The Reading Isaiah 52:13-53:12
Chapters 40 to 56 of the book of Isaiah contain four “songs of the suffering servant”; this is the fourth.
The Response Psalm 22
Psalm 22 begins with heartbreaking words that Jesus utters on the Cross—but even in the darkness there is hope.
The Epistle Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9
Jesus is both God and man, both high priest and sacrifice, and ready to forgive. How can we believe this, and live into it?
The Gospel John 18:1-19:42
The Passion account in the gospel of John is the one we read each year for Good Friday. Year by year let us learn each of the lessons it teaches.
Ponderables
Good Friday is the darkest day of the Triduum, the three days from Maundy Thursday through Holy Saturday. In these days, God the Creator and Sustainer, God the Pure, God the Judge has washed feet, faced betrayal, gone to trial like a common criminal, and has voluntarily died the most humiliating, painful, and utterly graceless public death that human ingenuity and vengeance could devise.
At my hands.
And for my sake.
Lord of Sorrows, have mercy.
