Easter Vigil
Wake Forest University School of Divinity invites you to join us for the annual Easter Vigil.
Saturday, March 30, 2024
7:30 PM
Wait Chapel
About the Easter Vigil
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO KEEP VIGIL?
Merriam-Webster tells us that to keep vigil is “to stay in place and quietly wait and pray for a period of time.”
To keep vigil is to stay awake, especially through misty midnight hours, to be with someone who is near death or to protest an injustice or to pray during a crisis. To keep vigil is to keep watch when people are usually sleeping.
The Easter Vigil holds these meaning and more. Observed on the Saturday before Easter Sunday, the Easter Vigil vocalizes and embodies the first “alleluias” of Easter. The traditional Vigil consists of four parts: Service of Light, Service of the Word, Baptism, and Eucharist. The Service of the Word incorporates biblical readings that accompany worshipers on a journey from creation to resurrection.
The Easter Vigil also incorporates biblical readings. Together, through music, prayers, dance, and readings, we will journey from creation to resurrection and offer our “alleluias.” The service
invites us to keep vigil as the earth and all its people listen for the rumble of the stone rolling away from Jesus’ tomb.
The service also invites us to lean into what it means to keep vigil in contemporary times as people face stark realities and frightening uncertainties in their lives and communities. Keeping vigil as a spiritual practice cultivates attentiveness to what is happening in the world and to how God is with us in this present moment. Keeping vigil engages our natural response to the wonder and power of love, sorrow, and awe. We need and desire sleep, but the moment’s realities urge us to keep watch through the night, holding onto the promise of God’s love and hope.
Alleluia! Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed.
Reverend Dr. Timothy L. Auman, University Chaplain
Reverend Dr. Jill Crainshaw, School of Divinity
Dean Corey D.B. Walker, School of Divinity
Learn more about Holy Week events at Wake Forest University School of Divinity.
Visit divinity.wfu.edu/holy-week.
