Holy Thursday

Four minute homilies

Holy Thursday

Today is an important day for the Church. We priests celebrate two Masses. In the morning all priests of the Diocese go to the Cathedral to concelebrate with the bishop what we call the Chrism Mass. Two things happen during this Mass. First we priests renew our commitments, to place Jesus first in our lives, to obey our bishop, and to look after the People of God. Secondly during this Mass the bishop consecrates the three oils we use for Baptism, Confirmation, Holy Orders and Anointing of the sick. It is called the Chrism Mass because Chrism is the name of one of the holy oils. At the end of the Mass we collect our oils to keep them in the parish. Every year we burn the old ones and we replace them with the new oils. It is like what happens to us during these days of Holy Week: we die to ourselves and we rise again with Christ.

In the evening we have the Mass of Holy Thursday, the beginning of the Easter Triduum, where we commemorate three things that happened at the Last Supper: the washing of the feet, the institution of the Eucharist and the institution of the priesthood. The Eucharist is the important one. Jesus had to go to heaven, but he wanted to stay with us, because he loves us and we need him. He could do it because he is God. Therefore he left us this sacrament, for the priest to be able to consecrate the bread and the wine, for us to be nourished by his body and blood, and for Jesus to be able to remain with us in the tabernacle. If all the sacraments are important, this one is the most important one; in the others we receive grace from Jesus, in the Mass we receive Jesus himself.

In the washing of the feet we remember Jesus washing his apostles feet. We normally wash twelve men’s feet, easier for us to identify them with the twelve apostles. But what we truly remember is how Jesus lowered himself to the form of a servant to wash our feet. The washing of the feet was reserved to slaves. God is coming down to us to the point of performing a menial task. Our feet need plenty of washing, because when we walk we get dirty. Peter said to Jesus when he came to wash him: Master, wash my hands and head as well. We too are like Saint Peter: we need a thorough washing. Jesus even washed Judas’ feet. He is ready to wash any sinners’ feet, ours too.

The last thing we commemorate today is the beginning of the priesthood. Jesus established priests for his Church to renew the sacrifice of Calvary throughout the centuries. The main reason for our priesthood is the Mass. We also need priests for the other sacraments, specially Confession, to become better, holier and closer to Jesus. Today is a special day when we pray for priests, specially the ones in our own parish. The more we pray for our priests, the holier they become. It is a good selfish prayer. We get the priests we deserve. When we complain about our priests, we should blame ourselves: we don’t pray enough for them.

At the end of the Mass we reserve the Blessed Sacrament on the altar of repose. We keep enough hosts to give Communion on Good Friday because it is a day when we won’t have Mass, because Jesus is dead. The tradition is to spend a bit of time in front of the Blessed Sacrament. We keep Jesus company on this night, when he was alone in the garden of Gethsemane.

[e-mail]