When God Vanishes

 

I read this today from Maggi Dwan 

"Why is it called Good Friday?" asked my son. "It's not good at all, it's really bad."

The shops are full of eggs and chickens and sunshine and cheer. But Good Friday and Holy Saturday are the most sombre days in the whole Church calendar, recalling the death and disappearance of God.  Not much there to celebrate or feel happy about.

For those who enjoy a degree of certainty in their faith, maybe Good Friday and Holy Saturday don't really "bite" - they are more about anticipation than devastation. But those of us who live with a fragemented faith, a faith that has had too many holes punctured in it, too much damage ever to recover a naive certainty, there is something reassuring about the rise and fall of the Church seasons. It's a relief to be honest, to acknowledge the disappearance of God and the uncertainty of the outcome. 

That's not to say that there is no hope of the resurrection. But that hope doesn't forestall the depth of blackness that can descend even upon people of faith. And the recollection that the Easter faith was born in the darkness is, perhaps, a reason to hold on and not to give up.

This comment was left: I remember saying almost exactly the same thing as a child. Part of me still thinks that Really Awful World-come-crashing-down Friday sounds more like it ...

It is an interesting thought.  Good Friday is an interesting choice for a day that saw God placed on a cross.  It is a day that I am sure we do not totaly understand, God incarnate laying down his life for all of mankind.

Easter Sunday is the pinical! When Christ defeats death.  Good friday is a day of anticipation and I guess that is why it it is called Good.  But I agree with the comment it is an awful day!  A day of pain and darkness, a day of fear and sin, a day of pain and suffering, a day of ignorance and arogance.  Yes "Really Awful World-come-crashing-down Friday" is really fitting.  It is out of the great pains of life that much growth and joy can come.  We can not have the joy and miraculousness of Easter Sunday with out the terror of Friday.