Here is a series of monologues which can be used on their own or as part of a longer mediation on the cross and the response of several characters involved in the Good Friday story.
Please ensure copyright information is kept with the scripts.
Monologues 1 - 5 adapted where stated from “Voices from the crowd Holy Week Meditation 3” from "Stages on the way" (Wild Goose Publications 1998) © WGRG, Iona Community, G2 3DH
1. Jesus is condemned to death Mt 27.1-2, 11-26
Monologue: Barabbas adapted from Stages on the Way WWRG Iona Community pg 148f
And I’m Barabbas and I’m a free man, looking at my cross, only I’m not on it
I’m just standing here - alive and he is there dying
I shouldn’t hang around here for long
Everyone knows me and knows what I’ve done
To some I’m a hero - a man of action
To others - I’m a man to be feared my name is terror to the Romans
They trapped me and arrested me
It was inevitable
I knew it would happen one day and so I wasn’t afraid
They can kill me, but there’s one of me and I’ve killed lots of them
So it’s been worth it
The trial was a foregone conclusion
So there I was sitting on death row waiting for the inevitable when I heard this chanting
“Barabbas … Barabbas …” all these people shouting my name
over and over more trouble?
I was up to my neck in trouble
I was at the end of the line, on Death Row,
I was going to be nailed to a cross naked laughed at and if I hadn’t died by sunset they would probably break my legs, just to hurry me along not even Pilate is stupid enough to leave us up there over the Sabbath
So with that in mind
I wasn’t really bothered what else they did to me they can’t do anything worse than crucifixion
Having that hanging over you clears your mind, why be frightened of anything else?
Next thing that happened there was a key turned in the lock
and they unchained me took me outside
… and just let me go
I stood there blinking in the sunlight not for very long
I didn’t know