As you attend the Good Friday service at your parish today, you may notice that something is missing. Something hugely important, in fact…
THERE IS NO MASS
Rather, what you’re attending is a liturgical “service”, the only sacraments celebrated on Good Friday being the Anointing of the Sick and Confession. So there is a Good Friday “service”, but no true Mass. And there is no true Mass because there is no consecration. If you do receive Holy Communion today, then it is from Sacred Hosts consecrated last night, kept in that “altar of repose”. So there is a liturgical “service”, but not a true Mass. And there is no true Mass because there is no consecration on Good Friday.
Why is there no Mass celebrated on Good Friday? Because as St. Thomas Aquinas writes, “The figure ceases on the advent of the reality. But this sacrament is a figure and a representation of our Lord’s Passion, as stated above. And therefore on the day on which our Lord’s Passion is recalled as it was really accomplished, this sacrament is not consecrated.” Essentially, St. Thomas teaches that the Mass is not celebrated on Good Friday because it is on this day that we commemorate Our Lord’s real sacrifice on the Cross. In the Good Friday commemoration, we are mystically present at Calvary alongside the Blessed Mother and the other disciples who remained at the Cross. Yes, it is true that every Mass is the re-presentation of the Passion, but as the figure passes away before the reality, so too the Church omits the celebration of Mass when she commemorates the Passion as it really happened in time. The Mass both signifies Christ’s sacrifice and actually makes it present. And so, in the commemoration on Good Friday, the sign of Christ’s sacrifice offered in the Mass gives way to the historical reality.
Instead of the celebration of the Mass on Good Friday, we have a liturgical “service” that includes a liturgy of the word, the adoration of the cross, and a Communion service using hosts already consecrated. Something that might give the appearance of the Mass, without it actually being a Mass. Again as St. Thomas writes, speaking of the Communion distributed at the Good Friday “service”, “Nevertheless, lest the Church be deprived on that day of the fruit of the Passion offered to us by this sacrament, the body of Christ consecrated the day before is reserved to be consumed on that day.” The focal point of the Good Friday “service” is, however, the adoration of the cross. As the sign of Christ’s sacrifice offered in the Mass gives way to the historical reality of His death, so we particularly venerate during the Good Friday “service” that instrument of the death of our Lord, the cross of our salvation. And thus we are prepared to encounter the risen Lord at the Easter Vigil on the night of Holy Saturday, the climax to our Sacred Triduum celebrated with the commemoration of Christ’s victory over satan, sin, and death.
