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About the Author

Kathleen Hughes Burgess '79 is married to her husband Michael and is the mother of Joe and Catherine. She is an attorney and the Executive Director of the Maternity and Early Childhood Foundation in Albany, New York, which provides funding for programs that assist pregnant and parenting women and their families who are most in need.

Thinking Out Loud

The Sacred Walk by Kathleen Burgess, '79

Unlike the hopeful anticipation that accompanies the days before Christmas, the days approaching Easter are filled with the rawest of human emotions: betrayal, fear, abandonment and the knowledge of impending death. Holy Week is an invitation to walk this most sacred journey with Jesus through the last days of His life to His death. The challenge of this invitation is remembering that these events truly happened and not allow the passage of two millennia and changes in culture to dilute the essential truth of it all: that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that each of us - you and me - may have eternal life. The awesomeness of this is overwhelming.

From Jesus' birth in a manger as a helpless baby to the abandonment and helplessness Jesus experienced on the cross, Jesus hid His divinity. As he grew from a child to a man, He intensely experienced the range of human emotions that we all feel. At any point during His brief 33 years on earth, Jesus could have called upon legions of angels to save Him from the humility of being human and from experiencing the pain, the betrayal, and ultimately, His death. The mystery of Holy Week, however, is that Jesus did not do this. Rather, Jesus embraced this suffering and death because of the inconceivable depth of His love for each and every one of us.

So, how are we to mark this sacred and holy week? What will set this week apart from the other 51 weeks of the year? Do we dare to accompany Jesus through His last days and share in His pain? "You are my friends," Jesus says to us (John 15:14). As we would share in the final days of the death of a close friend, we are invited this week to be part of this mystery and share in remembering the final days and death of Jesus.

"I have given you an example so that you may copy what I have done for you," said Jesus after He washed the feet of His disciples on Holy Thursday (John 13:15). The hallmark of Holy Thursday is the community of friends gathered for the last time. Jesus serves them again as an example of how we are to serve others. They share the Passover meal together for the final time with the instructions "to do this in remembrance of me." The strength of this community is what gave each of them, singly and together, the courage to walk the final days with Jesus.

Holy Thursday presents us with an opportunity to reflect upon the life of Jesus and how I have brought that example into my own world where I live. Am I of service to others? Do I use my talents and gifts to benefit others? Do I forgive others? Do I bring healing and peace to the world? Do I use Jesus' life as an example in my own? These are all important questions to ponder for ourselves.

To honor the hallmark of Holy Thursday, it is especially an opportunity to reflect upon our own faith community. How does my community give me courage and strength to undertake the challenges life presents to me? What gifts and strengths do I, in turn, bring to my community? The gift of Holy Thursday is that Jesus left us, not only with His act of service, but with the Eucharist to share with each other because He knew the importance of sharing this faith journey with others who are friends.

"Then Jesus, uttering a loud cry, breathed His last." (Mark 16:37). Death seems so final. The heart of that person will no longer beat, the face will no longer smile, and the hand will no longer touch. A terrible physical void is created at the moment of that last breath. So too it was with Jesus. How did those who loved Jesus and who spent those last days with Him feel at that moment at the foot of the cross? They walked with Him, witnessed the false accusations, listened to Him being mocked, saw Him being scourged and crowned with a wreath of thorns. How helpless did they feel as they watched Him carry the cross and then later saw Him crucified? They heard Him utter a loud cry and perhaps, too, heard His last breath. Can I imagine what Mary, His mother, and His other followers and friends were feeling at that moment? Can I feel the fear, the desolation, the hurt, the void, the hole in my heart while I sit at the foot of the cross? What was Jesus feeling at that moment before His last breath on earth? Can I feel His fear, abandonment, and suffering? It is too much to bear.

Lent leads us to this moment on Good Friday. All of our Lenten practices help us to more fully understand our dependence on God, on that infinite source of love. Jesus' acceptance of death on the cross is the ultimate dependence on that source of love. Jesus gave us this example as a gift so that we may copy what He has done when we face all the Good Fridays of our own lives: the crisis, the struggles, the deaths and, ultimately, our own death. At a moment of incredible darkness, when all seems to be lost, can I believe Divinity is in the darkness as well as in the light? Do I believe that the infinite source of love sustains me through all times, especially when I feel overwhelmed, abandoned, without hope and feel that I can not take another breath? Do I believe that Jesus walks with me each day, sustaining me, guiding me, leading me to the Father? The grace of Good Friday is that, while it may be too much for us to bear Jesus' pain, our pain has been felt by Jesus and is never too great for Him to bear.

What did Jesus' friends do on Holy Saturday? Probably they talked about Him and tried to understand what happened. Maybe they wondered what the future would hold. They may have read the Torah for guidance and comfort. Most likely, they prayed together. Holy Saturday allows us to ponder this and think about those days after our own Good Fridays. Do I wonder where God is after a crisis or a death? Does my faith community of friends provide comfort in those moments of need? Do I have faith that God will lead and guide? Do I pray, either alone or with others, when searching for guidance? The gift of Holy Saturday is finding strength and comfort in our faith and in those around us when all else seems lost.

If we allow ourselves to enter into this great mystery of Holy Week and walk through these sacred and holy days, then the wondrous grace for each of us is the deeper awareness that Jesus is with us every step of our own sacred walk. Jesus took on our humanity and bore pain and even tasted our death in order to bring each of us closer to the Father. Jesus' death was not in spite of our sins and failings but because of them, so that we may more fully know the love and compassion of God in our daily life and in eternal life. Jesus knows first-hand the difficulty of this journey, so He left us the Eucharist and the beginnings of a faith community so that we can draw strength from Him and from each other. As we walk this sacred journey with Jesus through Holy Week, the week that Love Incarnate died for each and every one of us, we will be blessed by knowing we never will walk our own sacred journey alone.