This morning, at 7 AM EDT, I hiked up a 60-foot “mountain” (actually, an uplift along the Piedmont Fall Line) to the
Easter Sunday sunrise service at 7 AM at Trinity Presbyterian in Arlington VA, to
one of the higher spots in Arlington (maybe
450 feet above sea level). As I approached, I could hear the congregation sing
the main theme from the finale of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony finale, but my
camera didn’t pick it up very well.
I’ve always thought that it didn’t make sense that
the observed day for Easter should vary with the position of the Moon. That sounds pagan. It seems to me Palm Sunday should always
occur the first Sunday in April, which would make the range for Easter
observance April 8 to 14.
The main service started with an organ and brass
rendition of Cesar Franck’s “Grand Choeur in C” (transcription by Craig
Garner). The main rollicking theme is really in C Minor, and the piece sounds
episodic, like a rondo. There followed an Antiphon by David Conte, “O filii et
filae” (brothers and sisters) by Wilbur Held, and a rather polytonal “Easter
Fantasy” by John Gardner.
The main anthem was “Three Days Had Passed” by John
Thornburg and Joel Martinson. It was really more like a day and a half. But the title of the anthem reminds me of
David Day’s famous 1981 sermon at Metropolitan Community Church in Dallas, “It’s
Friday but Sunday is coming.” The
offertory was “Jubliate Deo: Come Away to the Skies” as adapted by David Ashley
White.
The Postlude, the popular, loud and modernist “No
Thank We All Our God” by Sigfried
Karg-Elert. The congregation remained seated (as it should during "real" postludes) and applauded.
The sermons focused on the accounts of the
Resurrection in Mark and John. In Mark, the reader is left hanging. In John,
Mary Magdalene does not recognize Jesus.
The revelations are made to women first, however, and angels are
involved. Wikipedia has a comparative
synopsis here. Screenwriters have long
tried to piece together the surface contradictions in the several accounts. I think it's interesting to try to identify the "angels", too.
Here’s a brass-organ performance of the Franck Choeur from Italy
in 2009, link.
When I lived in Dallas in the 1980s, the Dallas
Symphony always held a free pops concert in Lee Park near Turtle Creek on Easter
afternoon. I don’t know if it still
does.
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