The Vatican asked bishops from all over the world to help the faithful make Easter at home

The Vatican has asked Catholic bishops around the world, both in the Latin Rite and in the Eastern Catholic Churches, to provide their faithful with resources to support personal and family prayer during Holy Week and Easter, especially where COVID-19 restrictions make them they prevent from going to church.

The Congregation for the Eastern Churches, by publishing "indications" on March 25 for Easter celebrations in the churches it supports, urged the heads of the churches to issue concrete and specific rules for the celebrations "in accordance with the measures established by the civil authorities for containment of the contagion. "

The declaration was signed by Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the congregation, and asked the Eastern churches to "organize and distribute through the means of social communication, aids that allow an adult in the family to explain the" mystagogy "(religious meaning) of the rites that in normal conditions would be celebrated in church with the assembly present ”.

The Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, updating a note originally published on March 20, has also asked the conferences and dioceses of bishops "to ensure that resources are provided to support family and personal prayer" during Holy Week and Easter. where they cannot go to Massa.

The suggestions from the Congregation for the Eastern Churches for celebrating liturgies in the midst of the pandemic were not as specific as those issued for Latin Rite Catholics because Eastern Catholic churches have a variety of liturgical traditions and can follow the Julian calendar, with Sunday of Palms and Easter a week later this year than the Gregorian calendar used by most Catholics.

However, the congregation said, in Eastern Catholic churches, "feasts must be rigorously held on the days set by the liturgical calendar, broadcasting or streaming possible celebrations, so that they can be followed by the faithful in their homes. "

The only exception is the liturgy in which the "holy mirone", or sacramental oils, are blessed. While it has become customary to bless the oil on the morning of Holy Thursday, "this celebration, not being connected to the East to this day, can be moved to another date," the note states.

Sandri asked the heads of Eastern Catholic churches to consider ways to adapt their liturgies, particularly because "the participation of the choir and ministers envisaged by some ritual traditions is not possible at the present time when prudence advises avoiding gathering in significant number ".

The congregation asked churches to omit the rites usually held outside the church building and to postpone any baptisms scheduled for Easter.

Eastern Christianity has a wealth of ancient prayers, hymns and sermons that the faithful should be encouraged to read around the cross on Good Friday, the statement says.

Where it is not possible to go to the nocturnal celebration of the Easter liturgy, Sandri suggested that "families can be invited, where possible through the festive ringing of bells, to come together to read the Gospel of the Resurrection, light a lamp and sing a little songs or songs typical of their tradition that the faithful often know from memory. "

And, he said, many Eastern Catholics will be disappointed that they will not be able to confess before Easter. In line with a decree issued on March 19 by the Apostolic Penitentiary, "let the pastors direct the faithful to recite some of the rich penitential prayers of the Eastern tradition to be recited with a spirit of contrition".

The decree of the Apostolic Penitentiary, an ecclesial tribunal that dealt with matters of conscience, asked priests to remind Catholics in the face of "the painful impossibility of receiving sacramental absolution" that they could do an act of contrition directly to God in prayer.

If they are sincere and promise to go to confession as soon as possible, "they obtain the forgiveness of sins, even of mortal sins," the decree said.

Bishop Kenneth Nowakowski, the new head of the Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy of the Holy Family of London, told Catholic News Service on March 25 that a group of Ukrainian bishops are already working on guidelines for their church.

A popular Easter tradition, followed mostly by Ukrainians living abroad without their families, he said, is for the bishop or priest to bless a basket of their Easter foods, including decorated eggs, bread, butter, meat and cheese.

"We want to find ways to livestream the liturgies and help our faithful understand that it is Christ who blesses," not the priest, Nowakowski said.

Furthermore, he said: “Our Lord is not limited by the sacraments; it can enter our life in these very difficult circumstances in many ways.