We are a small Episcopal Church on the banks of the Rappahannock in Port Royal, Virginia. We acknowledge that we gather on the traditional land of the first people of Port Royal, the Nandtaughtacund, and we respect and honor with gratitude the land itself, the legacy of the ancestors, and the life of the Rappahannock Tribe. Our mission statement is to do God’s Will in all that we do.

2023 Sun April 9

Tenebrae

Tenebrae is the opening of the Holy Week services for the church. Due to Covid, we have not scheduled this service since 2019.  The 2019 bulletin is here.  The description of this day in Holy Week with the Bible readings and commentaries is here.  The background of the service is here.  A photo gallery of the day from 2019 can be found here.

This was our introduction to the service:

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Sermon, Good Friday, April 7, 2023

Can you imagine being Mary, the mother of Jesus, that day? 

Mary stood there with her sister, with Mary the wife of Clopas, with Mary Magdalene and with the beloved disciple on that dusty, horrid hill, Golgotha, the Place of the Skull.  The most sordid of deaths, Roman crucifixions, took place there.  Criminals hung on crosses and gasped out the last hours of their lives, and finally, agonizingly, suffocated and died.

Now, Mary is watching her own son hang on the cross.  This is the man that she had carried in her body for nine months, and given birth to,  loved and cared for as a child.  She loved him as he grew up into the man in whom she had complete confidence.  She is watching him die an ignominious death on a Roman cross. 

What must she have been feeling? 

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Tenebrae Returned! April 5, 2023,

1. Background of the service Tenebrae is the opening of the Holy Week services for the church.

Unlike the other Easter services, Tenebrae doesn’t relate to a specific Holy Week event as Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter.

“Tenebrae” is Latin for shadows. The purpose of the service is to recreate the emotional aspects of the passion story. This is an unusual service with its own Liturgy. There is no music – the readings carry the service. And it’s not from the traditional Gospel readings.

It sets a mood and brings you through the Holy Week story through a set of “shadows”. The shadows move through the agony of last week- Betrayal, Agony of the Spirit, Denial, Accusation, Crucifixion, Death and Burial – symbolized by the lighted candles.

Each shadow generally has a reading from Luke, a Psalm and a hymn. The readings range from Lamentations in the Old Testament to commentary from St Augustine, and at last a reading from Hebrews, in which the theology of God’s saving grace through Jesus Christ is presented for our consideration. The Psalms dominate the service. 

This service makes use of the power of light and sound to emphasize the darkness of death.  15 candles are lit and extinguished gradually throughout the service until one is left.   The candles are snuffed out as Jesus life was.  The candle in the end, the Christ candle, is taken away seemingly saying that evil won. However, dramatically a noise is heard at the end denoting the events of Good Friday and the Christ candle is brought back,  a solitary light in the darkness for resurrection into which we depart, indicating that Christ has triumphed.

2. Bulletin

3. Photo gallery

4. Service (begins at 10:11)

2. Bulletin

Maundy Thursday marks the beginning of the Triduum, the last three days of Holy Week, in which our worship flows in one continuous liturgy, beginning with the Maundy Thursday service. “Time is suspended as we ponder and celebrate the great mysteries of our redemption.” The word “Maundy” is derived from Middle English, Old French and from the Latin word mandatum, meaning “commandment,” the first word of the phrase “Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos” (“A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another, as I have loved you”), the statement we hear from Jesus to his disciples in tonight’s gospel reading.

3. Description of Holy Thursday with the Bible readings and commentaries here. 

4. A photo gallery of the service from 2019 can be found here.

5. 2023 Sermon – Susan Mitchell

6. The Foot Washing

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