A Happy ViennEaster!

As featured in Varsity: An Easter far from home | Varsity

If there’s one thing doing a Year Abroad during a pandemic has taught me, it’s to prepare to be unprepared. No matter how many meticulous spreadsheets I might make, advance tickets I might book, mutant virus strains, ever-changing travel restrictions and the whim of Sebastian Kurz are all inevitably out there to scupper my plans. With a trip back home for the Easter weekend therefore looking as likely as my chance of finding Hot Cross Buns in Austria (zero), my Catholic flatmates and I found ourselves faced with the prospect of spending the most important days of our year away from home for the first time, as well as with questions we’d never had to ask ourselves before. What would a Holy Week away from the comforts and customs of the family home look like? What was essential for us, and where were we willing to compromise (carrots - yes, roast potatoes – absolutely not!)? We found that such decisions brought with them not only a sense of freedom, but also a feeling of responsibility. Instead of just trailing along with our families to our local parishes, we were actively deciding to participate in the Holy Triduum, and so writing ourselves into the story of the Churches and places we visited, and into the thousand-year-old traditions of our faith.

The first day of the Triduum is Maundy Thursday, or Gründonnerstag as it is called in the German-speaking world. There seem to be various suggestions as to why – some propose that ‘Grün’ comes from the German verb ‘Greinen’, to whine, or to lament, while others propose that it is indeed ‘Green’ Thursday. The practice of eating particularly verdant vegetables on the day can be traced back to the 14th Century.

After dutifully eating a spinach puree which looked so green it ought to belong in a millennial detox boot-camp, we headed off for what would be the first of many hours spent in Church. We’d gone for a baroque-style and more traditional choice with Mass at the Rochuskirche (same Oratorians as those in Birmingham, Oxford and Brompton Oratory, London), and as soon as I could smell the incense wafting out down the street, I knew we wouldn’t be disappointed.

The Maundy Thursday Mass commemorates the Last Supper which Jesus shared with his disciples, and is especially meaningful for Catholics, who believe that it is through the breaking and sharing of the bread that Jesus instituted the Eucharist; the ‘source and summit of the Christian life” (CCC 1324). The priest usually washes the feet of willing volunteers, re-enacting Jesus washing the feet of his disciples, as found in John's Gospel account, but it turns out that while washing hands is highly recommended, washing feet is too high of a Covid-19 risk. There is also the tradition of the 'Ölbergandacht', or 'Altar of Repose'; keeping watch and praying late into the night, much in the same way that Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane before his betrayal and arrest. After Mass we made our way to Stefansdom to find the side chapel filled with all sorts of shrubbery, two slightly creepy angel statues which looked like they belonged in a Doctor Who episode, yet another modern art installation in the form of a fluorescent 'ladder to heaven', and benches of socially distanced contemplative Viennese Catholics, reflecting on what was about to happen next.

I’ve always found the second day of the Triduum, Good Friday (Karfreitag), challenging. Some years I just can’t seem to focus through the lengthy service, and some years I’ve found it difficult to be so solemn – especially with the knowledge that the joy of Easter is just round the corner. But for there to be an Easter Sunday there must be a Good Friday which comes before it, and if this year was challenging it was because I was forced to dig a little deeper. Looking back, I’d say that the ‘little walk through the Viennese woods to Heiligenkreuz’, as my flatmate had sold it, which turned out to be a four hour near-vertiginous hike ending with a two-hour chanted service, was largely responsible for this. Quick note to say that we were informed at the start of all these services that we were having the shortened version due to Covid-19 restrictions and reduced capacity in the Church, goodness knows how long they normally go on for!

Stift Heiligenkreuz is the oldest continuously occupied Cistercian monastery in the world and has a relic of the True Cross of Jesus, presented by Leopold V in 1188. Leaving my scepticism about the authenticity of such a relic outside, as I entered the Chapel, I tried to think about how Jesus’ disciples felt, seeing their master, their friend, being led to his death. With daily updates on the Covid-19 death toll and the tragic loss of many loved ones, I think the pandemic has confronted us all with the stark reality of death over the past year. A particularly painful loss for the Catholic community in Cambridge has been that of our much-loved Chaplain at Fisher House, Fr Mark Langham, who passed away in January. Shivering under the stone vaults and staring at the vacant tabernacle, feelings of grief and emptiness returned and the void which death seems to be, and which it leaves behind, felt very real and close to heart indeed.

One of the most moving moments of live-streamed Holy Week last year was Fr Mark singing the Exultet at the Easter Vigil, and although the sound quality was patchy, the strength of his voice, and the majesty and clarity of the message he was proclaiming, remained undiminished. Listening to the Exultet being sung in German at the Stefansdom Easter Vigil was therefore particularly poignant. Putting aside the sad thought that I wouldn’t be able to email Fr Mark to tell him all about the fine vestments and organ music, which I knew he would have loved, I tried to focus on understanding what was happening before me.

A fire being lit by Cardinal Schönborn, candlelight spreading gradually through the darkness of the Cathedral, the sound of the Cathedral’s bells ringing out through the Viennese night, an old Austrian man belting out an Alleluia: Jesus conquering death and bringing light to the world. After quite the few days, we had reached the pinnacle – the reason why I’m a Catholic and the reason which gives me hope and joy to live each day by. Easter in Vienna might have looked incredibly different to an Easter at home, but through the spinach soup and the steep hills, the differences and the difficulties, the message remains unchanged, for as St Pope John Paul II said,

“We are an Easter people and Alleluia is our song”.

(Photo credits: Alice HW)

Wishing you all a very Happy Easter, Frohe Ostern indeed! We took our candles, lit from the Paschal Fire, all the way from Stefansdom back on the tram to light the candles in our Studentinnenheim Chapel - I'm all for 'be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire' (St Catherine of Siena), was just a bit concerned that the Saturday 11.15pm Straßenbahn 41 service would go up with it too. Bis bald!