Bulletin Article 4LC - You call it "pink", I call it "manly rose"...

Quincy, IL TV Mass for shut-ins,
c. 2006 (when I was a bit younger and heavier)

   Laetare Sunday... one of two Sundays during the year that presents the option of dressing the priest and deacon in Rose vestments.

   I have always understood the "rose" weekends of Advent and Lent as the "heads up" weekends of each season.  In both cases, when they come, we are just over half-way to the great feast.  This is the time of the season when confessions and penance services kick in to high gear.  Indeed, I like looking at opportunities to see a "little Pentecost' in the midst of Advent during the Third Sunday, and Lent when the readings lend themselves to that interpretation, as we can sometimes faintly see the inexorable movement of the Spirit, hidden in the common and the lowly, but about to erupt in new life and joy for the world in the Incarnation and the Resurrection.

   The "rose" Sunday of Lent, "Laetare" Sunday comes from the first words (in Latin) of the Entrance Antiphon from the day.  The Entrance Antiphon appears in the front of your missalettes at church, and remains the official "song" for the beginning of Mass, although most parishes out there typically ignore it and go straight to some metrical hymn-type tune that may or may not have anything to do with the actual liturgy to be celebrated... which is unfortuante, but gris for the mill on another post someday.

  And so, that anitphon reads:

• Laetare Jerusalem: et conventum facite omnes qui diligitis eam: gaudete cum laetitia, qui in tristitia fuistis: ut exsultetis, et satiemini ab uberibus consolationis vestrae.
 
• Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together all you that love her, rejoice with joy you that have been in sorrow: that you may exult and be filled from the breasts of your consolation.

   The mothering image of Jerusalem is contrasted with the continual movement of Jesus 'up the road' to the Jerusalem where he would be consummate his covenant upon Calvary.   The image of nourishment from the sacrifice of the cross and the Last Supper is unmistakable here.

   I always am also drawn to remember that this fourth week of Lent is intended to remind us that the drama of our salvation has already played out in Jerusalem, and we know, happily, how the story ends.  In faith, then, even though continuing the discipline of the Holy Season, we take this weekend to look forward in confidence and joy, the saving work that has already been completed and which is celebrated, even these days, in the light of the resurrection.

   So brothers, get out the rose and wear it proudly for mom and holy mother Church.  Let it stand for a subtle injection of the fire of the Holy Spirit during the season... let it be a cooler color than the moody violets and bloody purples of the rest of the season.  There is something offer in hope as we look to the trajectory of the entire season: an unfolding of the resurrection in our own day and time.