Below is our schedule of liturgies and Masses for Holy Week, the Triduum, and Easter Sunday. All of our liturgies and Masses will also be live-streamed at livestream.stjoan.church.

7:00 AM - Mass

1:00 - 2:00 PM - Confessions

7:00 AM - Mass

7:00 AM - Mass

5:00 PM - Confessions

6:00 PM - Mass

7:00 PM - Mass of the Lord's Supper

12:00 PM - Stations of the Cross

12:30 PM - Divine Mercy Chaplet

1:00 PM - Liturgy of the Lord's Passion

11:00 AM - Confessions

12:00 PM - Blessing of Food

8:00 PM - Easter Vigil

6:00 AM - Mass

8:00 AM - Mass

10:00 AM - Mass

12:00 PM - Mass

As we enter Holy Week, it's good to look at the various liturgies that mark this most significant week of the Church's liturgical year. In the following video, I walk through each of the Holy Week liturgies and offer a brief explanation of each of them.

During Holy Week, we have scheduled the following confession opportunities:

The Sacrament is celebrated in the Sr. Carol Center; signs are posted in the Gathering Place with further directions.

There is also a communal penance service with individual confession on

As we have mentioned at the weekend masses, don't worry if you've forgotten the prayers or how to go to confession because we will guide you through it. And, it doesn't matter how long it has been since you've last gone to confession. Just come and experience the Lord's awesome gift of mercy!

From Ascension Presents: Confession is a place of never-ending mercy and forgiveness, and is one of the most beautiful parts of our Catholic faith. But for many, it can also be a very daunting experience, especially if it’s been a long time since your last confession. Whether it’s the first time you’ve gone in a year, or it’s the first time you’ve gone in your life, God is ready and willing to forgive your sins. All we have to do is let him into our hearts.

In the following video, Fr. Mike Schmitz explains how to approach going to confession for the first time in a long time.

Last weekend, we welcomed to our parish seminarians from Sacred Heart Major Seminary to talk about the Desert Formation Experience.

The Desert Formation Experience is the thirty-day spiritual pilgrimage first-year graduate seminarians make each year to the Holy Land. There they experience firsthand the places Christ walked and taught, suffered and died, while seeking his guidance in their own walk toward the priesthood.

The ultimate goal of the Desert Formation Experience and all of the summer programs is to ensure the priest-graduate of the seminary is a man of strong character and deep spirituality; a man you can be proud to call your spiritual “Father.”

To watch a 3-minute video about the experience, click on the image below. To donate to the Desert experience, click on the following button:

For this Holy Week episode of Fr. Mark Toups’ Lenten Companion series, he encourages us to place ourselves at the foot of the Cross, and to find a way to receive the sacrament of reconciliation before Easter. He then invites everyone to pray with him as he meditates on the mysteries of Jesus’ final hours.

When you picture yourselves at the foot of the Cross, what do you see? Take this time to meditate on his broken body, broken for you and I. Do you see Mary there with you and Jesus? Do you see the Beloved Disciple? What’s going through your mind? At the foot of the Cross, what would you say to Jesus? What would you want him to say to you?

Or maybe you are speechless. If so, that’s just as good. All Jesus wants right now is for you to be there with him.

SJA is moderating a Facebook group for our parishioners and friends embarking on the Catechism in a Year podcast with Fr. Mike Schmitz and Ascension Press.

You can find the link to join on the SJA Facebook page or click the button below. We already have 90+ participants!

In this week’s Encountering the Word video Jeff Cavins discusses the readings for Palm Sunday, reflecting on the Tree of Life and Jesus being sentenced to death:

At The Procession With Palms: Matthew 21:1-11

First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-7

Responsorial Psalm: Psalms 22:8-9, 17-18, 19-20, 23-24

Second Reading: Philippians 2:6-11

Verse Before the Gospel: Philippians 2:8-9

Gospel: Matthew 26:14—27:66 or Matthew 27:11-54

Friends, on Palm Sunday, the culminating point of Lent, the Church reads from one of the great Passion narratives from the synoptic Gospels. But I want to look at the second reading today—a passage from the second chapter of Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, the heart of which is a hymn or poem. These words go back to the very beginning of Christianity, and they serve as a beautiful summary statement of the faith. Paul is reflecting on the downward trajectory of the Son of God—all the way down into death itself, even death on a cross.

Palm Sunday Appearance: A mom and dad returned home from Church on Palm Sunday. Their little son, who was ill that day, stayed home with an older sibling. The little guy was intrigued by the palms his parents brought home. He decided to pepper his parents with questions about the palms and the Palm Sunday liturgy. They described how they started outside and then processed with the palms, almost like in a parade, to celebrate Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. At one point in the dialogue the little guy said, “Wouldn’t you know it, the very day I stay home from Church, Jesus finally shows up.”

Holy Week: Today, we begin our solemn journey with the Lord. We have celebrated his entrance into Jerusalem, and now we journey with him to the cross and ultimately stand as witnesses to his glorious resurrection. These sacred days are filled with beautiful liturgies that have special meaning for us as Christians. I hope and pray that you and your family will make the time to attend as many of these liturgies as possible or even watch them online at livestream.stjoan.church, because we celebrate events that changed the world and events that changed your life and mine.

Many of us approach this sacred week with lots on our minds. We might be helping extended family members work through a tragedy, or maybe our family is dealing with a heavy cross right now. We continue to watch in absolute horror the senseless death and destruction occurring in Ukraine. As you reflect on these situations in your own life and in what is taking place in our world, we need to place all of these concerns at the foot of the cross and know that just as God had a plan for Christ and asked him to embrace the cross for a reason, God likewise has a plan and a destiny for each of us. The sacred events of this week are certainly centered on the saving reality of the Cross of Christ, but it is also about the saving reality of the crosses that Christ asks us, in the name of the Father, to embrace for the world’s salvation.

The Paschal Triduum: What exactly does Triduum mean? Triduum comes from two Latin words (tres and dies), meaning a space of three days. We calculate these days in the same way the Jews count days and festivals, that is, from sundown to sundown. Thus, the Triduum consists of three twenty-four hour periods. The Triduum starts at sundown on Holy Thursday with the Mass of the Lord’s Supper and concludes with evening prayer at sundown on Easter Sunday.

“The liturgy we celebrate these days is far more than an objective recall of the events of first century Palestine, or even a prayerful recollection by means of which we understand and appreciate more fully what God has done for us. Despite the dramatic impact of these liturgies we do much more than dramatize what happened once in the history of salvation. More fundamentally, the liturgy these days is our present privileged experience of these same saving mysteries in Christ. Through these liturgies we are inserted into and are made sharers of the same saving deeds Christ accomplished for our salvation and sanctification. We do not observe again what Jesus accomplished; we share in the accomplishment of salvation. Through the symbols and gestures, scripture proclamation and prayers, we participate in the same redeeming actions which Christ underwent for our salvation. What Jesus accomplished through his death and resurrection is actualized and made real in the liturgy. Through the various celebrations over three days we are progressively and more intimately brought into the paschal mystery. What God accomplished in Christ continues to draw us into the love of God. This incorporation into Christ makes us the body of Christ on earth (Kevin W. Irwin, A Guide to the Eucharist and Hours: Easter, p. 14).”

The liturgies we are about to celebrate are sacred indeed. They are filled with much symbolism and ritual. In celebrating the memorial of the institution of the Eucharist and the command to be of service as ritualized in the washing of the feet at the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, we enter more deeply into the paschal mystery. From hearing the proclamation of the Lord’s Passion to our veneration of the cross on Good Friday, we enter more deeply into the paschal mystery. From seeing the fire being blessed, hearing the proclamation of the Easter Exultet, to witnessing the baptism of those in the OCIA, the reception of those being brought into the Church, to our own renewal of baptismal promises where we reject Satan and profess our faith in Christ Jesus, we enter more deeply into the paschal mystery. But this entering into the paschal mystery is not just a once-a-year occurrence. We need to live the paschal mystery each day of our lives. We need to die to self by doing God’s will and serving others so we can rise to new life.

Living the paschal mystery is about putting God and others ahead of ourselves. Living the paschal mystery is about keeping Christ as the center of our lives.  “As we live this Christian mystery we gradually grow in our awareness and experience of the reality that the only way to live as Jesus taught us is to die to self. Indeed, in the paschal mystery dying to self and rising to new life collapse into the same reality of surrendering ourselves to allow God to work in and through us. The paschal mystery is living the rhythm of dying and rising as a people who are on a mission – with Christ we bring salvation to those who hunger for justice and truth, forgiveness and reconciliation, mercy and peace. We are a people on a mission – and this is what these days are about (Joyce Ann Zimmerman, C.PP.S., et al., ed., Living Liturgy, p. 102).”

As you and your family make plans for Holy Week and Easter, please consider attending these sacred liturgies, especially those you have never experienced before. You should also consider inviting a family member, a friend, or someone who may not attend Church regularly to come along with you. The experience and prayer of the Holy Week liturgies may bring them closer to Christ and allow them to come to a deeper understanding of the saving reality and beauty of the cross of Christ.

Our Schedule for Holy Week is as follows:

7 p.m. – Mass of the Lord’s Supper

12 p.m. – Stations of the Cross / Divine Mercy Chaplet

1 p.m. – Liturgy of the Passion

11 a.m. – Confession

12 p.m. – Blessing of Food

8 p.m. Easter Vigil

6 a.m., 8 a.m., 10 a.m., and 12 p.m.

Holy Week: Today we celebrate Palm Sunday and as Jesus enters Jerusalem, we enter into Holy Week. The fullest of the Church’s sights, sounds, smells, symbols, silence and sacraments are on display this week to be soaked in and to heighten our senses to the incredible Mystery that is unfolding before us—the Passion, death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ and the defeat of the world’s enemy, the devil.

If we really enter into the liturgies of this week, we cannot fail to recognize that something profound is going on. They are not just separate masses and liturgies. They are like the scenes of a movie or acts of a play, each one building on the drama of the one before, adding to the story and leading to the final scene when the hero of the story triumphs. It’s the ultimate story of crime and punishment, tragedy and suffering, tension and pain, and in the final act, joy and redemption of unimaginable depth.

The Church invites us not simply to settle down with popcorn and watch, but to take-up the script and step onto the stage and play our part in the story. If it’s not a story about us then it loses its meaning.

Personally, I love Holy Thursday. That was the day I really knew I could say yes to the Lord’s call to become Catholic some 17 years ago, and only on that night praying before the Blessed Sacrament. Despite the doubts I still had, the Tabernacle contained the God I had experienced and met, and I knew that was sufficient—that He was sufficient.

It was on my first Holy Thursday as a priest that, by virtue of the random order we happened to process into the Cathedral for the Chrism Mass, I found myself sitting in the very same seat I had been sitting in the previous Pentecost weekend, on the day of my ordination. On that day I had accepted the Archbishop’s call to Holy Orders. And now from that same seat that Holy Thursday, I renewed my commitment to the priesthood, alongside all my brother priests.

It was also on Holy Thursday in 2014 that I had arrived at the Cathedral for the Chrism Mass with my fellow seminarians. The parking lot had already been filled so we parked on the roadside and walked down the driveway. As I stepped off the sidewalk to walk around the open security gate, looking behind me, to check for traffic, and as I stepped back onto the sidewalk, I walked directly into the metal bracket that locked the two halves of the gate together…. with my head….

I heard it ring through my brain like an ugly square bell, as I fell to the sidewalk, holding my head. The security guard took me off to the security building to patch-up my head, and I went on my way to the standing-room only Cathedral. As I stood through the two-hour mass feeling pretty woozy, an usher came up to me and asked me to help direct Communion traffic from the pews to the Eucharistic Ministers. “Sure,” I said, and I proceeded to stand in the center aisle, waving my arms around like I was directing planes at Detroit Metro. I wasn't making any judgments about the lines, just sending people wherever, with no clue what I was doing!

As we walked out of the Cathedral after mass, my head pounding, I handed my car keys to another seminarian and said, “You’re driving.” And that’s about all I remember of that Mass!

It was the only concussion I’ve had and showed-up clearly on Easter Monday when the seminary final exams week began. In my Church History exam, the professor threw in a total soft ball question, a give-away point: “Where did Our Lady of Fatima appear?” My answer?.... “Lourdes.”

Not my finest moment in seminary. However, the German professor with the reputation for precision, gave me the point for my answer. I can still hear him saying to himself, “Ah yes! There is only one Our Lady.”

The evening of Holy Thursdays in the seminary was a special time too. We would have a nice steak dinner (with table cloths, so you knew it was something special!) Then that would be followed by the Mass of the Lord’s Supper. Mass would end with a Eucharistic Procession with candles, in the dark, from the beautiful main chapel, through the pewabic tile hallways and archways down to the St. Joseph Chapel as we sang Pange Lingua. The shape of the hallway ceilings and the tiled floor echoed back the sound of our choir singing in 3 parts and it was always a highlight of my year. Just so beautiful. Jesus was placed in the tabernacle in the small, dark chapel that had been emptied of all furnishings. The rest of the night was spent in silence with seminarians coming and going, spending time in adoration in the chapel and returning to our rooms in silence.

But if I love Holy Thursday, I can say the same about Good Friday. The seminary would end with the Tenebrae service, which is a beautiful presentation of the Office of Readings for Holy Saturday. Someone would spend the entire day blocking out all places where light would enter the main chapel so that the service could take place in almost total darkness, except for 15 candles.

The service is characterized by the gradual extinguishing of the candles, and by a "strepitus" or "loud noise" taking place in total darkness near the end of the service. This sudden and violent noise occurs after the final candle is removed. The noise represents the violent shaking of creation as Jesus dies and descends into hell. Then a server holding that single candle re-enters the chapel and the re-places it on the stand. This is the light of hope because we know that soon Christ will re-enter the world. I would sit and look at that single candle, realizing that for those who do not share our faith, the crushing darkness is all that remains. But for us, we still have hope, because we still have Christ.

There was such a beautiful silence to that night. I walked back to my room that night in my final Holy Week in seminary, to find this shadow on the wall.

It took me quite some time to work out where the shadow was coming from - the security lights outside and the crucifix on my desk. But it was a good reminder to remain with Jesus that night and through the Triduum. The church invites us to do the same this Holy Week so that we might fully experience the joy of Easter.

You are in my prayers this Holy Week.

adawson@sjascs.org 

Reading the Old Testament can be so frustrating. We hear the stories of God’s chosen people forming a covenant with God, and then breaking that covenant over and over. How could God allow this?

Today Fr. Mike helps us read Scripture with a lens towards our own unfaithfulness and stubbornness, and shows why God chose the Jewish people to make manifest his glory.

We’ve all been there at one time or another. 

Perhaps we’re cruising down the highway and we inadvertently cut someone off, for which we are quickly rewarded with an obscene gesture. 

Or perhaps we mistakenly take someone else’s parking place, for which we’re likewise on the receiving end of the same gesture.

Hopefully, of course, we’ve never been on the other side of that equation, being the one who flashed that obscene gesture to someone else who mistakenly wronged us.

Regardless, the question, apparently, is whether such a gesture is legal. At least that was the case recently in Canada, where a judge ruled the gesture is, indeed, legal. Making this gesture “is a God-given, Charter enshrined right that belongs to every red-blooded Canadian,” the judge was quoted as saying in a story reported by National Public Radio.

Is this how far our society has fallen?

God gave us all the gift of free will, to be sure, and so, in a sense, we have the right to be rude if we wish. 

But on this, our commemoration of Palm Sunday, perhaps it would be helpful, instead, to think of things in a more humble way, to take to heart Jesus’ example of dying to self for the good of others.

“I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who plucked my beard,” we hear in today’s first reading from the Prophet Isaiah. “My face I did not shield from buffets and spitting. The Lord God is my help, therefore I am not disgraced; I have set my face like flint, knowing that I shall not be put to shame.”

Even when we’re wronged – and even if it’s egregious – we’re called to be humble. Perhaps the best course of action next time would just be to put our hands in our pockets!

That’s it! You’re in. Now you can get the free FORMED app for your phone by searching FORMED Catholic in your app store.

Are you looking for a one-stop app for prayer and meditation? Look no further than Hallow. Hallow is an awesome prayer app. Hallow is a Catholic prayer and meditation app that helps users deepen their relationship with God through audio-guided contemplative prayer sessions. The app launched 2 years ago and is already the #1 Catholic app in the world.

To get started, simply click the button above/below to activate your free account on the Hallow website. Make sure to select “Sign Up with Email” when registering. For step-by-step instructions, you can visit this process guide. Enter the code stjoanofarcmi to obtain a discount on individual pro plans.

7:00 a.m., Jerome Rogier

7:00 a.m., Bob Ziolkowski

7:00 a.m., Antonio Calisi

6:00 p.m., Mark Dunn 

7:00 p.m., Charles Semany

12:00 p.m., Stations of the Cross

1:00 p.m., Liturgy of the Lords Passion

8:00 p.m., Antonio Calisi, Bonnie Batche, Michael Forrester, James Forrester, Margaret & Charles Forrester, the deceased members of the Cardosi & Giusti Families and a Special Intention for the J. Champine Family and the Thomas Family

6:00 am, For the deceased members of the Rogier & Dettloff Families

8:00 a.m., For the Intentions for St. Joan of Arc Parishioners

10:00 a.m., Joan & Helmut Linden

12:00 p.m., George & Sophie Rupinski, Larry Yandel, Dee Allor, Josephine & Salvatore Ciaravino, Julian Ross, Richard & Virginia Robinette, Virginia Prill, Edward Baranek, Joseph & Florence Semany, Charles Semany, Ron Lagodna, Dr. Edmond H. Aubrey, John L. & Marguerite Joseph, Mark & Danutoc Siwik, Hentyke Welendzewicz, Mario Tomasello

10:00 AM - Funeral for Donald Margiewicz (Read Obituary HERE)

Thursday (April 6):

Friday (April 7):

8:00 PM - Easter Vigil

6:00 AM - Mass