On Good Friday

Good Friday 2014. It’s about 11.45 AM and a group of maybe a hundred people has gathered at a church behind Lund’s train station. There are people with toddlers in strollers, older people with walking aids and anything in between. The amount of Swedish students is surprisingly low – most of them must have left for home – but a small group of internationals compensates a little. In a relaxed pace, we will walk through Lund, following a person carrying a small wooden cross, passing by the different churches that we belong to.

We walk a few distances in silence, but most of the time there is talking and even some laughter. About the weather, about the different churches that we pass by and about life in general. My Iranian friend observes Good Friday for the very first time and asks many questions. What kind of church is the next one? What is this song about? What is the difference between Calvinists and Lutherans? “Not too much of a difference”, I say. “I’m actually both.”

She delights when we arrive at the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, where women wear headscarves, everyone puts off their shoes when going in and people at times prostrate during the prayers. “They look like Muslims!”

At all churches, we do the same thing: reading a part of the Passion history, repeating it in an English translation, singing a song and saying a short prayer. But even here small significant differences can be observed and for once they don’t matter. At the Pentecostal church, the responsible person welcomes all of us with a hand when we come in. At the Ethiopian church, one of the hosts says in accented Swedish that he is so happy that we do this every year, visiting them as well. In the Catholic Church, all statues have been covered with purple cloth.

The last part towards the Cathedral we walk singing, through the center of Lund. It isn’t awkward. Some people stare: only very few seem amused, but most seem suddenly to remember the reason that they actually have off today. In the Cathedral, it is unusually dark and the last service includes psalm 22 and a lot of silence. Tomorrow at midnight it will be the complete opposite, with flowers, candles and lots of music, I have been told. But not yet. My friend from Iran nods understandingly when I explain that even the organ is silent today.

Quite oddly this was a pilgrimage, a city tour through my favorite town, a walk for Christian unity, a remembrance of suffering and a meeting with friends from all over the world in one. It was both sad and joyful. It was sunshine mixed with Swedish chilly wind.

Easter weekend is a good weekend to get confirmed.