Good Friday was a big thing in the 30s and 40s. A great many businesses closed from noon until three. Churches
of various denominations joined together for a three hour service
featuring Good Friday sermons by three of the town's leading clergy.
Some of that still happens but not on the scale of how it was done back
there.
Some cities carried the service on radio. In
Detroit the Fox Theater was the site for a big service and the entire
three hours were broadcast on a major radio station each year. I still
remember listening to the grand oratory, choir singing and
organist Ole Foerch playing the Fox Theater Wurlitzer. The Good
Friday observance was that important.
That wouldn't work
today. A merchant who closed during that period would probably be
charged with injecting personal faith into the business, not acceptable
in today's multicultural society. And Atheists would demand equal air
time. Oh well. for us old folks it's a treasured memory.
I attended what really felt like a 3 hour service at the Fox Theater in the D - but with one Preacher - an actual Rabbi AND Zen Buddhist Monk - ordained as both. Know who???
ReplyDeleteNot all that unusual.There is probably someone who holds a record for multiple and unlikely ordinations.
DeleteI know of a preacher who was Baptist and Unitarian! That's about as unlikely as it can get.
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