“This is first time in the past 110 years where we are preparing for an Easter Triduum without in-person gatherings due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The community of bandlines has been conducting the Passion Play in Our Lady of Lourdes Church from 1910, which is a recreation of the trial and crucifixion of Christ.
There’s a bit of history behind this. If we go back to the past in the early 1900s, Hyderabad city had witnessed the gloom of a deadly plague which took over hundreds of lives. Everywhere there was mourning, despair and there was no sign of liberation from the deadly diesese.
At that time, Rev. Fr. Pagani, the then Parish Priest of St. Joseph’s Cathedral, moved by the suffering of the people everywhere in the city pleaded God’s Mercy and made a vow that if his supplications are answered, The Passion Play will be held every Good Friday, depicting the suffering and death of Christ. Fr Pagani’s prayers were answered and the plague ended in Hyderabad.
Ever since, hundreds of people from diverse cultural and religious backgrounds come down to our passion playground to witness the play. The rehearsals begin at the start of Lent. Unlike usual Passion plays, we start the play from the miracles of Jesus. After the staging, we take out a procession with the wooden sculpture of the Christ around the bandline colony.
But this year, because of the national lockdown, we’ve prepared the special recorded sessions of Passion play, to help the worshippers to mark this special time of year from their own homes.
The public gathering of the Passion play has been cancelled, as the world is battling one of the worst outbreaks. This year, we wanted to send a message of hope at a time when the people are affected by the coronavirus, which is sowing anguish and death. We are all asked to rediscover where the church in our lives first started, and that’s in the family!”
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