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Good Friday—a holiday in just 10 states—is celebrated by most Christian denominations, with fasting and somber worship services that often end in silence.Before Christians joyously celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter Sunday, they first must make a gruesome stop at a hill called Calvary. Two days before the trumpets sound, and churches—many opening for the first time in a year—fill their sanctuaries with lilies, dogwood, and alleluias, we first must witness the hideous trial of the sinless Lord, the bloody brutal scourging by Roman soldiers and his anguishing suffering and suffocating death on the cross, a day called...

No matter how they identify the other 364 days of the year, on March 17, everyone within the city limits of Chicago considers himself Chirish.As I followed the shuffling crowd toward the green river, I attempted to avoid getting trampled amid the low-toned shouts from drunken teenagers and leering 40-something couples. I stopped in a clothing shop, to be greeted by a police officer singing “Danny Boy” with a surprisingly smooth vibrato voice. “Ah, welcome! We are all Irish today,” he said.As a native Chicago suburbanite who identifies as a Chicagoan on days like March 17, I say there’s nothing...

Christmas is the most wondrous day of our calendar in any year of our lives. The bright lights, smells, and smiles discernible even to an infant quickly grow into a sense of hope, awe, and mystery as young boys and girls crane their necks on the car ride back from papa’s house to look out the window for a sign of that bright red nose in the sky. As time moves on, our hopes turn to the company of friends and family, and our awe to the sacred mysteries of God made man for our sake. Our experience of Christmas...

That incredible shrinking Advent-Christmas season Twenty-one years in Washington, D.C., should have rendered me impervious to the bizarre. But I confess to having been taken aback in mid-October when, inside a grocery where I was vainly searching for some decent Peccorino Romano, I saw an enormous Christmas display with ersatz snow and all the trimmings. It was bad enough when stores started putting out the Christmas decorations (or, as they now say, “holiday decorations”) a nanosecond after sweeping their shelves of leftover candy corn and other Halloween goodies beloved of dentists with medical school bills to pay. But Santa and...

November 27, 2004Saturday of the Thirty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time Reading IRev 22:1-7 John said:An angel showed me the river of life-giving water,sparkling like crystal, flowing from the throne of Godand of the Lamb down the middle of the street,On either side of the river grew the tree of lifethat produces fruit twelve times a year, once each month;the leaves of the trees serve as medicine for the nations.Nothing accursed will be found anymore.The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it,and his servants will worship him.They will look upon his face, and his name will be...

November 23, 2003The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ the King Psalm: Sunday 50 Reading I Responsorial Psalm Reading II Gospel Reading IDn 7:13-14 As the visions during the night continued, I sawone like a Son of man coming,on the clouds of heaven;when he reached the Ancient Oneand was presented before him,the one like a Son of man received dominion, glory, and kingship;all peoples, nations, and languages serve him.His dominion is an everlasting dominionthat shall not be taken away,his kingship shall not be destroyed. Responsorial PsalmPs 93:1, 1-2, 5 R. (1a) The Lord is king; he is robed in majesty.The...

advent season originationQuestion from cgilbert on 11-20-2002: Where, when, and how did the advent season originate? Answer by Matthew Bunson on 11-23-2002: The name Advent is derived from the Latin word adventus (arrival or coming). In its original Roman sense, it was used by pagans to describe an honorific visit by a person of great importance, especially an emperor, to a village or city. For the Church, the Advent Season inaugurates the liturgical year. According to The General Norms for the Liturgical Year and Calendar, issued in 1969, “Advent has a twofold character: as a season to prepare us...