Message of Abbot Paul - Holy Saturday
Message from Fr Paul for Saturday, 18th April 2022
We are all horrified at the prospect of further and even worse fighting in the war that is devastating Ukraine. Surely far more help should be given to our Ukrainian brothers and sisters to put an end to this senseless and criminal aggression, destruction and death. Equally distressing, I find, is the British government’s decision to deport migrants to Rwanda, a country that, tragically, in recent times couldn’t even make its own people welcome. I must confess that I feel deeply ashamed to be British. It’s not that long ago, well within my lifetime, that lodging houses in parts of this country advised, “No Irish, blacks or dogs.” What an indictment on a nation, but has nothing changed? I pray for the conversion of Putin, but I also pray for the conversion of our own prime minister and his cabinet.
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Today is Holy Saturday, when Jesus lay in the silent darkness of the tomb. He had been buried hastily, thanks to the generosity of Joseph of Arimathea, who was helped by Nicodemus. They were both secret disciples of Jesus, yet brave enough, after his crucifixion, to step forward and claim the body of the Lord from Pontius Pilate. We read in John’s Gospel, for example, what occurred after this death on Good Friday. “After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body, Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus[e] by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds[f] in weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews. Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. So because of the Jewish day of Preparation, since the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there.” (Jn 19: 38-42) Once he was buried, they had to leave him there in the tomb. Nothing further could be done, as it was the Sabbath. Jesus rested in the tomb on the Sabbath day, in fact, from the setting of the sun on Good Friday to just before dawn on the first day of the week, the day that would become the Lord’s day or Sunday. The women who had been present on Calvary knew where Jesus was buried, but waited until very early in the morning on the first day of the week to visit the tomb with spices, as was the custom.
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In the Roman Church, which has the simplest and most austere of all the liturgical practices of the ancient, historic Churches, we have no special services, other than a very basic celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours, between the Good Friday Liturgy of the Passion and the Easter Vigil that should really be celebrated before dawn on Easter Sunday rather than on Holy Saturday evening. We simply watch and wait before the Holy Sepulchre, contemplating his death and looking forward to his Resurrection. It’s a day for quiet reflexion and prayer. Let’s not waste it.
