As we approach the solemnity of Good Friday, Father Stephen Sanchez joins us to navigate the depths of emotion and tradition that shroud this holy day. Together, we grapple with the weighty acknowledgment of our own roles in Christ's crucifixion, teetering between the heartache of remorse and the solace of gratitude for His sacrifice.
The quietude of Good Friday brings a stark reflection as we explore the symbolism behind an empty church and a stripped altar. These rituals echo Mary's profound sorrow, and through customs such as the Stations of the Cross, we find space for shared mourning and intimate contemplation. Good Friday is a poignant reminder that our personal trials often reflect Christ's sacrifice on the cross, offering both comfort and an opportunity for deeper connection.
Concluding our journey this episode, we ponder the vast expanse of God's love and its significance as we traverse from Good Friday through Easter. We invite you to join us and meditate on the goodness of the Father and let it permeate your Easter celebrations.
Have something you'd love to hear Fr. Stephen and John talk about? Email us at myfriendthefriar@gmail.com or click here!
As we approach the solemnity of Good Friday, Father Stephen Sanchez joins us to navigate the depths of emotion and tradition that shroud this holy day. Together, we grapple with the weighty acknowledgment of our own roles in Christ's crucifixion, teetering between the heartache of remorse and the solace of gratitude for His sacrifice.
The quietude of Good Friday brings a stark reflection as we explore the symbolism behind an empty church and a stripped altar. These rituals echo Mary's profound sorrow, and through customs such as the Stations of the Cross, we find space for shared mourning and intimate contemplation. Good Friday is a poignant reminder that our personal trials often reflect Christ's sacrifice on the cross, offering both comfort and an opportunity for deeper connection.
Concluding our journey this episode, we ponder the vast expanse of God's love and its significance as we traverse from Good Friday through Easter. We invite you to join us and meditate on the goodness of the Father and let it permeate your Easter celebrations.
Have something you'd love to hear Fr. Stephen and John talk about? Email us at myfriendthefriar@gmail.com or click here!
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Speaker 2:Welcome to the podcast. Thanks for joining me and my friend, the friar Father Stephen Sanchez, the Dischouse Carmelite Priest. Good morning, father. Good morning, we're back. Yes, we're back. We're continuing Good Friday because it is so good, can't get enough. Can't get enough Before we get into the adoration of the Holy Cross, which is where we're going to be picking up. Do you find yourself? What kind of range of emotions do you experience on Good Friday? Like? Are you mostly sad or more kind of melancholy? Are you joyful or like? Where do you find yourself nowadays?
Speaker 1:There's effectively right, effectively, and in the liturgy, the liturgy of the hours and stuff like that, there is a sadness, there is a again, this sort of mystagogical experience of loss, right, or repentance, or the desire to grow. There's a conviction right, there's a conviction right, and so usually Good Fridays there, always, I guess the word would be somber. I mean, there's a seriousness about it, there's a quietness about it. There's, again, I think it's a reflection or consideration of what it is that we're celebrating liturgically and what. Again, going back to the catechism of rereading and reliving, you know, to enter into it in a way that is present to us.
Speaker 1:And again, there are people that don't, there are people that have absolutely no idea. There are people out, you know, partying and doing their living, their life, completely oblivious and ignorant of what it is that the church is celebrating during these days, or they're more busy about, you know, going out buying Easter eggs and Easter baskets and what am I going to get, and that kind of stuff, and there's all that which is, you know, it's got its place and it's a good also, but I think for the believing church, this day is a day that is very, again, I think the word is somber. There's something there about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't help but feel I can't help, but I can't escape the feeling, the knowledge, the realization that, no matter how much I love Jesus now right, because I can't say I always have but now, even like I'm the reason, he's on that cross Right, and even though I love him now to the degree that I love him now, he's still on that cross for the same reason, right. So it's it's like if you've ever hurt somebody you love and you know, yeah, like you know that you, you, it wasn't an accident, you made that choice right and it caused someone pain, and just that. To grapple with that Right. That kind of because it can be a disappointment in yourself, like how could I do this? But that's not where you should focus, right it's. It's instead of thinking about how unworthy you are, instead a realization of how good the father is.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's so. Yeah, I can't, I can't get away from that. So it's, it's weird because I'm I'm so thankful, but man, I'm such a goofus too, Like I didn't have to do it. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the brokenness. Yeah it's about the brokenness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all right. So this Holy Cross, tell us about it.
Speaker 1:Oh yes. So the last time we were speaking we were speaking about speaking about the liturgy of Friday of the Passion of the Lord, or what we call Good Friday. We spoke about the first part of that liturgy, which is the liturgy of the Word and puts us in two parts the liturgy of the Word and the solemn intercessions. So then we, once we have finished with the solemn intercessions and we enter or flow into the second part of the liturgy, which is the adoration of the Holy Cross. And I always have a problem with this word adoration, because it's, I think, and for me, I'm, I think I'm much more over the fact of the optic of that, especially for non-Catholics, right, or even for Catholics, who don't know how to distinguish that.
Speaker 1:First of all, I want to say it's not an adoration of a worship of a piece of wood. That's not what it is. Right, there is a cross that is venerated during the liturgy, but it's not that. It's about the whole idea of the reality that this sign is pointing to, the reality of the fact that Jesus Christ, your God, true man, the Messiah, the incarnated second person of the Trinity, has come into our world and has suffered and died for us. Right, and so that is the whole idea of the cross, which is another way, I guess, a concentrated or reduced way, of pointing to or signifying the whole mystery of the passion, the paschal mystery, right? So I always have a problem with adoration. I would rather be just the veneration of the Holy Cross instead of the adoration of the Holy Cross. But yeah, yeah, I'm who am I? I'm just a grunt, so my opinion doesn't really matter. But anyway, that's my two cents on that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, what? And it's good, and I think that comes from a place of experience where, like me, you've probably know lots of beautiful Catholics who don't know how to differentiate and there's too much of a focus on other things instead of God or Jesus.
Speaker 1:Right, so amen A to the men.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So when we get to the liturgy, then this part of the liturgy of the adoration of the Holy Cross, which is what its formal title is. So there are two options in the showing of the cross and they both begin at the entrance to the church, the doors on the inside of the doors, right. And so one option is that the cross or crucifix it can be either one. Usually it's a crucifix, but the liturgy calls for a cross. It could be just a cross with no corpus on it. So the option is that the cross is lifted high at the entrance of the church and then the deacon or the priest then chants or sings the invitation to venerate the cross, and the invitation is behold a wood of the cross on which hung the salvation of the world, and then the assembly responds or chants, sings come, let us adore. So then the ministers proceed to the middle of the church and then again they raise the cross or crucifix and again invite to venerate. So there's the chanted invitation of the chanted response, and then finally they go up into the sanctuary and lifted up one final last time and again invite to venerate, and then there's the response. So that's one option.
Speaker 1:The other option is that the cross, again at the entrance of the church, is veiled.
Speaker 1:It's covered, it's usually a red cloth, it's covered in a red cloth, and so it's slowly revealed. So one part, one arm of the cross maybe the top part or the right or left arm is unveiled, and so it's the invitation to venerate the cross and the response, and then again to the middle of the church, and then the second arm or the second part of the cross or crucifix is revealed, and again the invitation to venerate and the response, and then the final one is they come up into the sanctuary and the cross is fully revealed or the crucifix is fully revealed, and then there is that invitation to venerate. I prefer this one. I prefer that the cross and crucifix be veiled, because to me it's much more mystagogical in that, again, as for me, it speaks a lot in terms of 2000 years later, we're still discovering and revealing and entering deeper into the mystery of the cross, and this is sort of a sign of that Right. So that's why I prefer this option to reveal the cross in parts.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, instead of just here's the thing, we got it Right. You see it, you see it, you see it.
Speaker 1:We got it Right.
Speaker 2:Here it is, Instead it's discovering over and over what is this thing Right?
Speaker 1:Right, so that's my preference, but again, that's, there are those, there are those two options. So, then, what happens in is, after the final invitation to venerate the mystery of the cross, then the faithful file make lines, we file up, and they come, they're invited to come forward to make a sign of reverence to the cross and it and it's acknowledging then the fact that they have been saved and that their salvation came at a cost, and that cost is the death of Christ, which we just celebrated in the liturgy of the word, in terms of the passion, right, the suffering of Christ, and that that is how salvation has been offered to me. And so it is making a sign of reverence. So it's, we file up, and in smaller churches it's good to have just one cross, but, like in larger churches, where you have like a thousand people attending or more, you know it would take forever to do it. So, yeah, they usually might have more than one cross to venerate. They just come up and they make a sign of veneration, which can be you can touch the cross, you can bow before the cross, you can kiss the cross, or you can make a genuine flexion before the cross.
Speaker 1:All of this, then, is part of an acknowledgement that the passion has happened for me, right to open up that capacity of reconciliation to the Father. And there's some beautiful music that can be sung during this veneration. You know Altwander Slav, which is a beautiful, beautiful hymn oh, sacred Heart, surrounded when I behold the wondrous cross, or the the gospel, the gospel, him, were you there when they crucified my Lord, right? There's also another option that I have never really experienced myself, but it is something that is present in the missile that they're called the reproaches, and the reproaches is basically God saying what did I do to you that you refuse to be faithful to the covenant? What more could I do for you? Right? But there was the inability to be faithful to the covenant, which then led to the fact that Christ had to come and to suffer. So they called the reproaches, and they're very beautiful, there's chance and stuff, and so I have not experienced that myself.
Speaker 2:But is it a call and a response?
Speaker 1:Yes, so there's usually two choruses. There's a chorus and they sing one part of the reproach and then another choir will sing the response.
Speaker 2:It's two, two choirs that kind of back to each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I bet that. Yeah, that sounds pretty intense, especially as you're going. You're in line.
Speaker 1:It's taking forever to get up there to the cross. You have to listen to it over and over. Yes, yes, yes, yes, wow. So after you have the veneration across, everybody goes back to their place and then we have the third part of the liturgy, which is the liturgy of Holy Communion. So again, so, since there is no Eucharist celebrated, right? The last Eucharist that was celebrated was on Holy Thursday, the Mass of the Lord's Supper, and so there's no Eucharist celebrated until Easter Vigil, right? Or the night of the vigil, right.
Speaker 1:So during this time, they put the cross somewhere to one side, or sometimes just put it in front of the altar. Later, in front of the altar, what happens and is after everybody's returned to their places, you'll have ministers that will come up. They'll come out and they'll lay an altar cloth on the altar, they begin to dress the altar and then, as they're dressing the altar and they put the missile up on the altar, usually two acolytes with candles will go with the priest or the deacon, and the priest or the deacon, the minister, will be wearing a humeral veil, the humeral veil that we wear for benediction, right? So they come with the humeral veil and then they go to the place of the altar of repose where they're heath the Blessed Sacrament, and then they bring the Blessed Sacrament covered in the humeral veil, so it's covered, so that they're not showing it. So, just like when they take it out for the procession, they cover it for this procession on Holy Thursday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and if anyone doesn't know what that it's like when they're doing adoration and they kind of cover their hands so they're not touching the monstrance and all that, it's that thing yeah.
Speaker 1:That big shawl kind of a thing, right, the humeral veil. So then they come with a Eucharist covered in the humeral veil, they place it on the altar right, and then the deacon or the priest then takes off the humeral veil and then the priest, whoever's presiding, they go to the altar and it's sort of like again if you've ever been to a communion service where there's no mass. So this is the communion service. The priest goes up to the altar, he leads the assembly in the our Father, and then he bows and he recites the private prayer, he geniaplex, and then he raises one of the consecrated hosts and we have the communion service right, and he begins the Behold the Lamb of God, right, and then, as the assembly responds you know, lord, I'm not worthy that, you shouldn't turn to my roof, right. So then they have the distribution of communion. So this is all done very simply, right. Sometimes there's music, sometimes there's not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then it's also a little jarring here too, because if you're missing a whole chunk of stuff, right.
Speaker 1:It is because you're just jumping into communion service. You go like, wait a minute, there's a priest. Why is he celebrating mass? Well, because there is no mass. This is a communion service because, again, this is the church. Still there is nothing to celebrate. We're still kind of in shock and in mourning and in repentance for the passion of the Lord. But there is this communion sort of like, and because of that passion, we are sons and daughters through the passion of Christ. And so there's this communion, there's this re-pludging, there's this acknowledgement, right, that we are still in this mystery of salvation and redemption with the Lord because of his sacrifice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, why do you think, instead they didn't just not have communion today, right on Good Friday, right To drive home even more, that you can't get to Jesus? He's not here anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that would be even more jarring. So I would have to do some investigation as to why we do have the communion service. It might be part of it that the connection to then is the fact that the whole, the blood and water flowing from the side. So this is part of that truth that we have communion with God, the Father, because of the Son through the sacraments, and so here we have communion, and maybe that's what the surgical mindset might be.
Speaker 2:So I'm not too sure about that and I suppose that's maybe a really good point. We are Christian, we have a church, we have communion with Jesus. Even though we're celebrating this whole event, we have the communion with him now and again. It's a communion with everybody else as well, that we're all together, part of the whole body of Christ.
Speaker 1:Thing right, the whole ecclesial thing, right. So then you have your usual distribution of communion After communion, then after communion there is after everybody returns to their seat. Then either the deacon or the priest then puts on the humeral veil again and then, with the two candles leading, they remove the blessed sacrament from the church again. It goes back to the altar of pose, it goes back to the secret room, wherever it is that they're keeping it, and they take the altar cloth off again. So the altar is stripped again. So we're back to this idea of yeah, he's not here, and then, after the priest comes back from removing the blessed sacrament, he comes back to the altar or to the presider's chair and he recites the closing prayer. There is no blessing, because again, this is the liturgy from Thursday, this is Friday's liturgy and we're getting ready for Saturday's liturgy, which is again the vigil of the.
Speaker 1:Easter right, of the Easter vigil, of the holy night, which is what it's entitled. And so then there's this, there's the closing prayer. There's no blessing, there's no nothing. And then the ministers come before and they genuflect before the crucifix, because now the crucifix is there, and so they genuflect before the crucifix, and then the exit in silence, and that's it. And so then, after the exit in silence, and either the priest or the ministers come back and they set up the crucifix in a place, prominent place, usually right before the altar or the steps of the altar.
Speaker 1:Now, usually was surrounded by candles, right, and so this is then the time for meditation, reflection upon the death of Christ, the passion of Christ, the price of our, of our redemption, right, and so then the church, they're just left to reflect on this in silence. And so the church is empty. You, you can stay there and reflect, and stay there and pray Whatever. So usually it's opened, and from three to whatever, or, if it's in the evening, from whatever till 10 or 11, whenever they decide, it's time to shut the doors, and and, and you go home again in this sort of a Jard Feeling of like, yeah, things are not the way they used to be, or things are not the way they should be and there's something missing, there's something, there's a wrongness, the wrongness to it. They go like, yeah, this is not the way it's supposed to be, and so that's part of the whole.
Speaker 2:Then feeling of the Mystic oji, then of the yeah, and that's, and it's so that that, that that awareness that something's wrong off, as you're saying that that this, this, there's an incompleteness or there's a lack, it's not finished the way it should be, I Think is really interesting in in anyone who's ever experienced the death of a family member, kind of thing, right? So for me, I think about when my father passed away and you go home Well, he's supposed to be there, but he's not right.
Speaker 1:There's an incompleteness to the experience right and Sometimes in some, some Hispanic communities with it would be if the back then, when it was held at three, there was a special liturgy for women, right, it was for women and it was basically the hope that the women would come and they would Sort of like the stations of the cross and it was basically accompanying our lady in her sorrow, the fact that Our lady has lost her son, she's grieving the death of her son.
Speaker 1:So sometimes it would be on Friday evenings and sometimes it would be on Saturday mornings before the vigil, and so it would be like so the priest would come or Deacon would come and give a homily on the passion, and then they would, they would pray the sorrow mysteries of the rosary or they would do the stations of the cross, and basically it's, it's just accompanying our lady in her sorrow, and so that was sort of part of the Tradition, that is, that is was present in or might simply present in the Hispanic community, sort of like a continuation of this reflection and meditation.
Speaker 2:Then yeah, that's, that's beautiful, because I think there's so much for us to and this is why I love our faith. There's so much to reflect on and to dig in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I heard somebody was talking about. What must it have been like for Mary who, jesus? He did anything she ever asked for, right? She goes, hey, turn this water into wine, and he's like but mom, do it, and he does it. Right. In so many words, he'd do anything for her.
Speaker 2:He loves her and she probably had no doubt in her mind in those moments that if I were to ask him to save himself Because he loves me, you know what I mean, and so I'm gonna hold back. I'm not going to ask for my son and then for Jesus to be looking down at her and knowing the pain he's causing her With all because I'm at, her life was a mess, and so for all of that mess to culminate into this right, like I'm do, I did this to you, you know, and you're the most undeserving person to ever go through this and I'm doing this. So all of that, that suffering and all of that sadness and all that pain, and and then even on on on top of all that, I Kind of think about Like for her, what must have been like? Just that emptiness after you know, just yeah, my son's gone, and then make you know I would have had some serious doubts and problems with God. At that moment I don't. I would imagine she has a little bit more faith in me.
Speaker 1:but to go really Like this has to happen. Continue to trust in God, in spite of what my experience is right now. Movies mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Okay so.
Speaker 1:For me, I think the most heart-wrenching scene in Zephyralli's Jesus of Nazareth is my favorite, favorite, favorite movie Jesus of Nazareth Religious movie I should say the scene of we call the desolation. The scene is when they they lower the body of Jesus off the cross. It's raining, it's, it's Usurable and it's rainy, and so they lower him down and Then they bring him to her and she's holding his body in her arms and she Wails. I mean it is such a heart-wrenching, gut wrenching Cry and it's just oh, my word. I was like oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, and so that is probably one of the most moving scenes. In it's a Olivia Hussie who plays the Blessed Mother in Jesus of Nazareth by Zeferelli, franco Zeferelli. She got this part After she had played Juliet in Romeo and Juliet. She's a very young girl and so she plays. She plays a part of Mary in Zeferelli's movie, but it is, it is heart-wrenching, absolutely heart-wrenching. On my side in the theaters Everybody in the theater was blowing snot everywhere, I mean it was just Totally, totally crushing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so yeah, I've never seen it. Now I have to go see it. Thank you, father.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's only three and a half hours, yeah, well, and the I Don't know everyone well at this point.
Speaker 2:Pretty much everyone's seen the Mel Gibson's Passion of Christ, which is that's hard to watch of, for obvious reasons because he wanted everyone to focus on the suffering part, but I remember that that was really rough to see. So, yeah, now, now I want to watch this one. Can you imagine? I Mean, I know you don't have, you don't have kids like I have kids, right, you're not a father like I'm a father.
Speaker 2:But Imagine the worst person in the world that you can Contemplate, right, whatever he's done to or she's done to, be that worst person in the world and like to me. I think, could I give up Sophia for them, right, just and not just. Can I get? Could I give her up, could, could she take her place or take his place or whatever. But Like, imagine, like, and say they're gonna get the death penalty or something like that, right, and I would imagine, all things considering, it's probably a lot more, if you can even use the word humane at this point in time in history than it used to be. But, but not all. So it's not just like that. She's gonna be tortured, yes, in his place, yes, no-transcript. And then to think even more.
Speaker 1:And a total and complete rejection. The fact that they picked Barabbas over Jesus, right, the fact that she sees him suffering. She knows that this is what they call, what we would call a kangaroo court. She knows that the whole court thing is set up and he's yeah, it's sort of like, okay, it's all been rigged and the complete and total rejection of of him and again, a very shameful, shameful, shameful death. That is totally, you know, we still don't grasp it Again, because he was crucified naked and we- yeah, we gotta cover him up.
Speaker 2:We can't take that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we can't, we can't, we can't. And it's not talking about pornography or anything, it's just like no, he should be covered Because it's so. There's something even shameful in that. And to be a public execution, capital punishment, and not just capital punishment. Not us not getting your head chopped off because you're a Roman citizen, but the worst possible way to kill someone to do that and for her to see her son, her child, suffer that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and he does it so willingly, right, and like he does it. I love and my friend Chris at work, he loves the scene in the garden too, because even Jesus, as he says, even Jesus is like are you sure about this? Yeah, like, are you sure, are you sure, are you sure you really want to do it? But he does it so willingly and so like to. And then I think again, going back to this example in my head, like if I could, this person who's done horrific things to whoever and deserves death, and I say in God's place, no, just go ahead and take my daughter instead, and then for her to go, yeah, yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and die for you, man, like I can't comprehend it and it like it breaks my heart just even trying to think about it.
Speaker 1:Right, and that's part of the whole mystery, the whole, beyond our capacity to understand of the Paschal Mystery. Right is, and even Paul himself will say like yeah, for someone to give their life for a just man, yeah, but to give your life for someone not just Mm-hmm, yeah because we are so focused on justice and retribution and vengeance and our culture and, I think, just human in our fall in nature, that's what we desire.
Speaker 2:It's like well, what do you mean that guy did that? He doesn't deserve whatever. Right right, right, or he gets that. Well, why don't I get this? Now we turn into the day workers, right? What do you mean? They're paying them. You're paying them the same as me. Yes.
Speaker 1:I remember I don't know if I've told you this, maybe I've mentioned this before in some other episodes in terms of forgiveness During the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, when I was there.
Speaker 1:I was there at our monastery there when that happened and one of the young girls that was murdered died in the terrorist bombing. She was studying Spanish literature. She loved John of the Cross. She would help at our clinic. We have a free clinic at Parrish there in Oklahoma City. She would help at the free clinic there and so she was. She was murdered. She dies in the bombing.
Speaker 1:And then her father, mr Welch and she was Julie Welch, it was her name and Mr Welch, he went on a campaign across the US against capital punishment because he didn't want Timothy McVeigh to suffer capital punishment because it's against our faith and, yes, my daughter died because of him. But just because of that it doesn't make it right that he should die. So he was on his capital campaign. This is the capital campaign. That's not a capital campaign, a nationwide campaign against capital punishment. I was like if anybody and again, so look at me, everybody has a right to ask where he still sits, it's you, it's like so I was like, wow, what an example, what an example. Like wow, yeah.
Speaker 2:God is so good and, as we were saying in one of our more recent episodes, it's not an obligation that we have. It's just this deeper invitation into the truth that is God and his love that's supposed to inform all of our reality.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, yeah, so we're leaving Well thank you for this and I hope everyone enjoyed it and I hope everybody, including you, good sir, has a beautiful and blessed Good Friday and enter into it, yeah, and I hope the whole Tridwom and Easter and everything is good. Spend some time reflecting on how good the Father is.
Speaker 1:Amen, amen God bless.
Speaker 2:We'll see you all next time. Bye for now. Bye.