The Autumn Triduum
- The Rev. Amanda K. Gott
- Oct 30, 2015
- 3 min read
A Triduum in the Church is a three-day liturgical or ritualistic practice. The Triduum with which Episcopalians are most familiar is, of course, the Spring Triduum which centers around Jesus’ Crucifixion and Resurrection – Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday, concluding with the Great Vigil of Easter. This Triduum is a marking of Jesus’ passage – and our passage – from death to life.
There is also a Triduum in the fall, in those three days encompassing Halloween (October 31), All Saints’ Day (November 1), and All Souls Day (November 2). This fall Triduum is about six months from its spring counterpart, splitting the year in half with two three day observances, both of which are fundamentally about the same thing – death and life. Cynthia Bourgeault (upon whose work I draw heavily in this essay) writes that these three days “do in fact comprise their own sacred passage, which is not only authentic in and of itself, but also a powerful mirror-image the spring Triduum. …Both spring and fall Triduums deal with that passage from death to life which is at the heart of Christianity. But they do so in very different modes, with a very different emotional and spiritual coloration.”
Bourgeault points out that in Spring, the earth in the Northern Hemisphere is budding with signs of new life. Resurrection is reflected in nature, in the course of the seasons, in the lengthening light of days. Then she continues, “In the Fall Triduum the movement is more inward. The days are shortening, the leaves are fallen, and the earth draws once again into itself. Everything in the natural world confronts us with reminders of our own mortality. …In this dark and inward season, there is little that encourages us to somersault over death right into resurrection; we must linger in the dark, allow the dawning recognition of how fragile we are. And yet in the midst of this broody season of dark and inwardness, the days do offer themselves as a journey, a progression we can take.”
Halloween is often lost in excess and revelry. But if you pay attention, it is actually asking us to acknowledge confront what we are most afraid of – in this death-denying society, our unacknowledged fear of mortality is represented by the costumes of death and decay that enjoy revelry through the night. But in context, we can let these frightening things cavort as they will for that space of time, knowing that the story of this Triduum does not end there. With our darkness, shadows, and fears faced, “we are then free on November 1 to move into that most subtle and exquisite foretaste of the glory to come, the mystical Communion of Saints …where the boundaries between ourselves and all we have loved but deemed lost, all we have grieved for, are met in the gentle solace of ‘yes.’” The Divine “yes” to our creation and our existence, our immeasurable worth in the eyes of the one who created us for an eternity of love. The darkness that we confronted on Halloween is shattered by the brilliant light of the glory to come – all fears are countered with a glimpse of eternal loving communion with God and those we thought lost.
From there, having glimpsed eternity, we are then invited on November 2 to return to the present. “We return to our human condition and particularity, to acknowledge and grieve the ones we have lost (from the viewpoint of the world) and to prepare ourselves to live more deeply and courageously” in the realities of our daily lives today, upheld by an awareness of our place in a larger, wonderful mystery that spans eternity.
As we are plummeted into darkness by the turning of the seasons and we hunker down for winter, the invitation is to gather around the hearth or table and tell stories, to remember those who have gone before, our ancestors and beloveds, and to celebrate and give thanks for how they have shaped us. We are invited to acknowledge what has been lost, and, where there is pain and sorrow, to attend intentionally to our grief so that we can be more fully alive, with freedom and audacious joy in the present realities - even the hard present realities – of our lives. “In the quiet, brown time of the year, these fall Triduum days are an invitation to do the profound inner work: to face our shadows, deep fears, and that which we mourn, to taste that in ourselves which already lies beyond death, drink at its fountain, then to move back into our lives again, both humbled and steadied in that which lies beyond both light and dark, beyond both life and death.”
The Rev. Amanda K. Gott
Grace & St. Peter's Episcopal Church
