Topic > Importance of Holy Week - 716

The Semana Santa, also known as Holy Week. Holy Week is called "Great and Holy Week". Holy Week in Christianity is the last week of Lent and the week before Easter. Holy Week in the Christian year is the week immediately before Easter. Holy Week begins with what is now called Palm Sunday. The Chrism Mass, the texts of which the Roman Missal now reports under Holy Thursday, may be brought forward to one of these days, to facilitate the participation of the greatest possible number of members of the clergy of the diocese together with the bishop. When the main services of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and the Easter Vigil were celebrated in the morning, each day's office of Matins and Lauds was celebrated in the evening of the previous day in the service known as Tenebrae. The liturgy is made up of three parts, the Liturgy of the Word, the Veneration of the Cross and Holy Communion. On Holy Saturday the Church waits at the tomb of the Lord in prayer and fasting, meditating on his passion and death and his descent into hell, and awaiting the resurrection. The liturgy begins after sunset on Holy Saturday when the crowd gathers inside the church. Holy Week has become one of Brazil's main symbols of community identity, most significant in the southern city of Campanha. Campanha Holy Week begins on Monday evening with the Procession of the Deposit. Holy Week in Guatemala includes processions with images of saints carried on wooden platforms. In Amatenango, Judas, who betrayed Christ, was the main focal point during Holy Week. Trapani hosts one of the most elaborate processions for Holy Week, larger than anywhere else in the world, in the Procession of the Mysteries of Trapani or also known as the Mysteries of Trapani, a long day......middle of paper.. ....serve Holy Week just like the Catholic Church does. Among Protestant communities, perhaps the Moravian Church's Holy Week services are the most extensive, as the congregation follows the life of Christ through His last week in daily services devoted to readings from a harmony of Gospel stories, responding to actions in hymns, prayers, and litanies, beginning on the eve of Palm Sunday and culminating in the "Easter Morning" or Easter Sunrise service begun by the Moravians in 1732. Some Protestant churches place great importance on the foot-washing ceremony Holy Thursday, for others it could be the only time of the year in which Holy Communion is celebrated. These Protestants conduct more informal Holy Week celebrations, usually including sermons on the last week of Christ's life and possibly some special services on Palm Sunday, Good Friday, and/or Easter Sunday..