My favorite week of the year is here and as usual, it couldn't come soon enough.
Two years ago, I cried in the pew through the Good Friday meditation at our parish, overwhelmed with the hurt and shame and anxiety of my infertility. Last year, I was 39 weeks pregnant on Easter Sunday. And this year, we're planning to baptize Sam at the Easter Vigil. I've been waiting impatiently these past 18 months -- ever since we saw Sam dancing on the ultrasound screen -- for the moment when Brian and I will offer Sam back to God, our hearts unimaginably stuffed with joy and gratitude and happiness. Just thinking about it, I'm crying.
We've had other opportunities to baptize Sam, of course. There was Pentacost, when Brian was baptized seven years ago. There was All Saints'. And the Baptism of the Lord in January. But we've waited all year for the Easter Vigil, because, well, it's the best. What could possibly be better than a squirmy naked baby, full immersion in the horse feed tub in Jarrow Garden, Easter alleluias and Easter promises and Easter miracles, surrounded and uplifted and joined by our parish, our family, our friends? Really, what could be better than this?
It's fitting, I guess, that this is the year I'll finally make it to every Holy Week service our parish has to offer. I've always attended church on Easter Sunday and I've been adding one additional service, more or less, for the past several years. It always happens the same way. Someone in the parish will say to me: "You don't come to the Maundy Thursday/Good Friday/Easter Vigil service?" [incredulous] "But that's the best service of the YEAR!" And, so, the following year, I go. And it is, indeed, the best service of the year. This year, though, I'm not limiting myself to just one best service of the year. There's more than enough best to go around.
