This past week, Jews celebrated a Passover and Christians celebrated a Holy Week different from all others. Now, Saudi officials are encouraging the more than 1 million Muslims planning to undertake the five-day Hajj to Mecca in July to consider postponing their sacred pilgrimage.
Throughout the earth, the multi-day sacred celebrations and gatherings that bring joy and peace to millions of Jews, Christians, and Muslims have been interrupted by the shadow of shutdowns caused by the specter of COVID-19.
Of course, billions around the world from all faiths have been able to worship in their homes, often with family members, and thus obtain the kind of spiritual, social, and relational benefits that can come from home-centered worship during the shutdown.
This past week, as I have thought about my Jewish, Christian, and Muslim friends who have not been able to gather with fellow believers, I have been reminded of my friends of various faiths who warmly welcomed me and my family to their sacred gatherings back in the spring of 2002, just six months after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.
I am a professor of family life at Brigham Young University. In December 2001, I left Utah with my family for a six-month sabbatical as a visiting scholar at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. As part of my work for the American Families of Faith project, I attended dozens of religious services in Christian, Jewish, and Muslim communities, and I interviewed Catholic priests, Protestant pastors, Jewish Rabbis, and Muslim Imams.
I was invited into the homes of 32 Jewish, Christian, and Muslim families where they shared with me how their religious beliefs, spiritual practices, and faith communities influenced their marriages and families. While most of our work addresses religious practice in home and family settings such as family prayer, here I mainly address more public worship practices.
To encourage hope during these difficult times, I would like to share some personal memories from the first Holy Week following 9/11.
A Hasidic Holy Thursday
On Holy Thursday, many Christians commemorate The Last Supper and, in many congregations, some kind of ceremony involving washing of feet is performed. That Holy Thursday in 2002 was also the second night of Passover (Pesach). My family and I were kindly invited to celebrate Passover at the Chabad House of Amherst. We were hosted by Rabbi Chaim Adelman, with whom I had the great pleasure of studying Torah and Talmud a couple times a week for several months.
This Passover was particularly poignant. Not only was it the first Passover after 9/11, but on the previous evening, March 27, 2002, a Hamas suicide bomber killed 30 and injured 140 in what is known as the Passover Massacre in Israel.
This most Jewish- and home- and family-centered of all holy nights was wonderful, and brought five of the most enjoyable and memorable hours of my life. We ate matzah flown in from Israel and drank non-alcoholic wine (as our Jewish friends became increasingly “joyful” drinking their four overflowing cups of wine). While there was no washing of feet, we all did wash our hands in the Jewish way that involves pouring water three times over each hand while reciting a blessing.
Near the end of the evening, Rabbi Adelman, in fulfillment of a Chabad tradition, opened up the front door to the Chabad House to “preach repentance to the Gentiles” (in a friendly Jewish way) to a large group of U-Mass Amherst students (who had obviously been drinking a lot as well) in the parking lot across the street partying after a football game. Fortunately, the students took the preaching in good humor.
I also enjoyed several other wonderful Jewish holidays with the Chabad community in Amherst including Purim and Shavuot. An unforgettable memory is of Rabbi Adelman standing before his congregation on Purim reading the Esther Scroll dressed in drag (with an ample bosom, a neon clown wig, and a red plastic clown nose).
I was also invited by the rabbi to attend a Hasidic wedding in Crown Heights, New York. My daughter and I loved every minute of the wedding ceremony and wedding party with my daughter dancing with the women and me with the men.
A Great Good Friday
On Good Friday, Christians commemorate the crucifixion of Christ. That same year, I attended three services: morning mass at St. Michael’s cathedral, Friday afternoon prayers at a masjid, and an evening Modern Orthodox Shabbat service.
Cathedrals are the seats of the Bishop and the services there, particularly on holy days, are often of somewhat greater solemnity than usual. This was especially true on Good Friday as the mass focused on the last week of Jesus’s life, centering on his suffering and his Passion at Golgotha.
At the mosque (masjid), I was hosted by the prayer leader, Imam Wissam Abdul-Baki. Despite the fact that he and many of his fellow Muslims had been treated with increased suspicion and even received threats in light of the recent attacks, he graciously extended the warm hand of hospitality to me.
When I attend services of other faiths, I try to participate as much as my knowledge and my own faith commitments allow. I do not speak the language of Islamic prayer (Arabic) but I was generally familiar with what is said. The famous phrase of Muslim prayer is “God is the greatest!” (“Allahu Akbar”).
Muslim writer Hesham A. Hassaballa explained the Muslim use of the prayer, stating, “‘Allahu Akbar’ was never intended to be the ‘battle cry’ of Muslims, the contentions of many notwithstanding. I hate it when Muslim terrorists use (and subsequently defile) this phrase. ‘Allahu Akbar’ teaches us humility. It reminds the Muslim believer that God is Supreme, that God is greater than anyone or anything in this universe. Muslims use this phrase to begin each of their daily ritual prayers, and it is a major portion of the Muslim call to prayer.”
On this Good Friday, I heard humble Muslims pray fervently to God while standing, bowing, kneeling, and prostrating their foreheads to the floor. I later listened to some of those worshippers tell me that those who say “Allahu Akbar” while carrying out murderous acts against innocent civilians are directly opposing the peacefully submissive meaning of that prayer.
On this Good Friday, the Imam’s sermon was entirely devoted to Jesus (Isa in Arabic). The Imam quoted various passages from the Qur’an that discuss Isa—his life and ministry. These passages relate a fascinating set of beliefs based on the more than 100 mentions of Jesus (Isa) in 93 verses in the Qur’an.
Much of what was mentioned would be familiar and comfortable to most Christians: Isa was born of a pure virgin—Maryam (Mary). He performed many miracles and healed many of their infirmities—by the permission and power of Allah. He was a great messenger of God, was the messiah, and will return again to earth.
The Imam said emphatically and repeatedly that a Muslim who does not accept the “Messengership of Isa” couldn’t be considered a Muslim. I was intrigued to hear how much reverence Muslims have for Jesus—not as Lord and Savior, but as a great messenger of God.
After the service, I was invited to enjoy a wonderful meal where I was treated as an honored guest. After the meal, I interviewed a faithful Muslim family for about 3 hours. They told me about their lives as Muslims, their experience as a family going on the Hajj, and how things had changed for them since 9/11. I felt a deep respect and appreciation for this faithful family who, like many other peaceful and faithful Muslims, found themselves the target of hatred and mocking.
I also interviewed Imam Abdul-Baki. In response to each question I asked, he would first quote, in Arabic, a passage or two from the Qur’an and the Hadith (sayings of Mohammed), which he would translate into English. Only then would he provide his own thoughts.
During the interview, the call to evening prayer came and Imam Abdul-Baki asked if I would like to join as he led the prayers. He showed me the washing area of the masjid, where he washed his head, eyes, nose, mouth, ears, arms, hands, legs, and feet–always the right one first–in preparation for prayer.
Later that evening, I attended Shabbat services at a Modern Orthodox synagogue and interviewed the Rabbi following the service. All in all, a really good Friday as I was able to worship with my friends from all three Abrahamic faiths in one day-long spiritual feast.
An Ecumenical Easter Sunday
On Easter Sunday, I attended three services with different members of my family. A few of us went to a Sunrise Service in the Amherst Common (a large grassy area in the middle of town) conducted by a group of Evangelical Christian churches.
Then I and two daughters attended an Easter Eucharist at Grace Episcopal Church. Later, the whole family and I attended Easter Sacrament services at the Amherst Ward of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, our own congregation.
Thus, that memorable Easter Sunday, I joyfully sang the great Easter anthem “Christ the Lord is Risen Today” three times with three different congregations of Christians. Another day-long joyful spiritual feast.
Shared Sacred Color
Jews, Christians, and Muslims have a number of meaningful beliefs and practices in common. Among them is the symbolic color: white. The liturgical color of Easter is white symbolizing purity and glory.
Priest’s vestments and altar hangings will be white and new converts baptized on Holy Saturday will wear white at Easter services.
Traditionally, the person who leads the Passover Seder will wear a white garment, the kittel, as a symbol of the high priest in the ancient temple.
Muslim pilgrims on the Hajj, wear the white garment, the ihram, during the five-day pilgrimage to symbolize unity with other Muslims and ritual purity.
Conclusion
In my experience, both 9-11 and COVID-19 involve grief over profound losses, anxieties and fears about the future, suspicions of others, and divisions across political lines, as well as increased prayers for self and others, increased desire to understand those who are suffering or are different, and greater efforts to build bridges across various divides.
In 2020, Passover and Easter have been unique and hopefully special. May next year’s holy weeks be especially joyous and meaningful.
I hope that next year my Jewish friends will be able to gather with as many as they desire as they end their Passover in a joyful, “Next Year in Jerusalem!”
I hope that next year my Christian friends will be able to gather with as many as they desire in churches and cathedrals and sing, “He is risen, He is risen!”
I hope that this summer my Muslim friends will be able to gather with as many as they desire, surround the holy Ka’ba in Mecca and pray, “God is greatest!”
I hope that next year, despite whatever personal, family, or global difficulties we may be experiencing, my family and I will be able to gather with our Latter-day Saint friends and joyfully sing, “Christ the Lord is Risen Today.”
Above all, as we mourn the loss of loved ones to 9-11, to COVID-19, and to any number of causes, I hope the sacred yearning expressed in the Mourners Kaddish is fulfilled:
May He establish His kingdom in your lifetime and during your days, and within the life of the entire House of Israel, speedily and soon; and ...
May there be abundant peace from heaven, and life, for us ...
David C. Dollahite is Camilla Eyring Kimball Professor of Family Life at BYU where he teaches classes on the nexus of religion and relationships in the Abrahamic faiths and is co-director of the American Families of Faith research project.