Day 755: Sunday, April 10, 2022

We celebrate Palm Sunday.

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Palm Sunday Celebration for the Emmaus Community

Order of Service for April 10, 2022

Let us begin our liturgy.

Victoria rings singing bowl three times

Victoria: Welcome and Introduction and Victoria offers a brief explanation of our theme for this evening:

Opening Song: Two Processions

A Palm Sunday hymn based on the book The Last Week by Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qp51womEqRE

Opening Prayer: Blessing by Jan Richardson

Blessing: Read by Marcie

Now more than ever let us be the ones who will not turn away. Let us be the ones who will go farther into the wreck and deeper into the rubble. Let us be the ones who will enter into the places of devastation beyond belief and despair beyond our imagining. And there let us listen for the Spirit that brooded over the formless darkness, and there let us look again for the God who gathered up the chaos and began to create. Let us be the ones who will give ourselves to the work of making again

and to the endless beginning of creation.

First Reading (from the Book of Zechariah 9: 9-10)

Read by Rosemary

Rejoice heart and soul, daughter of Zion!

Shout for joy, daughter of Jerusalem!

Look, your king is approaching,

he is vindicated and victorious,

humble and riding on a donkey,

on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

He will banish chariots from Ephraim

and horses from Jerusalem;

the bow of war will be banished.

He will proclaim peace to the nations,

his empire will stretch from sea to sea,

from the River to the ends of the earth.

Responsorial Psalm: Courage by David Whyte from his book Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words

Read by David

COURAGE is a word that tempts us to think outwardly, to run bravely against opposing fire, to do something under besieging circumstance, and perhaps, above all, to be seen to do it in public, to show courage; to be celebrated in story, rewarded with medals, given the accolade, but a look at its linguistic origins is to look in a more interior direction and toward its original template, the old Norman French.

Courage is the measure of our heartfelt participation with life, with another, with a community, a work; a future. To be courageous is not necessarily to go anywhere or do anything except to make conscious those things we already feel deeply. To be courageous is to stay close to the way we are made.

Courage is what love looks like when tested by the simple everyday necessities of being alive.

We become courageous whenever we live closely to the point of tears with any new possibility made known inside us, whenever we demonstrate a faith in the interior annunciations and align ourselves with the new and surprising and heartfelt necessities of even the average existence.

To allow ourselves to feel deeply and thoroughly what has already come into being is to change our future, simply by living up to the consequence of knowing what we hold in our affections.

From the inside, it can feel like confusion, only slowly do we learn what we really care about, and allow our outer life to be realigned in that gravitational pull; with maturity that robust vulnerability comes to feel like the only necessary way forward, the only real invitation and the surest, safest ground from which to step.

On the inside we come to know who and what and how we love and what we can do to deepen that love; only from the outside and only by looking back, does it look like courage.

Gospel Reading: Read by Jacqueline (Luke 19:28-40 Jesus’ Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem)

28 After he had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.

29 When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, 30 saying, “Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find tied there, a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31

If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’” 32 So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. 33 As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?” 34 They said, “The Lord needs it.” 35 Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. 36 As he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road.

37 As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, 38 saying,

“Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!”

39 Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” 40 Jesus answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

Victoria: Shared Homily:

Starter Questions:

• When confronted with all that attracts and allures, how do you decide what is best for you, and/or what might be best for the common good?

• As you walk through Holy Week, and other times of struggle in your life, what are the things that help you, nourish you and help move you forward?

Nancy: What is it that we bring to the table tonight:

Eucharistic Prayer:

(portions of this Eucharistic prayer from poem: Eucharista by J.Richardson)

Presider ( Victoria ):

We give great thanks for you

Who gave your body and blood

To give him birth,

Who sustained him in his growing,

Who traveled the path with him,

Who supported him

From your own resources.

Presider (Nancy ):

We give great thanks for you

Who reached to him for healing,

Who challenged him with questions,

Who shared your table with him,

Who claimed your place at his.

Presider (Victoria ):

We give great thanks for you

Who drank in every word,

Who told out his good news,

Who touched him in his leaving,

Who walked with him toward death.

Presider ( Nancy ):

And so

With thanks giving and celebration

We praise you;

You who found

The stones of your life

Turned to bread by him,

We remember you.

On the night before he died,

Jesus was at table with his friends.

He took bread,

Gave thanks to you,

Broke it, and gave it to his friends saying,

All: This is my body broken for you.

Presider ( Victoria):

You who found

Your bitter cup

Turned to wine by him

We remember you.

As supper was ending, Jesus took the cup of wine,

and ourselves, a living sacrifice.

Pour out your Spirit upon all these gifts that

they and we, may be the Body and Blood of the Christ.

Breathe your Spirit over the whole earth and make us your new creation.

Presider (Nancy):

You whose names

Have been lost to the winds,

Whose stories

Have been turned to scraps,

Whose voices

Echo through the ages

And beckon us to listen,

We give thanks

And we remember you.

Nancy& All: This is the cup of my love, poured out for all of you so you may know the Spirit. Do this in memory of me.

Nancy& All: (spoken)

We Remember

We remember how you loved us all your life.

And still we celebrate for you are with us here.

And we believe that we will see you

When you come, when you come again!

We remember! We celebrate! We Believe!

Presider (Victoria):

In the fullness of time

bring us with all your saints

from every tribe and language,

from every people and nation

to feast at the banquet prepared

from the foundation of the world.

Now gathered at your table,

we offer to you our gifts of bread and wine,

and ourselves, a living sacrifice.

Pour out your Spirit upon all these gifts that

they, and we, may be the Body and Blood of Christ.

Breathe your Spirit over the whole earth and make us your new creation.

Victoria (holding up both the bread and wine):

For, it is “Through Him, With Him, In Him,

In the Unity of the Holy Spirit,

all glory and honor is yours

Forever and Ever.

Nancy: Now together, as one community, we offer to you O God,

our prayer, in the name of your beloved son and our brother, Jesus:

All: Our Mother, Our Father Holy and blessed is your true name.

We pray for your reign of peace to come. We pray that your good will be done.

Let heaven and earth become one. Give us this day the bread we need.

Give it to those who have none.

Let forgiveness flow like a river between us, from each one to each one.

Lead us to holy innocence beyond the evil of our days.

Come swiftly Mother, Father, come.

For yours is the power and the glory and the mercy:

Forever your name is All in One.

Offering Our Gift of Peace:

Victoria_: Let us offer to one another a sign of our peace and love.

Pat O’Connor : Invitation to Communion:

Everyone is welcome to this table.

The Spirit, whom the Universe cannot contain

is present to us in this bread.

She who redeems us and calls us by name

Now meets us in this cup.

So, come, take this bread,

Drink this wine,

In them, the Spirit comes to us,

So that we may become one with the Spirit.

We invite everyone to partake in communion now.

Communion Song: (Hildegard Chant with her sisters on YouTube)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9K9PfjRjxM

Communion Meditation: (Video of Thich Nhat Hanh:

Please Call Me By My True Names)

Nancy: Closing Blessing: Blessing that Becomes Empty as It Goes For Passion Sunday (A Blessing for making our way, step by step, through Holy Week by Jan Richardson)

This Blessing

keeps nothing

for itself.

You can find it

by following the path

of what it has let go,

of what it has learned

it can live without.

Say this blessing out loud

a few times

and you will hear

the hollow places

within it,

how it echoes

in a way

that gives your voice

back to you

as if you had never

heard it before.

Yet this blessing

would not be mistaken

for any other,

as if,

in its emptying,

it had lost

what makes it

most itself.

It simply desires

to have room enough

to welcome

what comes.

Today

It’s you.

So come and sit

in this place

made holy

by its hollows.

You think you have

too much to do,

too little time,

too great a weight

of responsibility

that none but you

can carry.

I tell you,

lay it down.

Just for a moment,

if that’s what you

can manage first.

Five minutes.

Lift up your voice—

in laughter,

in weeping,

it does not matter—

and let it ring against

these spacious walls.

Do this

until you can hear

the spaces within

your own breathing.

Do this

Until you can feel

the hollow in your heart

where something

is letting go,

where something

is making way.

David: Announcements: