Here and now, Avignon again, and just one drink
The Friday Pillar Post
Happy Good Friday Friends,
This year, as I usually do, I am finding today a strange day to try to live well.
There are things to do, of course, to get ready for Easter, both around the office and at home. But it feels odd, slightly wrong, even, to be doing much of anything on the day of the Lord’s Passion.
Somehow, no matter what I am doing — however necessary or worthy — it has the feeling of being trivial and unequal to the day, which I suppose at some level I feel I ought to be spending in quiet prayer and reflection.
I hope to do some of that, of course. Here at The Pillar we make the best effort we can to keep the Triduum, and to celebrate Easter. We operate a night-watchman rotation in the newsroom for the weekend and through Monday, so that we can focus on the things that really matter this season.
The news doesn’t stop, but sometimes we have to — especially when our beat is the life of the Church. Otherwise, it’s too easy to find ourselves on the outside of the faith looking in, instead of where we need to be, in the heart of this greatest of feasts.
But part of the struggle for me to enter Good Friday well is not to take myself out of daily life completely, despite the natural religious impulse to do so.
The Triduum is, after all, not some pious memorial of things past, above and apart from the life I am living.
When later today I head over to church to venerate the cross, it takes a real act of the will to recall that it is the cross in my own life I am supposed to be venerating, recognizing that the sufferings in my life have dignity and meaning and import for my own salvation.
Last night, listening to John’s account of the farewell discourse, I was struck by the dichotomy the Lord presents: hate, for each other and by necessary extension for the Lord and the Father, and sorrow or love and joy.
Christ promises us the Paraclete, which he sends to make real his promise that we can love one another as he has loved us, that his joy may be in us and our joy may be complete. It is an overwhelmingly bold offer.
While I spend plenty of time thinking about the petty and serious crosses in my life I am called to take up, and the people I am called to serve as Christ came to serve, I slip too easily into a Pelegian desire to will myself on to some kind of moral victory. In so doing, I cheapen what Christ offers — grace in super abundance — and miss the real promise of Easter, that I can taste the joys of heaven, here and now.
On that note, a blessed Triduum to you. But first, here’s the news.
The News
Catholic dioceses across the world are reporting that record numbers of adults are seeking baptism at this year’s Easter Vigil.
What kind of figures are dioceses seeing? And what are the baptismal candidates, known as catechumens, saying about their journeys to the Catholic Church?
Luke Coppen took a look at what is happening, country-by-country.
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What does the Church expect of us in Holy Week? To take part in the great services of the Easter Triduum, for sure.
But what about the times in between liturgies across these three days?
One possible answer is the rosary: the ancient and ingenious Marian prayer using 59 stringed beads. As you pray, you meditate on events in the life of Christ, including those commemorated in the Holy Triduum.
How can the rosary lead us deeper into the events of Holy Week? The Pillar asked Bishop Erik Varden, a spiritual writer, Trappist monk, and Prelate of Trondheim in Norway.
This is what you want to read, trust me.
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On Easter Sunday, Bishop William Shomali of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem will be in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, as usual.
But, as the bishop noted in an interview with The Pillar this week, it is going to be unusually crowded this year, since both Catholics and Orthodox Christians will be marking the feast on the same date.
That creates some unusual logistic challenges. “It’s chaotic, but this chaos is well organized,” he told us.
Read the whole conversation here.
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When civil war broke out in Sudan two years ago today, there were more than 1.2 million Catholics in the country — heirs to a rich and long tradition.
Two years on, it’s hard to build a comprehensive picture because of the fog of war. Reports have been patchy, but they give some insight into the conflict’s impact on the country’s Catholic minority.
But here’s what we know, and there is a lot here for us to pray about.
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An Armenian Orthodox bishop has said that Azerbaijan’s funding of Vatican projects is influencing the Holy See’s approach to the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Orthodox Archbishop Vicken Aykazian, ecumenical director of the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church of America, told The Pillar this week that he believes financial ties to the Azeri government have influenced Vatican diplomacy.
“There’s a lot of people and a lot of media articles asking why the Vatican is forgetting their friends in Armenia, and it is because there are cardinals and Vatican officials in touch with Azerbaijan, and getting money from them,” Aykazian said.
The bishop’s remarks came amid public pushback over a conference on Christianity in Azerbaijan held at the Gregorian University this month, which Armenian activists and church officials say is part of an Azeri effort to erase Armenian history.
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One of the big topics of conversation just about anywhere you look these past few weeks has been about Adolescence, a Netflix drama about teenage murder, online culture, and role models.
Elizabeth Lev, probably the best art historian working in and around the Vatican, saw the series. And it put her in mind of the life and works of Caravaggio, the bad boy of Baroque, and one of the most powerful artists of his age.
As unexpected high-art/low-art parallels to be drawn go, using a Netflix series to walk through the development of the most famous painters of all time has to be right up there. What I love most about most, though, is that it doesn’t just make you smarter for having read it, it makes you want to talk about it.
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A Milwaukee priest was sentenced this month to two years probation after he pled guilty to several counts of theft from his parish over a four-year period.
In an apparent deal with prosecutors, Fr. Mauricio Fernandez-Boscan pleaded guilty to stealing more than $33,000 from Milwaukee’s St. Adelbert’s Parish.
But while the current parish pastor claims that Fernandez-Boscan actually embezzled more than $160,000 from its accounts, Fernandez-Boscan saw support from other priests in the Milwaukee archdiocese amid his conviction.
In a strong show of support, eight fellow priests sent letters to the judge who sentenced Fernandez-Boscan — an unusually high number of interventions for a priest convicted of stealing from his parish.
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“The world is uneasy, though it does not know why. Things seem to draw toward some great consummation. But what?”
That’s how Stephen White started his column this week. His question is in part rhetorical, of course. This, of all weeks, we know what the great consummation of creation is.
But as Stephen goes on to discuss, our knowing the answer only ups the need to diagnose the increasingly urgent questions our world is unravelling itself over in these days of fear and trembling.
This is some solid Triduum reading here.
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Messages exchanged between witnesses in the Vatican financial crimes trial appear to show collusion between them as they prepared to give evidence, according to new Italian media reports.
As I wrote in an analysis this week, the messages, sent between some of the most high-profile people to give evidence at the trial, which concluded in December 2023, appear to point to more than just unseemly cooperation between themselves, and suggest consistent cooperation between witnesses and the Vatican City Office of the Promoter of Justice.
Even more concerning for the Vatican is the possibility of possible perjury by some witnesses in the trial — and that the prosecution may have been aware of it as it occurred.
Read all about what happened and what it means right here.
Avignon, again
As you might imagine, I read the story of the text messages between les femmes Chaouqui and Ciferri with great attention. The incredibly porous nature of the Holy See’s departments remains a source of wonderment to me.
Even though I am not unused to benefitting from curial indiscretion myself, from time to time, the contents of the messages, which lay plain that someone in the Office of the Promoter of Justice was systematically leaking details of an investigation to a woman who is herself a convicted criminal in Vatican City (for the crime of leaking confidential information, no less) is remarkable.
The irony is compounded, given that the chief prosecutor Alessandro Diddi, alleged in the messages by Ciferri to be the leak, has himself been known to attempt to prosecute journalists for reporting the news.
It’s tempting to laugh, so comically bad has the situation become. But, in truth, it is far too serious for mirth. The Vatican government's penchant for shenanigans has now hit critical mass, I think.
There’s now a real existential risk to the Holy See, at least as we have come to know it.