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Lenten Reflection Series
The Triduum:
April 8, 2004 Holy Thursday
April 9, 2004: Good Friday
April 10, 2004: Holy Saturday
Click on the date in order to read the Scriptural texts on which the reflections are based.
“Jesus realized that the hour had come…and He wanted to show His love for them to the end.” (Jn 13:1-2)
At the end of January my uncle and aunt celebrated their golden wedding anniversary. They decided to have a renewal of their marriage vows, followed by brunch with family and friends. My dad and I traveled to southwestern Ohio for the festivities to be with them and their children and grandchildren. It was a wonderful time filled with laughs, reminiscences, and the joy of being together. Our enjoyment was made more poignant by the knowledge that, beginning the Tuesday after we left, my uncle would be undergoing the first a severe chemotherapy regimen that would span several months. Saying our good-byes before the ride to the airport was difficult. There are still so many questions of what the future will hold. I know that I was grateful for the opportunity to have that short three-day window together.
For us limited human beings, we can only leave a portion of our selves at partings to show our love – a photo, a memento, a cherished memory. Not so for Jesus. When the time came for Him to bring to fulfillment His mission on earth just before his passion, He wanted to leave behind something substantial, something upon which His disciples could be anchored. He gave us the incredible gift of His own self, His body and His blood. A memory wasn't enough; he left us Himself in the Eucharist.
Tonight the Church enters into its most solemn liturgies of the whole year. We begin the Triduum, the “three days” of remembering the suffering, death, and resurrection of the Lord for us . How appropriate that we begin with the Mass of the Lord's Supper, wherein we not only remember and give thanks for the gift of the Eucharist, but also for the gift of the ordained priesthood, which ensures that the gift is passed on in time in the Church. It is a Philadelphia tradition that priests who can gather at the Cathedral renew their priestly vows on Holy Thursday morning.
These three days give us the opportunity to “try and understand what Jesus did for us.” He didn't give us a parting token, but a gift by which He remains always with us, forever connected to us who receive His body and His blood.
Fr. Joseph Tracy
Office of the Secretary for Catholic Human Services
This year, especially, with all the publicity around Mel Gibson's movie, The Passion of the Christ, people are engaged in talking about this central event of our faith. Hopefully, our conversation will go beyond an opinion of liking or disliking the film, or even seeing the film, and move us to deeper and more personal questions. What is the meaning of the passion, both in the context of Jesus' life and in the context of our own lives?
For me, the simplest and most profound truth that we learn from Jesus' passion is that our God is trustworthy and stands with us, despite overwhelming darkness, suffering, and temptation to despair of that love. Of course that becomes obvious only in the context of the entire Paschal Mystery.
Jesus, having become human like ourselves, was called to believe in a God of tenderness and compassion as he faced overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Throughout his ministry, Jesus saw suffering and yet believed in and taught a God who loves and saves us. The most profound test of that conviction was his own suffering and annihilation, seemingly abandoned by the God he had served. God's vindication of Jesus' faith is in raising him from death, granting him victory over the ultimate enemy, and securing the same victory for us. Do the events of the Easter story transform the way we look at suffering in our own lives? Even in the midst of his suffering Jesus remained mindful of those around him. He asked that his disciples not be arrested with him. He cured Malchus' ear when Peter tried to rescue him by violence. Dying, he prayed for his enemies, and comforted the thief who was dying with him. What a role model for us on bad days!
By his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus has given us the ultimate pattern of the Christian life. Each of us working within the Church is engaged in a ministry of proclaiming that same message of Jesus. We serve a God who cares for those who are burdened, marginalized, despairing, and sinful. We model Jesus' acceptance and encouragement of those God places before us. Despite all appearances, we believe in God's power to raise them and us from the tombs where we dwell. We endure discouragement, mistrust, betrayal. We work in faith, trusting in God's dominion over evil and death. We proclaim the reign of God growing among us despite all obstacles.
Sister Margaret Taylor, RSM
Office for Community Development
April 10, 2004 - Holy Saturday
All you who are thirsty, come to the water.
Water is a theme that runs throughout the various readings of the Holy Saturday liturgy, during which the Church since ancient times has baptized new converts into the Christian community. The liturgy is also time for that same community to reflect upon the “the history of our salvation” which often uses water as a symbol of God's gift of life.
Most of us have no idea what a blessing it is to have fresh water always at our disposal. After middle-class comfort for most of my life, I had the opportunity to live for nearly five years in Nicaragua . It is an extraordinarily beautiful country, with idyllic tropical beaches on both the Atlantic and Pacific, and numerous fresh water lakes. I spent many a day enjoying the refreshment of swimming there. Yet it is also a very poor country, where many people in rural areas do not have running water, paved roads, or electricity. I witnessed the challenging reality of life for those who had to cart their water for miles uphill in large containers on ox-drawn carts. I learned that many children still suffer and some die from severe diarrhea caused by bad drinking water, or from dengue caused by mosquitoes that breed in stagnant water. Even rain can be both blessing and curse—it is essential for a largely agricultural country to yield a good harvest, but too much often causes dirt roads to become impassable, or can even provoke mud slides like that of 1998, which killed more than 4000 people in a matter of a half-hour.
The people of Israel certainly knew the value of water in a land that was often arid. In this light, we hear the prophet say: “Come to the water, without paying or cost.” Water which God created and called good, water which nourishes the earth and produces fruit. Water of the sea which God divided so that the Israelites could pass through, yet swallowed up the Egyptian charioteers who pursued them. Water in which Jesus was baptized by John, and then gave his disciples the command to baptize the nations in his name. And then the apostle Paul asks us: Are you not aware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? The irony of the Christian message is captured in this dual reality that water can cause both life and death. Paul reminds us that in baptism we are submerged into the death of Christ on the cross, we “drown” in the waters of baptism in order to come forth into new life together with him. Just as there is no natural life without natural death, so there can be no eternal life without recognizing that “our old self was crucified with him” so that “we too might live in newness of life.” As the women and eventually Peter discovered on that first Easter morning—the way of the Cross led eventually to the empty tomb and the joy of knowing that “He is not here – he has been raised.” And the Good News is that the water and blood that flowed from the side of Christ have become the waters of new life and salvation for all of humanity.
Edward J. Lis, Office of the Secretary for Catholic Human Services
