In silence, we wait....

Throughout the world on this day, the tabernacles in Catholic churches sit empty.  Mass is not celebrated on this day.  Like an empty tabernacle, Saturday is a day of emptiness.  This is how we celebrate every Holy Saturday.  This is the day described in the Apostles’ Creed, the first prayer we say to begin the Rosary: “He was crucified, died, and was buried.  He descended into hell…”  By the expression "He descended into hell", the Creed confesses that Jesus did really die and through His death for us conquered death and the devil "who has the power of death" (Heb 2:14).  It also means that in His human soul united to His divine person, the dead Christ went down to the realm of the dead.  He opened Heaven's gates for the just who had gone before Him.  [Catechism of the Catholic Church, Part 1, Section 2, Chapter 2, Article 5, Lines 636-637]

This is the day we keep silent vigil between Good Friday and the Resurrection.  In a lot of ways, we have been experiencing this for several weeks already.  On this day, as in so many days and weeks throughout the world-wide pandemic, we have been called to wait in silence and solitude in a new and different way.  In these times of social distancing from one another, and on this day, we are called to experience a spiritual distance from Christ, even as we pray “Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord.” (Psalm 130:1)

Holy Saturday is the day of hope, when we are reminded that God’s hand can reach to deepest recesses of our lives, of our experience.  Hope calls us to resistance; to resist despair, darkness, and death.  Where there is resistance, there is hope – as we await Easter.