Good Friday – April 18
The Stations of the Cross will begin at 3:00 PM, followed at 3:45 PM by the Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion and the Veneration of the Cross. The day will conclude with the Burial Service at 7:30 PM.

The Burial service is a solemn reenactment of the Burial of Christ. This powerful ceremony closely mirrors the one celebrated each year at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem by the friars of the Custody of the Holy Land. Very few places outside the Holy Land observe this unique ritual.

The Franciscan Monastery in Washington, entrusted to the same friars of the Holy Land, contains faithful replicas of Calvary, the Stone of Anointing, and the Holy Tomb. The service begins at the replica of Calvary, inside the main church, where the figure of Christ is reverently removed from the Cross. The friars then process through the church three times, circling the main altar. At the conclusion of the procession, the “body” is placed on the Stone of Anointing, where it is solemnly incensed and anointed. Finally, it is laid in the replica of the Holy Sepulchre, and the service ends with the dramatic closing of the tomb — to be reopened on the “third day.”