Easter, 2010

The tomb is empty and Our Lord is Truly Risen!

We attended Easter Vigil last night at the Parish of St. Peter with Fr. Angelo Van der Putten, Fr. Eric Flood, and Deacon Rhone Lillard -- all FSSP. Wow. 

I feel so incredibly blessed and fortunate to have been led into the Traditional Catholic movement, where the Latin epigram "Bonum, Verum, Pulchrum" (The Good, the True and the Beautiful) have such significance and impact.

After a Parish rosary a little after 10 p.m., the Easter celebrations at our Traditional Latin Mass began with the New Fire ceremony outside the doors of St. Augustine Catholic Church in North Tulsa.

It begins with the congregation surrounding a wood fire outside the doors of the church, where the year's Paschal Candle is blessed and inscribed with the Alpha and Omega and the year, and then blessed grains of incense are inserted into the candle in cruciform. The Paschal Candle will be burned during the holy sacrifice of the Mass throughout the liturgical year. 

Once it is blessed, the candle is lit from the fire and the entire congregation processes into the darkened church, pausing three times -- once at the entrance, then in the middle, and finally at the sanctuary -- for the traditional sung chant "Lumen Christi!" (The Light of Christ!) and response from the congregation "Deo Gratias!" (Thanks be to God!)

Arriving at the sanctuary, the holy fire is passed to the acolytes who then pass the fire to the congregation's candles and the entire church fills with the warm glow of the holy light of Christ. 

From there the Easter Vigil begins and the next two hours are filled with the sounds of the Holy Prophecies -- readings beginning from Genesis and throughout the Old Testament, prophesying the Birth, Passion and Resurrection of Christ.

During the liturgy the lights of the church remain off and the only light is that of the Paschal candle and the candles held by the parishioners as they worship in reverence and attentiveness (excepting the little ones, who invariably fall fast asleep in the pews.)

The culmination is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and the reception of Communion. But for some reason I particularly love the Litany of Saints -- which dates from approximately 590 A.D. The litany is done in call and response with a cantor intoning for example "Sancte Michael" and the congregation responding "Ora pro nobis".

Here's a link to a YouTube video containing the litany: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiM9uJIN64g

A blessed and wonderful Easter to all! Remember that Easter began today, but lasts for the next 40 days. Let us go forth and transform the world through the light of Jesus Christ, who loved us so much that he willingly endured the pains of torture and death to rescue us from Hell.

Holy Week - The Triduum

Finally, we arrive at the Triduum -- almost at the very foot of the Cross.

As usual I am limping into Holy Week, my soul caked with failed resolutions, splattered with the mud of my failures, and all my imperfections intact. They ride upon my shoulder mocking me and pulling at my beard (actually I jettisoned the Lenten beard about 3 weeks ago, no longer able to withstand the discomfort and embarrassment.)

And so I stand here on the brink of failure.

But little do they know, for my Savior does not share my weaknesses and imperfections. He, strong beyond strength, trudges on to Calvary in my place. He is Holy, He is Perfect, He is preparing even now to withstand the loneliness of the garden at Gethsemane. He knows what He must do, and He alone is strong enough to withstand it. He will save me. He will.

Holy Thursday

Last evening we made it to our Latin Mass parish for Maundy Thursday Mass. The church itself and the holy images of Christ on the crucifix, the saints obscured now in dark purple -- representing penance -- a reminder of how spare and joyless this world would be without the presence of God and Christ. "The world would easier survive without the sun, than without the Mass" said Padre Pio, according to our pastor. Even the holy water fonts are dry, as a reminder of the spiritual poverty we are about to face.

Holy Thursday Mass is a memorial of the Last Supper at which Christ instituted the Holy Eucharist ("My flesh is real food, my blood is real drink") hidden beneath the auspices of bread and wine. He is really and truly present on the altar -- the priest an alter Christus ("another Christ") who has been given the power to re-produce Christ's sacrifice on the altar before him.

We watched as twelve of my friends -- men every bit as holy, and because they are men, every bit as sinful as I am -- patiently waited while our good and holy priest, Fr. Peter Byrne, FSSP, humbly washed their feet in imitation of our Savior who washed the feet of the twelve disciples on that Thursday night two millennium before.

After Communion and Mass is finished, the Blessed Sacrament -- Christ's actual body, blood, soul and divinity -- solemnly processed around the interior of the church while the congregation led by the crystal voices of our women's schola, sang the Latin hymn the Tantum Ergo (Google it) to the altar of repose. Whereupon the main altar was stripped of its altar cloths and the remaining six candlesticks which mark the traditional Mass arrangement, finally the Gospel is repeated: "Diviserunt sibi vestimenta mea: et super vestem meam miserunt sortem" ("They parted my garments amongst them: and upon my vesture they cast lots.")

The rubrics of the traditional Mass say here, simply and finally: "The celebrant and sacred ministers [servers] return in silence to the sacristy."

Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner.