From the Bishops Participate in Palm Sunday, Holy Week church services

Apr 8, 2009

Let the Eucharist have its full effect, changing us into Jesus, filling us with the spirit of Christ

 

The Palm Sunday entry into Jerusalem.

 

The Holy Thursday foot washing.

 

The Good Friday passion and cross.

 

The Holy Saturday resurrection light.

 

The Holy Week services take us in a participatory way through the most significant events in the life of Christ. This week our imitation is as close to acting as it will ever get.

What might be said about Lent can be said in spades about Holy Week: we do what Jesus did and why to prepare for Baptism or to renew our baptismal promises at Easter so to live our lives in Christ.

 

The stage of our acting like Christ is clearly not limited to the liturgy in church. Otherwise, those worship services would be cold and empty. They might even be considered harmful for giving us a sense of being holier-than-thou because we went to church.

 

So, take up a palm branch on Sunday and take it home to adorn a crucifix or holy picture. But let it also be a memento of the Lord’s second coming in glory, stirring us to live in joyful expectation, and reminding us to persevere in our efforts to live our faith (we can be fickle like the inhabitants of Jerusalem that first holy week, turning from Jesus to sin).

 

On Holy Thursday, kiss the hand of the priest who provides the food of the Eucharist, receive it worthily in Holy Communion, and adore it in the chapel of reservation. But let the Eucharist have its full effect, changing us into Jesus, filling us with the spirit of Christ, such that it is natural and unremarkable for us to wash the feet of others.

 

On Good Friday, listen again to the story of the Passion, watch as Jesus walks the way to Calvary, and venerate the cross as an expression of contrition for sin and gratitude for being loved so very, very much. But we take up our own cross, Jesus tells his followers, understood to mean putting to death self, or more specifically a selfish, self-centered, self-serving life. No more “I, me, and mine” or at least not only; but now also “we, you, and ours.”

 

On Holy Saturday, hold a lighted candle in memory of Jesus’ resurrection snuffing out the darkness of sin and death, and renew the promises to life differently, in imitation of Jesus, making the world a different, better place because we try. Allel… (Oops; not yet).

 

Let me take this occasion to wish you all Easter peace and joy.

(Column continues below)

 

Printed with permission from the Catholic Advance, newspaper for the Diocese of Wichta, Kansas.