Friday: The Rock and the Handmaiden
All week we have grappled with our dual nature.
It began on Palm Sunday. We started by shouting Hosanna to the Son of David, and ended shouting for his crucifixion.
It’s bewildering and exhausting being knocked from pillar to post, being confronted with our best selves and our worst selves, hardly knowing from one minute to the next who we will be.
Are we Jesus’ faithful disciples, pledging to be with him to the end and actually going through with it?
Or are we his betrayers, selling him out to those who would kill him and running and hiding when the trial comes?
We face the dichotomy of our divided selves one more time today, on Good Friday.
We are two people in this story.
We are Peter, and we are Jesus’ mother Mary.
We are the ones who deny him, and the ones who will not be kept away from him but stay at his feet until the bitter end. Continue reading