Stations of the Cross in the context of "Holy Friday"

Good Friday, also known as Holy Friday, Great Friday, Great and Holy Friday, or Friday of the Passion of the Lord, is a solemn Christian holy day commemorating the crucifixion of Jesus and his death at Calvary (Golgotha). It is observed during Holy Week as part of the Paschal Triduum.

Members of many Christian denominations, including the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Lutheran, Anglican, Methodist, Oriental Orthodox, United Protestant and some Reformed traditions (including certain Continental Reformed, Presbyterian and Congregationalist churches), observe Good Friday with fasting and church services. In many Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican and Methodist churches, the Service of the Great Three Hours' Agony is held from noon until 3 p.m.—the hours the Bible records darkness covering the land until Jesus' death on the cross. In the Catholic, Lutheran and Anglican traditions of Christianity, the Stations of the Cross are prayed in the evening of Good Friday, as with other Fridays of Lent. Communicants of the Moravian Church have a Good Friday tradition of cleaning gravestones in Moravian cemeteries.

The Descent from the Cross (Greek: Ἀποκαθήλωσις, Apokathelosis), or Deposition of Christ, is the scene, as depicted in art, from the Gospels' accounts of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus taking Christ down from the cross after his crucifixion (John 19, John 19:38–42). In Byzantine art the topic became popular in the 9th century, and in the West from the 10th century. The Descent from the Cross is the 13th Station of the Cross, and is also the sixth of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Other figures not mentioned in the Gospels who are often included in depictions of this subject include John the Evangelist, who is sometimes depicted supporting a fainting Mary (as in the work below by Rogier van der Weyden), and Mary Magdalene. The Gospels mention an undefined number of women as watching the crucifixion, including The Three Marys, (Mary Salome being mentioned in Mark 15 (Mark 15:40)), and also that the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene saw the burial (Mark 15:47). These and further women and unnamed male helpers are often shown.

The Via Dolorosa (Latin for 'Sorrowful Way', often translated as 'Way of Suffering'; Arabic: طريق الآلام; Hebrew: ויה דולורוזה), sometimes known as the Via Crucis (Latin for 'Way of Cross'; Arabic: درب الصليب, lit. 'Via Crucis'; Hebrew: ויה קרוסיס) is a processional route in the Old City of Jerusalem. It represents the path that Jesus took, forced by the Roman soldiers, on the way to his crucifixion. The winding route from the former Antonia Fortress to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre—a distance of about 600 metres (2,000 ft)—is a celebrated place of Christian pilgrimage. The current route has been established since the 18th century, replacing various earlier versions. It is today marked by 14 Stations of the Cross, nine of which are outside, in the streets, with the remaining five stations being currently inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

The Church of the Flagellation is a Roman Catholic church and Christian pilgrimage site located in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, near St. Stephen's Gate (also called Lions' Gate). It is part a Franciscan monastery which also includes the Church of the Condemnation and Imposition of the Cross. The monastery stands at the traditional Second Station of the Cross on the Via Dolorosa.

The Scriptural Way of the Cross or Scriptural Stations of the Cross is a modern version of the ancient Christian, especially Catholic, devotion called the Stations of the Cross. This version was inaugurated on Good Friday 1991 by Pope John Paul II. The Scriptural version was not intended to invalidate the traditional version. Rather it was meant to add nuance to an understanding of the Passion.

Remagen (German pronunciation: [ˈʁeːmaːɡn̩] ) is a town in Germany in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, in the district of Ahrweiler. It is about a one-hour drive from Cologne, just south of Bonn, the former West German seat of government. It is situated on the left (western) bank of the river Rhine. There is a ferry across the Rhine from Remagen every 10–15 minutes in the summer. Remagen has many notable and well-maintained buildings, churches, castles and monuments. It also has a sizeable pedestrian zone with plenty of shops.

Overlooking the west bank of the Rhine just north of the city centre is the Apollinariskirche. It has an observation deck that is only open to parishioners on Sundays. Pedestrians reach the church via a dirt trail that passes a series of roadside monuments representing each of the fourteen Stations of the Cross. The church grounds contain an outdoor crypt and an abbey. Further down the river is one of the many castles along the Rhine, perched even higher than the Apollinariskirche.

A calvary, also called calvary hill, Sacred Mount, or Sacred Mountain, is a type of Christian sacred place, built on the slopes of a hill, composed by a set of chapels, usually laid out in the form of a pilgrims' way. It is intended to represent the passion of Jesus Christ and takes its name after Calvary, the hill in Jerusalem where Jesus was crucified.

These function as greatly expanded versions of the Stations of the Cross that are usual in Catholic churches, allowing the devout to follow the progress of the stages of the Passion of Christ along the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem. Each chapel contains a large image of the scene from the Passion it commemorates, sometimes in sculpture, that may be up to life-size. This kind of shrine was especially popular in the Baroque period when the Holy Land was under Ottoman Turkish rule and it was dangerous and highly difficult to make a pilgrimage to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.