The countdown to Easter Vigil has begun, as of Palm Sunday!
Yesterday I did my best to save my voice all day for the marathon singing session in the evening, beginning with a 4:30 combined choir rehearsal with the marvelous musicians from St. Thomas Aquinas and their director, Matthew Sprinkle. The Pontifical Mass of Chrism began at 7:00 and was a full 2 hours in length. This is the mass where all the priests and religious of the diocese gather to renew their vows of consecration, and the oils that will be used throughout the diocese for the next year for anointing the sick, for baptism, and for confirmation are blessed.  For an idea of the scope of such a service, check out these images of Chrism masses from all over the world. It is truly impressive to see hundreds of priests and religious filling half the cathedral. I especially loved seeing all the different habits from the different orders of women religious – black, white, grey, white with blue stripes, royal blue; and there was one Franciscan brother that I saw as well . I had no idea there were so many different orders in our diocese. Only Laurent was able to come from our family, and she wrote beautifully about her reflections at her own blog.
Tonight we have the rehearsal for Easter Vigil with our fellow candidates and catechumens and our sponsors. I hope to get some photos tonight… we’ll see how that works out. (There are quite a few of us, nearly 50 in our class plus lots in the Spanish language class, so there’s a lot they have to go over with us tonight. T’will be interesting!)
People keep asking me if I’m getting excited about Saturday – and I am, but it’s almost surreal – I almost can’t believe it is finally happening, after so many years of study and prayer. I’m just trying to soak up everything I can this week – despite many years of living the liturgical calendar in Anglican churches, there is so much that is new and wonderful to me as I am experiencing this in the Catholic setting for the first time.
