Palm Sunday tomorrow

The two major feasts on the life of Christ are Christmas and Holy Week. Christmas marks the Nativity of our Lord, Holy week commemorates the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Christ, which is the "solemnity of solemnities" that is the center of the liturgical year. For reasons we have never been able to figure out, both events are commemorated by two different types of calendars. Christmas always falls on December 25 because it is based on the solar calendar while Easter is based on the lunar calendar and its celebration is held on the Sunday after the full moon that follows on the spring equinox so it can fall anytime between March 22nd and April 25th. So we commemorate the birth of Christ on a fixed date and his death and resurrection on a variable date.

Tomorrow is the last Sunday of Lent that marks the start of Holy Week. It is the day that commemorates Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem and it is celebrated with a procession with blessed palms. In this country, we use the palm leaves of the coconut that are blessed and converted into sacramentals. It is for this reason that they are preserved in the following year. It is the ashes of the blessed palms used in the preceding year that are burned and used to mark the foreheads of the faithful during the Ash Wednesday ceremony that marks the start of Lent.

Tomorrow every parish will have its Palm Sunday procession.

Palm Sunday is also called Passion Sunday because it begins the liturgical season of Passiontide, meaning that the attention of the liturgy is directed to the Passion of our Lord. An interesting local custom is what is known as pabasa, which is simply a family or group of faithful who read the passion of Christ for 24 straight hours.

Holy Thursday is the traditional name for the Thursday that falls during Holy Week, but with the coming of the Americans, people now call it Maundy Thursday. The name is a corruption of the word Mandatum, the very first word in the rite of the washing of the feet. People also re-enact the last supper during Maundy Thursday and it is interesting to watch the people playing the Apostles feast on fast food.

There are other very interesting folk practices during Holy Week. Among them is the senakulo, a folk portrayal of the life and times of Christ. There is also the Moriones of Marinduque that is now one of our top tourist attractions.

A custom that we wish would totally disappear is the practice of many of having themselves literally crucified on a cross. Sometimes even women have themselves nailed to a cross. Steps should be taken to discourage, if not outlaw, this practice.

Holy Week will certainly be a welcome break from the Iraq War and SARS. Sad to say, these two world problems have dominated the news for sometime now. As individuals, there is very little one can do to help solve any of these two problems. Holy Week should help us find peace and peace always has to start with one’s self.