Resurrexit sicut dixit, ALLELUIA!

Happy Easter, everyone!


I took the last week off from work and travelled south to Washington DC with my brother, the intrepid traveler that he is. We stayed at the JVC House in the Columbia Heights neighborhood (it was the second time in two weeks that they put me up, and the second time around they put up me and Joe! Thanks, guys!), and spent most of our evenings with them: eating dinner, drinking wine, watching Law & Order, and talking about Europe and social justice-y things. Jesuit Volunteers are cool.


I have fallen thoroughly in love with that city. I already have a favorite restaurant (Amsterdam Falafel, if you ever find yourself in the Columbia Heights area), bookstore (Idle Time Books—a wonderful, understated, and charming place that plays French lounge music and sells the best collection of used books I’ve ever seen), and place to go to church (the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. Staggeringly gorgeous.) Joe and I did decidedly tourist-y things during the days—visiting the monuments, going to museums, walking around a LOT—but it was nice to have a few favorite places to go where we felt a little less like tourists. I don’t see myself living there for a long time, but if I could swing graduate school there, I’d be a happy camper!


By the by, the basilica is a wonderful place to be during Triduum! Every priest in the archdiocese comes to concelebrate with the cardinal and the apostolic nuncio to the US. All the seminarians (literally, ALL of them) help serve the Mass. It’s a really beautiful thing to watch. I needed more than an hour to check out all of the side altars in that church!


We schlepped back to Camden after the Good Friday service because our community had planned on having an Easter dinner together (some months ago, the school that Mark and Jenna work for donated a turkey to our community, and we kept it in the freezer for a special occasion. We called the feast “Easter-giving.”) The Vigil Mass at Sacred Heart began at 4:30am (when my alarm clock went off, I actually said out loud, “Are you CRAZY?”), but it was gorgeous. One lady was initiated into the Church, and she just glowed with joy and sacramental grace when she received her Sacraments! She and her godparents led candlelight procession outside the Church (we sang a LOT of “alleluias”) and back in, and even at 5:30 in the morning, the people on the streets took a reverent notice. We went back into the church to finish Mass, and the whole event finished around 7am.


I decided to take advantage of the energy that I still had and went for a run after mass, but I had to hurry home and shower because most of us went to Christine’s church for the 9am Easter service. I really like her church—they have a great ministry team that serves as the pastoral team. Protestant services still feel a little foreign to me, but they’re always so joyful and profound that I certainly enjoy them. Kingsway (the name of the church) starts its services with a praise and worship session, and something pretty profound happened during it on Sunday.


Granted, I had gone to bed at midnight, awakened at 3:30am, been awake for a two-and-a-half hour Mass, and run three miles already that day. I had received a few messages from friends back home who told me they were thinking of me at Easter Vigil. It was my first Easter away from home. An experience (which I’ve always kept to myself) from Good Friday 2009 was still fresh in my mind, as its promise was fulfilled this Easter. So I was teetering on the edge of emotional to begin with.


But when the pianist played the first few measures of “Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)”, I just lost it. It wasn’t desperate bawling, but the tears just flowed up and out of me, and I didn’t have the strength to stop them. The song reminds me of home, my old Newman Center, and special moment with a special friend. I couldn’t really help myself.


The slightly mortifying part was that while none of my roommates noticed this (I was sandwiched in the row between Jenna’s boyfriend and my brother, so they couldn’t see me), the lead pastor did. He look over his shoulder, and even though my vision was blurred, I could see him turned toward me for part of the song. Keep in mind—I’ve only been there once before, and I doubt he even saw me that time. So, from his perspective, some unfamiliar woman was standing in his church, weeping like her heart would break on Easter morning. Being the good pastor that he is, when he came and shook hand with our row at the sign of peace (I’d composed myself by then), he gave me a pretty emphatic look and leaned in to ask if I was all right. I answered yes—I just get emotional about Easter.


The truth is, I don’t know what caused the sudden flood of emotion, but I felt a lot better afterwards. Then I napped for four hours, and we ended the day with a great dinner with our community (and a few extended community members! Siblings, significant others, etc).