Honoring Grief Through Ritual

Although Jesus repeatedly told his disciples that he was going to suffer and be put to death, as far as we know, only two took him at his word: Thomas and Mary of Bethany. When Jesus announced that he would go back to Judea after receiving word that Lazarus was ill, most of the disciples protested, pointing out that the people there had just tried to stone him; Thomas alone said, “Let us go die with him.” Perhaps these words of solidarity offered Jesus the comfort of knowing that the spirit was willing even though the flesh was weak—for Thomas did indeed flee with the others after Jesus was arrested.

Mary of Bethany had a keener grasp of what awaited Jesus. She was deeply grieved about his impending death and expressed her sorrow not with words but with an extravagant gesture of love. By anointing his feet with costly perfume, she comforted him with her understanding of what he would endure and transformed a burial ritual into a rite that helped him prepare to die. Jesus did not try to assuage her grief by telling her that everything would be all right, as we tend to do in an attempt to comfort others; rather, he honored her sorrow by permitting her to perform the ritual and by entering into that liminal space between life and death with her.

Every Holy Week, it is difficult to recall the passion and death of Jesus, whom we also have come to love. It helps to remember that he carried the memory of Mary’ loving act of anointing with him as he endured scourging and crucifixion. We usually express our own sorrow at Jesus’ suffering and death at our Good Friday services through the ritual of kissing or bowing to the cross. Although we cannot gather in our churches this Good Friday because of the COVID-19 pandemic, we can still set aside time to sit with the cross and be united in prayer with all people in our world today who are carrying their own crosses of illness or impending death, isolation, and fear.