Celebrate the Culmination

All Christians will observe the single most important day of the year on Easter Sunday. Easter is when we celebrate the culmination of the longing of God’s people throughout the ages.

Easter substantiates that Jesus Christ conquered sin, death, and the devil! All our hopes have been fulfilled in Him! By dying, Our Savior destroyed our death. By Rising, Our Savior restored our life.

Throughout these past 40 days of Lent, the Sunday Gospel readings prepared the way toward the culminating act of Christ’s resurrection. We are better prepared to rejoice on Easter because we have taken these past weeks reflecting upon and rejuvenating our commitment to our faith. The Lenten season helped us reconnect with Our Lord as we contemplated His strength, wisdom, and counsel. 

The Sunday Gospels During Lent

We read on the first Sunday of Lent about Jesus defeating the devil in Matthew 4:1-11. Our Lord overcame temptations with the support of Scripture. He also demonstrated for us that He has freed us from Satan’s power. 

On the next Lenten Sunday, we read in Matthew 17:1-9 about Jesus giving His Apostles a glimpse of His glory.

Then the Gospel of John (John 4:5-42) told us how Christ gave living water to the Samaritan woman and brings God’s promises for every person.

The following Sunday we read in John 9:1-41 that just as Jesus healed a man born blind, so too can our spiritual blindness be healed. 

We next saw in John 11:1-45 that Christ has power over death itself. When He contemplate Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead, we realize not to fear death as it does not have to be the end for us.

Finally, this past Palm Sunday, the processional reading from the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 21:1-11) recalled Jesus’s triumph entrance into Jerusalem. We hear the praising cries of “Hosanna to the Son of David!” Disappointingly, those will be replaced in just a few days with cries of “Crucify Him!” 

The Easter Triduum

As Lent ends, the Triduum begins. (Pronounced “trih-doo-um”). We reach the summit of the year during the final three days Catholics call the Triduum. This is the period from the evening of Holy Thursday to the evening of Easter Sunday. 

We recall Holy Thursday as when the first Eucharistic miracle occurred. In the upper room that original Thursday evening, Jesus gave us the Bread of Life at the Last Supper, telling the Apostles they must eat His flesh and drink His blood in order to have eternal life. That evening, Our Lord also gave us the gift of our priests. When Jesus told the Apostles that night to “do this in remembrance of me,” He was instituting them as His ministerial priests.

Good Friday earns the notorious distinction of being the most heart-rending, sorrowful day of the year, as we remember Jesus’s crucifixion. Catholics fast and pray the Stations of the Cross, and many Christians practice a Veneration of the Cross. This involves showing reverence to a wooden cross as a physical symbol of the instrument upon which Christ was crucified. 

Of course, the culmination – the summit – the pinnacle – the climactic point – the crescendo – the zenith of everything is Easter Sunday. The stone is rolled away, the tomb is empty, and Christ is risen. Alleluia!

Without Easter, our faith would only be a wonderful assortment of teachings and traditions. But because of Easter, we have proof that Jesus truly is God. That Sunday almost 2,000 years ago was a historic, earthshaking event when the whole world changed.

May you and your family celebrate life, death, new life, and eternal life on this Easter Triduum!