Holy Week Schedules in Rome - EF and Byzantine

The F.S.S.P. parish in Rome, Santissima Trinità dei Pellegrini, has announced the following schedule for the principal services of Holy Week. On the days not listed below, the normal schedule applies, with daily Masses at 7:30 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. Any readers who may be in Rome should know that the Passions of St. Matthew on Palm Sunday, and of Saint John on Good Friday, are sung with the “turba”, the parts that represent the crowd, in the polyphonic settings of Victoria, a major highlight of two very impressive ceremonies; Trinità dei Pellegrini also makes one of the most beautiful altars for the Blessed Sacrament in the whole city.

April 13, Palm Sunday: 9:00 a.m. Low Mass
10:30 a.m. Blessing of Palms, Procession and Pontifical Mass, celebrated by His Excellency François Bacqué, titular Archbishop of Gradisca and Apostolic Nuncio. (Please note that this is a half-hour in advance of the usual Sunday High Mass.)
5:30 p.m. Vespers and Benediction
6:30 p.m. Low Mass

April 16, Spy Wednesday: 8:30 p.m. Tenebræ

April 17, Holy Thursday: 6:30 p.m. Mass of the Lord’s Supper
8:30 p.m. Tenebræ (after the Mass)

April 18, Good Friday: 3 p.m. Stations of the Cross, and Veneration of the Relic of the Cross
6:30 p.m. Commemoration of the Passion and Death of our Lord Jesus Christ
8:30 p.m. Tenebræ (after the Good Friday liturgy)

April 19, Holy Saturday: 10: 30 p.m. Easter Vigil.

April 20, Easter Sunday: 9:00 a.m. Low Mass
11:00 a.m. Solemn High Mass
5:30 p.m. Vespers and Benediction
6:30 p.m. Low Mass

If you are visiting Rome in this period, keep in mind that Easter Monday is a legal holiday, as is April 25th, which is the Friday of the Easter Octave this year. Low Sunday will see the canonization of the Blessed Popes John XXIII and John Paul II; expect significant crowds!

The Pontifical Russian College has the following schedule. The choir of the Russicum is joined for Holy Week and Easter Sunday each year by a choir from Switzerland, the “Romanos der Melode Chor”; the music is among the finest to be heard in the Eternal City.

April 12, Saturday of Lazarus the Just: 7 a.m. Divine Liturgy
6:00 p.m. Night Vigil (celebrated every Saturday while the college is in session, from roughly mid-October to June.)

April 13, Palm Sunday: 10 a.m. Divine Liturgy (the regular Sunday schedule)

April 14-16, Holy Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday: 6 p.m. Vespers of the Presanctified Gifts.

April 17, Holy Thursday: 6 p.m. Divine Liturgy of St. Basil the Great and Vespers.
8:30 p.m. Matins of the Twelve Gospels.

April 18, Good Friday: 2:00 p.m. Vespers of the Holy Shroud
6:00 p.m. Canon of the Crucifixion of the Lord and the Lamentation of the Mother of God.

Last year’s table of the “Epitaphios”, as it is called in Greek, “Plashchanitsa” in Slavonic.

April 19, Holy Saturday: 10 a.m. Divine Liturgy of St. Basil the Great and Vespers
10:00 p.m. Reading of the Acts of the Apostles
11:00 p.m. Matins of the Paschal Canon (followed immediately by the Divine Liturgy)

April 20, Easter Sunday: Midnight, Divine Liturgy celebrated by His Excellency Cyril Vasyl,Secretary of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches.
6:00 p.m. Vespers with the reading of the Resurrection Gospel (note that there is no Divine Liturgy at 10 a.m.)

April 21, Easter Monday: 10 a.m. Divine Liturgy