 By Rev. Heather J. Blais, Rector
Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia! How did we get here? On Friday we remembered Jesus was crucified by the most powerful empire of his day, and then laid to rest in a tomb for his eventual burial. No burial preparations could happen on the Sabbath, so it was not until the following day that the tomb was found to be empty. The women, who had come to anoint Jesus' body for burial, found a divine figure who commissioned them to go and tell Peter and the disciples that Jesus had gone on ahead of them to Galilee. There they would see Jesus. Yet instead of doing as they were asked, “...they went out and fled the tomb for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” Again, I can’t help but wonder, how did we get here? How was the Good News ever shared or heard? In Mark’s gospel, the disciples' unfaithfulness is a recurring theme. It is especially prominent in Mark’s passion narrative.
In fact, we hear nothing else about any of Jesus’ followers until he has taken his final breath. Then, Mark tells us that several women were standing off in the distance. Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome, who had followed him and provided for him while he was in Galilee; along with many other women who did the same for him in Jerusalem. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James watched as Joseph of Arimethea took Jesus' body down and placed him in a tomb for burial. The morning after the Sabbath, these three women from Galilee bought the necessary spices so Jesus might be anointed for his final burial. They were worried about who would move such a heavy stone, and were shocked to find the stone moved, and the tomb empty. And just as they were given an important task, they too, fled. So how did we get here? If the disciples fled in fear? If the women who discovered the empty tomb fled in fear? How did we get here? Well, thanks be to God - the Jesus Movement, the dream of God is bigger than any of us. Bigger than our fear. Bigger than our insecurities. Bigger than the unrealistic expectations that we put upon ourselves and others. Bigger than every mistake we have ever made or yet will make. Better yet, bigger than any nation or empire that has ever been or yet will be. The women found an empty tomb with a divine messenger, not because Jesus successfully died for our sins in some final act of atonement. The God of Love would never demand an innocent man’s death. As Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan write in The Last Week: “God has vindicated Jesus. God has said ‘yes’ to Jesus and ‘no’ to the powers who executed him. Easter is not about an afterlife or about happy endings. Easter is God’s ‘yes’ to Jesus against the powers who killed him…Jesus is Lord. And if Jesus is Lord, the lords of this world are not. Easter affirms that the domination systems of this world are not of God and they do not have the final word.”* They go on to write, “The story of Holy Week as Mark and the other gospels tell it enables us to hear the passion of Jesus - what he was passionate about - that led to his execution. His passion was the kingdom of God, what life would be like on earth if God were king, and the rules, domination systems, and empires of this world were not. It is the world that the prophets dreamed of - a world of distributive justice in which everybody has enough and systems are fair. And it is not simply a political dream. It is God’s dream, a dream that can only be realized by being grounded ever more deeply in the reality of God, whose heart is justice. Jesus’ passion got him killed. But God has vindicated Jesus.”* How did we get here? God got us here. In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God has proclaimed then, now, and always: Jesus lives.**
Mark’s resurrection account is the earliest story of Easter in the Christian Scriptures.* It is the only story that does not have an explicit resurrection appearance. Instead, the appearance is implied. The divine messenger tells the women, “...go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.” There have been times in my life where this ambiguity has made me uneasy. Typically, it has been when I have craved certainty, and when I have yearned for clear cut answers. In a scary world, sometimes we want something straightforward to hold onto. Yet there is something absolutely fantastic about Marks’ gospel ending. It is unfinished. Just like us. Just like the Church. Just like the work of bringing about God’s dream for this world. It is all in process. We are all in process. And while the guarantee may be lost in the overall ambiguity of the ending, Mark’s gospel does offer certainty if we can be patient and look for it. The divine messenger tells the women: You will see him. Yet this message is not just for these three women. They were commissioned to tell Jesus' disciples and Peter.Or as the Common English Bible translates: “Go, tell his disciples, especially Peter, that he is going ahead of you into Galilee.” Especially Peter. Especially the one who thought he could never deny Jesus, but did. He especially needs to hear this message. Just as we do, when we lose our way. That is when we most need to be reminded that we, too, will see him. We will see him - and nothing can separate us from the Love of God.
When we have aligned ourselves with the Kingdoms of the World instead of the Kingdom of God - we will see him. We will see him. And there is nothing we can ever do that will keep us from the Love of God. Jesus is all around us. Because Christ lives in each of us.
So how did we get here? By the life changing love of God, who is turning this world upside down and right side up again. Our call, our invitation, is to commit ourselves to the work of Love made known in God’s dream for this world. And when we flee the empty tomb, or deny seeing Jesus in the eyes of our neighbor, we must remember that God is bigger than our mistake and nothing can ever keep us from the Love of God. We will see him. We will know God’s love. As we prepare to make our way back into the world, I urge us each to not let this day go quietly by without asking ourselves:
Amen. * Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, The Last Week, p. 205-206, 212-213, 194. ** Theme of Jesus Lives discussed by Borg & Crossan p. 204-205. By Rev. Heather J. Blais, Rector
There are many names for Good Friday.* In Greek Christianity, today is called ‘the Holy and Great Friday’. In Romance languages today is ‘Holy Friday’. In German it is ‘Sorrowful Friday’. Our own English ‘Good Friday’ may derive from ‘God’s Friday.’ Each one of these names captures some essence of the meaning of this day. This year, ‘Sorrowful Friday’ seems most appropriate to me. In an immediate sense, there is a real devastation, cruelty, violence, and oppression happening in our world that must make God weep. We know our neighbors in Gaza and throughout the Holy Land, Ukraine, Russia, and Sudan are having basic human rights and dignity ignored and violated. Closer to home, we witness neighbors divided by politics in a way we have not seen in generations, and a growing concern of whether our democracy will be able to endure this chapter in our nation’s history. To speak nothing of our neighbors plagued by poverty; hunger; inadequate housing and healthcare; discrimination; and living with the environmental ramifications of the climate crisis. Sorrowful Friday, indeed. Another reason this day is ‘Sorrowful’, is that historically it has been ripe with anti-semitism. As Bishop Fisher wrote in a letter to clergy in March 2023: “…acts of violence in synagogues and threats of such violence are on the rise. It is more critical than ever to renounce the historic antisemitism that has endangered our Jewish sisters and brothers since the foundation of Christianity…. Repentance is not just sorrow for sin, but a willingness to change. It is time for us to change how we pray on the day in which Jesus showed us the depths of God's love.” On this day, more than any other, as a Church we need to renounce the role of Christianity in anti-semitism by being willing to change how we think about this day, the readings, and the liturgy itself. In the Anglican tradition, we believe that ‘praying shapes believing’. To this end, our parish is joining many others for a second year in using an Alternative Good Friday liturgy approved for trial use in the Episcopal Church. In John’s Gospel, the culpability of a few religious leaders aligned with the emperor has been transferred to all Jews, always. This is reflected again and again by references to ‘the Jews’. As you probably noticed, on this day we shifted to saying ‘the Judeans’. This shift moves away from holding an entire religion responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion. While there’s been some conversation about making similar changes throughout John’s Gospel, Jewish scholars like Amy Jill-Levine caution the Church against eliminating ‘the Jews’ altogether. Primarily because it would risk Christians not realizing that Jesus and his disciples were Jewish themselves. Our own Good Friday liturgy has historically exasperated anti-Judaism, which is a general aversion to the Jewish religion, whereas anti-semitism is aversion towards Jews as a racial or ethnic group. Early versions of the Solemn Collects addressed Jewish unbelief, altogether forgetting the Jewish people have been and continue to be in covenant with God. In the revised version of the collects that we will pray today, we recognize Jesus was a faithful Jew, that God’s covenant with Jews remains, and pray for the continuing flourishing and safety of Jews. The collects also acknowledge Christian harm done to Jews, and envisions Jewish and Christian cooperation for the sake of the world. While there is much to be ‘Sorrowful’ about the Church’s role in perpetuating anti-Judaism and anti-semitism, these changes are one small way we can repent, changing our ways and perspective. In the most familiar sense, it is ‘Sorrowful Friday’ because Jesus died on the cross. Not because God required the sacrifice for our ‘sinfulness’ in an act of atonement. Rather, because of our corporate human brokenness. Scholars Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan describe it as ‘human inevitability’. They write in The Last Week: “Was the death of Jesus the will of God? No. It is never the will of God that a righteous man be crucified. It might have turned out differently… But for another reason the execution of Jesus was virtually inevitable. Not because of divine necessity, but because of human inevitability - this is what domination systems did to people who publicly and vigorously challenged them.”* The Roman Empire is merely one of many domination systems throughout human history that has used violence and oppression to suppress communities into submission. They were not unique or particularly horrible compared to other empires. What they were was another example of what it looks like when power and greed override compassion and neighborly love. A small group of Jewish leaders aligned with the Roman authorities. By becoming local collaborators, they were given the benefit of a small military force, and joined Rome in oppressing the Jewish people. Jesus was a nonviolent revolutionary passionate about God’s dream for this world. The vision he upheld for God’s world inherently stood against dominant systems of oppression and violence. Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan put it this way: “...if one lives for divine justice in a world that belongs to God, one will usually die a violent death from human injustice in a world that refuses recognition of such ownership.”* In other words, Jesus was a rebel working for divine justice and stood against imperial authority. It is for this reason his death was by crucifixion, which was a form of capital punishment generally held for rebels who did not accept Roman authority. The passion narrative itself is full of sorrow. The sorrow of Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denial. The sorrow and helplessness of the women standing by the cross, bearing witness to a young man’s life being stripped away from him and those he loved by imperial authority. The pain and grief of Jesus bidding his mother farewell, and asking his disciple and friend to care for her as his own mother. The mixture of sorrow and gratitude Joseph of Arimathea must have felt that Jesus’ body was intact enough to be taken down for burial. So often those who died by crucifixion were placed lower to the ground, giving birds and wild dogs access, and leaving the remains unrecognizable. The love and sorrow of Nicodemus as he anointed Jesus' body for burial in a manner fit for a king. Sorrowful Friday, indeed. As we continue our way through this evening’s liturgy, I would invite us to reflect:
Amen. * The points made in this paragraph are referencing Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan book, The Last Week, p. 137, 161, 118. By Rev. Heather J. Blais, Rector
How do we live and work together as a faith community? Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is directed to an early Christian community undergoing some growing pains. His letter offers clear instructions on how to correct many aspects of communal life. At the same time, his letter begs certain questions still relevant to Christian communities today, such as:
In today’s passage, he is especially concerned with the community’s practices around the eucharist. In the early Church, the eucharist was more than a simple meal of bread and wine. It was an all out feast, that was more akin to the Dinner Church services led by Jimmy this Lent. People brought what they could, and the food was equally available to all. The eucharist has always been grounded in a theology of God’s abundance, generosity, and love. Except, something had gone awry in Corinth. The Corinthian community had been following Roman and Jewish dining customs of the time, which involved reserving the best seats and finest foods for the most esteemed guests.* This resulted in the poorest and least influential members of the community receiving inferior treatment.* In the verses that precede tonight’s lesson, Paul actually says, “Now in the following instructions I do not commend you, because when you come together it is not for the better but for the worse” (11:17). In other words, if that’s how you are going to celebrate the eucharist, it would be better if you didn’t bother at all. He goes on to say, “For when the time comes to eat, each of you goes ahead with your own supper, and one goes hungry and another becomes drunk. What! Do you not have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you show contempt for the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What should I say to you? Should I commend you? In this matter I do not commend you!” (11:21-22). Ouch. Paul argues that the social stratification happening in Corinth is corrupting the very meaning of the eucharist. This is particularly offensive to him, as he was the one that initially instructed them on the practice of the eucharist. Clearly, they had not understood. In the section of his letter that we heard today, Paul is offering a correction. The practice of the eucharist comes from Jesus himself, when on the night he was betrayed, he took a loaf of bread, gave thanks, and said to his disciples: “This is my body, that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me” (11:24) Then in the same way he took the cup, saying: “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me” (11:25). Paul is reminding Christian communities that each time we share in the eucharist, we are sharing in God’s story of love and redemption as made known to us in Christ. He also tries to help the community understand there is a difference between a shared communal meal of the eucharist and eating because we are physically hungry. He tells people if they are so hungry they can’t wait for everyone to have some food, they should eat something at home before coming to worship. In other words, have a snack if you must. Paul also reminds us that prior to sharing the eucharist, we are meant to be examining our conscience, our behaviors, and our relationships. It can be easy to let this element of sharing the eucharist slip our minds. Because this aspect is hard.It’s one reason why this Lent, we’ve been regularly using one of the alternative offertory sentences prior to celebrating the eucharist together: “If you are offering your gift at the altar, and there remember that your neighbor has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your neighbor, and then come and offer your gift.” - Matthew 5:23, 24 Everytime we celebrate the eucharist at Saints James and Andrew, we say: “This is God’s table, and all are welcome here, no exceptions.” What we do not say so straightforwardly is: “This is God’s table, and walking the Way of Love is the hardest work we will ever do. So come; come and be spiritually nourished in our shared communal meal, so we might go out into the world to keep growing, and striving for reconciliation, for justice, mercy, and kindness in God’s world.” Yet another reason why eucharist is not a private meal, but rather a communal meal. We need one another as a community to walk this Way of Love. It’s easy to see why Paul was so upset about the social stratification at play in Corinth, for the ways it disrupts community and creates inequality at God’s table. It’s equally easy to scoff at another community when they make this kind of mistake. What were those foolish Corinthians thinking? Well, probably the same thing churches thought when they started selling pews. Likely some committee in some church looking to raise capital had the great idea that if we sold pews to members, it would help balance the budget. It would allow members to choose their own pew, and to fuss over who might be sitting nearby. But what about those who couldn’t afford a pew? Well, the solution was a poor man’s pew. Our church once had such a pew, located in what is now the Littles’ Corner. While churches eventually began to realize selling pews was bad form in Christian communities, the culture of owning pews persisted long after payment ceased. Many lifelong church goers have had the misfortune of accidentally sitting in ‘someone else’s pew’ and receiving a rude glare or unkind words in return. I’d like to think that kind of behavior has largely gone by the wayside, as we do not actually own pews anymore. (And if this is new information for you, I am sorry to be the bearer of such difficult news this evening.) But I have to say, thank God we stopped such foolishness. Because holding a special place at God’s table for the wealthy and prominent is exactly what Paul is so worked up about in today’s passage. Social stratification can sneak into communal life in all sorts of ways if we do not keep God’s Love as our North Star. Which is likely why Paul makes a long and beautiful speech about love a few paragraphs beyond today’s passage. While 1 Corinthians 13 is often read at weddings, it’s not actually about romantic love. It is about the communal love that guides our life together as the body of Christ. It’s no mistake that the creators of the lectionary choose this reading for Maundy Thursday. This passage helps Christian communities as we walk through Holy Week to remember that the Eucharist grounds our common life together, and that it actually matters how we go about breaking bread as a community. Whatever our social status may be out in the world, at God’s Table, we are siblings in Christ, cherished and beloved children of God, equally welcomed. Because the Eucharist is inherently about God’s love:
God sent Jesus to teach us what it means to love. The eucharist was one of the primary tools that Jesus gave us, to guide and ground us in God’s love as a community; sustaining us as we strive to love and serve God’s world. As was, the footwashing. I’ve been your priest long enough that y’all know I love the foot washing ceremony. I know we all have insecurities about our feet, and our bodies in general. These insecurities make us uncomfortable, and the thought of others washing our feet can leave us feeling vulnerable in ways we’d prefer not to feel vulnerable. But that was Jesus’ point. In community, we are meant to be vulnerable with one another, to take risks, and help one another to grow in love. Doing so strengthens the body of Christ and our mission. There is a reason, this is the action focused on in John’s gospel on the eve of Jesus’ arrest. Jesus was teaching his disciples that loving one another means serving one another. But we can’t serve one another if we are not willing to be served. Many of us are eager to jump in and do the serving. We will get our hands dirty. We will go where God sends us. At the same time, the idea that God may be sending us to have our feet washed may make us deeply uncomfortable. The idea of allowing our feet, with all the insecurities and vulnerabilities they represent, may leave us wanting to say thanks, but no thanks. And again, that is the point. To walk the Way of Love, we need to be willing to serve and be served. I’m not saying we need to be there today, tomorrow, or the next day. If you are not ready to partake in the foot washing this evening, that is okay. What I am saying is that God longs for us to know what it means to serve and be served in community. We will spend our whole lives growing and being changed by God’s reconciling and redemptive Love. So, this night, this particular worship, is especially for the Church. To gather in our local worshiping communities, and reflect on our communal life:
Amen. * Jewish Annotated New Testament, p. 341.  By Rev. Heather J. Blais, Rector
What are your childhood memories of Palm Sunday? I spent my middle and high school years worshiping at the former St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Augusta, Maine.* On Palm Sunday, we would gather at the Parish House with our palms, and process across the sidewalk into the church. Much like we did today, due to the ice, the crucifer would lead us in one of those curious figure eight processions, round and round the sanctuary, until finally we would make our way to our pews. I remember sitting in my pew, turning my palm into a cross, and curious neighbors would hand me theirs, so I might do the same with their palms. Looking back, I now recognize those neighbors were really compassionate grandparent figures, who could easily spot a kid in great need of something to do at a particularly lengthy Sunday service. Anyone who has ever sat next to me knows, I’m not very good at sitting still. The words of the liturgy and the readings would soak into me, even as I was busy fidgeting with palms. But when it was time for the gospel, things were startlingly different. Our parish celebrated Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday, where the congregation would turn the Passion gospel into a dramatic reading. There was a bone chilling moment where the entire congregation would shout together, ‘Crucify him, crucify him’. Many of us grew up with similar experiences on Palm Sunday. In recent years, here at James and Andrew, we have joined other churches in a conscious shift away from celebrating Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday. The primary hope is that instead of trying to fit all of Holy Week into a single service, instead we will gather daily as a community to give our full attention to each momentous element of Holy Week. To be certain, this is less convenient. Possibly a disastrous choice at a time when our culture increasingly values convenience. That said, when has following the Way of Love ever been convenient? In fact, it is largely rather inconvenient. Choosing to follow Jesus on the Way of Love forces us to regularly examine our motivations and actions, to strive for justice and peace, and to genuinely care for the wellbeing of all people and God’s creation. Yet there are still other reasons to hold off on a dramatic reading of the Passion. At our winter clergy day, Bishop Fisher and his staff brought in Dr. Daniel Joslyn-Siemiatkoski, who serves as Kraft Family Professor and Director of the Center for Christian-Jewish Learning at Boston College. He is also an Episcopal priest, serving the Diocese of Massachusetts as Ecumenical & Interreligious Officer.** He is deeply engaged in helping the Church examine and rethink how we talk about Jews, particularly within our lectionary, liturgy, and preaching. During his time with us, he addressed how we, as the Church, have historically engaged in antisemitism by the way we use certain texts in Holy Week. He strongly argues that how the Church speaks about Jews in worship shapes how the Church stands with Jews in public. Professor Joslyn-Siemiatkoski reminded us that the Church has long promoted supersessionism, which is the belief that the Church has replaced Israel as God’s chosen people.*** According to Professor Joslyn-Siemiatkoski supersessionism is woven into our beliefs in three core ways:
He goes on to say that when these beliefs go uncorrected, it misshapes and misunderstands Judaism as a religion that:
These anti-Judaism beliefs lead to instances of anti-semitism. In particular, Holy Week has historically been a time of rhetorical and physical violence for Jews. While Jews and Christians have begun the long work of reconciliation, the Church still has extensive work to do. Part of this work is taking a closer look at our liturgical practices during Holy Week. Earlier I mentioned there might be another reason to hold off on the dramatic reading of the Passion. In the Passion narratives, the crowd is understood to be Jewish. This means the narratives portray Jews as the ones crying out, ‘Crucify him!’, and in Matthew’s version, the crowd cries out: ‘His blood be on us and our children!’ (27:24-26). These readings portray Jewish leaders as though they carry a greater responsibility for Jesus' death than Pontious Pilate, when in reality, the Jewish people are subjects of an oppressive Roman Empire. Even the Jewish authorities who act as intermediaries are subject to Rome’s power and might. This means throughout history we have placed responsibility for the death of Jesus on an oppressed people, instead of their oppressor, the Roman Empire and the only person in the room holding all the actual power, Pontius Pilate. Above and beyond this fact, are the complexities we add in when we, as Christians, play act at being Jewish for a dramatic reading of the Passion. We get to experience that bone chilling moment when we cry out ‘Crucify him’ and feel, for a moment, what it's like to be responsible for Jesus’ suffering and death. But we are playing at being Jewish; a people that have historically been oppressed, and when the service is over, we go back out into the world as Christians. How is that appropriate, when as Christians, our religion sits so adjacent to power, that it has been swept up in its own oppressive and disturbing version of nationalism? Professor Joslyn-Siemiatkoski begs the question of us: Is the drama worth it? I would have to say no. Professor Joslyn-Siemiatkoski suggests one of the solutions to this challenge is to separate out Palm and Passion Sunday, as has been our custom in recent years. Good Friday holds its own complexities, which we will tend to later this week. Each year a gospel lesson is assigned for the ‘Liturgy of the Palms’ that we shift to our primary gospel lesson on Palm Sunday. Before we take a closer look at that text, and I promise, I don’t have a whole other sermon, I want to lift up something that theologians Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan observe about the Passion in their book The Last Week.**** They observe that the word ‘passion’ means more than simply ‘suffering’; it also means what a person is passionate about. These two interpretations play against one another in the life of Jesus. They write: “The first passion of Jesus was the kingdom of God, namely, to incarnate the justice of God by demanding for all a fair share of a world belonging to and ruled by the covenantal God of Israel. It was that first passion for God’s distributive justice that led inevitably to the second passion by Pilate’s punitive justice. Before Jesus, after Jesus, and, for Christians, archetypically in Jesus, those who live for nonviolent justice die all too often from violent injustice.” When we bear all this in mind, it helps make sense of the events in our gospel lesson.**** Jesus is not just randomly asking for the disciples to score him a colt, so he has a sweet ride into Jerusalem. He is actively planning a political demonstration. Jesus knows that on the other side of Jerusalem, the Roman governor Pontius Pilate was leading his own imperial procession into the city. Rome was always ready to showcase their might, particularly when they wanted to squelch the possibility of revolt. Only twenty-six years earlier, there had been a rebellion in Jerusalem following Herod the Great’s death. When Rome finally quelled the revolt, they punished the rebels by crucifying two thousand rebels en masse. It was customary for the Roman governor to arrive in Jerusalem in anticipation of any major Jewish festivals, particularly for Passover, which celebrated the Jewish people’s liberation from Egypt. The Kingdom of Caesar was on full display and it told the oppressed: Stay in your place. Yet the Kingdom of Caesar stood in direct opposition to everything the Kingdom of God stands for. And so, with the help of his followers, Jesus organized an entirely different procession of peasants that took place at the exact same time, on the other side of Jerusalem. Jesus entered Jerusalem on a colt, stirring to mind for the Jewish people the words of the prophet Zechariah, who foretold of God’s king who would bring peace: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the warhorse from Jerusalem; and the battle-bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations; his dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth” (Zechariah 9:10). All those years ago, two processions entered Jerusalem reminding the crowds of two very different ways of being, two very different kinds of kingdoms, and two very different dreams of what this world can be. There is the Way of Love and the Way of the Might. This Holy Week, this one precious life: Which Way will we follow? Which Way will we walk? Amen. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Mark%27s_Episcopal_Church_(Augusta,_Maine) ** https://www.diomass.org/news/diocesan-news/new-ecumenical-interreligious-officer-appointed *** The points made in this paragraph and the subsequent two paragraphs are directly taken from the Rev. Dr. Daniel Joslyn-Siemiatkoski talk and power point presentation on ‘Engaging Anti-Judaism in the Texts of Holy Week’ given at the Diocese of Western Massachusetts Winter Clergy Day on February 1, 2024. ****The points made in this paragraph are referencing Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan book, The Last Week, p. vii-viii, 2-30. |