The Whole Story

April 2025 Newsletter

Easter is late this year. The majority of April will be taken up with the observances of what is known as Passiontide - two weeks leading up to the resurrection celebrations on Sunday April 20th.

We will relive the story of Jesus' last two weeks as the gospels report them. The journey towards Jerusalem. The arrival there. The final meal and the rest in a garden. Then the arrest, trial and wait for an unlikely Roman execution. Maundy Thursday to Easter Day contains the climax of the Easter story in terms of worship. The foot washing and vigil. The waiting and Veneration of the cross. Holy Saturday, whilst Jesus rests in the tomb. And then the Easter fire as the resurrection is revealed as Mary Magdalen arrives at the tomb on the first Easter morning.

This is a story like no other. We can dip in and out of it as we wish but to do so is to lose the dramatic impetus of the whole event. We need to make the journey in its entirety. The Theologian Alistair McGrath writes: "The Christian faith tells a story that makes sense of the world, giving us a framework to understand who we are, why we are here, and what we are meant to be. It is a story that invites us to become part of it, to inhabit its world and be transformed by its vision of reality."

So, this Easter, let us grasp the Easter story in its entirety. Not just the fluffy bits. But the whole drama of Jesus' suffering and resurrection. To do so helps us make sense of the world. We may indeed then understand a little more about who we are. What is our task as Christian people today in terms of the wider community as we reach out.

As we say at the start of each station of the cross - a service repeated in the troubled city of Jerusalem many times over the next few days - We adore you O Christ and we praise you, because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.

Let that adoration speak volumes to those we know and love and to those to whom we are called to witness as we engage and celebrate in a story like no other.

The Revd Canon Dr Rob Marshall Rector