It is Holy Thursday — the Thursday of the Mysteries. The Upper Room.

Christ removes His garment, ties the towel around His waist, and bends down to wash the feet of His disciples. Peter refuses, and he hears the severe answer: “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me”. (John 13:8)

This is not only a historical event. It is divine guidance and a program of action.

When we say that “the Church washes the feet of the barefoot,” we mean that the essence of the Church’s social service is this deliberate bending down toward those whom the road has exhausted.

It is a reversal of the logic of power: “Whoever wants to be first must be servant of all”. (Mark 10:44) The Church is measured by the extent to which her clergy bend down.

The core idea is that authority in the Church is not domination. It is diakonia — service.

“Washing the feet of the barefoot” means touching directly the wounds of the weary and heavy-burdened, without mediation and without humiliation.

Washing feet means that I bend down until I become level with you, and I touch your pain with my own hands.

His Holiness Pope Francis called it a “field domain Church.” It leaves the sanctuary, becomes soiled with the dust of the road, and touches the wound.

The theological meaning of this is clear and unmistakable: whoever rejects the Church’s service, or refuses to serve, has not understood the mystery of the Eucharist.

The liturgy that is not completed by service to the barefoot becomes an empty ritual.

“It is more blessed to give than to receive.” (Acts 20:35) But before giving, you must bend down, because you do not know how to give rightly unless your hand has touched the dust on the feet of the barefoot.

In the Middle East, the Church washes feet; and if she wants to remain truly Church, she must remain bent down, because Christ did not go up to the Cross before He first went down to the ground and washed feet.

The Fathers understood this well. John Chrysostom cried out: “Do you wish to honor the body of Christ? Do not neglect Him when He is naked. You make the altar out of gold, while Christ dies of cold at the door”. (Homily 50)

The washing of feet is embodied in a mercy fund that provides medicine for a sick person: “I was hungry and you gave me food” (Matthew 25:35); in a communal kitchen that provides daily hot meals for the displaced and the destitute, for the Lord “took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them”; (John 6:11) in a free clinic, a volunteer doctor, a nursing sister, and medicine provided through donations, “to heal the brokenhearted”; (Luke 4:18) in listening, when the priest sits with a person in a state of collapse: “Weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15); in advocacy, when the bishop of the diocese negotiates for a humanitarian corridor, or sends a letter to international organizations: “Open your mouth, judge righteously, and defend the rights of the poor” (Proverbs 31:9); in steadfastness, the pastors and priests in South Lebanon, Palestine, and Sudan did not leave with those who left: “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep”. (John 10:11)

If the Church remains in the palace and behind stained glass, then she has washed no one’s feet. Otherwise, she becomes a governmental body stripped of doctrine. She becomes cold.

The scene of the washing of feet in the Upper Room represents something central to understanding the Church’s identity and mission. When Christ bent down to wash the feet of His disciples, He did not offer a passing ritual; He established an ethical and theological standard that defines the nature of authority within the community of believers. Authority, in the logic of the Gospel, is not understood as control or prestige, but as service that bends down to the humblest level of human need.

The phrase “the Church washes the feet of the barefoot” carries a clear metaphorical meaning. The “barefoot” are those whom the road of life has exhausted, whether through material poverty, displacement, illness, or social collapse. And “washing feet” expresses the full range of practices that fall within the Church’s social service, that is, diakonia. This metaphor has its theological foundations, its practical expressions, and the conditions that make it an authentic ecclesial act, rather than a passing relief activity.

The families who lost their savings in the collapse of the banks in Lebanon; those forcibly displaced from the villages of the South; the tormented and displaced people of Gaza, the Levant, Iraq, and Sudan; the sick who cannot secure their medicine; the elderly left without anyone to support them; and young graduates who are unemployed, all of these who share one common mark: the loss of the ability to walk with dignity, to hold their destiny in their own hands.

The “barefoot” are those who have no choice. And when dignity becomes a luxury, the Church’s intervention becomes a theological necessity before it is a charitable act.

“Washing the feet of the barefoot” is not a rhetorical slogan. It is a program of action drawn from the very heart of Christian doctrine. In a time when structures are collapsing, this act becomes credible testimony that the Church has not abandoned the world and has not reduced herself to isolated rituals.

The Church that bends down to wash the feet of the weary is the Church that preserves for herself the right to sit at the table of the Lord. Service and worship are two faces of one truth: the God who bent down in the Incarnation calls His Church to bend down with Him.

In this sense, the image of the bent-down Christ, the basin, and the towel remains an enduring symbol. Wherever there is an exhausted human being on the road, the Church is there, and there is a place for her hands. And there Christ is found, carrying the Cross of salvation for a lost and tormented humanity, leading it toward a better life.