A preliminary text from today’s appearance, from the Vatican: Dear Brothers and Sisters, On Palm Sunday we began Holy Week, the heart of the liturgical year, when we commemorate the great events that express most powerfully God’s loving plan for all men and women. Jesus enters Jerusalem in order to give himself completely. He gives us his body and his blood, and promises to remain with us always. He freely hands himself over to death in obedience to the Father’s will,... Read more
An intriguing take on the new pope, from Catholic San Francisco: Pope Francis is offering the contemporary world the example of Christ as a model of “what it means to be fully human,” in a way that is consistent with the previous two popes but breaks new ground in putting the Gospel into action, Jesuit Father James Hanvey said in an interview with Catholic San Francisco. “Most of the issues we’re fighting are not religious but what it means to... Read more
The Chicago Tribune follows one young man’s unusual pilgrimage: There’s nothing extraordinary about Aidan Gillespie’s daily commute on the No. 50 bus down Damen Avenue. Perhaps that’s why the Roman Catholic schoolteacher chose the train Tuesday for a more spiritual journey. Setting out before dawn, Gillespie, 25, rode every line of Chicago’s “L” from end to end, reflecting on the Stations of the Cross, a devotion marking the events that led to Christ’s crucifixion. Along the way he stopped at... Read more
Found this shot online, courtesy Vatican Radio: the three deacons who proclaimed the gospel at Pope Francis’ Palm Sunday Mass. Read more
From the Vatican: The Mass of the Lord’s Supper that Pope Francis will celebrate on Holy Thursday in the chapel of the Casal del Marmo Penitential Institute for Minors (IPM) will be, by his express desire, very simple, as reported by the Director of the Holy See Press Office, Fr. Federico Lombardi, S.J. Concelebrating with the Holy Father will be Cardinal Agostino Vallini, vicar general of the Diocese of Rome, and Fr. Gaetano Greco, chaplain of the Institute. Around 10... Read more
From CNS: Pope Francis has decided not to move into the papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace, but to live in a suite in the Vatican guesthouse where he has been since the beginning of the conclave that elected him, said Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman. “He is experimenting with this type of living arrangement, which is simple,” but allows him “to live in community with others,” both the permanent residents — priests and bishops who work at the... Read more
And, it turns out, most of them are Muslim. From Zenit: On Holy Thursday, Pope Francis will celebrate Mass in the Casal de Marmo, a juvenile detention center on the outskirts of Rome. ZENIT interviewed a chaplain at the prison, Father Gaetano Geco, who described interesting aspects of his work with minors. Father Gaetano belongs to the Franciscan Family of Capuchin Terciaries of the Virgin of Sorrows, a spiritual family founded by Monsignor Luis Amigo of Valencia, Spain. Although he... Read more
The text, to be prayed at the Col0sseum on Good Friday, was supervised by a newly created cardinal, Maronite Patriarch Béchara Boutros Raï, and written by Lebanese young people with a special emphasis on the struggles of people in the Middle East. CNS notes: A group of Lebanese young people wrote the meditations at the request of retired Pope Benedict XVI; the Vatican released the published text with commentary and prayers on the 14 Stations of the Cross March 25.... Read more
And before anyone asks: yes, he evidently did receive communion. Details: Vice President Joe Biden attended mass and received communion on Sunday at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York where the mass was celebrated by Cardinal Timothy Dolan. At a time when the administration is being sued by Dolan and the Catholic Bishop’s Conference over the Obama health care provision on birth control, the meeting was seen as an attempt to create a new dialogue. An Irish American Catholic, Biden receiving communion was also... Read more
Details: The outpouring of public grief over the death of Diana Princess of Wales marked the moment England returned to its Roman Catholic roots almost 500 years after the reformation, according to the leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales. Acts such as showering the Princess’s hearse with flowers show that the public is reverting to a “Catholic” approach to death after centuries of protestant reserve, the Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Rev Vincent Nichols suggested. He said... Read more
The Deacon's Bench
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