SOMETHING HAPPENED (Easter 2026)

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From the breakfast table I look towards the rising sun and over the distance to where I celebrated Easter last year, somewhat torn between two loves. It’s a “shepherds warning” kind of morning. Beautiful, with red blushed clouds that might be promising a later rain, but we will not dwell on that for now.

Storm Dave pounded on the roof of St. Anne’s Church during the Easter Vigil last night, rattling the doors, giving a kind of Pentecostal drama to the liturgy which was led by Auxiliary Bishop Donal Roche, accompanied by Emmet the Parish Priest and myself. All I had to do was sit back and take it all in and it was wonderful to experience, special for an Irish congregation to witness the baptism of a teenage boy and three adults receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation. Something that we have been used to in England and becoming more common in Ireland now. In the archdiocese of Dublin alone 139 adults have joined the Catholic Church this Easter. It seems there is a similar trend throughout the country.

New life. The life of the Risen Christ among us. And it begins in hidden places, out of sight, unrecognised for quite a long time. The hidden mystery within the tomb of Christ that no one witnessed, except the Father and the Holy Spirit and Jesus Himself.

Something happened in St. Anne’s this year. Something we weren’t expecting. Something that cannot quite be put into words.

We went faithfully through the season of Lent. Mass every morning. Stations of the Cross and Mass every evening. Faithfully and simply prayed. Led by members of the parish. I entered into it somewhat reluctantly. Haven’t ever done so many Stations of the Cross in one Lenten season. The briefest, shortest meditation on each Station, followed by Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory be and the sung refrain, “Were you there when they crucified my Lord…Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.”

It’s this last phrase that sums up the experience for me – it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble. Trembling in prayer is the result of the action of the Holy Spirit, a hidden stirring that one experiences in the face of the terrible suffering of Christ, and joined to His, the terrible suffering of the world. The suffering of individual people that we are aware of. The grief. We tremble.

These evening sessions for me became the centre of my personal Lent, much more than the things I had chosen to give up. By these evenings we were being prepared in ways that we did not understand. Prepared for something to happen.

And something happened. It emerged on Wednesday of Holy Week at the Service of Reconciliation. Six priests, including Bishop Donal, were there for confessions which took place within the context of Adoration. The size of the crowd astonished us, the ages of the crowd! Nowadays you expect very few to attend these liturgies and they usually last maybe for half an hour. This went of for almost two hours. It was like a wave of Divine Mercy washed through the whole gathering and it opened up in us all an availability to the Divine plan.

So, something did happen that night and it continued through the next few days. The Mass of the Lord’s Supper, the washing of the feet that made some people cry because there is something about our feet. It’s like they carry our vulnerability and are in themselves the naked expression of that vulnerability.

The kind trickle of warm water, touch of the towel, the surprise of a kiss that affects not just the feet but the entire being.

Adoration at the Altar of Repose brings us back to the lonely terror of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. The beauty of a child kneeling a long time before the Tabernacle. And many more adults seeking Mercy in Confession.

Good Friday gave us the Stations of the Cross led by the children. Utterly moving. Some of them a bit distracted. All of the speakers so clear and strong. And young Tom with the voice of an Angel silencing the whole church every time he opened his mouth to lead us in prayer. Something happened.

The solemn Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion at 3pm brought another large crowd. The kissing of the Cross is one of the most poignant things for me to witness. To hold the Crucifix, to watch the face of each person approaching to kiss or touch or simply bow. Every expression is utterly unique and personal, and I am stirred to pray for every single one in their moment of adoration, their pleading, and their hope.

In the evening, we had prayer around the Cross. A less formal kind of prayer. Very reflective, contemplative, based on the Taize model. Again, there is a power in each one approaching the Cross with a lighted candle. A power in the silence. A power in the music played over the speaker, but most especially the chants that we sang ourselves acapella. Jesus remember me.

It’s like we as a body were the tomb and all of these moments of prayer involved the hidden stirring of the Holy Spirit awaking what was dormant or even dead, bringing us to birth in an unspeakably beautiful way. You could see it after the Vigil last night as people lingered in little groups around the church, groups of young men and women, groups of parents, elders moving slowly towards the door out into the wild wind of Dave, symbol surely of the wild wind of Pentecost, the wild world-mothering air of Mary.

The Lord is truly risen, alleluia and He has appeared among us. Alleluia.

And the morning now has broken into a spectacular blue sky!


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