Pope Francis uses holy water to bless the crowd at the start of Palm Sunday Mass in St. Peter’s Square on March 29, a week before Easter.
By Laura Ieraci (CNS)
The Vatican’s office for liturgical celebrations, headed by Msgr. Guido Marini, released this schedule of events that Pope Francis presided over during Holy Week.
On Palm Sunday, March 29, starting at 9:30 am, the Pope blessed the palm and olive branches in St. Peter’s Square before presiding at the celebration of Mass. Palm Sunday also marked the XXX World Youth Day with the theme taken from St. Matthew’s Gospel, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”
On Holy Thursday, April 2, starting at 9:30 am in St. Peter’s Basilica, Pope Francis presided at the celebration of the Chrism Mass, during which the oils to be used during the upcoming year are blessed. The Pope also went to Rome’s Rebibbia Prison, which incarcerates juvenile offenders, in the evening, and washed the feet of 12 prisoners.
In April, Pope Francis celebrated the Easter Triduum — from Rome’s Colosseum on Good Friday to St. Peter’s Basilica on Easter Sunday
On Good Friday, the Pope presided at the celebration of Our Lord’s Passion in St. Peter’s Basilica starting at 5 pm. Later, beginning at 9:15 pm, he traveled across Rome to lead the traditional Via Crucis or Way of the Cross at the Colosseum and impart his Apostolic Blessing before returning to the Vatican.
On Holy Saturday, April 4, Pope Francis presided at the Easter Vigil in St. Peter’s Basilica beginning at 8:30 pm. After blessing the new fire and the Easter candle in the atrium of the Basilica, the Pope administered the Sacrament of Baptism and concelebrated Mass with the other cardinals and bishops.
On Easter morning, Sunday, April 5, beginning at 10:15, Francis presided at Mass in St. Peter’s Square before giving his “Urbi et Orbi” blessing (to the city of Rome and to the world) from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica.
Pope Francis breathes over chrism oil, a gesture symbolizing the infusion of the Holy Spirit, during Holy Thursday Chrism Mass in
St. Peter’s Basilica, April 2
(Galazka photo)
For a “good Easter,” Christians must do more than simply recall the Passion of Jesus during Holy Week; they must “enter into the mystery” of the Easter Triduum and make Jesus’ feelings and attitudes their own, Pope Francis said April 1 at his weekly general audience falling in the middle of Holy Week.
During his audience, he also recalled the “true martyrs” of today, men and women who “offer their lives with Jesus” for their Christian faith. Their witness, in imitation of Christ’s sacrifice, “reflects a ray of this perfect, full and pure love (of Christ),” he said.
Theirs, he added, “is a service of Christian witness to the point of bloodshed. It is the service Christ did for us; he redeemed us.”
The Pope began his catechesis, dedicated to the celebration of Holy Week and Easter, by saying that the death and resurrection of Christ are “the culmination” of the entire liturgical year and of the Christian life.
The Pope offered reflections for each day of the Triduum, beginning with Holy Thursday.
With the “prophetic gesture” of washing the apostles’ feet, Jesus expressed “the meaning of his life and passion — service to God and brother,” the Pope said.
Pope Francis washes the foot of
a female inmate at Rome’s Rebibbia Prison on April 2, Holy Thursday
(CNS photo/Reuters via L’Osservatore Romano)
At baptism, “the grace of God washed us of our sin and we took on Christ,” he said. Every time Catholics receive the Eucharist, “they are united with the Servant Christ in obedience to his commandment to love as he loved,” he said.
“If we receive Holy Communion without being open sincerely to washing each other’s feet, we do not recognize the body of the Lord,” he said.
The second day of the Triduum, Good Friday, recalls how Jesus “transformed the greatest iniquity into the greatest love” with his sacrifice on the cross,” the Pope said.
Francis lies prostrate at the start of the ceremony
(Galazka photos)
Following Christ, many Christian men and women today are giving their lives as martyrs, the Pope said. He gave the example of the “heroic testimony” of Father Andrea Santoro, an Italian priest who was killed in 2006 while working as a missionary in Turkey.
Pope Francis during the celebration of the Good Friday liturgy at the Vatican April 3. (Galazka photos)
“This example of a man of our times, and many others, strengthens us in offering our lives as gifts of love to our brothers in imitation of Jesus,” he said. The Pope also spoke about the significance of Jesus’ last words on the cross: “It is finished.”
“They mean that the work of salvation is accomplished, that all of the Scriptures find their complete fulfillment in the love of Christ,” he said.“How beautiful it would be if all of us, at the end of our lives, with our mistakes, our sins, even with our good works and our love for our neighbor, could say to the Father as Jesus did, ‘It is finished.’ Not with the perfection (of Jesus) but saying, ‘Lord, I did everything that I could. It is finished,’” the Pope said, speaking off the cuff.
On Holy Saturday, the Church identifies with Mary and contemplates Christ in the tomb, after the “victorious battle of the cross,” the Pope continued. “In the darkness that envelops creation, she remains alone to keep the flame of faith lit, hoping against all hope in the resurrection of Jesus,” he said.
“Sometimes, the darkness of night can penetrate the soul and we think, ‘There is nothing left to do,’ and the heart no longer finds the strength to love,” the Pope said, speaking about life’s discouragements. “But it is in this very darkness that Christ lights the fire of the love of God.” The Pope said the great mystery of Easter is that “the stone of pain is rolled back, leaving room for hope.”
An overview of the ceremony of the Good Friday Way of the Cross in Rome’s Colosseum.
(Galazka photos)
“As Christians, we are called to be sentinels of the morning, who know how to see the signs of the Risen one,” like the disciples at the tomb on Easter morning, he said.
Pope Francis looks pleased above the crowd of the faithful during his Easter message and blessing “Urbi et Orbi” (“to the city and the world”) from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican April 5
(Galazka photo)
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