A daily study of the Network’s diverse faiths
Holy Saturday (Easter Eve). The Roman Rite has no celebration of Mass between the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday evening and the Easter Vigil held in the hours of darkness between sunset on Holy Saturday and sunrise on Easter Day, most commonly in the evening of Holy Saturday the last day of Lent, or at midnight, this first celebration of Easter traditionally being considered to begin at sunset. The Easter Vigil was at 7:30 pm in St. Peter’s Basilica and Canterbury Cathedral arranged 9 pm ticketed and online public worship, other churches holding the Vigil with the lighting of the Paschal Candle and the renewal of baptismal vows in the churchyard or other place where services are routinely held. A vigil (vigilia, wakefulness, παννυχίς) is a period of purposeful sleeplessness for devotional watching or an observance on the eve of a major religious festival, a few Roman Catholic solemnities such as Easter Sunday being endowed with their own Vigil Mass.
Cold Food Festival (Hánshí Jié, 寒食节). Start of Chinese minor festival to 5 April in Shanxi province on the eve of Qing Ming day, commemorating the story of Jié Zitui, a loyal and humble servant at the time of the 771 to 476 BCE Spring and Autumn Period, who offered sustenance to his starving master and was saved from the burning down of his house. To mark the event, no fires were lit and all food was served cold. It marks the time when the fires used for heating over the winter are put out and the all the ashes cleared away, no fire thus being available for cooking.
St Richard of Chichester (Richard de Wych) (c1197-1253). Feast day in Roman Catholic Church and some provinces of the Anglican Communion for Wyche (modern Droitwich) gentleman Priest, Vicar of Deal, confessor and Bishop of Chichester, who in Paris and Bologna distinguished himself by his proficiency in canon law. An ascetic who wore a hair-shirt and displayed rigid frugality and temperance, he kept his diet simple and rigorously excluded animal flesh. Richard was merciless to usurers and corrupt clergy but was a stickler for clerical privilege. Miracles were wrought at Richard’s tomb in Chichester Cathedral and it became a centre of pilgrimage. In 1538, during the reign of Henry VIII, it was plundered and destroyed by order of Thomas Cromwell but it was re-established in 1930. Venerated in Roman Catholic Church, Anglican Communion. As his Feast Day falls within Lent or Eastertide, it is translated to 16 June in some provinces of the Anglican Communion and celebrated as Sussex Day. Patron of Diocese of Chichester, coachmen.
Prayer Most merciful Redeemer, Who gavest to Bishop Richard a love of learning, grant that aided by his prayers we may know Thee more clearly, love Thee more dearly and follow Thee more nearly, Who livest and reignest with the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, ever one God, world without end. Amen.