Remembering Maundy Thursday 2011

I am reposting something I wrote two years ago because it is as true

today as it was then. And today, I'm thinking about Holy Thursday in a special way, because the Chrism Mass that takes place today will yield the holy oils that will be used when my grandsons are baptized (one on Holy Saturday and one soon after his birth this summer) and when my daughter is Confirmed and received into the Church at Pentecost.

Yes. Today is a very special day.

(Reposted from Maundy Thursday 2011)

Today, dioceses across the world will celebrate the Holy Thursday Mass of the Chrism.

The holy oils will be blessed. Three holy oils. The oil for anointing catechumens. The oil for anointing the sick. And the oil that confers the gift of the Holy Spirit in the Sacraments of Holy Orders and Confirmation.

I remember the Holy Chrism Oil. How it smelled when I was Confirmed. What it was like to be anointed. To sense the Presence of the Holy Spirit. To be sealed in Him, with Him, for Him.

I'm discerning things now. I'm at a bend in the road. Waiting for next things.

It's not unsettling, though. I know that God has ordered all things well. He has anointed me with the Holy Spirit and the calling on my life is for His glory.

Whether that is writing and speaking.

Or teaching.

Or mostly one and some of the other.

For there is one thing I know, one thing I sense deeply. I have been anointed with holy Chrism and Confirmed. Isaiah spoke of it. Luke repeats it. My soul demands it, and my spirit says yes to it.

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord."

Remembering Maundy Thursday 2011