1st Lenten Lamentation-Our Lord’s Agony

The Lamentations are a traditional Catholic devotion that contemplates the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ through song, reflective prayer, and intercession before the Blessed Sacrament and preaching on the mystery of the Passion.  The service in its present form dates back to the 18th century in Warsaw, Poland, where it comprised a part of the Holy Week observances carried out at the city’s Holy Cross Church.  The poignant hymns and the heart-rending pathos of the meditations (known as “Intentions”) confront the one who prays and sings with the unyielding love and bitter agony of the Crucified Christ.

There are three sets in the cycle of Lamentations, enabling the worshippers to walk with the Lord from Gethsemane to Golgotha.  The content of the Lamentations spans all the major events of the Passion narratives, with each set creating a time-stopping effect that allows us to pause at certain points along the way of the Cross and consider what is unfolding.

The first Lamentation focuses on Our Lord’s agony, His betrayal at the hands of Judas, and His subsequent arraignment before the Jewish Sanhedrin.