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Lent, Holy Week and Easter

Lent, Holy Week and Easter at Ely Cathedral 2024

Lent, Holy Week and Easter booklet

Download the booklet here

‘Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs’: Deepening our Devotion

‘Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly’ wrote St Paul to the early Church at Colossae, ‘teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs to God’. As we turn again this year to spiritual reflection and discipline in the Lenten season, we deepen our affections by contemplating our communal practice of worship as it is expressed in hymns and psalmody.

These are treasures of devotion we inherit from former generations and rework to God’s glory in our own. In the psalmody our souls speak directly to God, bringing every kind of feeling to be transformed by his attentive presence, and participating in ancient devotional practice, as old as the earliest of our monasteries. In singing hymns we bring ourselves before him in praise and adoration, in remembrance of the gifts of our Lord’s passion, suffering and resurrection, and in intercession for the needs of his children.

Lent Services

Wednesday 14 February, 7.30pm Live stream
Ash Wednesday Solemn Eucharist with ashing

Fridays in Lent: 16, 23 February; 1, 8, 15, 22 March, 12.10pm
Eucharist followed by Lent Charity Lunch

Tuesdays in Lent: 20, 27 February, 5, 12, 19, 26 March, 8pm
Candlelit Compline

Sunday 25 February, 6.30pm
Lent Taizé Service

Tuesday 19 March, 5.30pm
Festal Evensong for the Feast of St Joseph

Full details about all these services can be found in the booklet above.

Music and Meditation - Tuesdays in Lent
20, 27 February; 5, 12, 19, 26 March, 1pm
in the Presbytery

The musicians of Ely Cathedral contribute music expressing the themes of Lent, Passiontide and Easter. Each piece is preceded by a short meditation from one of the Cathedral clergy exploring the week’s musical treatment of these themes, both in the music itself and in the theological and spiritual threads which can be drawn from it. The whole meditation lasts about 20 minutes.

20 February
Canon James Reveley | Stanley Godfrey (Graduate Organ Scholar)
27 February
Canon Jessica Martin | Sarah MacDonald (Director, Ely Cathedral Girl Choristers)

5 March
The Dean | Andrew Parnell (Assistant Director, Ely Cathedral Octagon Singers)

12 March
Canon James Garrard | Thomas Strudwick (King’s Ely)

19 March
The Dean | Glen Dempsey (Assistant Director of Music)

26 March
Canon Nicholas Thistlethwaite | Edmund Aldhouse (Director of Music)

Holy Week and Easter Services

This year’s Holy Week preacher is The Revd Dr Cally Hammond, Dean of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge

Palm Sunday 24 March
10.30am Sung Eucharist
4pm Evensong

Monday in Holy Week 25 March
7.30pm Via Crucis

Tuesday in Holy Week 26 March
8pm Candlelit Compline and Address

Wednesday in Holy Week 27 March
7.30pm Devotional Concert and Address

Maundy Thursday 28 March
10.30am Chrism Eucharist
7.30-11pm Eucharist of the Last Supper

Good Friday 29 March
10am Worship for Children
10.15am Christians Together Walk of Witness
Midday-3pm Preaching of the Cross and The Liturgy of the Day
5.30pm Choral Evensong

Holy Saturday 30 March
5.30pm Evensong with plainsong
8pm Easter Vigil with Baptism and Confirmation

Easter Day 31 March
8.15am Holy Communion
10.30am Orchestral Eucharist
10.30am Eucharist with Children's Activities followed by an Easter Egg Hunt
4pm Festal Evensong and Procession

Full details about all these services can be found in the booklet above.