Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion
Every year, priests are asked to take a spiritual retreat. On a merely physical level, it’s an opportunity to “recharge the batteries,” that can be drained by spending himself for his people. On a spiritual level, it’s an opportunity to deepen his relationship with the Lord, to grow in the Theological virtues of faith, hope, and love. Jesus Himself invited the Twelve to take a brief retreat in Mark 6:31, when Jesus said, “‘Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.’” Mark notes that there were large numbers of people who had been coming to see Jesus, and the apostles and Jesus were often missing meal time, so they went off in a boat “to a deserted place.”
But retreats aren’t only for priests. The lay faithful, too, are encouraged, to the extent possible, to take a yearly retreat. Before COVID, our great retreat center in DeWitt offered different tailored retreats to men, women, married couples, and other groups. As we get through this pandemic you can make sure and check their webpage for upcoming retreat opportunities.
But I get that retreats are especially hard for those who are still working and/or who are caring for dependents. For many Catholics, a retreat is something that they hear about that other people do, but nothing they take advantage of for themselves.
So this year, for our upcoming Sacred Triduum–Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday–I want to encourage you to think about the opportunities for prayer as a chance to retreat, to take some extra time with the Lord. We’ve added times for prayer, but there’s also the times when the Church is simply open and quiet, when you can come and spend time with Jesus.
Jesus Himself, as we heard in our Passion Narrative today, took time to pray in the Garden of Gethsemane as He was preparing for His Passion and Death. He asked St. Peter, “‘Could you not keep watch for one hour?’” Come to the Mass of the Lord’s Supper at 7 p.m. on Holy Thursday, and pray with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane after the Mass. Pray for the openness to what the Lord wants to share with you during these holy days of the Lord’s Passion. Sign-up for 30 minutes or and hour to spend with Jesus in our Community Room Gethsemane, which will start after Mass and go until 10 p.m. Most of that time is simply silent, with the Blessed Sacrament. But it’s a powerful time to pray and spend with Jesus.
For Good Friday, we’ll have four opportunities for you to come and spend time with Jesus. The church will be stripped, and we’ll start with Daytime Prayer, part of the Liturgy of the Hours, the official prayer of the Church, at noon. Then at 12:30 we’ll continue with Stations of the Cross, the great devotion of walking with Jesus as He walked to Calvary to die for love of us. It’s then that we can ponder our own crosses, our own falls on the path the God has allowed us to walk. At 3 p.m., the hour that Jesus died, we’ll recall His Death on the Cross, and venerate the cross that saved us from sin and death. And then at 8 p.m. Good Friday night, we’ll hear the powerful and sorrowful psalms and readings that point to the price that was paid for our salvation. And, if any of those exact times don’t work, feel free to come to the church any time between 11:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. to spend time with Jesus.
Holy Saturday is our day of watching and waiting. We know the rest of the story, but we put ourselves into the place of the Apostles and faithful disciples who didn’t know what to do after Jesus had died. We wait in the great silence of the day that Jesus’ Body remained in the Tomb, while His Soul descended to hell, the place of the dead, to rescue to the souls of the just and escort them into heaven. We’ll have a powerful set of readings at 8:30 a.m., and then bless any Easter food you bring at 12:30 p.m. On that day of silence, the expectation of what we know will happen that night pushes us to be patient with God’s will as it becomes known to us in our daily lives, especially in the sufferings that we endure, often not seeing the future risings that will come from them. And then, at 8:30 p.m., we’ll begin our solemn Easter Vigil, the Night of Nights, when sorrow turned to joy, darkness turned to light, and death was conquered by Life Himself.
It’s only a three-day retreat, and it’s not the full three days, but you’ll have a great opportunity to take time away with the Lord, to give Him all that is on your heart right now, to rest with Him. This is a beautiful way that we accompany Jesus during His Passion, doing for Jesus what He does for us in all our sufferings: stay with us, encourage us, pray with us. Don’t miss out on this opportunity of our Triduum retreat. Recharge your spiritual batteries; come to be with Jesus; rest with Him.