Preparing for Good Friday 2020

Accompanying Jesus and the Cross

With the restrictions in place to reduce the spread of the Corona Virus, and our Re-enactment of Our Lord's Passion cancelled and public attendance and Masses stopped, this is the Lentiest Lent we have ever Lented.
After listening to the readings at Palm Sunday today and seeing all of our great actors playing and reading the roles, I thought I would share our resources so you can prepare for Good Friday using the play as a basis.

The Script

Recognising the various options technology brings us we now have the script in ePub and PDF formats. ePub is great for reading on your phone or tablet. It has chapter headings for each scene, you can search and add bookmarks. You can also change the font size to suit differing eye strengths! The PDF is formatted for printing to A4.
Script - ePub version
Script - PDF version

Sources for the Script:

1. Primary source is the Scriptures, naturally. A great book is "The Gospel Story" for Ronald Cox and Ronald Knox which brings together the new testament in sequential order, combining all four gospels into one in an excellent English translation. Each section also has notes to aid in understanding. The book is out of print but I have converted it to an ePub which you can download here: The Gospel Story.
2. Additional ideas regarding Pontius Pilate and Claudia derive from "Christ or Barrabas" by Danial A Lord SJ (1958). Great short story providing background and a good tale to share. Christ or Barrabas (ePub) or Christ or Barrabas (PDF).
3. Past plays and tradition. So many actors and directors have added great faithful parts to the play which are consistent with scripture and they are incorporated in the play. After all, this is a "people's play" and the great variety of faithful contributors make our play a great experience.

Re-enactment of Our Lord's passion - The audio book!

In October we gathered a number of actors and the priests from the Monastery and made an audio recording of the play. The length is just under an hour and covers the complete script. This makes for an easier method of remembering our lines. You can have the m4a version which is an iTunes Audiobook, or you can download the zip file of the MP3 format files. Each scene is a separate chapter.

iTunes Audiobook (Via Dropbox)
MP3 zip file (Via Dropbox)

There you go. Offer up this time for all this suffering from the virus and the economic crisis we are experiencing in our efforts to fight it.