going to one of those services as a teenager, panicking that my feet would be all smelly when someone washed them! I was certain the next song played by the organist would be the Odor Eaters theme song.

During the Middle Ages, this holy day was sometimes called Shere Thursday; shere means “pure.” In England during this time, bearded men found another reason for that name when they sheared their beards on Maundy Thursday as a symbol of the cleansing of body and soul before Eater.

Good Friday

When: Friday before Easter

Observance: Crucifixion of Jesus on the cross

Biblical reference: Luke 23

Good Friday marks the day on which Jesus Christ was crucified on the cross for the sins of the world. When I was growing up, the term Good Friday always seemed confusing, because I associated good with happy. Good Friday isn’t a happy day, but its name is a reminder that humans can only be considered good because of what happened on that day. Some believe that its name was originally God’s Friday, which, over the years, became its present name. In Germany, Christians call it Quiet Friday (from noon on Friday until Easter morning, church bells remain silent). Christians in other parts of Europe call it Great Friday or Holy Friday.

Good Friday is a day of mourning and sorrow over the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ and a reminder that the sins of all people made it necessary for him to die in the first place. It’s also a day of gratitude for the supreme sacrifice that he made.

Protestant churches sometimes hold services between noon and 3:00 p.m. to commemorate Jesus’ hours on the cross. Catholics often remove everything from the altar and kiss the crucifix as an expression of worship. Some churches even hold a Service of Darkness in which candles are extinguished until people are left sitting in total darkness, as a reminder of the darkness that covered the earth after Jesus died (Luke 23:44-46).

Easter

When: First Sunday after the first full moon after March 21

Observance: Resurrection of Jesus Christ

Biblical reference: Luke 24

Bar none, Easter is the single most important holy day of the Christian Church, for it celebrates the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the central event in Christianity. To Christians, the resurrection backs up Jesus’ claim that he had the authority to die for the sins of the world and the power to come back to life again. It also gives hope to Christians that they too will experience a resurrected life in heaven.

The exact day of the year that Easter falls on is very confusing, and the logic seems pretty old-fashioned in this digital age, because it’s based on the lunar calendar and tied to the start of the solar spring. But the Western Church (Catholic and Protestant) continues to observe it based on the rules of long ago – that it falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after March 21. It can’t come before March 22 or after April 25. In contrast, Orthodox Churches wanted to tie Easter to Jewish Passover, given the relationship between Passover and the day of Christ’s resurrection. (See the “Maundy Thursday” section, earlier in this chapter.) Because the Jewish calendar determines the date that Jews celebrate Passover, Easter for the Orthodox Churches can vary by as much as five weeks from the Western Church.

Which came first: The bunny or the name?

No one knows for certain where the term Easter came from, but one theory is that it’s derived from the Anglo-Saxon goddess Eostre, who was connected with fertility and spring. If so, Christians named their high holy day Easter aiming to replace the pagan celebration of spring with their own holiday – like they did with Christmas. Easter is also often known as Pasch, which comes from the Hebrew word Pesach, meaning “Passover.” Some Protestants prefer to call it simply Resurrection Day to remove the commercialized baggage that they see associated with the holy day.

In addition, the Easter bunny has pagan origins and has no real connection with the Christian celebration, although some churches use eggs as a metaphor for the new life Christians receive because of the Resurrection.

Pentecost

When: 40 days after Easter

Observance: Coming of the Holy Spirit

Biblical reference: Acts 2

Originally, Pentecost was a Jewish holiday held 50 days after Passover. One of three major feasts during the Jewish year, it celebrated Thanksgiving for harvested crops. However, Pentecost for Christians means something far different. Before Jesus was crucified, he told his disciples that the Holy Spirit (which I discuss in Chapter 7) would come after him (see John 14:16). And 40 days after Jesus was resurrected (ten days after he ascended into heaven; see Luke 24:51), that promise was fulfilled when Peter and the early Church were in Jerusalem for Pentecost.

Although many North American Christians hardly notice Pentecost today, traditional European churches consider it a major feast day. Pentecost, also called Whitsuntide in parts of Europe, is just behind Easter in overall importance. For example, in German today on only three occasions does the observance of a national holiday span two days: Christmas (December 25 and 26), Easter (Sunday and Monday), and Pentecost (Sunday and Monday).