Gospel According to Glee – 40 Days at McKinley High
Day 40 – Holy Saturday
To Read: (Series 3 Episode 11)
[QUINN has some good news to tell Glee Club about her future… and her past]
WILL: Wow, Quinn, that was incredible.
WILL: Even more incredible is her big news. Tell them.
QUINN: I got into Yale.
BRITTANY: Whoo!
WILL: It’s just– it-it’s amazing.
WILL: After everything you’ve been through, you really deserve this, Quinn.
MERCEDES: We are so proud of you, Quinn.
QUINN: I want to thank you guys… because without each and every one of you, this would have never happened. You supported me and loved me through all the drama, and that’s why I’m standing here.
I wasted so much time hating myself for the stupid mistakes that I made, but the truth is, is that without all of those, I never would have dreamed this
to be my future. I was the only one standing in the way of myself.
You can’t change your past… but you can let go and start your future.
To Watch:
‘Something’s Coming’ sung by Blaine
Original Artist: Jimmy Bryant (in the movie West Side Story)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1kHuV4rGqw
From the Scriptures:
Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9 Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you. (Philippians 4v8-9)
To Reflect:
Quinn, at the beginning of our story was the Queen Bee of USA High School legend and she literally ruled her world. She was destined to be the glamorous Prom Queen and voted the Person Most Likely to Succeed.
Well she did become Prom Queen but from a wheelchair…
President of the Purity club she had a baby, gave her up for adoption, and then schemed to regain custody of her.
She had a series of boyfriends and currently is not dating any of them.
She rebelled, changed her style, joined the Skanks and set fire to a piano.
She was going nowhere.
Then something changed. At the Prom she gave her crown away to Rachel so that Rachel could dance with Finn. She came back to Glee Club. She learnt to ‘mother’ her baby from a distance. She began to hope…
To put her journey into religious language, she was brought low by her deeds (sins), met unconditional love through the Glee Club (redemption), faced a few home truths (humility) and came to the choir to thank them (repentance) and call them to live better lives (evangelism). Her final words in today’s script says it all;
You can’t change your past… but you can let go and start your future.
In a nutshell that is what the Journey of faith, and this time of Lent is about. Realising that, if we want things to work out better, we start from where we are and not where we were. She has learnt the truth that to hold on to the future, to look forward to the ‘Somethings Coming’, demands that we let go of the past.
She has also learnt that often the only thing blocking her own future was herself;
I was the only one standing in the way of myself.
She is the one who is keeping the stone firmly in place in front of her own tomb and was not able to move it until she knew she was loved without condition by the rest of the club. There is another religious word for that, resurrection.
Beloved friends. Thank you for walking with me this Lent. Spending time each day compiling these words has been a journey of my own and has helped me move myself out of my own way a little. Our life, even our life of faith, (although I am learning that those two must become one) can easily become cluttered with stuff that is often about holding on to things of the past. It is all too easy to have a life so full of our past achievements and status that we become straight-jacketed by them and are unable to reach for the joy of the ‘Somethings Coming’.
Could be, who knows?
There’s something due any day
I will know right away, soon as it shows
It may come cannonballing down through the sky
Gleam in its eye, bright as a rose
Who knows? It’s only just out of reach
Down the block, on a beach, under a tree
I got a feeling there’s a miracle due
Gonna come true, coming to me.
It’s a cliché, but clichés exist for a reason. Today, this day of waiting for the miracle of Easter may be a good day to move ourself out of our own way and ‘Let go and let God’.
To Pray:
Dance, when you’re broken open.
Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off.
Dance in the middle of the fighting.
Dance in your blood.
Dance when you’re perfectly free.
(Rumi)
To Do:
- Throw away (or pass on to a friend) something that was once valuable to you but the support you gained from it is no longer needed.
- Before Easter dawns make a conscious act of self-surrender to God. This prayer (a version of the Anima Christi) may help…
Jesus, may all that is in you flow into me.
May your body and blood be my food and drink.
May your passion and death be my strength and life.
Jesus, with you by my side enough has been given.
May the shelter I seek be the shadow of your cross.
Let me not run from the love which you offer.
But hold me safe from the forces of evil.
On each of my dyings shed your light and your love.
Keep calling to me until that day comes.
When with our saints, I may praise you forever. Amen.
(David Fleming SJ)
Reprise: Click here to watch the original version of today’s song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOQPMjKLQQU
Acknowledgements:
Prayers from ‘Prayers for Hard Times’ are copyright © Becca Anderson 2017
Scripture quotations are copyright © New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Transcripts of Glee Episodes were made with thanks to subslikescripts.com
These Reflections, ‘ ‘Gospel According to Glee’ are copyright © Andrew Dotchin 2021 and may be reproduced without charge on condition that the source is acknowledged
Suffolk Vicar 