Thursday is Maundy Thursday.
We set up two chairs after the sermon and fill two basins with water and set aside a few fluffy white towels and have the two ministers kneel next to the chairs and invite anyone who wants to, to come up and sit in the chairs.
The kneeling people wash the feet of the people in the chairs and then hand them the towels. Two more volunteers come up and get their feet washed then take the towels and wash the next persons and so on until everything who desires to participate does so. People are not selected ahead of time and everyone chooses to particpate or not on their own.
Some people come up eagerly, others out of curiosity and some not at all. Somehow I like the idea that everyone must make a decision to participate or not. I suggest that holding someone’s feet in one’s hands and washing those feet can be transformative.
Certainly more transformative and powerful than putting inflatable plastic Easter Bunnies in the trees outside your house (ref: Easter Traditions topic).
In the Lutheran churches I used to attend, we would end the Maundy
Thursday service by stripping the alter in silence. It’s quite powerful,
especially when you come back Easter Sunday to a bright alter strewn
with lillies.
This is the most perverse thread I have ever seen. We have gone from the deliberate attempt to confuse everybody whether it is Maundy or Thursday, to foot fetishists, to public nudity, and now to draping your lily over the altar. Is there no end to this depravity?
Come on Deej, footwashing is good for the sole.
Why do you have to be such a heel?
We started doing a Maundy Thursday service with footwashing about 3 yrs ago. The idea was brought in by our choir director, who grew up in a different denomination (Church of the Brethren). Not only do I think the service is wonderful, but it’s really encouraging to see change and flexibility in our church
I note that the same basin and towels are shared by the entire congregation, which looks to me like a good way to ensure the subsequent spread of toenail fungus is shared by the entire congregation as well.
The same pseudo-entity is also attributed creation of toe fungus. It seems a rather circular logic that this entity should be ascribed creating toe fungus, and that one must then entreat with the same entity to cure the toe fungus, yet the prescribed method of entreaty to the entity should consist of sharing foot baths with infected individuals so that one is constantly re-exposed to infection by toe fungus.
