Standing on the Threshold

The drama of Jesus’s earthly life and ministry culminates in the Great Three Days – a period of remembrance beginning at sunset on Maundy (Holy) Thursday followed by commemoration of his Crucifixion on Good Friday and the mournful, frightened vigil of Holy Saturday leading to the stunning glorious Easter Sunday Resurrection. This year the Holy Week calendar converges for Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant Christians, while Jews simultaneously celebrate Passover, the feast of liberation that Jesus and his disciples observed in the gospels.

The symbolic significance of these sacred confluences could hardly be more apocalyptic than they are in 2025. The world confronts us unsparingly with ongoing catastrophes of war, famine, pestilence, injustice and death. These disparate occurences are exacerbated by what many feel is a runaway U.S. federal administration hellbent on sowing lies and destruction for the sake of consolidating power, just as in the time of Jesus and his disciples.

Standing on the threshold of this year’s observance, we’ve chosen to advance publication of United Methodist Insight so that readers have an opportunity to encounter news and views set against the context of Christianity’s greatest story. In many cases, our contributors are feeling the weight of both current events and history’s parallels. While fear and chaos tempt us to withdraw from the world’s pain, the story of Jesus’s passion confronts us with a harsh reality that we cannot escape. We, too, cry out, “O God, why have you forsaken us?” Much as we wish it otherwise, there is no Resurrection joy without Crucifixion agony.

Yet the community of believers rallies our flagging spirits. Rather than our typical explication of story highlights, we invite our readers instead to review the links at the end of this newsletter and choose where to enter this year’s mingling of contemporary events with historical anchors. There is much here to ponder, to lament, and to denounce. Yet there are also shafts of hope and courage, shining like sunrise on the first Easter morning after Good Friday terror and the grief of Saturday’s vigil.

Broken and bloodied though we be, we are unbowed. Death does not have the final word, for Jesus Christ has overcome death. God, not Caesar, rules. May that Reality supersede all else we face in these soul-shattering times, and may we be strengthened to hold fast to one another and to our faith.

Christ is Risen. Christ is Risen, indeed!     – Cynthia B. Astle, Editor