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Dear Sisters
and Brothers in the Lord:
A popular
practice in many parishes during Lent is the Stations of the Cross.
Several communities celebrate the Stations on Good Friday with people
from other Christian traditions. It is an ideal form of ecumenical
worship. For some it is an outdoor event with participants walking from
station to station along the Way of the Cross. For others it is a
spiritual journey with Jesus that allows them to express the subjective
dimension of their faith. The form of devotion known as the Stations of
the Cross arose after pilgrims began to visit the Holy Land from the end
of the 4th century to follow the path that Jesus trod in his
last week of life. On Palm Sunday they walked down from the summit of
the Mount of Olives, singing psalms and antiphons. On Thursday people
processed to Gethsemane where the Lord prayed. On Friday they gathered
at Golgotha, the site of the crucifixion, to venerate the Wood of the
Cross.
Christians who
heard these stories but were unable to travel to Palestine themselves
reproduced a parallel devotion at home. The first recorded ‘Stations of
the Cross’ was at the Church of San Stefano in Bologna in the 5th
century. The Franciscans popularized the practice during the Middle
Ages, but the number and subject of the stations was not settled until
the 18th century when Pope Clement XII officially recognized
the Stations of the Cross as a noble devotion for the Church. The
fourteen stations that were established were a blend of biblical and
legendary material. The Church has never provided an official ritual for
celebrating the Stations. In 1975 the Congregation for Sacred Rites
suggested a list of Stations of the Cross that is more in keeping with
the gospel accounts than the traditional form. It begins with the Last
Supper and concludes with Christ’s resurrection.
Pope John
Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have used another set of Stations that
differs from the traditional 14 when celebrating the Way of Cross at the
Coliseum during Holy Week. It also omits those events that are not
attested to in the biblical account of the Passion.
The
Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy issued by the
Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in
2002 makes a number of what it describes as ‘useful suggestions for a
fruitful celebration of the Via Crucis (Way of the Cross)’. These
include:
▪ Alternative
forms of the Stations approved by Rome or used by the popes ‘can be
regarded as genuine forms of the devotion and may be used as the
occasion might warrant’.
▪ The
choice of texts should take account of the wise pastoral principle of
integrating renewal and continuity. It is always preferable to choose
texts written in a clear simple style.
▪ The
celebration could end with a commemoration of the Lord’s resurrection
‘to leave the faithful with a sense of expectation of the resurrection
in faith and hope’.
‘The Via Crucis in which
hymns, silence, procession and reflective pauses are wisely integrated
in a balanced manner contribute significantly to obtaining the spiritual
fruits of the pious exercise.’
As we remember
the sufferings of Jesus, we are led into the celebration of Christ’s
victory over death and into the renewal of our commitment to the life of
faith at the Easter sacraments.
Let’s give our minds and
hearts to the Lord this Lent! Father Joe
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