Easter Sunday at Broadway Baptist Church carries fond memories for Tiffany McClain.
McClain, 56, grew up going to the church in Fort Worth’s Near Southside neighborhood. She recalls the excitement she felt as a kid putting on a new dress on Easter morning, feeling the rumbling of the organ as worship commenced and breaking bread with her grandparents and other loved ones during lunch after the service.
Now as the church’s music and worship coordinator, McClain’s preparation for the holiday celebration stretches beyond all those things. Between a late Good Friday service and an early Easter morning, McClain was at the church on April 4 to help prepare Broadway Baptist for the day Christians around the world commemorate when Jesus is believed to have risen from the dead.
“It’s just nice to be behind the scenes … to be those little elves you may or may not know and just do something special,” McClain said.
Tiffany McClain moves lilies around the front at Broadway Baptist Church on April 4, 2026. McClain was part of a group helping to get the church decorated for Easter Sunday. (Maria Crane | Fort Worth Report/CatchLight Local/Report for America)
Broadway Baptist Church prepares the room for Easter Sunday on April 4, 2026. (Maria Crane | Fort Worth Report/CatchLight Local/Report for America)
On Saturday afternoon McClain led a group of congregants in decorating the church ahead of Easter festivities.
Dennis Jewett, the church’s minister of music, attached palm leaves to a large wooden cross wrapped in wire standing in the church’s narthex, a gathering space outside of the worship room. On Easter, members of the congregation are invited to adorn the bare cross with flowers before walking into the sanctuary — a historic tradition for some Protestant churches that represents the transition from Good Friday to Easter.
On Good Friday, a solemn Christian holy day commemorating the crucifixion and death of Jesus Christ, Broadway Baptist had a candle-lit tenebrae service, which ended in darkness to symbolize the gravity of Jesus’ death.
While Friday is a time for lament, Easter is when Jewett gets to lead the congregation in celebratory hymns like “Christ the Lord is risen today,” he said.
“It’s thrilling to see that energy from so many people there, and to watch them sing hymns they know, and you know, hymns that have been sung for hundreds of years, and we share those traditions,” Jewett said.
Harriet Harral drapes cloth over the front of the pulpit at Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth on April 4, 2026. Harral has been a member of the church for almost 40 years. (Maria Crane | Fort Worth Report/CatchLight Local/Report for America)
Broadway Baptist Church members Harriet Harral and Galen Steele place white lilies around the front of the church on April 4, 2026. The two spent the morning with a few other members of the church decorating for Easter Sunday. (Maria Crane | Fort Worth Report/CatchLight Local/Report for America)
Inside the sanctuary, members adorned the front of the room with palm trees, a large bouquet of pink roses, banners and white Easter lilies.
The floral and other decorative elements help visualize the transition from sorrow to celebration, said Harriet Harral, who has been a member of the church for 40 years.
During the Lenten season, churches generally keep their altars bare and without flower arrangements to symbolize penance in preparation for Easter, according to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
For Harral, 81, Easter “has always been just this beautiful change in atmosphere.”
The holiday also serves as a reminder to congregants to remember Jesus’ message to love and care for those in need, she said.
“I have a new appreciation of what Jesus was bringing to the kingdom of God, as opposed to an empire of wealth and privilege,” Harral said. “Easter is a way to celebrate the strength and the courage, bravery, the will to be able to stand up in difficult times.”
After a couple of hours the group’s task was complete, bringing Easter into full bloom.
Marissa Greene is a Report for America corps member, covering faith for the Fort Worth Report. You can contact her at marissa.greene@fortworthreport.org.
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