Pope calls for global ‘solidarity’ on Easter
VATICAN CITY, April 14, (AP): Pope Francis called for global solidarity Sunday to confront the “epochal challenge” posed by the coronavirus pandemic as he and Christians around the world celebrated the joy of Easter in unusually solitary and somber circumstances due to bans on public gatherings and stay-at-home orders.
With most churches closed to their congregations and police checkpoints set up in Europe to enforce the restrictions, families that normally would attend morning church services wearing their Easter best and then join friends and relatives for traditional meals generally stayed home.
People cut off from their faith communities and loved ones had the option of watching Easter services on TV or online, or in a handful of cases attending drive-through services with the windows of their vehicles rolled up. A few lucky Rome residents attended church from their balconies overlooking a church where a priest celebrated Mass on the roof.
“We feel close to each other despite this distance,” Luca Rosati, a Santa Emerenziana church parishioner said of the unusual open-air Easter service. “We can experience from here what we normally would experience inside the church, as a community.”
At Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where many Christians believe Jesus was crucified and entombed, Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa urged the faithful not to be discouraged.
“The message of Easter is that life, despite all, will prevail,” Pizzaballa said during a Mass attended by a few clerics while the streets of the surrounding Old City stood devoid of pilgrims and vendors.
At the Vatican, Francis celebrated Mass in a largely empty St. Peter’s Basilica. A handful of faithful sat one per pew, and the choir’s Kyrie hymn echoed off the marble floors.
Normally, fresh tulips and orchids would paint the promenade of St. Peter’s Square in a riot of color on Easter to underscore the day’s message of life and rebirth following Christ’s crucifixion.