Maundy Thursday

May the Lord who served be the one we follow; may the One we serve be honored in our service; may we, as we serve one another, and those we once called stranger, become servants of our Lord.

Traditionally, most years, it is our custom both to wash feet and to share communion on this holy Thursday. But this year that is not to be. Instead, we may well find ourselves returning back to the Word, to the relation of the events of that first Maundy Thursday night as they presage the events of that night and the next morning. That is, the celebratory aspects of the traditional get-together may be overwhelmed by the memory of what is to come: Good Friday.

In the old Book of Common Prayer that was first published in England in 1662,  and is still in use in that realm today, the emphasis is on the Passion, in the Gospel of John. The Epistle, granted, is of the Last Supper: and how we use it to proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. 

So the hope is beyond time. And yet it is now.

Somehow in all these events of Holy Week, Easter and Easter Week, we are to see beyond our own difficulties and sorrows, and the sorrows of Jesus and all his loving followers, then and now, to the hope beyond hope that the Resurrection demands. That it imposes on us, if we take it seriously.

Can we? Is that even possible?

Some seek to tell us that in past catastrophes, epidemics, plagues, and the familiar California litany of drought, rainstorm, flood, mudslide, earthquake, and drought again, "nobody helped anybody else, it was every man (sic) for himself." Well, no. I am reminded of those early Christians within the Roman Empire who became known for self less nursing of the sick, in times of famine and plague. And of those in brave London who looked after one another in the years just following the publication of the old prayer book, that is, in the Great Fire and then the Plague that hit that town. 

And I think of the self giving (there are the terms self-donative and kenosis, again) of the clergy and people who stayed in the city of Memphis during an outbreak of yellow fever in 1878. They included: 

The Martyrs of Memphis: Sisters Constance, Thecla, Ruth, and Frances of the Community of Saint Mary, the Reverend Charles Parsons, and the Reverend Louis Schuyler.

We remember them on September 9th, every year, and this year, perhaps many more days than one. 

Serving as relief workers at the Episcopal cathedral of Saint Mary in Memphis amid sweltering heat and scenes of indescribable horror, they gave relief to the sick, comfort to the dying, and homes to the many orphaned children.  

See how these Christians are, as Pliny the Younger and other Roman officials wrote in perplexion to Caesar, as they give of themselves, to each other surely, but also to others, even strangers. What shall I do with them?


Flog them if they persevere obstinate. That's one answer. And sure enough, they persisted. 

See how they love one another. 

But that's not it, not all of it, not by a long shot. 

For Jesus died not just to save the people of his own tribe, but that all might find hope and healing and salvation.

I don't think you have to sign up for anything. I don't think you even have to know or care much about him, or certainly not his followers. 

Just know that in Christ, in how he died and even more how he lived, God showed that there is hope, death is not the end: that love is strong as death, and when even faith and hope are gone, love endures.

***

Revised Common Lectionary (Episcopal Edition)

Exodus 12:1-4, (5-10), 11-14
1 Corinthians 11:23-26
John 13:1-17, 31b-35
Psalm 116:1, 10-17

***

The Book of Common Prayer, 1662

Thursday before Easter. The Epistle. 1 COR. 11. 17.

The Gospel. S. LUKE 23. 1. 

ALMIGHTY and everlaſting God, who of thy tender love towards mankind, haſt sent thy Son our Saviour Jesus Chriſt, to take upon him our flesh, and to suffer death upon the cross, that all mankind should follow the example of his great humility; Mercifully grant, that we may both follow the example of his patience, and also be made partakers of his resurrection, through the same Jesus Chriſt our Lord. Amen.

***

From Lesser Feasts and Fasts, 2008 edition, pages 465-466:

SEPTEMBER 9: THE MARTYRS OF MEMPHIS: CONSTANCE, THECLA, RUTH, FRANCES, CHARLES PARSONS, AND LOUIS SCHUYLER, 1878

In August 1878, yellow fever invaded the city of Memphis, Tennessee for the third time in ten years. By the month’s end, the disease had become epidemic and a quarantine was ordered. While more than 25,000 citizens had fled in terror, nearly 20,000 more remained to face the pestilence. As cases multiplied, death toll averaged 200 people per day. When the worst was over, ninety percent of the people who remained had contracted the fever and more than 5,000 people had died. 

In that time of panic and flight, many brave men and women, both lay and ordained, remained at their posts of duty or came as volunteers
to assist in spite of the terrible risk. Notable among these heroes were four Episcopal sisters from the Community of Saint Mary, and two of their clergy colleagues, all of whom died while tending to the sick. They have ever since been known as “The Martyrs of Memphis,” as have those of other communions who ministered in Christ’s name during this time of desolation. 

The Sisters had come to Memphis in 1873, at Bishop Quintard’s request, to found a school for girls adjacent to St. Mary’s Cathedral. When the 1878 epidemic began, George C. Harris, the cathedral dean, and Sister Constance immediately organized relief work among the stricken. Helping were six of Constance’s fellow Sisters of St. Mary; Sister Clare from St. Margaret’s House, Boston, Massachusetts; the Reverend Charles C. Parsons, Rector of Grace and St. Lazarus Church, Memphis; and the Reverend Louis S. Schuyler, assistant at Holy Innocents, Hoboken, New Jersey. The cathedral group also included three physicians, two of whom were ordained Episcopal priests, the Sisters’ two matrons, and several volunteer nurses from New York. 

The cathedral buildings were located in the most infected region of Memphis. Here, amid sweltering heat and scenes of indescribable horror, these men and women of God gave relief to the sick, comfort to the dying, and homes to the many orphaned children. Only two of the workers escaped the fever. Among those who died were Constance, Thecla, Ruth, and Frances, the Reverend Charles Parsons, and the Reverend Louis Schuyler. All six are buried at Elmwood Cemetery. The monument marking the joint grave of Fathers Parsons and Schuyler bears the inscription: “Greater Love Hath No Man.” The high altar in St. Mary’s Cathedral, Memphis, is a memorial to the four Sisters.

(Pliny, Letters 10.96-97. Pliny to the Emperor Trajan. https://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/texts/pliny.html. accessed April 5, 2020.)