Lenten Penance Schedule - April 11th
Penance Service 7:00 P.M.

Holy Thursday - April 18th
Liturgy of the Hours 7:00 A.M.
Mass of the Lord's Supper 7:30 P.M. (Bilingual)

Good Friday - April 19th
Liturgy of the Hours 7:00 A.M.
Commemoration of the Lord's Passion 6:00 P.M. (English) and 8:00 P.M. (Spanish)

Easter Vigil - April 20th
Liturgy of the Hours 7:00 A.M.
Easter Vigil Mass 9:00 P.M.

Easter Sunday - April 21st
Mass 9:30 A.M. (English)
Mass 12:00 P.M. (Spanish)
Easter Egg Hunt right after 9:30 A.M. Mass

Divine Mercy Novena
Good Friday and Holy Thursday 7:00 p.m. at the parish office
April 21st until April 27th Divine Mercy 7:00 P.M. at the church

Days of Fast & Abstinence: Good Friday, limit of one full meal for all between ages 18 and 59 inclusive.

Days of Abstinence: (All Fridays in Lent) All who have reached their 14th year are bound to abstain totally from meat.

Parish Office will close at noon on Wednesday, April 17th, and will reopen on Tuesday, April 23rd at 9:00 a.m.
 

If there were a "Catholic Super Bowl," Holy Week is it.  Every year, starting on Palm Sunday and running through Easter Sunday, Catholics gather around the world to celebrate the events of the passion, death, and resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  The Triduum, the Great Three Days, are the main events of this holy week, "to which all leads and from which all flows."

Day One begins on Holy Thursday evening with "The Evening Mass of the Lord's Supper."  This beautiful liturgy gives us a brief glimpse of what is to come, what is waiting on the other side of the Passion.  For just a moment we experience bells, the color white, and the Gloria.  We wash the feet of parishioners to remind us of what Jesus did for His own at the last supper(and what we are called to do as Christians). We celebrate the institution of the Eucharist and process with Jesus, just as His disciples did on that last night from the upper room to the garden of Gethsemane.  In those moments following his departure, the church is stripped of all signs of celebration in order to prepare ourselves and this sacred space for the suffering and death of our Lord.  Day Once continues until sundown on Good Friday.  In the afternoon hours of this first day, we will gather for the Celebration of the Lord's Passion.  During this service (not a Mass), we recall the suffering and death of our Lord through the reading of the Passion from the Gospel of John.  We come forward to venerate the cross, paying homage to the wood that bore the body of Jesus, the body that bore the sin of the world.  We conclude by receiving the Eucharist that was consecrated the previous evening.  We depart in silence.

On Day Two, which runs from Good Friday sundown to Holy Saturday sundown, we rest.  There are no Masses held.  "In burial, the Lord rested, and we rest in him (even from liturgy).

On Day Three begins the holiest night of the year (Easter Vigil) and leads into "the day of days, the queen of feasts."  The Easter Vigil welcomes back the Light of the World with the dedication of the Easter fire and the blessing of the Easter candle (which will be used for baptisms and funerals until next Easter) during the Service of Light.  The Liturgy of the Word traces the history of our salvation, brought to fruition through our risen Lord.  The Elect are welcomed into the fullness of the Catholic Church through Baptism or Profession of Faith and Confirmation.  All, along with the neophytes (new Catholics), receive Jesus present to us in the Blessed Sacrament.  We are surrounded by joy: white and gold decor and vestments, the singing of the Alleluia, the ringing of bells, and the sprinkling of the newly blessed Holy Water.  We are renewed.  We are saved.  He is Risen.