Palm Sunday, realized

I liked it.  A lot.  More than liked it.  It has never made much sense to me to read the Passion twice, once from the Gospel appointed for the year on Palm/Passion Sunday, and then again from John every Good Friday.  It always felt like an appeasement to those who did not have time for Holy Week.  I was in a parish early on in ordained life in which we made buttons which said Walk with us (through Holy Week).  Made it a marketing campaign.  But still we read the Passion on Palm Sunday.  I liked it this way better.  The (maybe) donkey, the teddy bears, the postponing of the Passion until the day it occurred, the sermon which focused on hope in the midst of pain.  I never could figure out how to preach post-Passion.  Today formed a whole, and an invitation to stay and experience what happens next.

The donkey*s name was Molly.

The running conversation over lunch

Was whether she was a mule

Or a jenny.

The ears weren*t quite

A donkey*s ears.

No trumpets, and still the hymn

Did not line up

From front to back.

Best of all, I think,

We did not do the crazy-making thing

With the palm procession,

Then the crucifixion

Ten minutes later.

Donkey, mule, jenny,

Notwithstanding.

Definitely better.

Children and adults both

Brought teddy bears to be donated

To children

In the hospital;

They lined the front of the altar

Four bears deep.

The sermon spoke hope in the midst

Of pain.

Again, no matter the nature of the animal

Who walked behind the processional cross,

The invitation to continue the walk

through the week,

Made sense this year

In a way it rarely has

Before.

With more than ten minutes between

The palms

And the Passion

There is time to live into the news

All the news

So the bells and alleluias make sense

At the End,

Make sense

At the Beginning again.