A Reflection On Holy Week | Easter Is The Opportunity For The Whole Church To Proclaim Our Creed

Our School Youth Group recently organised a Palm Sunday procession to commemorate Holy Week. During the procession, I offered a reflection to over eighty students who attended during their Lunch break to learn more about why the Catholic Church stops to commemorate Holy Week and meditate on her Redeemer's Passion, death and Resurrection. In this short article, I reflect on why the Church punctuates her liturgical life with this most sacred week leading up to Easter. 

Firstly, Palm Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week, the most sacred week in the liturgical calendar of the Catholic Church. On Easter Sunday, the Catholic Church celebrates the glorious Resurrection of her Redeemer, Jesus Christ, from the dead. However, prior to His rising from the dead, our Lord and Saviour had to endure a most violent death the Cross, a Roman crucifixion. He willingly suffered for our sins and was obedient unto death for the salvation each human person. So, my reflection to the students first consisted of bringing to light the immense and infinite love that Jesus Christ has for each human person. 

Secondly, the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that Christ died a redemptive death. The great Apostle, St Paul, confirms that “Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3). This means that by his Passion, death and Resurrection, Jesus Christ merits for the whole human race the gift of divine forgiveness. [1] Through Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven. Through Jesus Christ who died for our sins, we become a redeemed people; a chosen people—a holy Church​​—who have been reconciled with God the Almighty Father. Moreover, the fact that Jesus rose from the dead also means that He “crushed death.” [2] The celebration of Easter therefore anticipates our own supernatural destiny, where we too will experience a bodily resurrection from the dead at the end of time. Against this backdrop, my reflection to the students finally consisted of deepening their understanding that when the Catholic Church celebrates Easter, she is not only commemorating the sacrifice of our Lord on Calvary, but also celebrating the fact that He conquered and defeated death. Thus, Easter is the opportunity for the whole Church to proclaim our Creed and belief in the resurrection of the dead and life everlasting.

  So, to summarise, I presented to the students the Church’s eschatological vision of the human person: that through Jesus Christ, every faithful Christian believer will experience a bodily resurrection at the end of time, having been redeemed and reconciled with God the Almighty Father through the Blood of the Lamb. In a word, we too will rise from the dead in Christ. Thus, when the Church commemorates Holy Week, she is recalling the Passion and death of Christ, celebrating the glorious feast of Easter, and looking forward towards the supernatural destiny of the entire People of God, namely, to live forever with Love in Heaven in our glorified bodies.

[1] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Vatican City: Vatican Press, 1997), 613.

[2] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1169.