How Good is your Friday?
For Christians or Catholics like myself, this is the day Jesus Christ died on the cross to save mankind from eternal death.
It's been a while that I have practiced the rituals of the Holy Week. Ash Wednesday, Palm Sunday, The Washing of the Feet on Holy Thursday, The Way of the Cross on Good Friday. Black Saturday in Church, with the Lord Jesus wrapped in velvet cloth because he was dead and finally, the Resurrection on Easter Sunday.
Holy Week is really the continuing story of Jesus' sacrifice, HIS death and HIS Resurrection. Truly a remarkable story of a remarkable God made man.
My mother used to tell us that the Holy Week is so sacred that we are not allowed to talk loud, make noise, nor take a bath :-) on Good Friday. That we should make little sacrifices to commiserate with Jesus as he hang out there saying HIS seven last words. I remember, one summer, in Sta Rosa, Nueva Ecija where my father comes from and where I witnessed penitents flagging themselves till their bodies were soaking red with blood and yet (and this is true, I saw it with my own eyes), after taking a bath in the river where they all end up after the flagellation, no trace of wound/s can be found.
Unbelievable? That is somehow the mystery that remains in my brain till now. I guess, this is the reason I have remained a Catholic all this time.
It's been a while that I have practiced the rituals of the Holy Week. Ash Wednesday, Palm Sunday, The Washing of the Feet on Holy Thursday, The Way of the Cross on Good Friday. Black Saturday in Church, with the Lord Jesus wrapped in velvet cloth because he was dead and finally, the Resurrection on Easter Sunday.
Holy Week is really the continuing story of Jesus' sacrifice, HIS death and HIS Resurrection. Truly a remarkable story of a remarkable God made man.
My mother used to tell us that the Holy Week is so sacred that we are not allowed to talk loud, make noise, nor take a bath :-) on Good Friday. That we should make little sacrifices to commiserate with Jesus as he hang out there saying HIS seven last words. I remember, one summer, in Sta Rosa, Nueva Ecija where my father comes from and where I witnessed penitents flagging themselves till their bodies were soaking red with blood and yet (and this is true, I saw it with my own eyes), after taking a bath in the river where they all end up after the flagellation, no trace of wound/s can be found.
Unbelievable? That is somehow the mystery that remains in my brain till now. I guess, this is the reason I have remained a Catholic all this time.
