O love, O charity beyond all telling, to ransom a slave you gave away your Son!
O happy fault that earned so great, so glorious a Redeemer!
- Exsultet, sung at the Easter Vigil
It begins with the call of the community to raise up our palm branches and march into Jerusalem; and it ends on the eve of a new week, on the eve of a new Creation, as we gather around the fire and prepare ourselves for the overcoming of the grave. In between, Holy Week, the most sacred season of the Christian year, carries us through the foundational moments—and the founding symbols—of our faith tradition. Water and fire, oil and touch, bread broken and wine poured, the passage of light into darkness and the rising of the light again, the washing of feet and the stripping of the altar: in these symbols are borne the inexpressible mystery of the Pascha—the Passover of the Lord—and the reminder to us that the world, for all its suffering, has been saved by God’s absolute and irrevocable act of love. Our task now is to receive it, in symbol and in substance.
The Origin of Holy Week: The Christian Pascha
For the Jewish People of the 1st century, the central story of their covenant with God came in the Feast of Passover. The Pascha (a Greek word derived from the Hebrew, Pesach, or in English, Passover) was a celebration not only of the events of the Exodus, but of the whole history of God’s love for the Jewish People. A famous Jewish poem of this era spoke of four events symbolically connected with Passover: the Creation of the world, the offering of Isaac by Abraham, the deliverance from Egypt, and the coming of the Messiah. These four moments deepened the meaning of the Pascha, and clearly influenced the Christian understanding of Jesus’ death: for in Jesus’ resurrection comes the New Creation; in him is the sacrifice of love made complete; he is our Exodus from the slavery of sin; and the fulfillment of the Messianic promises.
The dating of Easter reenforces the connection between Jesus’ death and the Jewish Pascha. We know, from various sources, that the historical death of Jesus occurred on either the 14th or 15th day of the Jewish month of Nisan (the Gospel of John places it on the 14th while the synoptics use the 15th). Though it is likely that John’s dating is the more accurate, it also has a symbolic element, since Jesus dies at the very hour when the lambs were sacrificed for the Passover supper (thus, “Behold the Lamb of God; behold the One who takes away the sins of the world.”) In the early Church, the desire to maintain this connection to Passover led to the movable feast we have today, for since the Jews follow a lunar calendar while we follow the Roman tradition of a solar one, it means the date of Easter moves around, being the first Sunday after the first full moon of spring.
Palm/Passion Sunday
The final entry of Jesus into Jerusalem is one of the few stories recorded in all four gospels and is proclaimed even before the procession of the community to the altar begins— indeed, the gospel is often read outside the church, where a formal procession begins. In all the gospels, Jesus, the Son of David, enters the city of David, symbolically taking possession of his Kingdom. Here we see Jesus as Messiah (a Hebrew word meaning “Anointed One,” translated into Greek as “Christ”), a role implied by his riding on a donkey, as the Prophets foretold. Further, Jesus rides over branches and cloaks, laid out to smooth his way and keep the dusty road from troubling him—a practice reserved for kings. Finally, the song the people sing—“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna!” (a song also recalled in the Preface of the Eucharistic Prayer)—comes from the Prophet Isaiah, a direct reference to the Messiah. All these things lead the Jewish leaders to see Jesus as a threat to their power. And if the adulation of the crowd will soon turn to rejection and crucifixion, we (i.e., post-resurrection Christians) know that the praise given is appropriate. Jesus is the Messiah/Christ, though not in the way traditionally imagined. Rather than reestablishing the political kingdom of David, he comes to proclaim a new Jerusalem, a kingdom of justice won not in battle but by the suffering he accepts.
Holy Thursday: Mass of the Lord’s Supper
As the opening of the Triduum (i.e., “Three Days”), the Mass of the Lord’s Supper is one part of a single Great Liturgy, which continues through Good Friday and the Easter Vigil. Ending without a dismissal, Holy Thursday suggests that we are beginning a journey on this feast, a journey that does not end in a single night, but follows Jesus forward to the grave and to his resurrection.
The Mass of the Lord’s Supper, in which we recall the institution of the Eucharist, ironically proclaims the Gospel of John, in which there is no institution narrative. Rather, this gospel tells of Jesus’ washing of the feet of his disciples. In taking the role of foot-washer, Jesus does the work of the least important slave, and thus binds himself, absolutely, to the poor. The act of a slave is how the Teacher chooses to begin the Passover meal—in which all Jews recall their liberation from Egypt and from slavery—and thus, Christ, and the Church after him, suggests that self-emptying love (i.e., the corporal works of mercy) is at the heart of Eucharist, is part of its essence, not a secondary concern added by later communities. This feast reminds us that the fullness of the Eucharist is in the service of others.
Further, by instituting the Eucharist in a Passover meal (as the synoptic gospels suggest), or a pre-Passover meal (as one would suppose from John), Jesus proclaims that his death is a gift of liberation like the Exodus itself. Passover—when Jews break unleaven bread and drink several ritual glasses of wine, offered in thanksgiving to God who had rescued them from slavery—centers upon the sharing of a sacrificed lamb, i.e., the Lamb of God, whose blood, spilled on the door, is the protection of the people, and whose flesh is nourishment for their journey. In instituting the Eucharist at Passover, Jesus uses the ritual bread and one of the ritual cups of wine, saying “This is my body” and “This is the covenant of my blood,” thus declaring that his is the blood that protects and his the flesh that nourishes; and he gives his life to the people freely, before anyone can take it from him. This freely given gift of suffering, accepted out of love (i.e., this sacrifice), seals the new covenant not in the blood of a lamb but in the blood of God’s own Son.
At the end of the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, the consecrated host is taken to an altar of repose, a sign of Jesus’ departure to the Garden and then to his arrest. We are invited, at this point, to stay in vigil with Jesus—to pray in the sacramental presence of Christ, and so to be like “the beloved disciple” waiting in the garden outside the trial of Jesus. But even before this vigil, the altar is stripped and the lights lowered, symbolizing the darkness of Jesus’ passion and death. For the sacrifice symbolized in the sacramental meal, is also— we recall—a true and bloody sacrifice given on the streets of Jerusalem; a sacrifice offered that we might know how much we are loved.
Good Friday
The one day on which Mass is never said is the day we recall the death of Jesus, and the acceptance by God of ultimate and absolute humanity. It is not our cross, but Christ’s that we embrace this day: spectators and beloved disciples, powerless in the face of evil and in the wonder of love. Opening himself totally to God, Jesus invites us to give him every failure, every sin and loss we bear, so that all these may go with him into death and rise with him transformed. A continuation of the three-day liturgy, Good Friday begins where Holy Thursday ends, leading us to the sorrow and emptying of Jesus’ trial and death. Here we pray at the cross of Jesus and watch as he empties himself completely into the hands of God, while never ceasing to love us or the God who seems to have forsaken him. Divided into three parts—Liturgy of the Word, Veneration of the Cross, and Holy Communion—the Good Friday liturgy begins with the story of Christ’s Passion and Death, followed by the Prayers of the Faithful in their most original form. Then comes the Veneration of the Cross, when we do what we can: i.e., not save ourselves, but honor that by which we are saved. This is Jesus’ Hour of Glory, as St. John says, since on the cross he fully unites our human loss with God’s gracious receiving; thus, we venerate the cross, honoring the gift of love that triumphs by holding on to the end. Finally, from the altar of repose, prepared on Holy Thursday, we receive Holy Communion, as a promise and a foretaste of the Easter gifts.
Holy Saturday & The Easter Vigil
Following the sorrow of the cross comes the silence of the tomb, represented by Holy Saturday. On the Jewish Sabbath, Jesus descends to the dead, and we wait—without Mass or any other ritual—until the Sabbath ends at sundown.
In darkness, the Great Triduum Liturgy ends and the Easter Season begins with the holiest celebration of the Church year: the Great Vigil of Easter. Since ancient days, this celebration of Christ’s resurrection has been the time when the story of our salvation has been told at length and new members have been welcomed. In our own day, since Vatican II restored the RCIA, this has been when the Elect, who have fulfilled their Lenten pilgrimage, are baptized and confirmed into the Risen Christ. The Vigil, and indeed, all of Easter is marked by the fundamental symbols of our faith: by fire and light, which drives back the darkness; by story and song, which unite us to salvation history; by passage through the waters and anointing in the Spirit, by which we are reborn in the image of Christ Jesus our Lord. And in all these moments, the greatest symbol remains the Assembly itself, the beloved ones who manifest Christ’s loving action in the world until he comes again in glory.
Fr. John Whitney, S.J.