Joining me for a very special day.
It is Good Friday and incredibly important Christian Well, I don't want to say holiday, that's the wrong word. But maybe my next guest, a very familiar voice, Father Mike Tests joining us from Wisconsin right now, to talk about Good Friday.
Hi, Father Mike.
Hi'm Mandy.
So we don't we don't call it a holiday? What is it? It's not a holiday.
When I said holiday, I went, wait, that sounds wrong ish, but couldn't remember what the actual word was. So in the scale of holy days, I was trying to figure this out earlier, Father Mike, where does where does good Friday fit? I put it at second place. You got Eastern you got Good Friday and then Christmas.
Is that the order?
Yeah, that would pretty much be the order. That would be the order.
Why is this stay important? For people who may not be of the Christian faith, are not familiar with why these are holy days?
So we call this holy It starts with the last Sunday, which is Palm Sunday, and it's one of the ironies of humankind but makes perfect sense to God. We enter into he answers into Jerusalem as the triumphant King Hoddanna in the eyes on Sunday and by Friday he is dead on a tree, only to not be held there, as we believe, but on Easter Sunday to rise from the dead. And that's Postqua, that's Easter.
So this is this is kind of the dannumal of Jesus's life and why we give him the status as a deity. I mean, a normal guy doesn't rise from the dead. Father Michael, and ask a difficult question. Yeah, I want to ask you a question because this is one of those questions that I get from atheists all the time, and they say things like, do you believe that the man literally rose from the dead or is this a parable? I'm guessing I know what you're gonna say, but I want to hear how you say it.
Well, no, it's not a parable Jesus. He is parables. But we believe that he truly and we historically know that he was, that there was a punch pilot, that there was anison Caiphus high priests, that there was a Jesus of Nazareth, and that he was crucified and hung
on a cross and then laid in a tomb. And then we believe that death could not hold him, that as God's Son, truly God, say the nice in Creed every Sunday, we say it in churches across Chris's Stem, truly God and truly man, that he hung on a tree, but that death could not hold him in. Because death could not hold him, he opened for us the way to eternal life. And so death doesn't hold us either.
So whenever I am saying goodbye to people I love, or helping people in my parish say goodbye, I always say, this is the tent. The body' is the tent, and he goes. The people go into the chrystalist and become the butterfly. That's what Christ Day. Christ went into the tomb and came out risen. And so we will rise with Christ. That's the promise he makes. And so these three days Monty Thursday, Yesterday the foot washing. He washes his disciples feet and says, love them as I have
loved you. Then Good Friday he is crucified and hangs it across and dies is put in the tomb. And then Saturday evening, actually after dusk, we have was called Easter vigil, and that is the first celebration of Easter, it's actually an Eastern Mass. If you go to church on Saturday morning, you're going to be still in the tomb on Eastern nights. Saturday night, the vigil starts in
darkness and goes to the light. We light a candle off the fire and we bless the Eastern water, and we celebrate Eastern And then all of Sunday and into the next forty days is the Easter season.
That's why I asked.
Know, That's why I asked you the question because I knew you would give me a really, really good answer. You know, this time of year, are there particular traditions And you weren't Episcopal priest, but you used to be a Roman Catholic priest other than the traditions that you just mentioned of this week. Because I used to love Palm Sunday when I was a kid. I just thought it was like the coolest thing, right, and then leading up to Good Friday. There when you go to Catholic school,
you get to experience all of these different things. But as we go to the Easter season, what sort of things are our traditions in the next forty days?
So this is so for forty days, we haven't said a word a La luyah. We put those away. We have not rung many churches haven't rung bells. Many people to extra piety for these days. And so with Easter we go from red from purple. So Holy Week is the color is red. And then we go to white Easter white with the lilies and the resurrection. But and this season is the season I'm joy all the way to Pentecost, where we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit, Father,
Son and Holy Spirit. Right Father gives a son, son comes and saves us. All goes back to the Father like he said he would, and believes and parts on us the gifts of the Holy Spirit of God in the Holy Spirit has left with us to do the work that is left and done, which is bring everybody home eventually.
I have a question that doesn't have anything to do with Easter. And I don't know if you saw, and you're right up there in Wisconsin, did you see that the Ohio State football championship ring has a cross embedded
in the underside. They actually puts on the rate. Well, apparently some of the most prominent members of the Ohio State team held an on campus revival and a prayer service, and several thousand kids showed up and people got baptized, and it was just all these kids came out to declare their you know, their belief in Jesus and and and sort of reassert that. I mean, there are things happening, and Mike, you and I have talked about this stuff. It's like, for me, it feels like we have the
potential to have a spiritual awakening in this country. Are you seeing that in your daily now you know? Or your weekly masses or who's coming to mass now?
I do have an uptick at both of my churches. I do. I find a lot of people are questioning and people are well. I mean, it's been kind of church people roll their eyes when you say spiritual but not religious. But I really don't think God cares if you're going to church or not going to church. We've had this discussion for I think what is important is for people to know that God loves them and that they're part of it. And so that has been my
passion for forty years of ministry. And I'm having conversations with people. I had the most incredible conversation with this lady who's an atheist about light and energy and how though light and energy for her goes to the same place that me praying to God, it builds the same part of her that me giving my heart the Christ does. And I think that God uses all of it because God is God and has a plan to bring all of God's children home.
Well, I just got a question, and I don't know if we ever asked this question on the air, but I think it's a really good answer, Mandy. I would love to know why he moved to a different denomination sometime. I know this isn't the time, but that would be cool. But I know it's a good story, so I'm going to ask that question now, Mike.
Well, I loved being a priest and my whole. When I was seven, I said to the vocation director, I want to be a priest and a dad, and they said, you can be a priest, but not a dad. And I was a really I am a really good priest. What I am not really good at is being alone. And I was not healthy as a celibate priest. And I have so much admiration for my brothers who can and I have many many friends bishops and priests who are active and doing wonderful work and can be healthy
as a celibate. I came to the conclusion, and there's still some heartache in me that I that I couldn't that because I really wanted to. But I knew in my heart that that seven year old boy, that that prayer was answered in a way that was not what I thought it was going to be. And that's how God often answers prayers is in an unconventional way. In the Episcopal Church, I could still be father, Mike, I could still have seven sacraments, but I could be married.
And that was for me. I mean, and when I'm counsel in folks and if they're active in their Catholicism and their disillusion, I sent them back. I mean, there is my whole clent is still Roman Catholic. There is so much good and so much power in that church. But I was born to be a priest. But I was not born to not be as you see me with my kids and with my wife. I was born to be both.
I'll tell you that Father is one of those people that you could put him in a field with two hundred other people, and if you let loose a bunch of kids, they would immediately find him. He is a person who children love, and his family is just absolutely full of the best human beings you could possibly imagine. So he is serving his purpose. And I think that's a great question, is a fair question. I don't think I've ever asked him that question. I have another question
for you. We're taking text line questions now, Mike, you ready, Mandy, how does he explain that most religions have a similar history and beginning sometimes hundreds of years beforehand.
And I don't know exactly what that is.
How does he explain that most religions have a similar history and beginning, sometimes hundreds of years beforehand.
What for Christianity? So if okay, if the question is, how do I explain that we all have similar stories like Noah and the arc creation story. So many many religions have those stories, and we were We consider self an Abrahamic religion. So Muslims, Christians, Orthodox and Jews all all consider themselves from Abraham. So we have many, many similarities, and many of the ancient traditions, non non God centered religions have similar stories. And the thing I say is
that God uses it all. God uses everything. This is how we experience. So I believe for Christians this is how God gets us home. But I don't think that it's the only way to get home. And and I do get feedback from folks who don't agree with me, and they're they're more than that's fine, they cannot agree with me. In my heart, if there is this all powerful, all creating God, and I love my children, you love
Q and you would do anything. We've had this conversation before too, if you would do anything for your child, and I would do anything for my children. This guy that created us. Hopefully that God not have a way to get all of God's children home unless you just make Christians and not everybody, which I don't believe. I believe God made us all that there is ways for us to get home.
I mean, isn't that the ultimate prodigal sun story? I mean, he hasn't it.
He has got it.
They kind of laid it out there from where I sit.
So we're in the Easter season, and you know Jewish, the Jewish tradition, there are so many incredibly powerful actions that Jews take a lot around their holidays, right, They're very specific, purposeful actions. Do we have that in Christianity other than Catholics not eating fish on Friday or giving up something for lent or or something.
Of that nature. Do we have that overall for Christianity?
Not not sweeping like that, But what we have is ways, possibilities, strains, threads for people to that fit them the boat the most. So we have Cistercians who who eat bread and water and pray eight nine hours a day. We have different brands and different vehicles in Christianity that mystics who who write and have these incredible deep conversations with God. So there's ways for you to enter into it. Nothing that's mandated. In Judaism, it's mandated, right, if you're going to do
this is what you do. But even in Judaism, there's you know, a dozen different expressions of Judaism. There's Orthodox, and there's Reformed, and you know, there's Conservative, there's all kinds of different judiatic traditions.
Well, I just think, like, you know, having the opportunity, and I've always been interested in other traditions and other religious faiths, and I generally walk away from an experience with the.
Different faith and I think, wow, that's really good. We should adopt that on our side doo.
Yeah, when it's usually something that involves like, I love the entire way the Jewish faith leans on making atonement. You know, we ask for forgiveness. We ask for forgiveness from God. If you're Catholic, you go to confession, But the Jews actually ask for forgiveness from people they believe they've wronged, right.
And things like that.
I wish we could kind of sweep that in and say, hey, our Jewish friends, we're going to lean into that that notion, you know, of reaching out to people. Is it too late to get some new traditions going in Christianity?
I feel like this could get legs.
I think there's all I think it's always being born and new everythink. I think every old wheel comes back around eventually.
Every old wheel. Mandy.
Here's a text, Mandy. But the Bible is clear that the only way to God is through Christ.
So how do you deal with that question?
So? And I do believe, I mean so that that is is it possibly saved without uttering the name of Jesus Christ as you shaved there? And I just well, I do believe that that is a way. And the person that wrote that actually is going to disagree with
me because the Bible is clear. But the Bible says a lot of things, and so that's that's a major difference between whether you believe it it is literal and so it is for word as God intended it, or if it's inspired scripture, which most of the mainline Christian religions believe, which is that eternal truth is captured in that in those stories and in that book, and that so is the point of the story for the flood, that God was not happy with how we were living
in covenant with God, or that God destroyed the world and put two of every animal on the bolt. Well, I'm saying that, yes, and so or is it important if the world is six thousand years old or six billion years old that God made the world in seven days and people will say, well, maybe I was one hundred thousand years Does it matter. What matters is that God made the world and it was good, and that God is in relationship with us. That's the eternal truth,
and that is immutable. You can't change that. It's forever. And one of the truths that scripture is from God and is eternal is that the best minds in the world have been picking it into it and studying it and digesting it, and it is inexhaustible. It is the only book ever written that is inexhospital is still this day revealing truth to us. And so that is God's God's love letter to us. But is it every you?
I mean, when you know, when you know how the Bible is written with inerrancy, that's the big word for it is the Bible and errants. It doesn't have errors in it. And as it is written, it is written by humans, and it is trusted by God, and so it is eternally true. But not maybe every I dotted in every tea crust because it was written by humans, but it was given to us by God, if that makes sense.
And in all honesty, a lot of it was an oral tradition before we got to the point where it was written down right, so we all know how that works out.
In Latin to the languages. And it was done by monks who copied it on skins by candle light for twelve hours at a time, and there was no breaks in the words. And so is it man's laughter or man's laughter? Because depending on where you break that word, you have two different meanings. I mean, that's where you go into that it is not without its human in an errancy, without its human mistakes, but it is a truly God's word for us and what it is supposed
to get to us does. That's what I believe, Father Mike.
Tests is my guest, and Father Mike, I'm assuming that you were going to be doing your Mass on your Facebook page at Saint Mark's Episcopal Church in beaver Dam, Wisconsin on Sunday because I linked to that today. So if anybody wants to watch your masks, and let me just say this as a as a lapsed Catholic, Father Mike is not the sort of priests that is going to give you a two hour homily. Okay, you're going to be in out, You're going to feel great at
the end of it. So if you want to tune in for Easter Mass, I would highly recommend you do it. And I linked to the Facebook page where they will put that so you can see it.
What time is.
Mass on Sunday Central time? Eight thirty in Central time, and then ten fifteen is our bilingual service, which is a a Good Shepherd that is also on YouTube. That's Good Shepherd w Piscopal Church. And that one's attempted to. So I'm doing both and there will be a lot of joy, a lot of excitement, and a lot of children. Everybody's coming behind the altar for the acoustic prayer, so it's going to be kind of cool.
And if you are not up at seven point thirty on Sunday to see the Mask live, they have it and they'll leave it on the Facebook page so you can watch it when you get up, right.
Will it be posted right after?
That's the beauty YEP, it's posted immediately after, and so you can watch when it's comedian for you. That's the beauty of online.
All right, Father Mike, I love you man, I'll talk to you again soon, Love you too.
Happy Easter and happy Triduum to all those who are sharing in these couple of days.
Absolutely all right, that is father, myke test