Dear NT-NL Leaders:

As we enter this weekend into Holy Week my prayers and encouragement go forward with you. In many of our communities this year will mark the first time in several years that the celebrations of this Holy Week will look anything like they did in 2019. But of course they are and will be different. Because we are different. We have been changed by the experiences of the last two years. We are not and cannot be the same as we were before.

Yet change, transformation, is the heart of the good news of Easter. God’s incarnation into this world, nailed to a tree, buried in a tomb, doesn’t stay there. Death doesn’t win. And after two years of losses and griefs we are dying to be transformed. And the good news is Holy Week, the Triduum, the joy of Easter does just that. It transforms our death into life and invites us to live anew. To honor our griefs and losses. To take seriously the work we are called to do as church and society in the ways of justice and peace. But to ultimately know and trust that God’s new life is for us and for our neighbor.

So as you go about this work, know we go into this work together. Together as lay and rostered leaders, called to various tasks and roles in this time, we go into this work together. And so doing together the worship of the church, the telling of the story, the proclamation of the gospel will happen. God’s peace and hope be with you in these days to come. We are…

#InMissionTogether,

Bishop Gronberg