What Happened on Black Saturday?

The question is a good one. We have almost reduced the major days in Holy Week to two days: Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Holy Saturday is treated like a “break” from all the church liturgy, at least until the Easter Vigil.

So where was Jesus during Black Saturday?  Was he just in the tomb?  In answering this question, let us be careful that we do not treat the death and Resurrection of Jesus in terms of human time and space.  The Resurrection did not occur during a particular time, say, for example, on the midnight of Sunday.  It is also difficult to talk about where exactly Jesus went when he died.

We know that Jesus died and Resurrected. What happened in between is referred to, in our Creed, as Jesus having “descended to the dead.” (Also referred to as “descended to hell” because those who are there are deprived of the vision of God. CCC, 633).

“Descended to the dead” means:

- Jesus, like all human beings, experienced death. He did not just pretend to die!

- Jesus’ act of salvation applies to all, even to those who died before him. Salvation is “not limited by time and space.”*

We are inspired that Jesus resurrected. Equally inspiring is that Jesus actually died. At a moment in human history, there is an event when Jesus (who is God) died -- just like all of us! Isn’t that also astonishing?

But Jesus, the God-human, died for a purpose: to be one with ALL humankind by “joining the others in the realm of the dead.”** 

In doing so, Jesus includes all humankind of all time and of all places in proclaiming the good news: I have come to bring you ALL back to the Father.  To conquer death, Jesus had to actually die -- and then resurrected.

This is the wonderful significance of Holy Saturday. God’s love indeed knows no bounds.

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Sources:

*CFC, 592 and CCC, 634-635
**CCC, 632

CFC is the Catechism for Filipino Catholics and CCC is the Catechism of the Catholic Church.