In my earlier years, my parents made sure we never missed mass on the three days before Easter Sunday. With how strict my parents followed the rules, I never even tried to entertain the thought of breaking any of those rules. Holy Thursday, we made sure to reach the church thirty minutes before mass, so we got a front seat before the mass started.
As Catholics, on Good Friday, we followed the rule of not eating meat or milk, or anything that has blood to the core. The meal for Good Friday, in our house was usually beans with pap, custard or garri, at whatever time we break our fast that afternoon, then at night, concoction rice without meat, fish or egg, for dinner. I'm not the biggest fan of beans and eating it after a fast always had me fast longer than the entire family did.
When I eventually can't hold it anymore, I would take a tiny portion of the beans and large amount of garri to compliment the beans. I always used garri because I disliked custard and pap. So, breaking my fast on Good Friday was usually a dilemma because I disliked the meals we usually broke with and because I didn't have too many options available to me, I had to make do. Today being Good Friday, the tradition still went the same way in my house. I ate beans and garri after the fast and this evening, ate rice.
The procession that usually took place on Good Friday was something I enjoyed the most. Back then, I and my siblings always looked forward to walking behind the youths acting 'the passion of Christ' on the streets. We followed them and struggled to find our way to the front so we could get a glimpse of almost everything happening, how the actor playing the role of Jesus was being beaten. We played the role of inspectors, studied how the actor winced when he was beaten, whether they were being lenient on him, and whether they used palm oil to serve as blood. Since I participated a lot in church activities, I knew most of the people who played the role of Jesus.
There was this one time after the passion had played out, and we were all kneeling, I whispered to my brother that that particular Jesus was Brother Emmanuel. I never forgot that particular incident because I thought I whispered but it turned out I hadn't. Many of the adults turned to look at me and began laughing. These past four years, I've been missing the procession. I've not missed the service that usually holds after the procession but the procession, which was most times, my highlight of Good Friday, is something I haven't attended in about four years now.
The Easter Vigil too is one I really loved attending then. I and my brother loved it mostly because of the continuous mention of the name Paschal at that mass. My brother loved it because bearing that name, it felt like attending a mass celebrated for him. It's been a long time since we attended the Triduum mass and that's mostly because of the insecurity around our area. Palm Sunday, Holy Monday, Holy Tuesday, are like any other day of the week in lent. We don't really have anything special onthose days aside the church rites on Palm Sunday, which we never miss. These have been the Holy Week practices in my family so far.
So, tell us in the #thoughtfuldailypost. Do you have any Holy Week practices? Don't hesitate to share them with us in the community.