Coptic Good Friday Services
Tomorrow is Good Friday, my favorite day of the year. When God Incarnate allows Himself to be scourged and spit upon and crucified for my sake, the least I can do is stand vigil at the foot of the cross each year for 8 hours.
Some years are better than others. This year, I can already tell you, will be very hard with a squirmy, squealing baby. I'm sure I will miss most of the parts of the service that I love. But I will go because my sanity is a small price to pay for the blessings of this day in my life.
When I was in high school, I had a friend who told me she didn't believe time was linear. She believed that events existed in circles, and it was possible to circle-jump. I have always loved that image and imagine God standing omnipresent over millions of floating, rotating disks of lives and times.
On Good Friday, I believe we circle-jump, that we are actually present at the Crucifixion of our Lord. We stand with the crowd and shout "Crucify Him!" We stand with St. Mary and weep with her and the others. We ponder our lives and the trajectory of the future slack-jawed as I imagine a young St. John the Beloved did. We tremble as St. Peter must have. We mourn as Judas did at our constant betrayal of Him who loves us--and struggle to stop short of despair at our sinful natures.
On Good Friday, we are there when they nail Him to the cross. We are there when He breathes His last. We are there when the curtain is rent, and the divide created by the Fall between Heaven and Earth is torn asunder. We are there when St. Dimas, the thief on the right, cries out, "Remember me, O Lord, when You come into Your kingdom." We cry out with him, over and over and over... "Remember me, O Master, when You come into Your kingdom."
We take rose petals and myrrh and bury our Lord, as He descends into Hades to free the souls of the patriarchs from the clutches of the evil one, to give salvation to those who kept His commandments and His words in their hearts through long and difficult lives.
And then we prepare for the Night of the Apocalypse, the Night of Revelation. "Behold, the Judge is standing at the door!" (James 5:9)
I really can't imagine being anywhere else.