This year Holy week is different—it is more than just a devotional, this year we are living it. We are truly immersed in the pain, suffering, grief, and confusion Jesus experienced. In this lived experience Holy Week has taken on a different flavor. It looks different, sounds different, and feels different, but at the same time we can still recognize it. That it looks different doesn’t mean that it isn’t any less real or that it is happening in a lesser way. It’s just different. For example, this past Sunday was Palm Sunday. Yes, we were not able to process into our a church with our respective parish communities but Mrs. Noble put out the call to have us decorate our doors with palm branches. She then put the photos families sent making these lovely pictures into several collages that were posted on our school Instagram page. Though this she gave us an active way to live out Palm Sunday and helped to keep us all connected.
To continue living out Holy Week in new ways you can pray along with the video the teachers and staff made of the Stations of the Cross (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIAHqWQdPds&t=8s). You can use some of the other ideas I’ve seen such as putting out a pitcher of water, bowl, and towel on your front door on Holy Thursday as a social distancing way of participating in the washing of feet that Jesus did. Holy Name of Jesus, our diocese, the Vatican, as well as many other parishes around the world will livestream the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Good Friday’s veneration of the cross, as well as the Easter Vigil Mass and Easter Sunday masses. It will all look different and feel different but we will still be living out our faith. God is bringing new life at Easter. It might not be as recognizable on the 12th of April to what we’ve become accustomed to but our Lord is bringing new life and all will be good.
To illustrate how something can look different yet be recognizable I mention the Getty Museum’s quarantine art challenge. Hopefully, if nothing else, it will help ease your stress for a moment and make you smile as you see how folks have stepped up to the challenge the Getty put forth and have recreated famous art in amazing ways. These homemade compositions look different from the original artwork, but at the same time you instantly recognize what it is. Link to Getty Museum challenge on Twitter: https://twitter.com/gettymuseum/status/1242845952974544896.
Bishop Barnes Essay
by Luke
I would like to tell Bishop Barnes how much I liked that you came to our school and had Mass with us. You made it easy for everyone to understand. You were good visiting with the kids and parents. The one thing I wish is that there are more youth groups. I wish you were younger so you could stay longer. It was great having you as our bishop.
God bless,
Mrs. Alhadef
Campus Minister
5th Grade Aide/4th Grade Religion