This year will be our first celebration of the resurrection of the Lord in our new home on rue Lescarbot in Montreal. Our Easter celebration will certainly be an acknowledgement of a hope that can never be extinguished. We very much like our new home, and we are enjoying a community life that feels more natural, a little less distant from one another. We are no longer surrounded by a building that was much too big for us and was more about the past than the future.
We will not all be together for all the liturgical celebrations at Easter time, as some of us will be called out of our friary to assist pastors and parishes in the greater Montreal area. They will preside at liturgies with large numbers of the faithful. But in our home, even if it might just be a handful of friars left in the chapel, our community will nevertheless celebrate the Easter Triduum which we consider to be at the heart of our communal life. And of course, all of us will gather around the table for the culinary Easter feast and celebrate together.
Slowly, our house has begun to see visitors. We welcomed some old visitors back from the old days of the Rosemont friary, and we welcomed young visitors who come with hopes for new and contemporary ways of living the Christian life. In our daily life, our community continues some customs of the old friary, but mostly we adapt to our new place—both spiritually and locally. Spring will be in the air when Easter is celebrated! We have much to be grateful for, and much to look forward to.
