Among the books on my shelves that I intended to pull and browse this week (I didn't) was:
"Using the gospel of Mark as their guide, Borg and Crossan present a day-by-day account of Jesus's final week of life. They begin their story on Palm Sunday with two triumphal entries into Jerusalem. The first entry, that of Roman governor Pontius Pilate leading Roman soldiers into the city, symbolized military strength. The second heralded a new kind of moral hero who was praised by the people as he rode in on a humble donkey. The Jesus introduced by Borg and Crossan is this new moral hero...."
Writing the book was apparently motivated by the authors' realization, especially after the release of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, that many of us are unclear about the details of the events of Holy Week.
If you celebrated a religious festival this week or recently, was there a particular book or ritual that supported or challenged you? Or, perhaps, you found this a year that you chose to be aloof or distanced from those festivities?
I think it depends upon the individual whether they "take a back seat" or not. Family gathering together to celebrate together is very important as well.
I particularly like the following two books this time of year:
And we watched 'The Passion of Christ' Friday night after going to a service for the 'Stations of the Cross'.
Easter Vigil last night which was beautiful as always, and dinner together tonight. Easter has actually become more special to me than Christmas over the last few years.
Joseph: I have been going to a Liberal Jewish friends' Passover Seder for around 15 years now and they often change the way they do things, sometimes because they have attended a Seder at a friend's house who did things differently, or in a way they liked. For instance, in the past few years as well as Elijah's cup on the table, there has been a cup for Miriam, to represent women's contribution to Jewish culture. I like that idea. This year we 'reclined' in the lounge whilst reading the Haggadah and tasting the ritual foods but went to the dining room for our main meal and fourth cup of wine, after the children had found the Afikomen. Of course, Orthodox Seder's keep more firmly to tradition but it is years since I attended one of those.
I am in favour of keeping all the religious holidays for all the religions but I would add one for atheists
. Although I associate these holidays mainly with food and do not know what atheism could contribute! We have far fewer religious holidays in the UK than in most European countries, where the catholic tradition means that many saint's days are holidays. There are now calls for a day to celebrate the end of Ramadan and one to comemorate Divali but they are having to take their place alongside the longtime call for a Churchill Day!
Joseph_F wrote:What's interesting to me about our sacred days is how these lofty, spiritual ideas have to take a backseat to what really means something to us: food, family, music, and other concrete things that we love and that we enjoy and that really make the holiday for us. And, to me, that's great. Anything that makes us connect the people that we love with the idea of the sacred is great, because spending time with family is sacred and important.
This leads to another interesting point, though, where people often conflate religious tradition with the personal traditions of their family. For instance, having recently moved away from the area where my entire extended family lives, I went this year to a Passover Seder at the family of a friend's house. Some of their traditions were completely different from mine, and while it was fun it still felt distinctly wrong, as though they were going against the sacred day somehow. Of course, they weren't. They were just doing some of the minor traditions attached to the sacred day slightly differently, but in my mind all of those minor traditions had been entertwined with the real meaning of the day.
Choisya wrote:Joseph: I have been going to a Liberal Jewish friends' Passover Seder for around 15 years now and they often change the way they do things, sometimes because they have attended a Seder at a friend's house who did things differently, or in a way they liked. For instance, in the past few years as well as Elijah's cup on the table, there has been a cup for Miriam, to represent women's contribution to Jewish culture. I like that idea. This year we 'reclined' in the lounge whilst reading the Haggadah and tasting the ritual foods but went to the dining room for our main meal and fourth cup of wine, after the children had found the Afikomen. Of course, Orthodox Seder's keep more firmly to tradition but it is years since I attended one of those.
I am in favour of keeping all the religious holidays for all the religions but I would add one for atheists
I agree with you. But I've got a few pagan almanacs over the years. The used to be published by Llewellyn, haven't run across one in a while though. Listed every day of the year with all the various religious holidays. 96% of the 365 days of the year ARE religious holidays. It would make it complicated.
