Sacred Triduum

Holy Saturday has always been an “aliturgical” day.  There has never been a Eucharistic liturgy, not even a Communion service, on Holy Saturday. As far back as the first years of the fifth century Pope Innocent I (A.D. 401-407) testifies that the Eucharist was not celebrated on this day on view of the Apostles who spent the day mourning the death of our Lord.

In 1955 the Congregation of Sacred Rite wrote:

This is the day of the most intense sorrow, the day on which the Church tarries at the Lord’s tomb, meditating about His Passion and death.  While the altar remains stripped, the Church abstains from the sacrifice of the Mass until, after the Solemn Vigil or the nocturnal wait for the Resurrection, there come Easter joys, the abundance of which carries over to the days that follow.*

*see James Monti,  The Week of Salvation, Our Sunday Visitor, Indiana, USA, 1993