By Judith Sudilovsky, OSV News
JERUSALEM — Christians in the Holy Land not only have the right but also the duty to celebrate Easter despite all the difficulties and conflicts they are now experiencing, said Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, in his recorded video Easter Message released on April 16.
“We need to celebrate because we need to announce with our life, with our gestures, that we belong to the … powerful love of God in Jesus,” he said. “I (say) to all those who want to listen to us that despite everything, we want to keep testifying with our life, with what we are doing, what we are. How beautiful it is to live with the risen Lord, with Jesus, here in the Holy Land.”
He emphasized the importance of celebrating life and hope despite the many difficulties not only in the Holy Land but around the world, noting that the resurrection of Jesus signifies the power of God’s love, which is more powerful than death and which can transform darkness into light.
“It seems it is difficult now to talk about life, hope, which is the message of Easter, the message of the risen Lord. But our faith says that this is what we have to look to and to base our life on,” he said.
Following tradition, on Holy Thursday morning, the patriarch held the Pontifical Mass of the Lord’s Supper and washing of the feet, along with the procession of the Blessed Sacrament, at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, reenacting of the washing the feet of the apostles by Jesus.
Later in the afternoon, Franciscan Father Francesco Patton, the custos of the Holy Land, led a similar ceremony celebrating the Mass of the Lord’s Supper at the Cenacle, also called the Upper Room, on Mt. Zion, where according to Catholic tradition Jesus held the Last Supper.
“We are gathered today for the annual commemoration of Christ’s Passover, right here where it was fulfilled. In the mysteries of Maundy Thursday, which we celebrate, it is like an anticipation and summary. Here is revealed to us the deepest desire of Jesus, the intention that inspired him in the days of his passion, his way of being in the world in order to save it,” the patriarch said in his Holy Thursday homily at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.
“As far as possible, I would like you to join me in putting ourselves in his school, the school of the Upper Room, to learn from Jesus the style of the disciple, to try to be, in this world of ours, instruments of salvation. In fact, I am convinced that the mission of the Church and its members, despite the diversity of ministries and charisms, is essentially one and the same: to contribute, with the grace of the Holy Spirit, to the salvific encounter of humanity with the Passover of Christ.”
In a shared Easter Message released on April 17, the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem sent special Easter greetings to the faithful clergy and Christians in Gaza taking refuge inside the St. Porphyrios Orthodox Church and Holy Family Catholic Church complexes since the start of the war in Gaza after the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023, and expressed solidarity with the staff of the Anglican-run Ahli Arab Hospital, which was recently bombed by Israel.
They proclaimed their “deep gratitude for God’s redeeming grace in Christ” and said they embraced their mission to help the poor and oppressed but could not take on the “weighty task” alone, calling on the international Christian community and others to join them.
“We, therefore, call upon Christians and others of goodwill from around the world to recommit themselves to working and praying for the relief of the afflicted, the release of all captives, and an end to the wars and assaults that have led to immeasurable human suffering, death, and destruction throughout our beloved Holy Land — as well as in other parts of the world similarly stricken. Most of all, we call upon them to join us in working for a just and lasting peace — beginning in Jerusalem, the City of the Resurrection — and extending from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth,” they said in the message.
They noted that in 2025 the Eastern and Western Easter celebrations fall on the same date for the first time since 2017, aligning also with the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, which was the first of the ecumenical councils that united Christian leaders from around the world.
The Jewish holiday of Passover also falls during the same week in 2025.
“We pray that this happy confluence of events may inspire our churches to increasingly strive for greater unity in Christ, even as this year we proclaim to each other on the same day that ancient Easter greeting that continues to reverberate across the ages: ‘Christ is Risen,'” they said.
