Today is a day like no other in the Church calendar. The Eucharist is never celebrated, there are no liturgies or readings today. Holy Saturday between Good Friday and the Easter Vigil (late tonight) is the great blank space in the liturgical year while we wait for Easter. Nothing seems to be happening: there is simply the sense of continuing the thoughts of Good Friday or the sense of simply waiting for the vigil that heralds Easter.

But this year is different as millions of us around the globe are locked in a “stay-at-home” waiting. Many of us don’t go to work, we don’t socialise, we maintain “physical distancing”. It’s a bit like a big shapeless empty “time in-between” – between what was and what will be, when we hope, normality returns. Maybe this year we can use that sense of “in-between” to appreciate a part of the Christian year we usually skip. This gap in liturgy has value as a time to reflect on aspects of our liturgy often forgotten.

On this day, we wait. Christ has died; we know he comes again; we know there will be Resurrection. I am trying to imagine what this day was like for Mary, and for the disciples and followers of Jesus. I am sure they believed in what he said. In the darkness of this time, in the sadness and grief, in that great abyss of loss, their faith offered a glimmer of hope and of light.

Sometimes we fear death and have trouble coming to grips with our own. That thought should serve us as we let the message and meaning of Christ’s death sink in: Jesus became fully human, and died for us so that we might live and have everlasting life with him. That is our light and our hope. On a day when our usual and comforting routine is no longer there, we can close our eyes, take a deep breath. God is here in the darkness.

I pray, God, in these uncertain times, contemplating the mystery of life and death, of Resurrection, give me the grace to “let go and let God be God” – to believe that death has no power over me. Christ’s victory is mine, too, leading to renewal, newness of life. Yes, I believe. To appreciate a special day, one needs an ordinary day; to appreciate a special season, one needs an ‘ordinary time’! Variety is the spice of life. May the measures we take to combat the coronavirus make us aware of the things we may have taken for granted – family, friends, freedom, faith, God’s presence in one another. Just stay with today’s emptiness and starkness and wait in hope. Blessings.

Fr. Brian