Between the large Friday and the Sunday of Resurrection is the day of silence. No miracles, no signs, no answers. Many moments of our lives are just like the large Saturday — a suspension time where we do not yet see sense. It is simply a reminder that mature religion is born, not in spectacular exultations, but in silence.
A day erstwhile nothing happens
Good Friday is simply a day of drama: crowd, noise, cross, death. Sunday of Resurrection brings the morning of victory. But between them is simply a day that seems almost empty. large Saturday.
Good Friday, we're watching any very breathtaking scenes. "The veil of the tabernacle was torn into two" (Mk 15:38). On the 3rd day, we witness the Resurrection. You execute the top of miracles. These are intense moments, full of emotion. It's humanly impressive. Golgot, an empty grave and the glorified body of the Master. What happens on Saturday? Silence. Grief. Disorientation.
Jesus is mourned in hiding. He's in the grave. All hopes are buried. The Master is dead. He didn't last in any miraculous way. There are inactive images of torment and crucifixion before their eyes. Pain and despair. From a human standpoint, nothing happens.
We know there is to be a resurrection. But will it? There are doubts, uncertainty, sadness. It's the Sabbath.
Yet, according to the ancient tradition of the Church, Christ descends into the abyss to declare salvation to those who lived before his coming.
As St. Peter writes: “Christ besides died erstwhile for sins, just for the unjust, to bring you to God. Killed on the body, but called to life by the Spirit. In him he went to announce [the salvation] even to the spirits locked in prison" (1 P 3,18–19).
For those who do not know, however, there is inactive silence. No signs. There are no miracles. There's no answer.
A Time In which religion ceases to Be Obvious
Saturday is simply a day erstwhile religion ceases to be obvious. We look at the cross on Good Friday. On Sunday of Resurrection there is light. But Saturday does not give you anything that can be seen by human eyesight. There is no Jesus teaching crowds anymore. There is only a gravestone and a memory of words that at the minute seem besides hard to believe. That is why the large Saturday is so much like the human experience of faith. For religion is frequently not about seeing miracles, but about surviving erstwhile nothing is seen. A mystical Christian tradition called specified moments a “night of faith.” Saint John of the Cross wrote that it is in darkness that the soul learns most profoundly to trust God, who even works erstwhile hidden. Apparently, nothing seems to happen. Yet at specified moments the most crucial changes take place. It was besides on Saturday. For the students, it was a day of defeat and end. For God, the eve of a fresh beginning.
Great Saturday Students
Jesus foretold that on the 3rd day he would emergence from the dead. Yet, the disciples are not waiting for that promise to be fulfilled. They're sad. They feel like losers. Women prepare the aromas to anoint the body. They don't anticipate an empty grave. This scene says something crucial about human faith. Even those who heard Jesus ’ words were closest to them cannot hold hope in the minute of trial.
Why is this happening? If they have heard the prophecy of the resurrection, why do they not look forward to its fulfillment? They don't read signs. In the Gospel of Luke, the words of Jesus ’ disciples to Emmaus are: "Some of our women frightened us: They were at the grave in the morning, and not uncovering his body, they returned and told us that they had a imagination of the angels, who assured us that He was alive." There's no confidence, there's terror. uncertainty and bitterness prevail: "And we expected that He was about to deliver Israel." (Lk 24:21). The silence of the large Saturday thus exposes the fragility of our religion – abruptly and mercilessly.
The priests ask Pilate to defender the grave, fearing provocation and stealing the body. It may seem that Jesus ’ enemies feared his power more than the disciples trusted his words. The fear of enemies proves stronger than the religion of loved ones. If the disciples were truly expecting a resurrection, would women prepare the aroma to anoint the body?
We besides frequently do not trust God’s promises. Christ says, "Keep in my love," and we live as if next day would not bring change. Something bad is happening, and we can't wait with hope. We are very akin to the Apostles.
Our own large Saturdays
Every man lives his large Saturdays. Moments where something ends, and fresh ones haven't started yet. It could be a illness that lasts for months. matrimony crisis. Losing your job. Long silence of God in prayer. After a large shock comes silence. And that is erstwhile the questions arise: Where is God? Why is he quiet? Why isn't anything changing?
There is simply a waiting space between suffering and comfort. We know that promises have been made to us, and yet it is hard for us to endure due to bitterness.
There are no spectacular miracles or abrupt solutions. There's only a regular life that sometimes seems like a burden. That's erstwhile the test of our assurance begins. Good and fruitful times are not only awesome events. Before the miracle comes, we frequently request a time to prepare our hearts — a time for humility and reflection.
The Way of the Cross as a Way of Life
Christendom has made it clear from the beginning that the way to God is through the cross. This fact is powerfully expressed by Tomasz à Kempis in the book ‘On the Imitating of Christ”:
“You will arrange everything and plan according to your own will and will, and yet always, whether you want or not, will find you suffering, you will always find the cross. For you will either be touched by the pain of the body, or you will gotta endure the anguish of the spirit.
And here God will leave you, and here your loved ones will hurt, and worse, you will become a origin of torment for yourself. And out of nowhere help, out of nowhere hope of release and relief and you must go through all this until God tells you: enough.”
It is in the time of waiting for God's “enoughness” that we carry our cross most full and connect it with His Most Holy Passion.
Prayer for an hr of Darkness
The Bible does not conceal the experience of God’s silence. The psalmist calls out:
“As the hind desires water from streams, so my soul desires you, God” (Ps 42).
A believer besides experiences moments where prayer seems to come back with a deaf echo. This does not mean that God is no longer present.
In 1 of the meditations of the Way of the Cross at the Colosseum, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger wrote a prayer that peculiarly fits the silence of the large Saturday:
“Lord, you came down in the darkness of death. However, good hands take over your body and wrap it in a clean canvas (Mt 27:59). religion didn't rather die, the sun didn't rather happen. How many times do you think you're sleeping? How easy it is for us, people, to decision distant and say to ourselves, "God died." Make us think in the hr of darkness that you are there. Don't leave us alone erstwhile we start losing our spirit. aid us not leave you alone. Give us faithfulness that will defy loss. Give the love that will receive you in the minute of your top need, like your mother, which will take you back into your womb. aid us, aid the mediocre and the rich, the ignorant and the learned, to see despite fears and prejudices. Give you our opportunities, our hearts and time to prepare the garden in which the resurrection will rise."
Silence in which religion ripens
The large Saturday reminds us of something very important: religion is not only increasing among the large signs. Sometimes it's in silence.
Christ wants us to be with him not only on the day of victory, but besides in the time of torment, death and expectation. Not until it's clear. He wants us to trust him, too, or possibly above all, at a time erstwhile he seems to be far away.
As Cardinal Ratzinger wrote: “But God hidden remains a surviving and close God”.
Silence is not the end of history. It is the space in which God prepares the resurrection. And only love for Christ and assurance in the fact that He can transform our fate, soothe the pain, and lift up a man carrying his own cross, allows us to pass through the time of spiritual emptiness.
Anna Dubaniowska
