THE Mass of the Lord’s Supper, celebrated in the evening of Maundy Thursday, commemorates the Last Supper, the institution of the Eucharist and the priesthood. It also marks the beginning of the Easter Triduum. It’s a joyful Mass, distinct from the somber services on Good Friday, and includes unique elements like the washing of the feet and a procession of the consecrated host.
The Church holds this service in the evening to honor the Jewish Passover tradition. It features unique rituals, such as washing the feet of twelve people to symbolize Jesus’ command to serve with humility. During the procession, the faithful carry the consecrated hosts to the Altar of Repose for adoration, replaying Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane. Finally, ministers strip the altar bare, plunging the church into the silence of Good Friday.
And thus begins the Easter Triduum, a three-day liturgical celebration, beginning with the Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Maundy Thursday, continuing through Good Friday (Passion of the Lord), and culminating in the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday, ending with the Evening Prayer on Easter Sunday that commemorates Jesus’ Passion, Death and Resurrection.
The Church views these celebrations as one continuous liturgy. While the faithful should participate actively in each service, the only formal obligation remains the Easter Sunday Mass.
We just have to remember that the Easter Triduum is the most solemn three-day Christian observance that marks the core of our Christian faith and the culmination of the liturgical year. Its significance lies in reliving Christ’s redemptive sacrifice, beginning with Last Supper, moving through his crucifixion, and culminating in the triumph of the Resurrection at the Easter Vigil.
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In these sacred rites, we see God’s tremendous love, which conquers any evil we commit through our cooperation. The Easter Triduum offers a perfect occasion to savor this divine love—not to spoil us, but to inspire our best response.
We must repay God’s love by loving Him and others in return. We respond to His total, gratuitous, and merciful love with a similar self-giving, even when it involves great sacrifice. Never answer such divine love with ingratitude or indifference.
This, of course, means that we have to learn to give ourselves entirely to God and to others without counting the cost or expecting any reward, trusting that God will never fail to provide us with what we truly need.
This also means that we should learn to love with a universal scope, extending our love to everyone, including enemies, since God is kind even to the ungrateful and gives special attention to the lost, as dramatized in the parables of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin and the Prodigal Son.
This definitely would require us to go through a lifelong process of developing virtues with the view of becoming more and more like Christ and assuming the very spirit of love of God in whose image and likeness we have been created.
Let’s hope that these considerations are not lost as we go through the celebration of the Easter Triduum that starts in the Evening Mass of the Last Supper on Maundy Thursday.
