Holy Wednesday - Into the Darkness

Holy Week continues in many Christian traditions on ‘Holy Wednesday’ (known as ‘Spy Wednesday’ in earlier times). Holy Wednesday is often marked with a service of Tenebrae (Latin for ‘darkness’ or ‘shadows’), with the hearing of appropriate psalms and other readings while candles on a candelabrum (the ‘Tenebrae hearse’) are gradually extinguished, creating the sense of growing darkness.

This darkness symbolizes the abandonment of Jesus by his disciples, and anticipates the anguish and tragedy of Good Friday later on in Holy Week.

What follows then are the ‘Triduum’ of Holy Week – Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday.