For most of us, the beginning of Lent was like any other. We chose which Lenten practices we wanted to do, if possible, we made a point to go to Mass on Ash Wednesday, and we settled in for another 40-day season of purple. But we did not count on this: ending Lent and spending the Holy Triduum sheltering at home, social distancing, with sickness, death, economic difficulties and stress looming over us. We did not choose this cross.
Read MoreMost people are familiar with the afternoon and evening liturgies of the Triduum: Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday, the Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion on Good Friday, and, of course, the Easter Vigil Mass the night before Easter Sunday. But there is also another powerful time of liturgical prayer during the early morning of these three days: Tenebrae.
Read MoreOf all the fears and pain we face, there is one we find most terrible. Yet no matter how hard we try, we cannot escape from it: the pain of loneliness, isolation, abandonment. To feel unwanted and unloved. As He was fully human, this was part of the pain Jesus underwent throughout His passion, beginning in the garden of Gethsemane. His pain of loneliness and abandonment reaches to the depths of human suffering when He cries out from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
Read MoreHoly Week and Easter Sunday at the Monastery.
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