The Holy Week is a very important time for Christians, and has been for a long time. Like many holidays, we have a tendency to forget the reason why we started celebrating it in the first place. It is important that we remind ourselves of the true meaning behind Holy Week, and that parents must teach it to their children in order to strengthen their faith.
Appreciating the holiday can only be done after understanding it. Holy week is basically the last week of Jesus before he was crucified. It is referred to as Passion Week because in that time, Jesus Christ truly revealed His passion for us in the suffering He willingly went through on our behalf.
“What should our attitude be during Holy/Passion Week? We should be passionate in our worship of Jesus and in our proclamation of His Gospel! As He suffered for us, so should we be willing to suffer for the cause of following Him and proclaiming the message of His death and resurrection,” says Noel Haloc, a pastor and a CVE teacher in our school.
Though young children may follow the traditions of their parents, it can be difficult for them to fully grasp these ideas, and the pandemic only makes it more difficult. It is the responsibility of parents to help them do so. The parents could explain the Holy Week to their children in a more easy to understand way.
Families could also join church celebrations or worship services. It doesn’t matter how you celebrate the season; the only important thing is knowing its importance and appreciating what Jesus Christ did for everyone.
“Christians are celebrating it because they want to be reminded of God’s great love for them. Both children and adult can only appreciate celebrating it if they understood the significance of these events to our salvation. So I think teaching children of these stories from the Bible is a good start (reading book, watching movies about it) before they learn to appreciate Holy Week,” he added.
According to him, this season is marked with church activities in which his family does together.
“As a family, we usually join our church celebration, we have worship service starting from Friday remembering the last word and also sunrise service during Sunday of the resurrection. We make sure all of us in the family will join,” he explained.
When asked how his family celebrated the occasion last year during a time when the country was under a strict quarantine, he shared that the event was conducted online.
“Last year due to pandemic, we just attended the online worship during Friday worship (7 last words) and resurrection Sunday. Probably most churches that time were still on the process of adjustment to a different platform so there’s no special activities for the Holy Week.”
Story by Samuel Cheng and Vian Ching