A Blessed Triduum! How to Celebrate it with Children

Our Easter Triduum, such a wonderful time in our faith, as we trace our history.  Triduum means 'three days' and it refers to the events of the Last Supper, Jesus' death, and His resurrection.  It begins at sundown on Holy Thursday, and continues until sundown on Easter Sunday.  So, in terms of hours, it is three days, but it does actually take part over the course of four calendar days!  On Holy Thursday, we celebrate the Mass of the Lord's Supper, where Jesus instituted the Eucharist and the Priesthood at the Last Supper.  On Good Friday, we remember Jesus' sacrifice for us, redeeming our sin.  Finally, at the Easter Vigil and on Easter Sunday, we remember and rejoice in the resurrection.  What an amazing few days!  Here are some ways to observe this time with your kids.

All Ages:
Have a Holy Week Egg Hunt, where you hunt for symbols of Holy Week and read about what happened that week.  The original post can be found here.

Have a Holy Thursday  meal, with foods that illustrate the events of the Last Supper.  A list of ideas can be found on this sheet. 

For kids who like to get creative, pull out the building blocks (Legos) and have them build Holy Week scenes.  They could make scenes of the Last Supper, the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus' Crucifixion, or the tomb where He was buried.  Below are some that our parish children created on Palm Sunday.

Go to church and pray the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday.  Some parishes, ours included, have stations geared specifically for children.  If you don't have access to these or can't attend, you can find many Stations for Children online that you could print out and bring with you to pray.  You could also pray them at home if you can't get to church.  Type 'children's stations of the cross' into your favorite search engine.

Eat hot cross buns on Good Friday, as they are a traditional food.  Talk about why they are traditional.  (They are meatless, and the icing cross reminds us of Jesus' sacrifice and death.)  Just remember that Good Friday is a day of fasting for adults without health restrictions, so adjust accordingly.

This is our tree brought to life by the good deeds of our parish kids.  The base was white for Holy Thurday.

For Older Kids:
 I really only have one suggestion here, but it's an important one.  Take them to church during the Three Days.  While Easter is obvious, often families don't think about going to church on Holy Thursday, Good Friday, or attending the Easter Vigil.  These liturgies are such a wonderful expression of our faith, that I highly recommend going to them, once your kids are old enough to pay attention and have some understanding of what's going on.

Holy Thursday is about an hour and a half long.  It has unique parts to it, such as the washing of feet, and processing with the Blessed Sacrament to the Altar of Repose.  My 1st and 3rd graders will be attending with me for the first time this year.

Good Friday will usually have a stations of the cross service and also a liturgical service.  These are an hour to an hour and a half in length.  The liturgical service will have a proclamation of the Passion, the story of how Jesus died.

The Easter Vigil is about 3 hours long, and could be longer.  There are many readings during the vigil, and they trace the history of our faith.  Fire will be blessed, and Mass will begin with the church in darkness, gradually becoming lit with candles and the church lights.  This is a powerful symbol of Christ as the light of the world.  A new Paschal Candle that will be lit during Easter and for baptisms and funerals throughout the year is blessed.  RCIA candidates will be baptized, receive 1st communion, and be confirmed on this special night.  I will probably wait a few more years to take my children as it is a very long Mass and doesn't begin until sundown.  If your kids are middle school or older, however, this is a wonderful and beautiful Mass to celebrate with your family and parish.

May the richness of our faith and the depth of Christ's love touch your heart this Triduum!
Carolyn

Holy Week Palm Sunday Centerpiece Craft

I love Palm Sunday!  It begins the holiest week of the year, and starts with us celebrating Jesus' welcome into Jerusalem, where the people cheered, waved palms, and laid their coats at Jesus' feet.   I'm always left thinking how the people in that crowd couldn't have known how difficult and sad the days ahead would be, or that the real rejoicing and celebrating was a week later, when Jesus gave us new life on that first Easter.

Here is an easy way for your kids to make a palm branch centerpiece for Palm Sunday.  Thank you so much to our Religious Ed. Coordinator, Janet, who suggested this! We made this after our family Mass this past weekend, and it appealed to a wide variety of ages, as well as being simple enough for the very little ones.  I just eyeballed the sizes of tissue paper, it does not need to be exact.  This is what you'll need:

• Paper towel tube, cut in half (not pictured)
• Green tissue paper, cut into 12 3X3" squares
• Green tissue paper, cut into 1 6X6" squares
• Glue stick or craft glue

 Run a line of glue or liberally apply the glue stick in a line halfway down the length of the tube.

Scrunch up a 3X3" piece of tissue paper, and stick it to the side of the tube, close to the top.  Repeat this, going halfway down the tube.  You should have room for 3 rows.  Make another column, right next to the already completed one.  This will add some fullness to your branch.

Leave a space (it will be the stem part of the branch) and then add 2 more columns, right next to each other.

To finish the centerpiece, put some glue around the top inside of the tube.  Take the 6X6" piece of tissue paper and stuff it into the tube.  Push it gently against the sides so that it sticks to the glue.  You can always use another piece if you'd like it to be fuller.

Display the centerpiece on your table for Palm Sunday!  (This is the demo I made.)

Happy Palm Sunday!
Carolyn

A Holy Week Easter Egg Hunt!

Most egg hunts happen now before Easter, as opposed to during the Easter season.  I suspect that this is because most kids are back in school the day after Easter Sunday now, so usually the hunts are the day before Easter or the day before Palm Sunday.  We had never really had a problem with this, our church's hunt (the Saturday before Palm Sunday) was just simply a lead up to Holy Week for us.  It is a wonderful community event at our parish, and I want my children to experience that community.  I would always let the kids choose a piece of candy to enjoy, and then they would put it all away, to be brought out and enjoyed on Easter. 

This was all well and good until last year, when I started hearing, "It's Easter!  We're hunting for eggs and on vacation!"  Well, the 'on vacation' part I couldn't do much about, but I certainly could fix the egg hunt issue!  This is a take on other egg ideas all over the internet.  Type 'Resurrection Eggs' or 'Stations of the Cross Eggs' into a search engine, and you'll get some ideas.  The basic premise is to take symbols from the events of Holy Week, put the symbols into plastic eggs, hide them around your house, hunt for them, and as you open them, read the Holy Week stories from the Bible.  Here's how we did it last year, step by step.

Above are the symbols I used.  Here is the list, top to bottom, starting with the column on the left.

1. The rolled up pipe cleaner is soft, like the fur of the donkey Jesus rode into Jerusalem.
2. A palm branch for the branches that were waved.
3. A dove and cotton ball (lamb's fur)  for the money lenders and trade going on at the temple.
4. Three dimes for the thirty pieces of silver, the amount of money for which Judas betrayed Jesus.
5. Soap and a Towel for Jesus washing the apostles' feet.
6. A Cracker and (top 2nd column) Chalice toy representing the institution of the Eucharist.
7. A picture of a flower representing the garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prayed.
8. The letter 'Z' representing the sleeping apostles.
9. A chocolate kiss for Judas betraying Jesus with a kiss.
10. A toy sword for Peter cutting off the servant's ear.
11. Lanyard or rope for Jesus being bound.
12. The number three (top 3rd column) for the number of times Peter denied Jesus.
13. A red feather for the crowing of the rooster.
14. Yarn tied to look like a whip for the scourging.
15. Gravel representing Jesus carrying His cross on the road.
16. A toy soldier
17. Purple cloth (top 4th column) for Jesus being stripped of His garments.
18. Nails for Jesus nailed to the cross.
19. Sign saying 'INRI' for the sign above Jesus' head.
20. Dice for the soldiers gambling for Jesus' garment. 
21. Blue cloth for Jesus speaking to His mother.
22. A black oval representing the eclipse of the sun.
23. A ripped cloth (top 5th column) representing the torn curtain of the temple.
24. A rock for the rock placed in front of the tomb.
25. An empty egg representing the resurrection.
26. Sand representing the three times Jesus fell.

I placed all these items in eggs and hid them around the house.  I made sure I had 30 items, since I have 3 kids and that way they could each find 10 eggs, but you could do fewer than I did.  We hunted for the eggs, found them, opened them, and talked about what they could mean.  Then I read the Holy Week events to them, and as we read, the children would pick up the items as we read about them.  I ended with the resurrection, as I think it's better for little ones to know that the story doesn't end with Good Friday.

    

We had so much fun doing this, and it really drove home the point that this week is about Christ, not the candy.

A blessed Holy Week!
Carolyn