Music Planning Pages
as featured in
Ash Wednesday — Easter Sunday 2026 (Year A)
Ash Wednesday (February 18, 2026)
1st Sunday of Lent (February 22, 2026)
2nd Sunday of Lent (March 1, 2026)
3rd Sunday of Lent (March 8, 2026)
4th Sunday of Lent (March 15, 2026)
5th Sunday of Lent (March 22, 2026)
Palm Sunday (March 29, 2026)
Holy Thursday (April 2, 2026)
Good Friday (April 3, 2026)
Easter Vigil / Easter Sunday (April 4/5, 2026)
February 18 /Ash Wednesday
THE FIRST READING IS LUSH WITH visceral imagery—fasting, weeping, rending, offerings, and libations. Lent doesn’t begin with a gentle push but with a loud outcry. Trumpets should be blown, assemblies gathered—a great fuss is to be made! There is work to be done, wrongs to be righted, and sins to be forgiven. Jesus’s admonishment not to blow any trumpets and to do righteous work quietly offers a whiplash moment. We are marking ourselves openly with ashes on our foreheads and hearing in the first reading a call to rend our garments, and yet Jesus counsels us to do otherwise. Many may argue that such fierce righteousness is warranted in a public way. Public displays of
Hymnals
piety and righteousness mean nothing without the inner work to truly and fully repent. We are called to rend our hearts, not our garments.
The tension between public witness and attention and our inner spiritual workings will continue to challenge the disciples. It will continue to challenge us as disciples, too. Wherever we may feel called to openly live out our discipleship, we should always begin—as we do with Lent—with attention toward the conversion of our own hearts. Even now, what must we rend within ourselves? What conversion of heart might God be inviting us to this Lent? —ERN
Contemporary Music Resources
February 22 /First Sunday of Lent
WHAT ARE YOUR PARTICULAR FEARS THAT land more acutely than others do? Perhaps it is hunger, loneliness, heights, poverty, abandonment, or loss of a loved one. We all have things that we fear, things that can play on our emotions and affect how we make our decisions and how we choose to live in the world.
The devil does not merely tempt Jesus in today’s Gospel; the devil plays on some real fears that people experience. Hunger is a real and painful experience for far too many. Many of us fear death or the loss of power and comfort that come with affluence. These moments of fear are where evil manages to sneak its way
Hymnals
Una Mirada de Fe/A
Yield
in and to offer us a false sense of security over our fears. Evil may not speak to us as specifically as the devil speaks to Jesus, but it still speaks clearly and as often as it can.
We see Jesus lean into what he has already been taught about who God is and what God asks of us. In times of fear and uncertainty, when it can be difficult to think clearly, we can lean into what we know of God and what God asks of us. As we step deeper into Lent, where can we hear God’s voice speaking to our fears? —ERN
CEL/H
¡Celebremos! (Let
Hymnal
CEL/M
¡Celebremos! (Let Us Celebrate!) Missal
Pequé, Dios Mío
Contemporary Music Resources
March 1 /Second Sunday of Lent
WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU experienced the transfiguration? How do you think you would react if such a theophany occurred in front of your very eyes? I have always empathized deeply with Peter. An intensely profound moment is taking place, and he wants to build tents—he wants to hold onto and keep the moment as it is.
One of the great treasures of this Gospel is that Peter, James, and John witnessed how fully God came into the world as Jesus Christ. There is something astonishing and awe-filling about our God who wants us to know it is not some particularly gifted prophet but God’s very self who came into the world. God
Hymnals
Yo Quiero Ser, Señor Amado/ I
wants to be fully present and known to us. While we may not experience a shining Jesus alongside Moses and Elijah on a mountaintop, we are still offered profound encounters with God’s very self—especially as we celebrate the Eucharist. Do we recognize the ways God continues to manifest in front of our own eyes? Or do we write off theophanies as a thing that doesn’t happen to us? Can we see the Eucharist as the profound encounter it is? God is not hiding from us; God wants to be seen and known. How can we do as God asks when we come to the moment of encounter and listen to Jesus? —ERN
¡Celebremos! (Let Us Celebrate!) Hymnal
CEL/M
¡Celebremos! (Let Us Celebrate!) Missal
Contemporary Music Resources
March 8 /Third Sunday of Lent
I HAVE NEVER HAD TO WORRY about whether I will have enough water. I have never lived anywhere that suffers from droughts and have never worried about paying my water bill. Carrying the water that my family and I need to live is nowhere within my lived experience. But for far too many, intense thirst and struggling to quench that thirst is abundantly familiar. Moses and the Samaritan women are inhabitants of a land and a time where procuring water is a daily and crucial necessity. And no matter how much water is gathered, there will always be a need for more. Jesus points out the endless thirst that we
Hymnals
the Way My Savior Leads Me
De Tu Cántaro Dame /
I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say (Bolduc)
Leaving Her Water Jar Behind
O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing
Sacarán Aguas con Alegría
will perpetually know because that is, quite simply, our reality. The second reading offers us encouragement in our times of thirst: hope does not disappoint. When we live in hope that both our bodily thirst and the thirst of our souls for living water will be satisfied, we trust that it will become true. The encounter the Samaritan woman had with Jesus took away her thirst—she left her jar at the well. It is hope that takes us back to the well again, to keep seeking the living water God offers to us and to be open to truly receiving it. When Jesus offers us living water, can we leave our jar behind? —ERN
Contemporary Music Resources
March 15 /Fourth Sunday of Lent
WHOSE FAULT IS IT? IT IS easy to fall into a search for responsibility or blame when something isn’t right. We need to know why. Why was this person born with a disability? Why do some receive miracles and others do not? Why do only some people follow rules and laws? Why doesn’t everyone follow them? When things don’t quite make sense, we can be relentless in our pursuit to understand.
Sometimes our desperation to explore the “why” puts us in a place of our own blindness. There are times when the desire to dig deep or to determine who is truly responsible causes us to miss what is simply before us. It is a miracle to heal someone
Hymnals
My Help Comes from the Lord
Grace
O Sleeper, Rise from Death
Awaken, Sleepers
I Want to Walk as a Child
In All Our Grief
the Stillness, God of Mercy
Lead Me, Guide Me
from blindness. It can be confusing to see that some people are born with disabilities and others are not. The “why” of it can quickly take the place of grace in all of this. Jesus opens all of our eyes to a new way of living that we did not know before. God can work through those who have only ever known blindness. God’s grace is not limited by days or observances—it is for always and anytime.
As we draw closer to Holy Week, has God’s grace opened your eyes in a new way? Have the “whys” or worries of your life carried you away? —ERN
El Señor Es Mi Luz: Sal 27(26)* (Reza)
CEL/H
¡Celebremos! (Let
Hymnal
CEL/M
¡Celebremos! (Let
Missal
Contemporary Music Resources
March 22 /Fifth Sunday of Lent
TRYING TO TEACH MY YOUNG CHILDREN what it means to die
can be a challenging endeavor. I don’t want them to be afraid, but tiptoeing around the reality of death doesn’t really work either. Many who work in various capacities in the medical field are taught to be clear with their words. It isn’t just sleeping or passing. It is death. As with my children, we strive to be gentle but also clear that people do not fall asleep but truly die.
I wonder what prompted Jesus to describe Lazarus first as asleep, only to clarify that his friend had died. It is an important point that is emphasized through the imagery of graves in the
Hymnals
All That Is Hidden
O Sleeper, Rise from Death
El Señor Nos Ama Hoy / Christ Our Lord Has Loved Us
Martha, Mary, Waiting, Weeping
We
We
You
You
first reading from Ezekiel. It is not a friend who is ill or sleeping that they will travel to Bethany for, but a friend who has well and truly died. There is no metaphor here but the loss of a dear loved one.
We receive a preview of God’s power over death as Jesus calls Lazarus back to life. Death can come for Jesus’s beloved friend and will also come for Jesus. We are not immune to the realities of our mortal lives. But it only serves to emphasize how powerful God’s love for us truly is that death cannot have the last word. —ERN
WC/M
We Celebrate Hymnal Missal
WS
Word and Song
CEL/H
¡Celebremos! (Let Us Celebrate!) Hymnal
CEL/M
¡Celebremos! (Let Us Celebrate!) Missal
John 11:1–45 or John 11:3–7, 17, 20–27, 33b–45
= BILINGUAL
Contemporary Music Resources
