For the Mass of the Day on Easter Sunday, the traditional
Resurrexit rite was restored and renamed
Peter, Witness of the Resurrection. At the beginning of the Mass two deacons open the doors of the venerable icon of Christ the Saviour known as the
Achiropita (not made by human hands), after which one of the deacons proclaims in song the news of the Lord’s Resurrection: first to the assembly with the chant
Surrexit Dominus de sepulcro, qui pro nobis pependit in ligno, and then to the Holy Father with the words
Surrexit Dominus vere et apparuit Simoni. This ancient rite of the Pope’s witness before the icon of the Saviour, suitably enhanced and adapted in keeping with the spirit of the conciliar liturgical reform, became after the year 2000 one of the rites proper to the papal liturgy.
OFFICE OF THE LITURGICAL CELEBRATIONS OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF 