An Easter Dress

Our Mission

Ignatians West transforms lives by supporting nonprofit agencies that assist people who are poor or marginalized through the service and companionship of mature adults 50+ who are available to share their experience and talent in meaningful part time volunteer positions and reflect on their encounters in the Ignatian tradition.

This is the day the Lord has made…

Last week my 97-year-old aunt asked if I was getting a new dress for Easter. I laughed and told her those days were over. Later that evening her question and my dismissal of it came back to me. What caused my less than enthusiasitc reaction to her question?

The past couple of years have been trying. Unexpected changes brought dark nights of the soul, occasional tears and flurries of prayers for patience and acceptance of what is rather than a lamentation for what was. Optimism is fluid – up one day and down the next.

I thought about all of this in terms of Holy Week culminating with Easter Sunday and the question about an Easter dress.

Holy Week brings with it a range of emotions. Palm Sunday is joyous, disturbing and violent all at the same time as we read and listen to the Passion of Jesus. Holy Thursday is somber, and thought-provoking and Good Friday drums up feelings of sadness and even anger as we once again experience the brutal suffering and death of Jesus. I left church Friday night in a state of confusion. It has been a Lent of questions.

Where does an Easter dress fit in here? How does a dress have anything to do with something as serious as the death and resurrection of Jesus?

An Easter dress is a sign of hope. It says you are willing to join the celebration. You will put on your best dress and join the celebration of hope Easter offers.

Given the state of the world we live in, celebrating can feel inappropriate. If we truly are the body of Christ we suffer with the people of Ukraine, Syria, Yemen and all places where war is wreaking havoc. We suffer with the scores of families who have lost loved ones to the insanity of gun violence and those who feel the injustice of racial inequity. We cringe at new revelations of clergy sexual abuse.

We also suffer through personal difficulties learning the results of an MRI that indicates abnormalities or the call that our job has been eliminated or even the death of a much-loved pet. Celebrating is not automatic and sometimes takes extra effort.

Hence the dress. Search it out and put it on. The act of entering in often brings with it an unexpected element of joy.

Easter is a time to dig deep and realize that understanding sometimes has to give way to simply experiencing for celebration to take place.

Faith seeks understanding but they do not always meet. Our liturgies, given the prayers, the music and the community have a way of touching our hearts and letting us realize there is something beyond what we know.

May the blessings and graces of Easter - known and unknown - be with you and your family.

Peace,

Anne

Fr. John Mossi, SJ offers a prayer for your Easter meal.

John Flaherty's thoughts on the Triduum offer wisdom that speaks to the soul.

Prayer before the Easter Meal

God of Resurrection and Joy,

in this Easter Season, let your blessings rest upon us

and upon our table, enriched with family and friends.

With Jesus Christ Risen,

we pray for the grace to be Risen in union with Christ.

May we be his vibrant life, hope, and light in our world.

We remember loved ones who now share your presence, as well as those who are not able to be with us.

As you bless us, may we be your compassionate blessing for one another, and for those not as fortunate.

In solidarity with Jesus Christ, may we radiate his risen spirit, life, and love always. Let everyone say: AMEN.

This Easter Triduum

I pray you have a blessed Eastertide. May all your preparation, planning and hard work this week make for moments of beauty, prayer, and transformation in your communities and in your own lives. May the God who loved each of you into being be glorified as Christ rises to new life in you, and through the work you do.

In these Three Days – this Easter Triduum - remember our story to one another in the sacred readings and stories passed down to us from generations past.

Wash feet.

Carry the very presence of Christ in the dark night to a chapel of repose and sing the ancient songs that your parents and grandparents sang on a holy Thursday night in days before you walked this earth.

Adore a cross to remind you of the price that was paid for your ransom.

Share bread that was blessed and consecrated the night before.

Gather in the darkness around a fire to waken the dawn.

Mark and bless a candle made possible only by the labors of millions of virgin bees and let the light of Christ chase away the darkness.

Tell the whole of our story – all of salvation history.

Welcome people into the Church, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and then be sprinkled yourself as a reminder of your own baptism and that we're all connected as a priestly people.

Lay hands on people, pour sacred oil – lots of it – on them to seal them, and then invite them to the table for the first time, giving them the place of honor.

Sing lots of Alleluias on the last of these Three Days as you leave into the dawn that can never be overcome by darkness again because of the one who laid down his life for you.

And rise. Rise with Christ the next day, the Lord's Day, to sing Alleluia again and again. Know that you have been born again. Go out to the world and do God’s work, the public work of the Church - liturgy - in this world so in need of your hands, your feet, your eyes and your compassion.

Remember, don't evaluate, discuss, or deconstruct your liturgies immediately after you celebrate them. Leave that for another day and time. Enter these three days fully. Take care of your own interior life, tending your own fire, and enter the prayer yourselves. Let your experience simply be that and encourage others around you to do the same.

May the work you do make this world a bit smaller and may your work allow someone, anyone, and perhaps everyone in your community, to be reconciled to God and to one another.

Blessings to you during this Easter Triduum.

John Flaherty