This, my friends, is THE picture for today, the day Christians call Holy Saturday.
The day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday when Jesus lay in a dark tomb, hidden away, here in my country, in Jerusalem.
Although not a Christian I can't help but wonder what the feeling of Christians is on this heavy day.
I entered this silent, dim, empty 18th century church in rural Austria alone.
How stunned I was to suddenly discover a life-sized dead "body" lying below the altar.
Such a life-like statue!
It was almost too life-like.
And look here -- how often do you see a pieta with Mary holding his hand?
A Way of the Cross ends on top of Mount Calvary, with three crosses as the final station.
The old Baroque church is called in German Kalvarienbergkirche.
Next to it was built (in 1984) the Franziskusgemeinschaft, the communal farming community where I volunteered last October-November.
It was a wonderful experience, all of it.
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(Linking to inSPIREd Sunday.)
Holy Saturday is a strange day. There are (questionable) traditions of Jesus "harrowing" hell, but mostly it's just a kind of weird empty day.
ReplyDeleteThanks Dina
ReplyDeleteWonderful photos! I, too, would be startled by that life-sized (or almost) figure of Jesus.
ReplyDeleteDina life -sized statue of Jesus are common in my place
ReplyDeleteI'm assuming that to be a sculptural work of some form, though one of the Catholic churches here does have the body of a nun- encased in some sort of plaster, behind glass in one of their altars. I've always found that a bit odd. In the Protestant tradition, the Saturday isn't really that emphasized, aside from being a day of preparation for Easter Sunday.
ReplyDeleteWilliam, oh yes--a sculptural work! But calling him a statue seemed too stiff. In any case, I just added another sentence to make it very clear.
ReplyDeleteThat IS strange, that church having a dead nun in an altar!
It's too bad the Protestant tradition is missing this very moving Saturday, IMHO.
Gosia, I imagine many in Poland yes, but are there horizontal statues like this?
Magical Mystical Teacher, yes, I imagine how many poems such an experience would give you.
Cloudia, thanks to you!
Crystal, yeah, I know, but there is a limit to what my Jewish imagination can imagine. So I kept my post simple.
And I really preferred the image in the poem you just now posted on your blog:
“Saturday Night in the Tomb” by William Coleman
I like to imagine Him dancing there,
testing his limbs’ limits once more, fitting
back into his body the way we might
slip back again into a forgotten
favorite shirt crumpled in the closet,
finding ourselves wrapped in an old love’s
scent and remembering the moonflowers
opening in our gaze, steadying
for another long, glorious night of worship.
That’s the God I believe in—the one
who can’t wait to roll back the rock, leave nothing
behind, make an appearance everywhere,
yet who still loves these nights alone, the cool
darkness of His room, that sweet, solitary
music that keeps Him humming long after the dying’s done.
I think the Pieta is so powerful is because every mother in the world knows what is feels like when our child is sick or wounded. The sense of maternal helplessness and despair is universal :(
ReplyDeleteI have never seen such elaborate and lifelike statuary in a church. Thank you for sharing these. The perfect thing for these Christian holy days.
ReplyDeletePowerful images.
ReplyDeleteLovely post Dina...may you find peace and happiness in your life everyday.
ReplyDeleteVery awe inspireing church
ReplyDeleteAnother stunning church. Mexico likes to have life like bodies laid out in their churches.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful images, that means all of them.
ReplyDeleteThat statue reminds me of the Pieta.
ReplyDelete