Holy Week Reflections: Easter Joy and Spiritual Wisdom

Holy Week and Easter: Saying Yes with Mary and Sharing Christ’s Peace

Cristy Murray and Father Perry Kenaston present a special Easter episode of “Mary’s Message, Leading Hearts to Jesus Today,” opening with prayer and reflections as Holy Week unfolds in Alaska from Holy Thursday through Easter Sunday. Father Perry invites listeners to “pray up” each day, imitate Mary’s humble yes to God, and prepare to experience Christ’s resurrection personally. He shares a St. Francis de Sales meditation on peace and discernment, recounts encounters with a young man discerning priesthood and a fast-food employee considering the Culinary Institute of America, and encourages giving witness through service. They ask for prayers as they expand the podcast, mention open invitations for a November Poland trip, and offer an Easter prayer of thanksgiving. Cristy encourages attending Holy Week liturgies, adoration, and Good Friday devotions, and the episode closes with a call to reach out to those who need Jesus and to subscribe and share.

00:00 Welcome to Mary’s Message
00:35 Easter Episode Prayer
01:13 Holy Week Reflections
02:57 St Francis de Sales Peace
03:35 Discernment Encounters
05:11 Serving and Spreading Word
06:49 Poland Pilgrimage Invite
08:06 Easter Prayer Meditation
10:48 Holy Week Plans and Walk
13:02 Easter Bunny Banter
13:29 Closing Blessing and Outreach
15:00 Subscribe and Stay Connected

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Transcript

Restream recording Apr 03, 2026 • 05:34:52 AM 0:00

Welcome to Mary's Message, leading Hearts to Jesus Today, the podcast where we listen to the voice of the blessed mother and allow her to guide us even closer to her son in our modern world. I'm Cristy Murray, along with Father Perry Kenaston, and each week we explore stories of faith, conversations with Catholic voices and practical spiritual tools to help you encounter Christ more deeply in a world longing for peace and clarity. Mary continues to speak to her children with love, hope, and a mother's gentle wisdom. Thank you for joining us as we open our hearts to Mary's message and let her lead us into the loving embrace of Jesus. And we are here having a special Easter episode for you. Father Perry, would you like to start us in prayer? Sure. In the name of the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit. Amen. Grant us oh Lord, to see everything now with your new eyes. To discern and test the spirits that help me and us read the signs of the times to relish the things. That are yours and communicate them to others. Give me us the charity of understanding that you gave Saint Ignatius. Amen. Amen. Welcome my brothers and sisters in Christ for. As we enter Holy Week, as we enter the holy Thursday, we just finished here in Alaska. Uh, tomorrow is Good Friday, and then we have Easter Vigil, then we have Easter Sunday. I would invite you, my friends, who are listening to Pray up each day. Um, what I did is when I was a pastor, I prayed up good Thursday. And Good Friday and the Easter vigil daily on a day by day basis, and asking God to, well, just to, to guide our, to guide my steps on each day. Today's liturgy, holy Thursday, went very well, and I anticipate the next three days going very well. It is not only practice, but at the same time there's a lot of work behind the scenes that take place. And you know, when Mama Mary said her yes to God the father, he, uh, she knew in a sense what was going on, but at the, at the same time, she said, Lord, let Thy will be done. I'm the handmade of the Lord. Are we ready to experience the, the resurrection in our life? Are we ready and willing and able just to say, as Mary did, I'm years. I am your, take me into your heart, take me into your hands, and just give me a really nice hug today. Not only today, but all the time. We know the nativity scene. We know everything. I have a meditation here for you, and it's from St. Francis de SALs. And what I would like you to do, and we're gonna try to put this on the notes if we can. I don't know how that would work, but anyway, maybe a snapshotty or whatever. The closing prayer from St. Francis SALs, be it peace. There's someone in your life right now that's disturbing your peace. Pray for them. Do not look forward to fear in the change of your life. Are you making a decision shortly as regards to, uh, a change in your life? If so, ask God for the discernment. I had a wonderful experience the other day at the monastery here in Anchorage. As I got up and I left, I saw a young man there just sitting there. I came over to him and I said, are you thinking about the priesthood? And he says, yes, father, I am. Wow. And he said, and he said, well, we're gonna pray for discernment. Well, thank you. No, my son, you and I will pray for discernment to see if that is God's call. The next little small event that took place was I went to my usual watering hole at Carl's Jr. So. Fast, fast food place, and I just got there talking to a couple people and I talked to one of the employees there and to find out he had culinary background too. Matter of fact, in West Virginia, his family, um, they own restaurants, but because of COVID, uh, they COVID did 'em in. And I, and he says, well, you know, I've been thinking about going, attending the Culinary Institute of America, which is top-notch stuff. That's, you get into that and you go through their, their training. Uh, you're guaranteed a really, really good job in the food service industry. And we got to talking a little bit, a little bit some more. And I said, you know. I said, I'm gonna look into that father. And I said, if you look into that, send me the information, and I've got no problems in recommending you for a letter of recommendation just on the spot. Wow. And I, I don't have, but the, and I shared this with the Knights the other day, you know, as far as that goes in, might sometimes we're just afraid to, to give witness to Jesus and how he works in our lives. Is there some, as you listen to this, as you listen to this podcast that we're, we're doing, uh, and we're gonna try to send out more and more, and this is one of the things that for today, uh, this is an Easter, an Easter gift to you, uh, a blessed Easter. So pass the word. Uh, we, we've got names here and addresses and we're, we're trying to get everything together so we can send it out. To more and more people. So keep us in prayer as we work on our little project here and ask God and Mother Mary to, to help us along the way. But I don't know where you're from or however it is, but the, the message that we put out basically is, is for everybody. You know, we're, we're here to serve people. You know, I, father Leo said a really important thing today. I think he was saying, be of service to people. That's essentially, that's what that is. Yeah. Uh, I've been, I've been a Catholic priest now for 27 years, and it's always been, service hasn't been anything else. You just sit there and, and, and, and you try to help as many people as you possibly can, and that's what St. Paul does too. St. Paul basically says, I'm a person to all people. And that's what Jesus tried to do too, for that. I mean, I don't know. What time it is where you're listening from, uh, spread the word, and we're still taking invitations, um, for the, uh, for the trip in Poland and in in November. And if you need any more detailed information, um. Just the email is right there and my telephone number is right there. So please gimme a call. Uh, we still have plenty of room. We've got 18 right now, and Robbie, the person that's handling our trip wants, wants a few more people. So, um, Poland is a chance to sees Sister Faina and a variety of other wonderful places. Hmm. So I just, I just invite you to, to at least give us a call. Uh, you know, the address, the email address is right there. So give us a call and I can share with you all the information you want. But mainly my friends, mainly my friends, just be humble enough to sit at the Master's feet and be like, Mary. And say, here my Lord. And there's this song out there like that, you know, here, my Lord, I come to do your will. Just open your hearts like MoMA Mary did and in a variety of other the Great Saints. So what I'd like to do, and I know this is a little short, but at the same time I think it, I think it spells, it shares everything, a prayer for Eastern. Oh Jesus, our beloved companion and glow of our inspiration. We thank thee on this glorious Easter mourn for guiding our lives and protecting in our homes and family, and for sharing that with us, the warmth, the thine unseen presence. We thank you old brother. For bring our way to the Father for lighting and our pathways to the spring. The source from winds all beauty, peace, and life endlessly flow in this miraculous season of rebirth. As the flowers and the trees and the grasses emerge from winter slumber as the butterflies and dragonflies taped to the breeze, once again, our creatures. A big and small nurture, a Jew generation of babies as they, as the days grow longer and the nights warmer, and the sky is bluer. We thank you oh Jesus, for bringing us together with our friends and loved ones on this Easter holiday in order that we might recall. Th own marvelous rebirth. So long ago when the task of that temporal ministry had drawn to a close and our father, by his grace unto us, did bring the back thee back to life and unto the dimensions, which is his. His own witch in us all around us, and which is called heaven, that we shall dwell by our side as our unseen, but ever present protector and counselor for the rest of these days. And lastly, Jesus, even as though. Has steadfast protected us. We humbly reaffirm our promise to protect the gifts of nature and tranquility that our father has bestowed upon us. And so it is in the name of Jesus Christ We pray. Amen. Amen. Must a beautiful prayer. Yeah. Well, friends, like we just ask you, you know, we're, we're just starting out here and we're sending out as many, but we have names and if you just refer those names to, to this podcast and everything else, we'd, we'd really appreciate it. You know, and but above all, share that love that you have for Jesus, especially during this Easter season. So. I don't know if Christy has any questions for me. No, I just wanna share that. Um, it is, you know, uh, we are recording this and it's um, holy Thursday and tomorrow is good Friday. It's just really, if you can make it to church to spend time with Jesus and adoration and pray. It's really nice, solemn. Um. Celebration tonight and, and tomorrow's veneration of the cross. Um, so yeah, I know tomorrow we have, uh, the faith walk that we always do annually here. And that's really nice too. 'cause a lot of parishes, we all end up in the same, um, the same place, um, after we all do the 14 stations and we have like a little, little, so is that ecumenical or not? What do you mean? Well, other churches or just Catholics. Catholics. Okay. Okay. Because I know, don't they have one too? That's for pro-life that's ecumenical all churches. I don't know. Okay. I was just curious. I should, yeah, I should ask. But that's, you know, my friends, little things like this. I, the church has got, I gave a last, the other day when I gave out the, a little gift and everything else to all the nights that were there at the meeting. Different, you know, different little prayers that, you know, rosary for Life. There's the one out there for Rosary for Life put up by the Knights. Um. And perhaps when, while they're doing the stations of the cross, perhaps during that time or whenever they can, they, they say the rosary or hymns or something. I know the organizers have got it all mapped out and everything else, but, um, gee, it's really nice to be able to just, to be able to participate in some of those things for, for those of us that can and everything else. Mm-hmm. And as far as, as far as I go. I, I'm gonna go over to the sister's monastery and do the Good Friday services over there and then come back to seas. Mm-hmm. And just be present. And, uh, father Leo needs my help. He'll tell me so. And of course, holy Saturday too. And then on on Easter Sunday, you know, guys, I tell you what. I'm mad at the Easter Bunny again. Why are you mad at the Easter Bunny again? Well, every year you're mad at the Easter Bunny. Well, for the last four or five years, I've ordered it from Amazon and he hasn't hopped in yet. Hmm. Oh, I see. He at least sending Easter eggs. No. He just sure is, is winsome with me? Maybe They got scrambled. They got scrambled. Okay. Father Perry. Um, so we are, let's see here. So you want to say, um, a closing prayer before we say goodbye and, yeah. Prayer. Heavenly Father, we come before you right now and we ask you to, to be with us and to guide us and protect us and share with us your wisdom and understanding as to be the and how to be the best shepherds you possibly can we go before you, heavenly Father and mother Mary on this Easter time. To fully experience your resurrection, Lord Jesus, and bring that experience to everyone that you tell us to bring it to, because that's what we are. We are his agents. That's all we do. We bring Jesus to one another. So I invite you, my friends, if you know of anybody right now that needs Jesus, especially during this special season. Give 'em a call, text them, zoom them, Instagram, however you wanna do it. But maybe there's somebody out there right now that needs the, that needs a hug from you in a sense, or, you know, reach out and touch someone. Like say, you know, like State Farm does, you're in good hands with Allstate. Well, that's the same thing. You're in good hands when you just turn your life totally, totally over to Jesus and to say that simple prayer that Mama Mary did, behold, I'm the handmaid of the Lord. So enjoy my friends this Easter time and we'll, uh, we'll talk to you later. So Father, son, the Holy Spirit. Amen. Amen. So, thank you for joining us today on Mary's message, leading Hearts to Jesus. If this conversation brought you closer to Jesus, I invite you to subscribe. Leave us a five star review and share this episode with someone who needs a little hope. And every time you do, you help Mary's message reach more hearts for links and resources and ways to stay connected. Be sure to check the show notes below. And if you'd like to go deeper, we now have a newsletter sign up for you. So head to our subscription landing page in the show notes to join our community and receive reflections, resources. And Mary, an inspiration delivered straight to your inbox and it's a good chance for you to get in touch with Ava Perry. You can ask him questions and spiritual direction. And until next time. May Mary's message echo in your heart and lead you ever closer to the loving embrace of Christ.