March 17, 2024
When I began my first teaching assignment back in 2001,
I was tasked with resurrecting (pardon the pun) the parish
grade school’s Passion Play. Now, I must point out,
Cecile B. DeMille I am not. And when I inquired if there
were other ‘Living Stations’ performances I could attend
in order to get ideas, the principal steered me toward
St. Anthony’s “Via Crucis.”
“There is a parish in the city of Wilmington that puts the
Living Stations on early using young people as the
performers,” I was told. “Why not check them out?”
I was sick to my stomach the rest of the weekend after
having attended St. Anthony’s Stations – the lights and
sound; the choreography and pageantry; the talent of
those kids. Here I was planning on using bath towels as
head coverings!
Nonetheless, I tackled the task that now awaited me:
making our school’s Passion Play as reverent as possible
with our lukewarm 14-year-old actors. Sure, the soldiers
whipped the actor Jesus a little too hard during practice
(“Guys, this is not the real Passion,” I yelled over and
over again during rehearsals), and the Weeping Women
of Station 8 giggled more than cried. Even actress Mary
wasn’t having any parts of actually embracing her actor
Son-of-God when he was taken from the cross.
But in the end, the eighth-grade students rose to the
occasion, and each of them shared afterward that it made
what Christ experienced more real to them. One mom –
the real mother of the actor Jesus – admitted that she
began going back to Mass after having witnessed the
Passion as reenacted by her son and his classmates.
After all, our loving God will use all things to bring us
closer to His Love – even when it is only a humble grade
school performance that utilizes bath towels and bed
sheets as costumes.