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(x = space)

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Two Children

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Holy Thursday

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Maundy Thursday

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Good Thursday

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Nice Thursday for the church

If we leave off

The arrest in the garden,

Which sounds ingenuous

But the day

Liturgically

Is named for the supper only

And what happened there:

What was said,

Mainly

The command

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And did they know

By the way

That supper was the

Last?

And looking back

Would the disciples

Want

To have called it

That?

Or did we need a name

And gave it

That one?

(names come after things,

I guess

for history

and liturgy

and calendars)

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Here’s how it used to go:

We’d have a dinner

At the church

Downstairs

Then go upstairs

(from the social hall)

To the sanctuary above

And we’d have church,

Which is to say

A service

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And there would be Communion

And we’d conclude the service

There

And it was nice

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Sorry, it was nice

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Jesus and his friends

For that what’s Maundy’s

All about,

A lazy term

For the Latin mandatum

Meaning command

For Jesus gave them orders

All the followers

That they should love

One another

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That a few ages later

We should love each other

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Good Friday

(good?)

Will

(for a fact)

Be awful,

And in between

The supper and the arrest

Admittedly

Is his time in the garden

Where disciples will betray him,

First two

And then the third

Follower

Who left the supper early

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While Christ on his own

More than he wished

Asked of the cup

Not filled with wine from the meal

But of the bitterness

Of mortal destiny

Should pass by

As a deadly metaphor

For will

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And then acceptance

And it’s really rather beautiful

As it is tragic

And then horrible

With an arrest

And all the dreadful

Words and acts

To follow

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So we should keep the garden

Time

Somewhere in between

The meal

And arrest,

Maybe a kind of vigil thing

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For the church meal before

And then Communion,

Well,

Was wonderful,

First roast beef

(typically and, yes, like the toe)

And then upstairs

Where we hardly ever

Had church for all of us

At night,

Waiting now

In fact

‘Til Christmas Eve—naturally,

A good association

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And here’s Good Thursday,

Maundy Thursday when

We are told

By the child of God

To love each other

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Though I’m thinking now

There are too many things

Too many good and bad things

To come together

Making sense

Out of a calendar

And faith

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And yet

Bethlehem’s

Christmas child

And the child that is placed

Among them

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And something about

Leadership

And children

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And then

All children

Must and should grow up,

After all

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So there

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CLC

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Matthew 18:2-4, Isaiah 11:6

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Photo by David Weber on Unsplash

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