During fifty-one weeks of the year, when the church is decorated, it is the altars and the walls we adorn to enhance our worship experience. But during Holy Week, sometimes the ground receives most of our attention. At Ascension, like churches of all denominations around the world, on Palm Sunday we recreate the actions of the early disciples of Jesus by covering the ground with palm branches. On the original Palm Sunday, Jesus entered Jerusalem on a humble donkey, but the Passover celebrants recognized him as the potential Messiah. They threw their robes and branches on the ground to prepare a path worthy of a king.

Jesus walked a far different path later that week when he was paraded through the streets on the way to his crucifixion. I imagine it was the ugliest of walks, filled with fear, humiliation, and pain. In Central America, we spend Holy Week covering the streets with colorful alfombras that are part of the Good Friday processions that take place in every town. In recent years at Ascension, on Palm Sunday afternoon we begin to create our alfombras. The walk of our worshipers over the alfombras on Good Friday is a reminder of the beauty of God’s love being darkened for those three days.

This year, without a sanctuary for Holy Week worship, the pathway for our alfombras is less obvious. In spite of the fact that we won’t have our usual Spanish Sanctuary for our alfombras, we will look for creative ways we can maintain the theology of the alfombras, and our culture.

Advent may be the season of preparing our hearts for Jesus, but Holy Week is the season of preparing our feet to walk the walk of Jesus. Preparing the way of the Lord is such an important idea, that the verse is mentioned twice in the Bible. “A voice is crying out in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, Make straight His Path.” ~Isaiah 40:3 & Matthew 3:3. For those other fifty-one weeks of the year, the weeks when we are not decorating the floors of the narthex and sanctuary, how will you prepare the path for Jesus?

 Edwin Aparicio, Pastoral Intern