I hope you all had as lovely an Easter celebration as I did. During the Friday liturgy, I realized something for the first time that colored my participation in the weekend liturgies – something I read from Fr. Z – that the Church dies with Christ on Friday, & rises with him Saturday night. As the Lord in the Eucharist disappears from the Church’s altars, the Bride weeps without her Groom & cannot live without him. Mary, not as Bride, but as the Mother present at Golgotha, descends to the grave with her Son & mourns throughout the night, awaiting the first rays of morning light & life to touch her tear-sodden face. How dreadful a thing is a Bride without her Groom, a Mother without her Son. Then how she rejoices at his return!
It’s a bit more than a metaphor, though – the Church throughout the world foregoes her true source of strength, sanctity, & life. She is a Church unable to move, unable to speak, unable to breathe. A Bride with her heart broken. A Bride in waiting. An empty tabernacle is a tomb all its own.
The Vigil never fails to move the soul – the Church never being more who she is than when celebrating her risen Lord & bearing him new children of God through holy Baptism, Confirmation, & finally consummating her love for him by celebrating the Eucharist again.
Sunrise Mass this morning at St. Thomas lived up to its promise. The pink & peach light shining through the clouds & beaming through the windows fulfilled the Psalm that heavens tell the glory of God.
If the day started beautiful, it only grew more so. The Afternoon E.F. Mass at St. Therese in Clinton was for me like new life breathed into dead lungs. The chants & hymns & motets filled the ears as sweetly as the incense filled the nostrils. “Gloria in excelsis Deo!” & “Victimae Paschali laudes!” simply filled the soul with gladness.
2 comments:
There's a replica of this Icon at our Cathedral in downtown KC, MO. Small world. :-)
It is actually a photo I took of an icon Fr. Al brought with him when he was giving a talk at St. Thomas a couple of years ago. I've heard the cathedral there is really impressive.
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