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Masses during Easter Week
24th March to 29th March
Cathedral: 10am & 7.30pm Monday–Friday
no 8am.
10am & 11am on Saturday.
St. Joseph’s: 11am Monday – Saturday
no 8am.
Cloughleigh: 9.30am Monday – Friday.
Friary: 10am & 1.05pm Monday – Friday.
7.30pm Tuesday only.
Poor Clares: 8.30am Monday - Friday.
The Joy of Easter overflows into 50 days of celebration. White vestments are worn, and alleluia is sung repeatedly. It culminates in his return to the Father at the Ascension & his sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
Easter Reflection
Breaking through the powers of darkness
Bursting from the stifling tomb
He slipped into the graveyard garden
To smell the blossom air.
Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,
That I have journeyed far
Into the darkest deeps I’ve been
In nights without a star.
Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,
That fear will flee my light
That though the ground will tremble
And despair will stalk the earth
I hold them firmly by the hand
Through terror, to new birth.
Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,
The globe and all that’s made
Is clasped to God’s great bosom
They must not be afraid.
For though they fall and die, He said
And the black earth wrapped them tight
They will know the warmth
Of God’s healing hands
In the early morning light.
Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,
Smelling the blossomed air
Tell my people to rise with me
To heal the earth’s despair.
Edwina Gateley.
In Holy Week, beginning with the commemoration of Christ’s entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, the church follows the path of Jesus from Gethsemane to Golgotha and to the glory of the resurrection. In the great three days (Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday) the events by which God saved us are celebrated: the gift of the holy Eucharist, the agony in the garden, the passion of the Lord, his decent into hell, and finally his rising from the dead. The joy of his Easter triumph overflows into fifty days of celebration. White vestments are worn, and alleluia is sung repeatedly. It culminates in his return to the father at the ascension and his sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. This is, however, no mere historical remembrance. Through the celebration of the liturgy the same Holy Spirit manifests the exalted Lord continually in his church, keeping alive the promise of Jesus that he would be with us until the end of time. Easter and Pentecost is the centre of the life of grace by which God adopts us as his children. They are our victory over death. |
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