09.04.2020
Christian Discipleship Does Not Stop When Churches Close – Good Friday and Easter in Dublin & Glendalough
Covid–19 may have forced the closure of church buildings but there is much happening beyond the church walls during Holy Week and Easter 2020. The Dioceses of Dublin & Glendalough has seen a huge shift to online services since the beginning of the pandemic.
Both the National Cathedral, St Patrick’s, and Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, have livestreamed services via webcam for a number of years. However, only a handful of parish services have been available online. But this year, almost 30 parishes (more than two thirds of the parishes in the United Dioceses) are offering services on line for Good Friday and Easter Sunday using YouTube, Facebook Live and Zoom. The full list of services is available on the Dublin & Glendalough website here: https://dublin.anglican.org/news/2020/04/06/holy-week-and-easter
Meanwhile, the Archbishop of Dublin, the Most Revd Dr Michael Jackson, has taken to YouTube to offer a series of reflections for Holy Week and Easter 2020. Entitled ‘The Last Lap’, they are available on the Dublin and Glendalough YouTube channel.
Not all church activity in the dioceses is taking place online. Locally parishes are supporting vulnerable people in the community. Throughout Holy Week, starting on Palm Sunday, Archbishop Jackson has been encouraging households to take part in the ‘Branch and Light’ initiative. In an initiative begun by the The Missionaries of The Holy Spirt households were asked to place a small branch on their door on Palm Sunday for Holy Week. The Archbishop also asked that people place a light in their window each evening from Palm Sunday to Easter Day.
Archbishop Jackson has also given his backing to the Anglican Communion Office’s #GlobalSonRise social media campaign to proclaim the good news of the resurrection. Anglicans around the world are being asked to post a video or picture with a message on social media at 5am on Easter Day to announce that Christ is Risen. Many Christian churches throughout Ireland hold SonRise services outdoors on Easter morning. As with other forms of worship during Holy Week and Easter 2020, these traditional services cannot take place.
“We are being asked, as part of our civic duty, not to gather physically this Easter in order to comply with the measures to curb the spread of Covid–19. But this does not mean our Christian discipleship stops. Posting a video or an image at dawn on Easter morning to proclaim the Risen Lord is something we can do publicly to show that we are Easter people,” he comments.