Principal’s Easter Message: 26 March 2021

I love Easter. I love the season of Lent leading up to it, I love the sacredness of Holy Week, I love the liturgies during the Easter Triduum, and especially I love the part I play in those liturgies. When asked by people what I will be doing over Easter, I have this stock reply: “I’ll be chained to an organ stool!” Which, while not being entirely correct (there are no chains involved) is, in many ways, true. My love for the Easter liturgies is tied very closely to my love for playing the church organ.

Last year none of us was able to participate in the Easter liturgies – in fact, none of us could go to church at all, as all the churches were closed. This year we are fortunate – our churches are all open for the Easter liturgies. While there are some restrictions, where we are unable to have certain aspects of the liturgies due to covid regulations – the washing of the feet, the veneration of the cross and the lighting of the Easter fire being some of them – we can still experience the joy of being truly present

My wish for all of you is that you experience that joy and travel the Easter journey with your families: from the celebration of the first Last Supper on Holy Thursday… to Stations of the Cross on Good Friday morning… to the Crucifixion service with the reading of the Passion on Good Friday afternoon… to the lighting of the Paschal candle at the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday evening… and finally to the joy of the Resurrection at Holy Mass on Easter Sunday morning. These are very special liturgies and will be long remembered, especially after the darkness of last year’s Easter.

I ask you to join other Springfield families this Easter weekend, and light an Easter candle in your homes – for our families, our communities, our country and our world during this time. In our Baptism, God lights the flame of faith within each of us. In the Easter liturgy we pray that “the Morning Star which never sets may find that flame of faith ever burning,” and that is my prayer to you as we enter Holy Week – that we may all play a part in keeping that flame of faith burning in everyone we know and love – and experience a sense of hope and renewal this Easter.

I shared this poem with the girls at our final Assembly this week:

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”

~1 Peter 1:3

ALISON DUNN

Principal of the Junior School