The Journey of a Bishop: Pilgrims to Jerusalem (Domus Galilaeae, Part IV)

To Jerusalem for the Lord's Day

"We celebrate Sunday because of the venerable Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, and we do so not only at Easter but also at each turning of the week": so wrote Pope Innocent I at the beginning of the fifth century, testifying to an already well established practice which had evolved from the early years after the Lord's Resurrection. Saint Basil speaks of "holy Sunday, honoured by the Lord's Resurrection, the first fruits of all the other days"; and Saint Augustine calls Sunday "a sacrament of Easter".

The intimate bond between Sunday and the Resurrection of the Lord is strongly emphasized by all the Churches of East and West. In the tradition of the Eastern Churches in particular, every Sunday is the anastàsimos hemèra, the day of Resurrection, and this is why it stands at the heart of all worship.

In the light of this constant and universal tradition, it is clear that, although the Lord's Day is rooted in the very work of creation and even more in the mystery of the biblical "rest" of God, it is nonetheless to the Resurrection of Christ that we must look in order to understand fully the Lord's Day. This is what the Christian Sunday does, leading the faithful each week to ponder and live the event of Easter, true source of the world's salvation. (John Paul II, Dies Domini, #19)

On Sunday, January 30, we lived out the memory of the Lord's Paschal Mystery by a short pilgrimage from Galilee to Jerusalem, visiting--after a comfort break in Jericho (cf. the camel above)--in the Holy City: the Greek Catholic Patriarchate, the Holy Sepulchre, the Notre Dame Centre (for lunch and an exposition on the Holy Shroud), the thee traditional site of the Upper Room where we celebrated the Eucharist.

Though it was windy, rainy and damp our spirits were lifted high throughout the day! Some pix: