Celebrating Holy Week and Easter from Home
Although you are unable to be in church for the festivals of Holy Week and Easter, you want to remain part of them.
We will explore ways in which you can still participate with your local community, despite being physically separated from it.
You will know people who are affected by the Covid-19 virus. Continue to hold them in your heart and mind.
Lent, Holy Week & Easter
The 90+ days of Lent, Holy Week and Easter – from Ash Wednesday to Pentecost, a quarter of the year – are the most significant in the life of the Church.
During Lent, we enter into the life-giving Passion of Jesus, as he begins his public ministry and
- heals the sick
- gives living water
- restores sight to the blind
- raises the dead to life.
Holy Week
On Palm Sunday, he enters Jerusalem, acclaimed by the crowds desperate for a Messiah to save them from the Romans.
Easter Triduum
Soon to be betrayed by a friend, Jesus instigates an extraordinary act: washing the feet of his disciples (the role of a servant).
He shares his life with them in the institution of the Eucharist: taking bread and wine, breaking the bread and sharing them:
“this is my body, broken for you”
“this is my blood, shed for you”
They sing hymns and psalms, before going to the Mount of Olives, where he is betrayed by one his disciples and captured.
After a show trial, he is sentenced to death.
Waiting…
…From the darkness of the tomb, new life.
Mystagogia
In the Easter season the Church rediscovers what this new life means for each of its members and for the wider world.
Ascension: where he has gone, we hope to follow.
Pentecost: We are enabled to witness to the power of new life
Trinity and beyond: we celebrate communion
Common elements for each day
- symbols
- liturgical texts to reflect on
- biblical readings
- other readings
- online art
- recorded music
- hymns and songs (words & perhaps links)