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PHOTOS: 2015 Maundy Thursday

JERUSALEM – The Arabic, English, and German Speaking Congregations of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Jerusalem joined together for the Maundy Thursday Service on Thursday, April 2nd, 2015.  Reflections were given in both English and German and the Gospel was read in Arabic by Bishop Munib Younan.  Prayers were read in Arabic, English, German, as well as Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian, and Danish.  Ecumenical clergy attended the service, including Methodist, United Church of Christ, and Presbyterian.  At the end of the service, clergy gathered to strip the altar and met the congregation outside.

After the service, the congregation gathered outside the church to process through the Old City.  Children, women, and men from the Arabic Speaking Congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Redeemer carried the cross during the procession through the Old City to the Garden of Gethsemane.  At the garden, a candlelight prayer service was held.

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Maundy Thursday Pan-Lutheran Worship and Procession to Gethsemane

On Maundy Thursday, April 8, 2004, hundreds of Lutherans gathered together in the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer for the remembrance of the Last Supper Jesus ate with his disciples, and to participate in the Eucharist. Bishop Younan, eight Lutheran pastors from six countries (Palestine, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, Finland and the U.S.) and a vicar from Germany led the worship service. The Rev. Russell O. Siler, pastor of the English-speaking Redeemer congregation preached and Bishop Younan and German Probst Martin Reyer officiated at the Eucharist. With the words of the Gospel of Mark in their ears – “When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives” – the congregation, led by Bishop Younan, processed through the Old City streets, out St. Stephen Gate, and down into the Kidron Valley. The procession passed the Garden of Gethsemane and proceeded up a narrow road and many steps to the courtyard of the Russian Orthodox Church of St. Mary Magdalene. A short service of Scripture readings about Jesus praying in Gethsemane and being arrested were read, and several hymns were sung.