Holy Week
My 49-year-old knees ache with the thought of Holy Week.
You see, my mind always plays a trick on me during the Holy Week leading up to Easter as I think back to my altar boy days.
(Yeah, I was a dedicated altar boy...you didn't think I got this nice without training, did you?)
Holy Week is pure torture on a dedicated altar boy.
First off, there's church every day!
Even though we didn't have to go to school, we had to show up at the front of the church. We also had to do the stand-up, kneel down, with the big cross deal during the stations of the cross.
I swear, 40 years later I think about the one day when we were just passing every single station...saying the rosary with the gathering of old ladies who were running their beads through their hands.
"How many more we got?" My buddy Al DeCarlo had whispered to me at one point.
"A thousand," I whispered back.
We both giggled and the priest scowled at us.
I think of it all because there are so many rituals that seem forgotten now. We head to church, but the kids weren't altar boys (those perverted priests throughout the land sort of soiled that deal), but as a kid, we felt important doing that, and growing up in the 1970's, that was sort of expected.
And I kinda' miss it too.
The standing for what seemed like 5 days during the Palm Sunday reading where the priest always played Jesus and the gathering played the murderous crowd while a guy from the crowd played Pontius Pilate.
And what a story it is.
No matter how many times you read it through, you feel all of the pain. The Greatest Story Ever Told some would say.
But back to those old days...
...the nuns were cranky.
The priest was acting as if we were actually responsible for making Jesus carry that cross.
The smiles were rare.
We were all walking up that hill...and the pain in our legs was ever-present.
As a kid it was always weird, you know?
We'd hear that story and then suddenly we'd celebrate it with the story of a bunny delivering chocolate.
Yet I certainly still feel different during this week leading up to Easter, I suppose. After all, rising from this world to the next is the basis for all of the living that we do.
When you really consider it...
...it makes you want to pick up the beads.
You see, my mind always plays a trick on me during the Holy Week leading up to Easter as I think back to my altar boy days.
(Yeah, I was a dedicated altar boy...you didn't think I got this nice without training, did you?)
Holy Week is pure torture on a dedicated altar boy.
First off, there's church every day!
Even though we didn't have to go to school, we had to show up at the front of the church. We also had to do the stand-up, kneel down, with the big cross deal during the stations of the cross.
I swear, 40 years later I think about the one day when we were just passing every single station...saying the rosary with the gathering of old ladies who were running their beads through their hands.
"How many more we got?" My buddy Al DeCarlo had whispered to me at one point.
"A thousand," I whispered back.
We both giggled and the priest scowled at us.
I think of it all because there are so many rituals that seem forgotten now. We head to church, but the kids weren't altar boys (those perverted priests throughout the land sort of soiled that deal), but as a kid, we felt important doing that, and growing up in the 1970's, that was sort of expected.
And I kinda' miss it too.
The standing for what seemed like 5 days during the Palm Sunday reading where the priest always played Jesus and the gathering played the murderous crowd while a guy from the crowd played Pontius Pilate.
And what a story it is.
No matter how many times you read it through, you feel all of the pain. The Greatest Story Ever Told some would say.
But back to those old days...
...the nuns were cranky.
The priest was acting as if we were actually responsible for making Jesus carry that cross.
The smiles were rare.
We were all walking up that hill...and the pain in our legs was ever-present.
As a kid it was always weird, you know?
We'd hear that story and then suddenly we'd celebrate it with the story of a bunny delivering chocolate.
Yet I certainly still feel different during this week leading up to Easter, I suppose. After all, rising from this world to the next is the basis for all of the living that we do.
When you really consider it...
...it makes you want to pick up the beads.
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