Holy Saturday: Food, Music, and Togetherness

Yesterday was wonderful.  My folks are in town, and happily we seemed in agreement that we didn't need to spend Holy Saturday racing around or going to tourist places.  We got some chores done early in the morning.  We came up with a meal plan for Easter, and then we went to Doris' Italian Market just as it opened, before the crowds showed up.  We also made a separate quick trip to the grocery store to get some cheap champagne for Easter mimosas and charcoal, and to Hollywood Vine, our local wine store.

And then, we spent the day cooking, relaxing, and preparing for Easter.  At one point, I made this Facebook post:

"How lucky am I? I am spending this time between Good Friday and Easter reading Henri Nouwen's journal of his time in Latin America in the early 80s while my parents and spouse practice the Easter cantata that they'll sing tomorrow. I'm so glad I've hung onto the keyboard that my mom is now playing!"

That music wove its way through my sleep last night, a lovely experience.

Later in the day, we all sang along to the Godspell soundtrack.  I wrote this on Facebook:  "We are sorting through vacation photos, doing dinner prep, and singing along to "Godspell"--a great Easter vigil!"  Later I commented, "Mom and Dad took us to "Godspell" at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta in 1974 or so--I was 9ish--my spiritual life hasn't been the same since."

I thought we might watch Godspell later, but we went for a short walk and then enjoyed our key lime pie in front of the firepit.  Because we knew that Easter was a full morning, we went to bed early.

I am now listening to Richard Rohr on Krista Tippett's On Being.  Wow.  Here's a quote from him, for Easter and beyond:  "But non-dual is where you move into both/and, where you don’t look for all-or-nothing thinking. And we’re seeing it in our political debates today. It’s almost the only form of conversation left is all-or-nothing thinking. And it’s amazing to me that we could have this many universities in this country and could have this many churches and synagogues and mosques and have so many people still at such a low level of consciousness that they read everything in terms of either/or. And that’s why all of the world religions, not just Christianity, discovered that you needed a different kind of software to deal with mysterious things, holy things.   . . .  It’s like putting on a different head, where — let me describe it this way, Krista — you let the moment, the event, the person, the new idea come toward you as it is, without labeling it, analyzing it up or down, in or out, for me or against me. It just is what it is what it is what it is, without my label. At this point in history, you have to teach people how to do that because none of us are taught how to do that. And that, for me, says that religion has not been doing its job for several hundred years because that’s what we were supposed to evolve people to, a higher level of consciousness that would allow them to do things like love their enemies, overlook offenses."

For the whole interview, go here.

I am wishing a blessed Easter for us all--let us remember how deeply we are loved.  Let us remember that God can make a way out of the most wretched violence, and that the transformation continues.