Whither Foot Washing
The_Riv
Shipmate
Again this year we will not have a foot washing during this evening's Holy Thursday liturgy.
Feet have not been washed at our place since 2019. There seems to be a mixed bag of feelings about it. What are yours?
Feet have not been washed at our place since 2019. There seems to be a mixed bag of feelings about it. What are yours?
Tagged:
Comments
We do it at Our Place, or at least attempt it - FatherinCharge was a bit worried earlier this week in case no-one volunteered - but I know of other local churches which have substituted hand washing. This seems a bit daft, as it's not really part of our (English) culture, whereas the washing of feet is at least recorded in the Gospel, and is a part of Jewish culture.
I haven't checked, but IIRC the foot washing is optional in the C of E. I've just watched the Mass from the Old-Catholic Cathedral in Utrecht, and there was no foot washing. They did, however, convey the Blessed Sacrament in procession to Another Place just off-screen, ending with the stripping of the altars and several of the readings for the Watch.
Being also Old and English, I was brought up (as it were) with the 1662 BCP service, in which it has no place.
I don't know if we're doing it, but I'm ushering at tonight's service, so I suppose I'll find out. We always used to, and then we had Covid, and now have a new priest, so there's plenty of scope for old habits to get changed.
We'll certainly be processing the MBS to the chapel, and keeping watch until the service at noon tomorrow.
I don't find foot washing particularly meaningful, so I don't think I really mind whether it happens or not.
Our lot would be disappointed if it didn't happen.
We've done it at home in the past - acting out the Holy week stories with the twanglets.
Done well in the right context it can certainly be a powerful thing I feel. Bit like @Gamma Gamaliel described forgiveness Sunday.
As for replacing it with hand washing, no. That is appalling. Just recollect who it was in the passion narrative publicly washed his hands, and why.
I’ve at least sometimes heard it explained as in Jesus’s day, it was the feet that got dirty, but in our day it’s the hands that get dirty. That never quite made sense to me—hands got dirty in Jesus’s day, too, and they were ritually washed, not by a servant but by the person whose hands they were. It was feet that might be washed by a servant.
I can get the Pilate-related objection, but my experience is that it doesn’t “read” that way at all. Pilate washed his own hands, not someone else’s.
This year our service took a different form, with the pastor’s family cooking and serving dinner for everyone—and cleaning up of course. I think that probably got the service emphasis across as well as anything, though it doesn’t pick up the “forgive as I have forgiven you” but at all, which is a pity.
That’s exactly what I thought when I read that
Interesting. What was the significance of that?
My present church has handwashing. I have never been but a friend went last night so I will ask her what she made of it.
Agreed that embarrasment is kind of written into it. Look at Peter's reaction in the Gospel of John.
(You will hopefully note what I did there
Haha, clever.
No it isn't, but it has been done everywhere I have been. But we had a priest who had never done it before coming to us.
(For many centuries now the monarchs in England have handed out money instead of washing feet, but they still carry little nosegays of sweet smelling flowers to counteract the smell of dirty feet).
Since Vatican 2 it has become standard practice in most parishes.
Although it was originally 12 men the group can be made up of both males and females now. There were about 300 people at our Maundy Thursday service yesterday evening but only eight people had their feet washed - by one priest and then dried by another.
I distinctly remember it happening in my pre Vat 2 youth. The music for the rite is traditional plainsong ... so it must go back a bit. I've just found d a bit of history that liturgy geeks might find interesting.
https://unamsanctamcatholicam.com/2023/04/06/liturgical-history-of-the-mandatum/
These would take some time to be implemented in some parishes.
Oooh. That was probably 40 years ago.
It was probably a Baptist or other equally low brow (speaking as one) Protestant church. I think the bride and groom (the ones washing each other's feet) were supposed to be demonstrating mutual service and sacrifice. (It was a loooooong time ago.)
I seem to recall there was a row a few years ago because in stead of washing the feet of some preselected church dignitaries, Pope Francis washed feet some of which were female and one pair at least of which might have been Moslem. It wasn't clear which of those two the liturgically pompous regarded as the bigger outrage.
that was certainly the case at our place, where I am quite new (second time round), but it has never been a well-attended service here.
however I'll perservere with the British Lent, Holy Week and Easter (with a few Iona insertions) rites here, as they are very well received once punters get to them and they receive universal appreciative gasp-approval
From Other Places, I was interested to note that the Old Catholics omitted foot-washing at their Maundy Thursday service, as did the Swedish Lutherans at Uppsala Cathedral. The same denomination, however, did include it in the Mass at the University Church of St Ansgar, Uppsala.
(FWIW, it's good to see Lutherans using incense, even if only on High Days and Holy Days).
So here's my two-happ'orth.
I've seen it done in ecumenical services and also once in a Baptist church. It can be very powerful and yes, it does have a raw and visceral element that does us Brits good sometimes.
In the mid 1950s pope Pius XII revised the various rites of Holy Week.
Although these changes were extensive they were overtaken a decade later by the further changes of Vatican 2. and they would not have made too many waves outside of the Roman Communion.
Before these changes in the 1950s Mass on Maundy Thursday was celebrated in the morning and the rest of the day (for pious Catholics) was spent trying to visit at least seven 'altars of repose' in different churches.
If the mandatum took place it would take place after Mass and after the Stripping of the altars and very often not directly in the church
Pius XII changed this and introduced at the same time the possibility generally of evening Mass and revision of the fasting rules before receiving Communion.
These changes proceeded over the next few years and included the washing of the feet after the Gospel of the Mass 'in coena Domini' (Lord's supper)
The custom of the British monarchs distributing Maundy money separate from the Eucharist goes back to the time when the Mandatum was celebrated outside of Mass
At my parish, which is still relatively new, we do a little more of Holy Week each year but we haven't quite managed to work up the dramatised Holy Thursday Gospel or foot-washing yet (we just managed a partially dramatised Passion for Holy Friday this year), but you can see what the rite should look like in this video from one of our parishes in France.
Perhaps one year...
I'm guessing that Jesus had more than a narrowly literal application in mind when he asked his disciples to follow his example. He was a 'lord' not lording himself over others but serving. I would say that that was the point of the action. Not a temporary and physical removal of dirt from a few people's feet. He did what, for the time, would've been a relevant and an immediately relatable visual to explain his point. And I can't see a hand-washing replacement being 'appalling'. Priests - liturgically - wash their hands before and after every celebration of the Eucharist. A reflection of ritual cleanliness quite easy to relate to. Some even get servers to do it to them. Contextually, as these ablutions sandwich the sacrifice of Christ one could argue that this is much more akin to Pilate washing his hands as he sends Jesus off to the cross! But, as I say, we don't want to kill the Spirit of the point being made with the dead letter of literalism.
I do recall the foot-washing thing being very powerful, when I first saw it done, a long time ago (CofE). Coming from a low church, such rituals were completely new to me, and it was powerful seeing scripture re-enacted in this way. I've included it from time to time in my own services. And I know how moving it can be. However, over the years it's become extremely difficult to a) find people willing to submit to it and b) certainly enough people to attend the service to number 12, if that were at all possible. Most people simply don't wish to take socks, tights, shoes etc off and expose their feet. Even if the water has been nicely warmed beforehand, and they have a comfortable seat! Some would be thrilled to participate, but are embarrassed by their corns, bunions, fungal nails etc and understandably don't wish to air their vulnerabilities in public.
In practical terms, too, one has to prepare the foot-washee in advance, so that they can wear the right socks and footwear for easy removal, which immediately means that some have been chosen and others not. And those who turn up ad hoc and are not included have been known to get quite offended at not having a part to play in the demonstration! It's quite a minefield, in a culture far removed from the Biblical times of exercising the universal courtesy of washing off bare, sandalled feet of the dust of the road.
Having said all that, I still dream of somehow incorporating it again on Maundy Thursday in a way which is both practical and not obviously exclusive or ridiculous.
I think that's more-or-less what FatherInCharge does at Our Place, where the Maundy Thursday congregation just about gets to double figures. He does try to get people to volunteer beforehand but, not, I'm told, with much success. Accepting all this, he's happy with six willing people...
The rather more ad hoc approach seems to me to be more in keeping with the actual Last Supper. One advantage of having a small congregation and a wide chancel (no choir stalls) is that it's easy for everyone to gather round the free-standing altar for the Eucharistic prayer, and for Communion.
So, the parish did not do it again. The church will go on. God is with us. We will not be defeated.