This Holy Week, Pray-Study-Act...

PRAYER - STUDY - ACTION

Holy Week, March 28-April 4

Friday, March 26, 2021

Greetings of peace!

This will be the final Prayer-Study-Action e-bulletin for Lent 2021. For next week, Holy Week, we'll send reflections to you for Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday. We hope that these resources have helped you in your Lenten journey, deepening the experience of the season for yourself, your family, your local group and community. If you missed any resource and want to find it, you can click here on our Lent 2021 webpage where we are archiving all of our Lenten resources.

As always, we thank you for your witness, your steadfast commitment to the peace of Christ during this holy season. May your work and witness be blessed during this upcoming Holy Week.

In peace,

Johnny Zokovitch

Executive Director, Pax Christi USA

PRAYER

CHRIST HAS NO BODY NOW BUT YOURS

By St. Teresa of Avila

Christ has no body now but yours,

No hands but yours,

No feet but yours.

Yours are the eyes through which

Christ's compassion must look out at the world.

Yours are the feet with which

He is to go about doing good.

Yours are the hands with which

He is to bless us now.

Amen.

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> Read this Lenten reflection from Pax Christi Metro New York.

> Join the Pax Christi USA Young Adult Caucus for a Lenten retreat for young adults tomorrow, Saturday, over Zoom, using Pope Francis's book, Let Us Dream. Click here to register today.

> Join us for the final Lenten community prayer service with the larger Pax Christi USA national community this Monday, March 29th at 8:30pm ET. Click here for more information or to register.

STUDY

A REFLECTION FOR PALM SUNDAY

by Joseph Nangle, ofm (originally published 1997)

Mark 11:1-10 | Isaiah 50:4-7 | Philippians 2:6-11 | Mark 14:1-15:47

“At noon darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon.

And at three o’clock, Jesus cried out in a loud voice,

‘Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachtani?’ which is translated,

‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?’” (Mark 15:33-34)

We approach now the culminating days of Lent. In the span of the next eight days we shall move, all too quickly, through the events which we call Jesus’s Paschal Mystery—his sufferings and death and his Resurrection.

Observers have noted that Christians in Latin America place all the emphasis of this week on the sufferings and death of Jesus while we in North America tend to skip over these harsher realities to his resurrection.

Those who reflect on this essential difference in the way Holy Week and Easter are observed in the North and in the South ascribe it to differing experiences of life. The masses of people in Latin America have had little but suffering in their lives and relate gratefully to a God who bore the cross they know so well. We in North America have, by and large, known privilege so that our understanding of the Paschal Mystery is confined to the glories of Easter. A serious reflection on the readings and significance of Palm Sunday, therefore, seems quite in order for us in the affluent world...

Click here to read the entire reflection.

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> Read Scott Wright's reflection for this past week's anniversary of the assassination of St. Oscar Romero, "San Romero and Papa Francisco: Living the Gospel in a time of global pandemic".

> On Sunday, March 28th at 3pm ET, join a conversation with Fr. Bryan Massingale who will provide a candid look at racism with the light of Holy Week. Join the church as we call for truth and reconciliation and prepare for the change required by Easter. Click here to register.

ACTIONS

WALK THE WAY OF THE CROSS ON GOOD FRIDAY

Join Pax Christi Metro New York via Zoom at 9am ET, April 2nd, Good Friday, for the Good Friday Way of the Cross Prayer Service. Click here to find out more information.

Join Pax Christi USA and our partners for the Virtual Way of the Cross for Economic and Ecological Justice, on Good Friday, April 2nd at 12pm ET. Click here to register via Zoom. You will also be able to watch the presentation live on YouTube.

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TAKE ACTION TO END GUN VIOLENCE

Join Everytown for Gun Safety and "Tell the U.S. Senate: Take Action on Background Checks". Read Pax Christi USA Executive Director Johnny Zokovitch's recent article in National Catholic Reporter, "We need more than 'thoughts and prayers'; we need gun background checks". Find out more about what you can do by connecting with and supporting Everytown for Gun Safety.

Sign the AACC Statement on the Atlanta Massacre and Ongoing Anti-Asian Hate, calling Christians and church leaders to make a clear and urgent response condemning this heinous act of hate, and inviting all Americans to work toward the dignity and respect of Asian and Asian American lives, especially women.