: Catechesis on the Triduum :
ANTICIPATING THE THREE DAYS - The Triduum
(From Holy Thursday through to Easter Sunday)
This material has been modified from a document written by Lucille Lang. The original work has served as the basis of parish catechesis and preparation for the Triduum at St. Bernadette Parish.
Annual Festival
In every Catholic liturgy we celebrate the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which we call the paschal mystery. We do this in the eucharist every Sunday of the year. However, once a year we celebrate this mystery in a three-day festival known as the Paschal Triduum ('tri-ju-wem). The Triduum defines who we are as Catholics. It celebrates the truths that are the core of our faith, and it is the life-blood that keeps our faith alive. As the baptized, it is our right and our privilege to participate in the Triduum and to expect to encounter God there.
The Three Days of Easter
The Paschal or Easter Triduum is so full of meaning that we take forty days to prepare for it (Lent), three days to celebrate it (the Triduum), and fifty days to rejoice in it (Easter Season). The three days of the Triduum are actually considered one, lasting from sundown Holy Thursday to sundown Easter Sunday. The liturgies of the three days flow from one into the next, like a great banquet with many courses. Each part celebrates the entire mystery of our redemption and each part is integral to the whole. Holy Thursday is Easter, Good Friday is Easter, and the Easter Vigil is Easter, as much as Easter Sunday. We do our best to take part in each liturgy each day because it is one continuing feast.
Sacred Time
The three days are sacred time. In addition to participating in the liturgies we try to observe the spirit of the time by setting aside our normal activities: like work, social engagements, entertainment, food except for the simplest nourishment. We do all this so that we might spend time with Christ: to serve, to suffer, to die and to rise.
Lived Experience
Like all Catholic liturgy, the Triduum is a lived experience. It is not historical re-enactment but ritual remembering or anamnesis ('a-nam-nee-sis). It is celebrating and representing those salvation events from our past in ways that make it possible for us to participate in them now. This kind of remembering helps us to fully absorb the truths of our faith into our own lives. It serves to transform us into what we believe! This is sacrament - a living experience of God - and it enriches our lives beyond measure.
Our Own Paschal Mystery
In the Triduum we believe that the God, who was present in the historical events of two thousand years ago, is also present today. We believe that the God who commissioned Jesus to his life of service, raised Jesus from the dead, and sent the Holy Spirit into the world, is giving each of us the grace to live as Jesus did. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, this kind of experience gives us an ability to graft ourselves onto Christ in his paschal mystery. That makes it possible for us to celebrate our own paschal mystery - our own living, our own rejoicing, our own dying, our own suffering - whatever it may be.
ANTICIPATING THE THREE DAYS
Glory In the Cross
Our solemn entrance into the Paschal or Easter Triduum takes place on the evening of Holy Thursday. "Let us ever glory in the cross of Christ, our salvation and our hope." The words of our gathering hymn launch us into our three-day festival, devoted to celebrating our salvation through the cross of Christ. In one of the most beautiful liturgies of the year we celebrate the mysteries of our faith with song, word, and symbol.
Celebration of the Lord's Supper - Holy Thursday
Our entrance procession is more elaborate this night, often with incense, the processional cross, and the holy oils consecrated and blessed by our Archbishop at the Chrism Mass in the presence of all the priests of the diocese. We will use these oils in several of our sacraments, to initiate our elect and candidates at the Easter Vigil, for baptisms and confirmation throughout the year, and for anointing of the sick. We hear the story of the first Passover, when God delivered the Israelites from slavery and instructed them to remember it forever by eating a special meal together. We hear the story of Christ becoming the new Passover meal, giving us his body and blood for food and instructing us to remember him by sharing that meal together. We hear the story of Christ washing the feet of his disciples, showing us another way to remember him. We experience the ritual washing of the feet, by humbly washing the feet of others, by submitting to having our own feet washed, or by uniting ourselves to the gesture in quiet solidarity. In our prayerful participation we commit ourselves to love as Christ loves, to be of service to one another. Remembering Christ's agony in the garden and the events leading up to Good Friday we empty our church, stripping the altar and reverently carrying the Blessed Sacrament to a place of prayer. We are invited to keep watch with Christ present in the Blessed Sacrament. This continues until midnight. We depart in silence. At home we begin a paschal fast. On Good Friday and Holy Saturday we eat little and fast from the noise and distraction of our daily life, so that we might come to the Vigil feast hungry and open to the gifts awaiting us there.
Celebration of the Lord's Passion - Good Friday
On Good Friday we grieve for what Jesus suffered but not without hope. Our liturgy is austere but not a funeral nor a passion play. It is our celebration of the Lord's Passion. We proclaim the Passion from St. John, the gospel where God's glory is present and active in the midst of suffering. Jesus reigns from the cross. His crucifixion is his glorification, his victory over evil and death. "Let us ever glory in the cross of Christ, our salvation and our hope." We lift up our prayers to God for the Church, for the world, for all peoples, for the suffering, the sick, the dead. We bring in the cross, symbol of our salvation. We venerate it together. We depart in silence.
This Is the Night - The Easter Vigil
We have reached the climax of our Paschal Triduum - the Celebration of the Resurrection of the Lord. On this most holy night of the Church year we recommit ourselves to Christ by renewing our baptism and we baptize those longing to be followers of Christ. Our liturgy takes time but we are unaware of time. We are celebrating the fundamental mystery of our faith.
It is during the Vigil that we keep watching and waiting, telling our story in a darkened church. Our readings from the Hebrew Testament proclaim the mighty deeds of God, the deeds through which God established his covenant with us for all time. These sacred scriptures, which we proclaim only once a year, set our hearts on fire. Interspersed with psalms and prayers, they present us with a banquet of the Word.
Hearts aflame with the Word of God, we bring our new paschal candle - large, ornate, beautiful - to be lite. that fire. From our paschal candle we light each other's tapers, sharing the light of Christ and spreading the radiance throughout our church.
By the light of the paschal candle and all of our candles, our cantor sings a summons to rejoice! Our Exsultet or Easter Proclamation announces that this is the night: the night when slaves were delivered to freedom, when Jesus was raised up and death's hold on us broken, when evil will be driven away, hatred take flight and peace settle in. We rejoice in this most wonderful song, holding our candles aloft. In this new light we proclaim the Epistle from the letter to the Romans. "Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?" With great alleluias we then tell the story, the story of the empty tomb, the story assuring us of our own resurrection.
Calling on all the saints, lead those to be initiated into the Church through the church, leading them with the new light. At the baptismal pool we ask the questions whereby we profess faith. They respond and we respond after them, renewing our own baptism promises. They are baptized with water, "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." They are then anointed with the sacred chrism, the oil of gladness, confirming them with the seal of the Holy Spirit so they may shine in our midst like the light of Christ. Our new members receive the body and blood of Christ for the first time and we receive as though for the first time.
Easter Sunday
Our joy spills over into the Easter morning masses, the continuing celebration of the Lord's Resurrection. Our paschal candle is ablaze, we sing "alleluia" again, with gusto, we proclaim the amazing story of the empty tomb, we renew our baptism promises and we baptize our infants. Now we begin the next 40 days of the Easter season, a season to continued rejoicing.
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