New, retired Catholic bishops will celebrate Holy Week Masses

Betsy PriceCulture, Headlines

a sunset in the background

Both Bishop William E. Koenig and former Bishop Francis Malooly will celebrate Holy Week and Easter masses. Photo by Pixabay

 

The Diocese of Wilmington has announced where Bishop William E. Koenig will celebrate services and participate in other events during Holy Week and Easter.

All Masses and services are open to the public. Events at the Cathedral of Saint Peter will be livestreamed on the Diocese of Wilmington’s YouTube channel.

Retired bishop, the Most Reverend W. Francis Malooly, also will be celebrating Holy Week and Easter events. He stepped aside last year.

Koenig will spend all day Saturday, April 9, with the diocese’s annual youth pilgrimage. He will walk with hundreds of youth and adult volunteers from all over Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore as they carry a wooden cross through the streets of Wilmington.

This year’s theme is “We Walk by Faith.” The event features a concert, prayer, a visit to Saint Francis Hospital, the Sacrament of Reconciliation (confession), Stations of the Cross, and Eucharistic Adoration, during stops at five Wilmington Catholic churches.

The bishop will conclude the pilgrimage by celebrating the 5 p.m. Palm Sunday Vigil Mass at St. Elizabeth Church, Cedar and Clayton Streets in Wilmington.

On Sunday, April 10, Koenig will celebrate the Palm Sunday Mass at the historic Cathedral of Saint Peter, Sixth and West Streets in Wilmington, beginning at 9:30 a.m.

Koenig, along with priests throughout the diocese, will hear confessions during Reconciliation Monday. Catholic residents of Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore, are invited to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation at any of the 56 parish churches in the diocese, from 3 p.m. until 8 p.m.

Reconciliation Monday is designed to make it more convenient for Catholics to receive the sacrament at the end of Lent and beginning of Holy Week, in anticipation of the celebration of Easter.

On Tuesday, April 12, Koenig will join with priests from all over the diocese for the annual Chrism Mass to be held at Holy Cross Church on South State Street in Dover, Delaware.

During the service, which begins at 7 p.m., the bishop will consecrate the perfumed oil known as Sacred Chrism, to be used throughout the diocese for baptisms, confirmations and ordinations as well as the other oils used in the ministering to catechumens, those coming into the Church, and to the sick.

The priests of the diocese will renew their priestly promises at this Mass.

On Holy Thursday, April 14, the bishop will preside at one of the most poignant ceremonies of the Church year: the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, to be held at 7 p.m. at the Cathedral of Saint Peter.

The celebrant will often wash the feet of 12 people, recreating what Jesus did to His Apostles as reported in the 13th chapter of the Gospel of St. John.

At 3 p.m., Koenig will preside at the Celebration of the Passion of the Lord at the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Wilmington.  Both solemn services commemorate the suffering and death of Jesus Christ.

The Easter Vigil Mass on Holy Saturday, April 16, will feature the blessing of fire, water and the Easter candle. Koenig will preside over it at 8 p.m. at the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Wilmington.

In many Catholic churches, the Easter Vigil also includes the baptism, confirmation and first holy communion of individuals who are joining the Catholic Church.

On Easter, April 17, Koenig will celebrate the resurrection of Christ with Mass at 9:30 a.m. the Cathedral of Saint Peter.

All Masses and services are open to the public and all are cordially invited. Events at the Cathedral of Saint Peter will be livestreamed on the Diocese of Wilmington’s YouTube channel – //YouTube.com/DioceseofWilm.

Malooly will celebrate Palm Sunday Mass at St. Elizabeth’s Church in Wilmington April 10 at 9 a.m., Holy Thursday Mass at Saint Mary Magdalen in Wilmington April 14 at 7 p.m., Good Friday Passion of the Lord at the Little Sisters of the Poor’s Jeanne Jugan Residence in Newark, Delaware on April 15 at 3 p.m., and Easter Sunday Mass on April 17 at 10:30 a.m. at Saint Mary Magdalen.

 

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