The Easter Vigil, celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ, begins on Holy Saturday evening. It has three  parts:  we first light the Paschal Candle, sign of the Risen Christ.  Then, we listen to the scriptures that proclaim the wonders the Lord has done for his people and the promises they contain for the future. Finally, we approach the sacraments that are the pledge of life given in the Risen Christ. 

In the vigil the Risen Christ is fire in the darkness and light for our way. As he did for his disciples on the way to Emmaus, he opens the scriptures and unfolds its mysteries for us. The lighted candle, the Risen Jesus, is placed next to the scriptures.

Jesus Christ is the light come into the darkness of the  world; he is life who came into the original chaos and now comes into the consequent darkness of our world. The Paschal Candle is a sign the Risen Lord is in our world now. 

Besides the reading from Genesis, other important stories from the Jewish Torah are read at the vigil. The account of Abraham offering his son in sacrifice is a reminder that God so loved the world that he gave us his Only Son.

God’s rescue of the Jewish people enslaved in Egypt from the Book of Exodus is never omitted from this night’s readings. God’s care for them reveals God’s care for the whole human family now.

Prophets like Isaiah and Ezechiel along with the psalms are also read during the vigil. God’s gift of water, essential for life , has become the water of baptism promising life to the human family and with it all creation.

Paul’s Letter to the Romans celebrating the new life we have through Christ in the waters of baptism and a gospel account of Jesus’ resurrection complete the scripture readings of the Easter Vigil.

After the readings, we celebrate the presence of Jesus Christ in the waters of baptism and in the signs of bread and wine. “Do this in remembrance of me,” Jesus told his disciples.

Can our story of redemption still be told to our generation?

We know from science today more about  the beginnings of our universe than the authors of the Book of Genesis did centuries ago. Earth came into being 4.5 billion years ago, scientists say. 500 million years ago, the first plants made our earth green. 140 million years ago, the flowers, and plants appeared that supported animal and place life. 7 million years ago, our hominid ancestors appeared. 20 thousand years ago our human ancestors migrated from Africa to other parts of our planet. 12 thousand years ago, the first humans came to the place where I’m living now. 

Still, Jesus Christ reveals something science cannot tell from its knowledge of the earth itself and our human family. God made the world and God still sees it good. God still loves us and the world he made so much that he sent his only Son that we might live. God still guides the human family on its journey. God still sends light into our darkness, water that we might not die of thirst. “Do not be afraid,” Jesus said to his disciples when he rose from the dead.

“Do not be afraid, I am with you,” he says to us today.

Pope Leo led the Stations of the Cross Good Friday evening at the Colosseum in Rome, once a site of death in the ancient city.

Here are some thoughts for following the pope, from Fr. Francesco Patton, OFM, from the Vatican website:

“This route is not reserved for the devout or those seeking a quiet space for prayer, rather as in the time of Jesus, we find ourselves walking through a chaotic, distracting, and noisy environment, surrounded by people who share our faith in Him, but also by those who deride or insult Him. Such is the reality of our daily life.The Way of the Cross is not intended for those who lead a pristinely pious or abstractly recollected life. Instead, it is the exercise of one who knows that faith, hope and charity must be incarnated in the real world”.

As Jesus is condemned to death by Pilate in the first station, we watch Jesus unmask “every human presumption of power”. Every person in authority will have to answer to God for the way they exercise their power,” as they start or end wars, sit in judgment, engage in economic activity, or promote or destroy human dignity.

As Jesus takes up His cross in the second station, we feel your own fear of pain and degradation. 

“Free us, Jesus, from fear of the cross. Give us the grace to follow the path you trod and to seek no glory other than in your cross.”

As Jesus falls in the third station, we are reminded that Jesus becoming human emptied himself.

“This fall is a foretaste of an even deeper descent. The descent into the realm of the dead and a surrender to the enigma of death—the fall that awaits each of us at the end of this earthly life.”

As Jesus meets His mother at the fourth station, we see the pain  of all mothers who endure the death of their children, whether by illness, accident, violence, or despair.

“Grant us a maternal heart, that we may understand and share in the suffering of others, and learn, in this way too, what it truly means to love.”

As Jesus receives help carrying His cross from Simon of Cyrene at the fifth station, we find him changed by the presence of Jesus.

“Even today, there are many people throughout the world who choose to do good for others. Many of them do not even believe in you, and yet—even unknowingly—they help you carry the cross.”

As Veronica wipes Jesus’ face at the sixth station, she received the gift of his face.

“Make us capable of wiping your face today, still covered with dust and blood, still disfigured by every act that tramples upon the dignity of the human person.”

As Jesus falls the second time at the seventh station, we find a love that raises up those who fall.

“When you fall, you do so to raise up those who are crushed to the ground by injustice, by falsehood, by every form of exploitation and violence, and by the misery produced by an economy that seeks individual profit rather than the common good.”

As Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem at the eighth station, we recall that presence of women wherever there is suffering.

“Give us tears once more, Lord, lest our conscience fade into the fog of indifference and we cease to be fully human.”

As Jesus falls the third time at the ninth station, we understand no matter how many time we fall, Jesus is there to lift us up in mercy.

“You desire that each of us, at your side, may reach the Father and find life—true life, eternal life—the life that nothing and no one can ever take away from us.”

As Jesus is stripped of His garments at the tenth station, we remember we see the indifference of  authoritarian, the media and our own lack of care before human dignity. 

“Remind us, Lord, that each time we fail to recognize the dignity of others, our own dignity is diminished. As Jesus is nailed to the cross at the eleventh station, we understand that true power is not force or violence, but rather the power of love to take upon ourselves the evil of humanity and destroy it with our forgiveness.”

As Jesus dies on the cross at the twelfth station, we witness His mission completed, as He returns to the Father and brings us with Him.

“We stand before the One who, in fulfilling the purpose of the Incarnation, opens for us the path to fulfill the deepest meaning of our own lives: to become children of God, to be His masterpiece,” 

As Jesus is taken down from the cross at the thirteenth station, we see His death begin to bear its first fruits as Joseph of Arimathea’s and Nicodemus courageously  approach Pilate for his body.

“Even in death, the human body retains its dignity and must not be desecrated, hidden, destroyed, withheld, or denied a proper burial.”

As Jesus is laid in the tomb at the fourteenth station, we enter to the Garden of Eden, where our first parents received the gift of a home but lost.

“Here Mary Magdalene received her mission to proclaim that death has been conquered: Jesus of Nazareth has risen; He is the Lord, the living One who dies no more.”

John’s passion narrative, our Good Friday reading, is different than the passion narratives of Matthew, Mark and Luke.

All the gospel readings tell the same story: Jesus was arrested in the garden, judged and put to death by crucifixion, then taken down from the cross and buried. All indicate the ultimate triumph of his resurrection, but in different ways. The synoptic gospels point to external miraculous signs, namely the veil of the temple torn, the tombs are opened and the bodies of the saints come out, the Roman soldier cries out his belief. 

John’s gospel sees the signs in Jesus himself. His words bring those come to arrest him to fall, Pilate is rebuffed by his presence, the water and blood from his side bring life. He himself reveals God’s glory in his passion. 

Our first Good Friday reading from Isaiah portrays the Suffering Servant, an image of Jesus and his mission. It points to someone raised up in glory and recognized beyond his own place by all:

“See, my servant shall prosper,  he shall be raised high and greatly exalted Even as many were amazed at him so marred was his look beyond human semblance and his appearance beyond that of the sons of man— so shall he startle many nations, because of him kings shall stand speechless; for those who have not been told shall see,  those who have not heard shall ponder it.”

He has a mission of expiation, not just for his own people, but for all:

“Yet it was our infirmities that he bore,  our sufferings that he endured,while we thought of him as stricken, as one smitten by God and afflicted. But he was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins; upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole,  by his stripes we were healed. We had all gone astray like sheep, each following his own way; but the Lord laid upon him the guilt of us all.”

For his saving work, God shall raise him up in glory:

“If he gives his life as an offering for sin,  he shall see his descendants in a long life,  and the will of the Lord shall be accomplished through him.Because of his affliction he shall see the light in fullness of days.”

We celebrate Good Friday with simple signs. We listen to his story, we follow him to the Cross, we venerate an image of him, we receive him in the sacrament.

We pray extensively on Good Friday for many things, because Jesus joins us as we pray. We pray for peace and ask him to take humanity down from the cross of war.

Below are today’s readings and the passion according to John.

Jesus used the Jewish scriptures to speak of his suffering. In Mark’s gospel his only words on the cross are from Psalm 22, a cry of lament. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.” The psalm is a window into Jesus’ mind and his feelings as he suffered and died.

His suffering is so great that he feels abandoned by God. Life and hope seem gone. Still, he holds on. The psalm ends with a cry of faith: “God did not turn away from me, but heard me when I cried out.”

The psalm describes the real, acute pain Jesus endured:

“Like water my life drains away;
all my bones are disjointed.
My heart has become like wax,
it melts away within me.
As dry as a potsherd is my throat;
my tongue cleaves to my palate;
you lay me in the dust of death.”

There’s no relief in his suffering, no comfort from the abuse of his enemies:

“ I am a worm, not a man, scorned by men,
despised by the people.
All who see me mock me;
they curl their lips and jeer;
they shake their heads at me:
“He relied on the LORD—let him deliver him;
if he loves him, let him rescue him.”

The love he knew all his life, from childhood and his mother’s womb, the respect he had from his years of his ministry, the warmth of God’s presence seem gone. Where is God, the psalm complains “ who drew me forth from my mother’s womb and made me safe from my mother’s breast?”

“They have pierced my hands and my feet
I can count all my bones.
They stare at me and gloat;
they divide my garments among them;
for my clothing they cast lots.”

The gospel writers later used Psalm 22 to frame the story of the Passion of Jesus.

Paul the Apostle says in his Letter to the Philippians, that Jesus ” who was in the form of God, emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, and coming in human likeness and found human in appearance, he humbled himself becoming obedient to death, even to death on a cross.”

Psalm 22 describes further what is meant when we hear Jesus humbled himself. Far from being immune to the human experience of death, Jesus experienced the darkest form of human experience: when he experienced death on a cross.

Psalm 22 gives no answer for the suffering. It says only that God does not abandon his creatures when suffering occurs, even suffering of the worst kind.

God did not abandon Jesus on the Cross, Paul tells the Philippians. He “ greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name
that is above every name,

that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue confess that
Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.”

God did not abandon his Son, nor does he abandon the world. “God so loved the world that he sent his only Son,” Nothing in creation or humanity is abandoned by God, the creator. God sent his Son into the world, not to condemn it, but to save it and give it life.

We draw hope from Jesus on the Cross . This is a blessed mystery. We bend our knee before it and confess with our tongue, that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior.

“After this Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfil the scripture), ‘I thirst.’” – John 19:28

After agonizing to the point of sweating blood, days spent in prison, being brutally whipped and crowned with thorns, and after the long road to Calvary carrying his cross, is it not too trivial to speak of thirst? I believe the Lord was calling our attention elsewhere, and the Church shows the way to us with the Scripture readings chosen for this holy season. This year, we were told on the second Sunday of Lent that, just before his Passion, Jesus was transfigured on Mount Tabor, shown together with Moses and Elijah in splendor, speaking of his coming Exodus.

On the following Sunday, we read from the book of Exodus. After having been delivered from slavery and brought through the Red Sea, the people of Israel grew increasingly weary from thirst and became angry that Moses ever led them into the desert. “Why did you ever make us leave Egypt? Was it just to have us die here of thirst with our children and our livestock?” they cry. Moses, tried but never abandoned by God, was instructed to take the same staff with which he parted the Red Sea, and to strike a rock from which came a stream of water for the people to drink.  Here, we can see Jesus in both Moses and in the people. Like the Israelites, he himself was dying of thirst, perishing on the wood of the Cross like they were perishing in the desert.  Just as Moses drew water from the rock, so did water come forth from Jesus’s pierced side. In his humanity, Jesus suffers exactly as we do, thirsting not just for water but for our love, for lost souls to return to him, and for a world healed from strife and division. In his divinity, he refreshes our spirit to strengthen us on our journey to Heaven. He brings us life through the waters of Baptism, in which catechumens across the world will be washed tomorrow night and raised to a new life of grace. Along with the water from his side came his precious blood, in which we are washed whenever we seek forgiveness in the sacrament of Confession.

Paired with the reading from Exodus is the Gospel passage of the Samaritan woman at the well, when Jesus asks her to give him water to drink. As though the Lord completely lost interest in his need for water, he tells her “If you knew the gift of God and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” The one who drinks this water, he tells us, will never thirst again. Though Jesus is himself the source of this living water, he did not avail himself of it. “I thirst” – in his Passion, he drinks only from the cup of suffering given to him in Gethsemane. Though master of the universe, he is content to allow himself to be deprived not just of water, but of any feeling of comfort or relief. Our Lord chose to suffer in the greatest measure he could. He brought together in one act the suffering and longing of humanity with the mercy and compassion of God. On the Cross, he is both the Lamb of God and the Good Shepherd, both the sacrificial lamb and the high priest. The Passion is both the greatest revelation of the love of God for man, as well as the perfect expression of man’s love for God – a pure gift of self to bring about the Kingdom on earth. 

We all thirst, if not for water then perhaps for understanding, compassion, or meaning, and above all we thirst for Christ. Our world certainly thirsts for peace and justice. In remembering this act of God’s immense love, we are reminded of the hope that comes with our longing. Today, we can turn to Jesus for this living water. Let us pray that in two days, we may rise to new life with him, and that we can bring this water to those close to us and to a world which is ever thirsting for the coming of Christ’s Kingdom. 

Daniel Ogulnick

Tenebrae for Good Friday begins with a reflective reading of Psalm 22, a psalm quoted 13 times in the gospel stories of the Passion of Jesus. The psalm reveals someone in the midst of hard suffering, yet with no bitterness, no complaints of injustice, no lashing out against an enemy. It reveals Jesus in his Passion to us.

“We meet a simple abandonment into the hands of God, and in this surrender there is peace. The psalmist asks so little of God; only that God hear his cry of abandonment. (v.2) Once God induces a mystic presence so that the psalmist can whisper ‘You heard me’ (v 21) the psalm modulates into a song of Thanksgiving.

“The psalm leads us into the suffering heart of Jesus,” who does not simply reflect on his own sufferings; he identified himself with the agony and faith of generations of persecuted, afflicted peoples.”
(Fr. Carroll Stuhlmueller, CP, Psalm 1, Wilmington, Del, USA 141-151)

In his passion, then, Jesus is aware of more than his own suffering. Our reading from the Letter to the Hebrews sees Christ as high priest of the good things that have come to be. “ (Hebrews 9, 11-28)

What are “the good things that have come to be? ” Even on Calvary we see them. Blood and water flow from his side as the soldier pierces him with a lance. Blood and water are universal signs of life. Humans need both to live.

In our final reading for Tenebrae, Saint John Chrysostom sees in blood and water Christ fashioning his church, as Eve was fashioned from Adam’s side as he slept a deep sleep. Blood and water are signs of Christ’s gift of life to us. He offers us life-giving sacraments.

The saint says further: “As a woman nourishes her child with her own blood and milk, so does Christ unceasingly nourish with his own blood those to whom he himself has given life.”

More than whips and thorns and nails, good things come about on Calvary. Jesus give us life here, life that conquers darkness and death.