This week: Daily meditations on Jesus’ Seven Words from the Cross
Daily from Sunday 29 April we will be publishing a series of meditations for Palm Sunday and Holy Week written by Bishop Harold Miller.
The bishop will meditate upon Jesus’ Seven Words From the Cross and you will find them on this website from Sunday through to Saturday.
The Seven Words
‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’
‘Today you will be with me in Paradise’
‘Here is your son…here is your mother’
‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’
‘I am thirsty’
‘It is finished’
‘Into your hands I commend my spirit’
The Seven Words have for centuries been the subject of meditation during a Good Friday ‘Three Hours Devotion’, outlined in In Bishop Harold’s recent book, ‘Week of All Weeks: A Worship Guide for Holy Week and Easter Day,’ and provided for in the accompanying Prayer Book.
He explains…
“Although the three hours from the sixth to the ninth hour, the hours of the suffering
and death of Jesus on the cross of Calvary, have been held with special reverence
since at least the fourth century, the specific tradition of the Three Hours devotion
as we know it today came originally from Lima, Peru, in South America in the
seventeenth century. It was popularised in the late nineteenth century, and has
remained popular in many churches, not least in Ireland, until the present day. In
Peru, it consisted essentially of addresses on the seven words from the cross, and
that remains its normative theme today, though other themes and structures are
often used.” (P.49)
Bishop Harold will conduct the Three Hours Devotion in Greyabbey on Good Friday, 3 April from 12 noon–3.00 pm.