The Triduum

For Catholics, the Season of Lent ended Thursday evening at dusk and the "Easter Triduum" began -- our three-day commemoration of Jesus Christ's Last Supper, Agony in the Garden, Suffering, Death, Entombment and Resurrection.

These days have been Spirit-filled for me. On Thursday evening, I attended a tremendous Holy Thursday Mass at St. Francis Xavier Church, a few blocks west of Union Square in Manhattan. For Good Friday, I spent about six hours at St. Patrick's Cathedral -- for the solemn "Three-Hour Meditation on Christ's Seven Last Words" and for the traditional Good Friday service.

At last year's Easter Vigil, Pope Benedict XVI spoke these words about what all this means for our world:

"If we may borrow the language of the theory of evolution," Benedict said, "it [the Resurrection] is the greatest 'mutation,' absolutely the most crucial leap into a totally new dimension that there has ever been in the long history of life and its development. … It is a qualitative leap … towards a new future life, towards a new world which, starting from Christ, already continuously permeates this world of ours, transforms it and draws it to itself."

A blessed Easter to all!