If you are a counter-cultural parent, trying to raise your children in a culture where more people are involved in immorality than in Christianity, this special period of Holy Week and Easter can be challenging. Most of society won’t be focused on the significance of this time being the greatest feast in the Christian calendar, but instead will give their attention to candy, bunnies, egg hunts, and spring break partying. Thus, Catholic parents need to make a concentrated effort to be involved in the Easter Triduum and to devote family time to teaching their youngsters what Easter truly is – a celebratory day that represents the fulfillment of our faith and was only able to come about because Jesus loved us enough to go through the excruciating pain of His Passion.
Parents can begin by explaining to their children the significance of Holy Thursday and participating in events at church. Please see my previous article – “Like a Middle Child, Holy Thursday Gets a Bad Rap” – to read more about Thursday.
As for Good Friday, mom and dad should make sure their kids understand that this was a sad day because Jesus was in two types of pain. He suffered the emotional pain of knowing he was being betrayed by Judas, left alone by his Apostles, and put to death by the mob yelling, “Crucify him!” Christ also of course suffered physical pain when he was scourged, forced to carry a heavy cross, got spikes driven through his body, and was left to hang on a cross to suffocate.
Your little ones may wonder why the day is called “Good” if bad things happened. Although some may try to explain it is “good” because something good – our redemption – happened on this original Friday, the actual origin of the phrase “Good Friday” is unclear. It is likely it originated either from the German “God’s Friday” or from the medieval use of the word “good” which meant “holy.”
Regardless of the name’s origin, it has been tradition for Catholics to not be doing “enjoyable” activities particularly between the hours of 12:00 and 3:00 p.m., the “3 hours of agony” that Jesus was first hung on the cross until the time he died. Good Friday is the most solemn day in the Church year, and so our actions should reflect that. At a minimum, it would be good to silence the home during these hours by turning off phones, TV, devices, etc. Additionally, the entire day should be a day for the family to abstain from eating meat, and although Church regulations say only adults age 18-59 need to fast on Good Friday, most children should be able to make this sacrifice too.
A wonderful activity would be to take time on Friday with your kids to meditate together on a crucifix. You can explain that historians believe Jesus’ wooden cross likely weighed at least 200 pounds, so its weight not only magnifies how much Christ suffered as He carried it up the hill to Golgotha, but its heaviness represents the weight of our sins. Help your youngsters examine the wounds in Our Lord’s feet and hands and contemplate how much pain He must have gone through. Recall that after He was pierced in His side by a sword, both blood and water flowed out. As you gaze at Jesus hanging on the cross for love of us, you can tell your Savior how much you really love Him, and how you desire to love Him more and more every day of your life until you die, at which time you hope to then see Him for eternity.
Families should try to get to church on Good Friday – not to attend Mass, since it is the one day of the year no Mass is to take place – but to walk the Stations of the Cross, either privately or as part of a parish service. Jesus said, “He who does not take his cross and follow Me is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:38), and “If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24). Recalling these words and figurately walking the way of the cross with Jesus in prayer, you and your children can recognize that we all have our own crosses to carry – sufferings in our own lives – and we should not fear when we cannot bear them anymore, because Jesus is here to help us.
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)
Recalling Jesus’s death on that original Good Friday brings to mind that suffering is an opportunity given to us to offer these pains to Our Lord in self-giving sacrifice in union with His sufferings. Our suffering then takes on a whole different dimension. Instead of whining with a “Why me, God?!” exclamation when we experience emotional or physical pain, we instead need to realize this is an opportunity to “give it up” (as Catholics are famous for saying).
Most churches have beautiful Stations of the Cross carvings or paintings on the walls that somewhat explain the Passion without using words, but you’ll want to read about or talk about what each particular event is depicting. Kids should be taught to genuflect before each Station and participate in a prayer response. If you are doing your own private walking of the Stations of the Cross, perhaps you can run off “scripts” for your family such as this one.
Also on Good Friday if you can make it to a church, ask your children what is different in the church than all the other times they’ve been there. They may notice the Tabernacle is empty, the Sanctuary Lamp next to it is extinguished, and the main crucifix and possibly other statues in the church are covered up with purple fabric. The covering of the crucifix may seem strange, especially since this day is when we recall Jesus dying on the cross, but by covering the corpus, our senses are heightened, we become more aware of what is missing. Moreover, we grow in anticipation of what soon will come. Similar to how throughout Lent we did not sing “Alleluia” or “The Gloria,” when we bring back these words and unveil the images starting with the Easter Vigil, we can more discerningly feel the joy and realize that through His Resurrection, Christ has “lifted the veil.”
Moving on to Holy Saturday, this day would be a great occasion for a family-movie-night. Older kids should be fine watching “The Passion of the Christ,” but it is too intense a movie for kids younger than high school age. A different idea, that all ages could view, would be the 1977 TV movie, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Because it was originally a weeklong miniseries, it would actually be better to watch over a number of nights, or you could just skip ahead and watch the final two hours Saturday night. Other possible films for family viewing on the eve of Easter include “The Gospel of John,” “Superbook: He Is Risen,” and “The Miracle Maker.”
Easter Sunday should need no explanation or helpful hints of what to do as a family. The ultimate celebration of the Church year includes attending Mass to celebrate the resurrection of our Savior and joyfully exclaiming, “Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed!”
Counter-cultural parents have their work cut out for them to keep the “Holy” in Holy Week. Holiness has drowned under a tidal wave of secularism in recent decades. Our agnostic, faithless society has already made Thanksgiving less a day to thank God and more a day for turkey and football. Christmas has been minimized by calling it “the holiday season” and known as the day we wait for Santa and to overindulge in gifts. Our culture has done the same with secularizing and commercializing the Easter holiday.
May God bless Catholic parents’ efforts at this time when they have ended their families’ 40 days of praying, fasting, and almsgiving, and are helping their kids understand that these acts of self-denial prepared them to “die” (spiritually) with Christ on Good Friday, so that on Easter they can rise with Him in new life in this world, and have the promise of eternal life with Him in the next world.
A PRINCIPAL'S PRINCIPLES FOR PARENTING 
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