Easter Triduum Polish style

My friend Father Piotr Kaczmarek sent me some pictures from St Joseph's parish in Ursus, Warsaw.

After the Holy Thursday Mass, the Blessed Sacrament is taken to a special place (there is normally a tabernacle also - we would refer to it as an Altar of Repose):

After the Good Friday liturgy the Blessed Sacrament is taken to the Sepulchre and set alongside the image of the dead Christ with special decorations

Adoration continues until midnight:

Confessions are heard until the last person has made his/her confession (this year until 11:35 p.m.) Adoration continues all day Saturday.

I was quite surprised when I heard about this custom but Fr Piotr assures me that the exposition/adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in this way is not forbidden in Poland. On the contrary it is a very well-known and widespread custom. People are praying waiting for the Resurection and contemplating the Passion of Our Lord.

On Saturday at 20:00 the Easter Vigil commences:

On Easter Sunday morning there was a special Resurrexit procession. The Cardinal Archbishop of Warsaw participated.

After the Triduum they replaced the sepulchre with a replica of Pope John Paul's coffin in anticipation of his forthcoming beatification.

It's always fascinating to appreciate different traditions.

Before the Protestant Reformation in England there used always to be an Easter Sepulchre built into the side of the churches and a Sacred Host was buried there after the Good Friday liturgy until the Easter Vigil. Here's a typical example from St Owswald's Church in Ashbourne, Derbyshire:

Poland Pilgrimage - the Dom Duszpasterski Hotel

Our group were accomodated at the excellent value Pastoral Lodge at Łagiewniki just outside the centre of Krakow. I would certainly recommend it. All rooms (shared or single) are en suite. A substantial breakfast is provided, and lunch and dinner may be booked, or guests may simply use the cafeteria.

Beata will organise an excellent programme. She booked Masses for us in the chapel of St Faustina beneath the basilica, the chapel of St John in the Wieliczka Salt Mine, the Basilica at Wodowice and the Convent Chapel where the relics of St Faustina are preserved. She also organised all our transport to our various destinations and tour guides. Nothing was too much for her. Staying at the Dom Duszpasterski was infinitely better than staying in a hotel. We were able to visit many places while maintaining the pilgrimage atmosphere, with easy access to exposition of the Blessed Sacrament 24/7, prayers/devotions in the convent chapel, etc. Some of our pilgrims even got up early to join the sisters at their Mass at 6.30am to savour the beautiful singing of the sisters.

Here's our group having dinner in the hotel.

Email: recepcja@pastorallodge.com.pl.

Poland Pilgrimage Day 2 - Czesthowa

On Tuesday 1st we visited Czestochowa. The journey was awful - road works just outside Krakow. Took us one hour to get of the city, and two hours for the rest of the journey. But we made it in good time for Mass. We were booked to join a larger American group led by a priest Missionary of Our Lady of La Salette. The group was from Louisiana and so, naturally, they prayed for the resolution of the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. They also had with them a young priest ordained for just two years and his parents.

When we arrived, the image of Our Lady was still covered. The daily unveiling took place at 1.30pm, just before the Mass. Our pilgrims said they found the unveiling, with the trumpet fanfare, an incredibly moving experience, as the face of Our Lady and the Child were gradually revealed. Our Lady's face has a rather haunting appearance.

Here's a photo of the covered image before Mass.

I'm afraid that, since I was concelebrating at the Mass, I have no photos of the uncovering, but hope you will be satisfied with this pic I took when I was there in February this year.
 

In the following picture you can see the sash that Pope John Paul II was wearing when he was shot on 13th May 1981:

Father Simon, one of the Pauline priests, gave us a brief guided tour. He is a charming man, named after the apostle Simon.

In the cloister of the monastery there are altars set up for Mass. They are in the open although sheltered from rain by the cloister, and people tend to just walk past. Nonetheless, it was edifying to see priests saying their Masses.

Krakow

Having left South Ashford at 5.30am by minibus, we arrived at the Divine Mercy Shrine at Łagewniki in Krakow on time, as planned for lunch, after which we met with Sister Gaudia - as the name implies, a very joyful and youthful sister - who is, of course, Polish, but speaks excellent slightly Americanised English.

She explained something of the significance of the message of Mercy that was entrusted to Saint Faustina, Jesus' Secretary of Divine Mercy. She particularly explained about the 3 o'clock prayer, and wanted it to be known that Our Lord did not ask that any particular prayer be said at 3 o'clock but that rather we pause at that time - for a few seconds, a few minutes, longer if possible - to meditate on the suffering and death of Jesus. Of course, one can say a prayer, the so-called '3 o'clock prayer', for instance, or even the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, but there is no intrinsic link between these prayers and keeping the hour of Our Lord's death.

Sister Gaudia also spoke about the humility of Saint Faustina, and how she is another example of how the Lord chooses the lowly of this world to be entrusted with something great. St Faustina's diaries are at once simple and profound. Simple souls say how easy it is to understand because of its simplicity, wise souls say how profound the diary is. Here we are by the wall just outside the convent chapel where the Chaplet is written in various languages:

I remarked to Sister Gaudia how much we need sisters like her and her order in England, dressed like sisters. She replied with some enthusiasm: "Yes, you do, you do!" Wouldn't it be wonderful if these sisters were established in the UK.

Just outside the convent chapel can be seen the window of the cell where St Faustina died, decorated with flowers:

Following her brief talk with us, we went to the Convent Chapel where the relics of St Faustina are preserved and joined in the 3 o'clock prayers which consisted of a meditation and some prayers in Polish (which naturally we did not understand) followed by the recitation of the Chaplet, one decade of which was done in English for our benefit.

After venerating the relic of St Faustina, we went to the Chapel of St Faustina beneath the basilica for Mass. Today is, of course, the feast of the Visitation, a very appropriate feast for considering lowly and humble creatures chosen by God for great things.

This afternoon I took the opportunity to meditate on some of St Faustina's Notebook VI from her diary, and it truly is profound. Here is what I just happened to read as I sat in front of the exposed Blessed Sacrament:

My heart is drawn there where my God is hidden,
Where He dwells with us day and night,
Clothed in the White Host;
He governs the whole world. He communes with souls.

My heart is drawn there where my God is hiding,
Where His love is immolated.
But my heart senses that the living water is here:
It is my living God, through a veil hides Him.

St Faustina is surely speaking of her own mystical experience of ecstasy when she writes:

During meditation, the Lord gave me knowledge of the joy of heaven and of the saints on our arrival there; they love God as the sole object of their love, but they also have a tender and heartfelt love for us. It is from the face of God that this joy flows out upon all, because we see Him face to face. His face is so sweet that the soul falls anew into ecstasy.

On February 13th 1938, she

saw how unwillingly the Lord Jesus came to certain souls in Holy Communion. And He spoke these words to me: I enter into certain hearts as into a second Passion.

Later this afternoon I took a walk round the grounds and visited the Convent cemetery. Here Sr Faustina was buried until her remains were removed to the Convent Chapel.

There appears now to be a large vault where the sisters are buried, with a wall on which the names of those interred are recorded. It must be wonderful to be able to contemplate daily the place where you will be laid to rest.

In the evening there is a beautifully prayerful atmosphere in the convent chapel, which is really the heart of the shrine (I'm afraid I don't much care for the modernist architecture of the basilica). There are evening prayers with exposition of the Blessed Sacrament (followed by distribution of Holy Communion which, I must say, I found a bit odd but which I also observed in my visit to Czestochowa earlier this year), Rosary for needy families, night prayers, etc. It is heart-warming to see so many sisters, including numerous novices, and ordinary lay people - many children too, gathered together for these times of prayer, with of course beautiful devout singing.

Off on a parish pilgrimage tomorrow

Kentish Express reports Polish Grief

I was telephoned today for some remarks concerning the tragic air disaster that occurred on Saturday morning. The KE put a report up pretty quickly here.

There truly was a very sombre attitude amongst the Polish people who were at Mass yesterday. Some came to the evening Mass as they were watching Polish TV all day to witness the repatriation of their President's body. I spoke with Fr Piotr Kaczmarek in Warsaw today. The Feast of the Divine Mercy is always associated with commemorations for the death of Pope John Paul II who died on the eve of Divine Mercy Sunday. The Polish bishops cancelled all such commemorations to focus on those who died in the air crash which, of course, occurred on the eve of Divine Mercy Sunday.

As the KE report, there will be a Polish Mass at St Francis' Church, Maidstone, next Sunday at 4pm. I will try to get along.

You can read more at the website for Polish people in Kent: Polish / English (Google translation).

Here's how the KE reported the Blessing of Food on Holy Saturday (the photo can be found at the KE website):

Greater numbers than ever at Church this Easter

After the Easter ceremonies last year I made a note that there was an extremely good attendance at the ceremonies, particular the Easter Sunday morning Mass. This year, there was an even greater number. This must confound the 'The Catholic Church is Finished' rhetoric of the media. As well as being the Church's major feast of the year, I think Easter possibly speaks to people at a more profound level than Christmas. It really is a feast of hope and joy. No matter how 'dead' the Church might seem, it always rises again. Perhaps in the midst of Her current difficulties, fuelled mainly by media who won't accept 'sorry' from the Pope no matter how often and in how many different ways he says it, the Church is a sign to a huge number of people who perhaps know they are not living 'up to the mark' in terms of regular church attendance, marriage, etc, etc, yet they see a Church that is made up of and welcomes sinners and gives them hope.

I reflected yesterday on the fact that the first witness of the empty tomb and of the Risen Christ was a woman who had had seven devils cast out of her. The Magdalen was a sinner, and it was as a forgiven and healed sinner that she proclaimed to the doubting apostles the fact of the Risen Christ. She is an example of the new batch of unleavened bread, the corrupting old yeast having been cast out of her. The mysterium iniquitatis was there at the beginning of the Church's proclamation of the Resurrection, and so it will be with the Church until the end of time. But that does not invalidate Her proclamation. In fact, it makes it all the more credible to those who need to live their lives in the hope of becoming something better than they are at present. The impossible is, with the power of God, possible.

A message received from a parishioner of mine this morning:

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

What a wonderful week of masses and ceremony. I feel refreshed and renewed.

You, and all involved, must have worked very hard so that everything went off smoothly, it was a joy being in church to worship our dear Lord.

Here is a photograph of St. Simon's altar decorated so beautifully for Easter morning.

God bless you for everything.

Thanks are due to everybody who worked really hard to prepare the church and the liturgy: cleaners, flower arrangers, choir, sacristy, MC, and particularly to our servers. We had a full complement at the Easter Vigil, with sufficient numbers to have torches, and an excellent turnout of servers at the Morning Mass. Fantastic!

Congratulations to Rachel Numas who was received into the full communion of the Catholic Church and who received Holy Communion with us for the first time during the Easter Vigil. She, together with five other adults (her husband Nigel, Martial and Sandrine Eba, Aude Alecks and Annelise Moore) were confirmed, taking as confirmation patron saints respectively: Therese of Lisieux, Thomas More, Gabriel, Rita, Joanna (one of the women who went to the tomb on Easter morning), Catherine of Sienna.

Two of the lads who have been popping into church recently came to the Easter Sunday morning Mass. I saw them at the back as I processed in and took them down to be near the front, placing them in the safe hands of the same parishioner who wrote the above appreciative message. Their sister and a friend popped in this morning and told me that one of the lads is telling everyone he wants to be a Catholic.

Saturday morning saw a packed church (I have never seen the Church so full) with the Polish blessing of food which, as last year, I did using the Latin formulae for the blessing of Lamb, Eggs and Bread at Easter found in the old Rituale Romanum. (See slideshow below). The Kentish Express photographer was present so we might see a few photographs in this Thursday's edition (see the KE's announcement here, search later this week for a report).



And on Good Friday evening some of the Polish community organised a very inspiring 'son et lumiere' Way of the Cross followed by a homage to Pope John Paul II whose fifth anniversary it was. Although I could understand nothing of what was said or read, the language of prayer and faith was all I needed. Congratulations to them. They made a huge effort in decorating the church with votive candles, including a cross on the church floor, and power point images taken from The Passion of the Christ etc. Very prayerful, very devotional. It took a couple of hours to set up and lasted for two hours. Congratulations to all involved.

Happy Easter everybody.

The Metropolitan Seminary of Warsaw

Whilst in Warsaw Father Zbigniew arranged for us to visit the Metropolitan University College Seminary of St John the Baptist. The tourists just direct people to the Carmelite Church of Our Lady of the Assumption. It was, of course, a Carmelite Church but is now the Seminary Church - not a bad chapel for the approximately two hundred seminary students!

I was very pleased to find this painting of our parish patron St Simon Stock receiving the Brown Scapular from the Blessed Virgin:



The students are in separate groups for Philosophy and Theology, reflecting the different stages of spiritual development and expectations in terms of prayer life, and each has its own chapel. Below is the beautiful chapel for the theology students:

The Rector, Father Krzysztof Pawlina, invited us to his study for tea and cheesecake where we exchanged opinions about the formation of seminarians and the promotion of vocations to the priesthood. Father Pawlina gave me a present of his book "Kandydaci do Kaplanstwa Trzeciego Tysiaclecia" (Candidates for the Priesthood of the Third Millennium). His study is of course written in Polish but a summary in English, German and Italian is contained at the end of the book.

In this summary we read that the average age of men entering the seminary in 2000 was 20. Average students come from a town and from a middle class family. Their parents are of modest professional and educational backgrounds. Their parents' average level of education is secondary level. Only one in ten have parents who have been to higher education institutions.

The majority were altar servers in their youth. They desire to serve God and the Church and seek holiness. They are not motivated by achieving status and are not afraid of poverty or being objects of ridicule.

"The future priest is quite observant and critical, also in relation to modern priests," observes Fr Pawlina. "He can see their faults - especially too much materialism, lack of humility, wrong attitude towards people, passiveness, and formalism." I wonder if this is youthful criticism. I did experience a little pre-occupation at times with 'formalism' but, by and large, the priests I met during the last week were zealous and hard working. Fr Pawlina continues describing the attitudes of today's seminarians: "And, what should a priest stand out by according to a young seminarian? So what is his ideal of a priest? Above all, he is to be a persistent man, constant, patient, obedient, forgiving, and modest. He should stand out by his diligence, courage, and piety."

The attitude of seminarians seems to be one of self-sacrifice and sincerity. I'm sure that if Fr Pawlina's book were available in English it would be an excellent contribution to the study of the identity and role of priests in this millennium.

Father Krzysztof Pawlina (centre) and Fr Zbigniew Sajnóg, parish priest of St Joseph's in Warsaw (right).

Incidentally, cassocks are normal dress for both staff and students.

The Venerable Father Jerzy Popielszko

Today we visited the church of St Stanislaw Kostka in Warsaw to pray at the burial place (pictured above) of Fr Popieluszko.


Here are a couple of shots of the church of St Stanislaw Kostka in which he served.



You can read a short biography of Fr Jerzy by clicking on the following photo.

We had hoped to visit the nearby museum but it was closed. However, you can find out more by visiting the museum's website and if your Polish is as non-existent as mine, you can run it through the Google translator which renders a reasonably comprehensible result.

I have discovered another holy example of a priest for this Year of Priesthood. Fr Jerzy was not a healthy man, sometimes fainting during Mass. He also feared violence and persecution. But he was ever faithful to the truth. Whilst his last prayer in public was for peace and that the people be spared violence (violence which he was to experience only hours later) he said that our lives are worth nothing if we are not faithful to the truth.

Fr Jerzy was thrown into the boot of a car which was driven into the Vistula. It took several days to discover his body.

I was very moved by the following photograph which was part of a display behind the choir and reredos in the church. See the grief of his father at the funeral:

Fr Jerzy's mother is still alive. According to rumours, it might well be that she will live to see her son's beatification...

Prayer for beatification of Venerable Father Jerzy Popieluszko (as in the English booklet bought at the church - clearly not a perfect translation):

Endlessly good God,
you have granted Venerable Father Jerzy Popieluszko
with the grace of faithful vocation,
which led him to his martyr's death.
We ask you through the words of Pope John Paul II
"May this death give rise to Good
just as the cross gives rise to resurrection."

Lord,
Father Jerzy was a steadfast defender
of human and God's rights.
He was given to our Homeland and the whole world
as a sign of victory over love and hate.
We pray that he be exalted
to the dignity of sainthood.

Merciful God,
I ask you through Father Jerzy
to grant me the grace I crave for.
May the sacrifice of His life
and His intercession with you
promote the Christian faith,
unity and peace in the world.
We ask you this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.

Me and Max are real good friends!

Max is one of the two dogs owned by the parents of Fr Piotr who kindly gave us lunch yesterday. They warned me to stay clear of their other dog.

St Maximilian Kolbe and the City of the Immaculate - Niepokalanow

One of the places we visited today was Niepokalanow, the City of the Immaculate set up by Saint Maximilian Kolbe. Together with a few franciscan friars he established this chapel in 1927.

We all know that St Maximilian died a martyr's death at Auschwitz. In the chapel are paintings reminding us that other beatified Franciscans were also prisoners in the death camp. Here are two of them:



Adjacent to the chapel is St Maximilian's cell (pictured below with some of the Christmas Crib artefacts in temporary storage):


together with a display of some liturgical artefacts which he would have used:


A friar was suitably on hand for a photo as he was making rosary beads:


The friary grew to contained huge printing press from which the Friars carried out an effective printing apostolate. Near the chapel is a museum, principally about the life of St Maximilian but also about the missionary activity of the Franciscan Friars.

A series of paintings describe the story of Maximilian's life in Aushwitz:

being beaten by the works 'Capo' who was of course a prisoner himself, so the Nazis set prisoner against fellow prisoner

Maximilian asking the Nazis to take him instead of a man who had a wife and family

Maximilian being poisoned to death having lived longer than expected through starvation in solitary confinement.

This candle, donated from Holland, is a particularly impressive work of religious art in memory of St Maximilian.

Here is a detail from the centre of the Cross which contains the face of the crucified Christ.

Below the Cross is a representation of grapes that are crushed to become wine and the Blood of Christ in the Chalice beneath the Cross. Jesus' Body was crushed so that we might be saved by the shedding of His Blood which we receive in Holy Communion, and as a martyr's body is crushed and his blood shed:

The word 'Credo' in blood red wax and dripping remind us that we must be prepared to declare our faith even to the shedding of our blood. It is only thus that our saying 'Credo', 'I believe', can truly be sincere.


A summary of the life of St Maximilian (click to see it enlarged):


Nearby is the Basilica in honour of Our Lady Immaculate:


As you can see it was cold. Fr Piotr on the phone with plenty of snow on the ground:

The car thermometer records the outside temperature:

In this year of priesthood, we can ask St Maximilian to give all priests - and, indeed, all religious men and women - the grace of putting themselves at the service of others. Their celibacy enables them to offer their lives in sacrifice, after the example of Christ Himself, and to espouse themselves most especially to the Virgin Mary.

O Saint Maximilian Mary Kolbe, faithful follower of St Francis of Assisi, inflamed by the love of God you dedicated your life to the practice of virtue and to works of the apostolate. Look down with favour upon us who devoutly confide in your intercession.

Having consecrated yourself to the Immaculate Virgin Mary, you inspired countless souls to a holy life and various forms of apostolate in order to do good to others and to spread the kingdom of God. Obtain for us the grace by our lives and labours to draw many souls to Christ.

In your close conformity to our Divine Saviour you reached such an intense degree of love, that you offered your life to save that of a fellow prisoner. Implore God that we, inflamed by such ardent charity, may through our living faith and our apostolic works witness Christ to our fellowmen, and thus merit to join you in the blessed vision of God. Amen.