Easter Vigil Mass

  • Thread starter Thread starter WillyAL
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
W

WillyAL

Guest
My wife has expressed a desire to attend the Easter Vigil Mass on Saturday night. As a non-Catholic, I’ve never been to one before. Actually, I’m kind of looking forward to the experience. (And I’m looking forward to sleeping in on Sunday.) However, I’ve heard that it’s kind of long…as in real long. Can anyone give me an idea of how long?
 
It depends on the parish. If it is at the Cathedral presided by the Bishop with people being baptized and confirmed. 3 Hours is not unheard of. If it is a small parish, 1-2 Hours.

Mass in general is usually about 1 hour in most places.
 
Two to three hours.

We sit through two hour movies. I spent three hours in the restaurant the last time I went to a really nice place to eat. 🤷

-Tim-
 
WillyAL said:
My wife has expressed a desire to attend the Easter Vigil Mass on Saturday night. As a non-Catholic, I’ve never been to one before. Actually, I’m kind of looking forward to the experience. (And I’m looking forward to sleeping in on Sunday.) However, I’ve heard that it’s kind of long…as in real long. Can anyone give me an idea of how long?
Click to expand...
Plan on 3 hours. It should not start until after (or just about) sunset so there will be a late start and it could run until after 10pm. It will be well worth it however; the Easter Vigil is AWESOME! (Take a nap and have a cup of your favorite caffeine before you go).
 
It depends on 1) How many people are being baptized/brought into the Church, and 2) How much of the music is being elaborately sung and adding time. I think in the Ordinary Form it will usually be between 2 and 3 hours…maybe less than 2 if little/no catechumens, more than 3 if there’s a lot of music and a lot of catechumens!

If done well, it really is a beautiful Mass - I’m glad you are looking forward to the experience! I know for many Catholics, this is their favorite time of the year in terms of the Masses/services.
 
Even with baptisms and singing, the Easter Vigil at one parish I was at only lasted about 2 hours. Depends on so many things really.

So here’s what to expect outside of the length of time:
  • Outside the church building, there will be the lighting and blessing of the Easter fire. And prayers.
  • The Easter Candle (a really big whopper of a candle) will be blessed and then lit from this fire.
  • The priest will bring the Easter candle into the church building. Three times he’ll sing “Christ, our Light.” The light from the Easter candle will spread to everyone else’s candles and the church will be aglow with this light.
  • Someone will sing the “Exsultet” – a proclamation of Christ’s resurrection.
  • There will be singing – the Gloria to God – and an opening prayer.
  • Then the readings begin. The readings will span the history of humanity’s encounter with God, beginning with Genesis and creation, then moving through the prophets, and so on.
  • There will be a sung response to each reading.
  • Then the Gospel reading of the resurrection.
  • Homily.
  • Baptisms, Confirmations.[this is about the 2 hour mark at our parish]
  • Rest of mass (Liturgy of the Eucharist) continues as usual.* [this only takes about another 25 minutes at our parish]*
 
The Vigil is a unique liturgy and one that is awesome to experience. As the others have stated, the length of the Vigil varies depending upon the components of the liturgy. The bulk of the liturgy comes from the seven Old Testament readings that detail our salvation history. Some parishes lower the number of readings to three or four, but all seven should be read since the Word of God is a critical part of the Vigil. It also depends upon how many people are being baptized, confirmed, received, etc.

I hope you like the Vigil! It’s an awesome experience!
 
Depends on how many readings were proclaimed, how many people were baptized. Maximum is 3 hours.
 
Hi Willy,

If you have the chance to go, I would say go, as well. It is such a beautiful Mass.

As the others have said, it can last up to three hours, depending on the number of readings used in the Mass, and also depending on the number of candidates that will be receiving Sacraments at the Mass, if there will be anyone being received into the church at that time from RCIA.
 
It depends on the parish and whether there are any new people being received into the Church. At my parish, we have no new Catholics and probably will only do 4 readings instead of 7, so it will probably take and hour and a half. At other parishes it could take up to 3 hours.
 
I went to our Cathedral last year and even with several baptisms and the full singing of the choir, we finished Mass in 1 hour and 50 minutes.
 
Sunbreak said:
It depends on the parish and whether there are any new people being received into the Church. At my parish, we have no new Catholics and probably will only do 4 readings instead of 7, so it will probably take and hour and a half. At other parishes it could take up to 3 hours.
Click to expand...
We have nobody being received into the Church tonight, so I assume that will shorten it a bit. As it happens, I have been drafted to be an usher tonight. I also have to help with the fire. Finally, I will be the guy at the circuit breaker box who will be in charge of turning the church lights on at the appropriate time. Hopefully I don’t screw it up.
 
I like the Easter vigil - it is easily the most dramatic and sensory (as in engaging with the senses) mass in the Church calendar. Standing on the sanctuary steps and looking down the nave of a darkened church lit by hundreds of candles is truly awe-inspiring. My only regret (if that) is that there’s not more catechesis, particularly in relation to the readings as well as the fire / darkness / candles. Although that said, one of our altar kids last night asked me “why do we start in darkness?” Before I could reply, the other said “because Jesus is dead” - got it in one!
 
It was just a tad under 3 hours.

Our associate pastor chanted the long form of the Exsultet.

We had 4 Baptisms, 22 Confirmations and 3 Weddings\Convalidations.

And a Benediction at the end.

Great Evening 🙂

👍
 
Ours didn’t exactly go as planned.

There were no baptisms or confirmations (not surprising, really, only ever had one Vigil Baptism in 17 years and nobody has ever been received into full communion at this time). In a parish of 1500, there were fewer than 100 at the Vigil. Lots of empty seats.

Our cantor is gone for a couple of weeks so there was nobody to sing the Exsultet! and there was no music. Father didn’t want it read so he insisted on a recording – unfortunately sung by a priest and unedited to remove the dialogue. That means that we also found ourselves responding “and also with you” to a machine.

Thankfully we had all 7 readings + Epistle. The Psalms were simply read and Fr. got mixed up in the order – instead of Reading/Psalm/Prayer he did Reading/Prayer/Psalm. Since in the Missal the Gloria comes immediately after the Prayer after the 7th reading, we didn’t get a Psalm for that one. He went directly to the Gloria. I kept thinking, Christ is risen, stop fussing about things you can’t change. But it was disappointing.

The choir acquitted themselves very well a capella for the Ordinary of the Mass and the hymns.
 
Phemie said:
Ours didn’t exactly go as planned.

There were no baptisms or confirmations (not surprising, really, only ever had one Vigil Baptism in 17 years and nobody has ever been received into full communion at this time). In a parish of 1500, there were fewer than 100 at the Vigil. Lots of empty seats.

Our cantor is gone for a couple of weeks so there was nobody to sing the Exsultet! and there was no music. Father didn’t want it read so he insisted on a recording – unfortunately sung by a priest and unedited to remove the dialogue. That means that we also found ourselves responding “and also with you” to a machine.

Thankfully we had all 7 readings + Epistle. The Psalms were simply read and Fr. got mixed up in the order – instead of Reading/Psalm/Prayer he did Reading/Prayer/Psalm. Since in the Missal the Gloria comes immediately after the Prayer after the 7th reading, we didn’t get a Psalm for that one. He went directly to the Gloria. I kept thinking, Christ is risen, stop fussing about things you can’t change. But it was disappointing.

The choir acquitted themselves very well a capella for the Ordinary of the Mass and the hymns.
Click to expand...
Yikes!

That is alarming.

Ours was longer than I expected but it was worth it! Our 5 kids were so well behaved! Even the 5 week old!
There were, 7 readings + Gospel, an extra long littany of the saints that included some of Father’s favorites, 2 Baptisms, and 15 confirmations, then 3 wedding convalidations (I think) and the homily was bilingual so you heard it twice even if you didn’t know you heard it twice.

It had a 3 hour and 20 minute run time. So, pretty much like a Lord of the Rings Movie.

It was great though and I loved it and my children loved it!
 
janeway529 said:
I went to our Cathedral last year and even with several baptisms and the full singing of the choir, we finished Mass in 1 hour and 50 minutes.
Click to expand...
Earlier in the day we had confession lines longer than that. And three priests with no one able to bless the Easter baskets, of which there were plenty. 🙂
 
The Vigil at my parish was beautiful, as always. We did four OT readings and the Epistle. We had no baptisms; only one person was confirmed and received into the Church. I really wish that I could hear all seven OT readings at the Vigil; my parish hasn’t done that in years.

I’m looking forward to Easter Sunday Mass!
 
Just back from the vigil at our Benedictine abbey. Never any baptisms at the abbey so that saves a bit of time. It lasted 2:10; the youngest deacon (there are two) sang the exsultet in French. The canticles between readings were in Latin Gregorian chant, as were the ordinary and the other proper chants.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top