PASCHA - Day Twenty Seven — To Resurrect the Cosmos

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

CHRIST IS RISEN!  INDEED HE IS RISEN!

"The work of Christ therefore presents a physical, one must even say, biological reality. On the cross, death is swallowed up by life. In Christ, death enters into divinity and is destroyed there, for "it does not find a place." Thus, redemption signifies the struggle for life against death and the triumph of life. Christ's humanity constitutes the first-fruits of a new creation. Through it a life force is introduced into the cosmos to resurrect and transfigure it for the final destruction of death. Since the incarnation and resurrection, death is unnerved, is no longer absolute. Everything converges towards the complete restoration of all that is destroyed by death, towards the illumination of the entire cosmos by the glory of God become all in all things, without excluding from this plentitude the freedom of each person before the full awareness his wretchedness, which the light divine will communicate to him."

From Dogmatic Theology by Vladimir Lossky (+1958)

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Vladimir Lossky wrote what today is still considered the classic of Orthodox theological literature of the 20th c. And that book is The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church. That book had an enormous influence on me when I first encountered it as a young man. I have subsequently read through it many times, together with his other books, as the one from which today's paschal meditation is taken. 

For all inquirers and catechumens, I continue to recommend reading The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church for all those who are ready to study a more challenging work. Not "easy" reading, but deeply inspiring and a "taste" of the richness of the Orthodox Christian Tradition. Lossky combines eloquence of expression and theological depth in his writing, and this has the result of a theological vision that is not only intellectually attractive, but which also speaks directly to the heart and soul, and which creates in us a thirst for the living God encountered in the Church. And that is one of the main goals of theology.

PASCHA - Day Twenty Five — Mid-Pentecost, 'If Anyone Thirst...'

 

Dear Parish Faithful

Paschal Meditation - Day Twenty Five

CHRIST IS RISEN!

INDEED HE IS RISEN!

On the feast of Mid-Pentecost, marking the mid-point of our journey from Pascha to Pentecost, we celebrate these words said, nay, cried out, by our Lord to all of us: If “anyone” thirsts, let him come to Me and drink.

That also means me, if I recognize that I do, indeed, “thirst” for the Holy Spirit; if I am “poor in Spirit,” rather than self-sufficient (a.k.a. “full of myself”). Today let me once again join the thirsting Church, not the full-of-ourselves Church, that I may re-focus on my cross-carrying journey, toward the “glorified” Lord. He has been “glorified” in His death and His new life, in which He invites me to participate, also today. So let me come to Him this morning, and drink of His life-creating Presence, in some heartfelt prayer and reading of His word, because I can. “Anyone” can. And we can all have “rivers” flowing out of us of “living water,” – of compassion, kindness, wisdom, creativity, courage, patience, humility and love, in the generous Self-offering of the Holy Spirit in our world. “Come and abide in us” today, Lord, as we choose to come and abide in You.

COFFEE WITH SISTER VASSA - Wednesday, May 29

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The word is out there that the Orthodox Church in America has been  experiencing significant  growth in this "post-Covid" era that we are living through. That means that thoughtful persons are "thirsting" for the words of life that flow from Christ; and for the sacramental life that flows from His pierced side while dying for the "life of the world" on the Cross. The Church, in turn, is not offering a haven for progressive or conservative politics; or a protective wall in today's current "cultural wars." Entering the Church with this "thirst" is to enter the living Body of Christ. If we focus on the voice of the Good Shepherd, then all the "protection" that we need is offered to us as an unmerited gift that we remain ever thankful for.

PASCHA - Day Twenty — 'The Apostles to the Apostles'

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

CHRIST IS RISEN! 

INDEED HE IS RISEN!

We are in the week of the Myrrh-bearing Women, as we extend Sunday's commemoration of these extraordinary women throughout the entirety of this week. At all the Vespers and Matins services for this week, the Church will sing and chant primarily about the myrrhbearing women and their role as apostolic witnesses, implying their role as "apostles to the apostles."

Their eyewitness testimony of both the empty tomb and the Risen Lord continues to amaze me, and I can only imagine the excitement and intense response with which this testimony must have been greeted when they shared their experience with the other members of the earliest Christian communities. Their timeless witness is with us until "the end of the world." As the New Testament scholar, Richard Baukham writes:

"These women, I think we can say, acted as apostolic eyewitness guarantors of the traditions about Jesus, especially his resurrection but no doubt also in other respects. As we have seen, that their witness acquires textual form in the Gospels implies that it can never have been regarded as superseded or unimportant. For as long as these women were alive their witness, 'We have seen the Lord,' carried the authority of those the Lord himself commissioned to witness to his resurrection...

"They were well-known figures and there were a large number of them. They surely continued to be active traditioners whose recognized eyewitness authority could act as a touchstone to guarantee the traditions as others relayed them and to protect the traditions from inauthentic developments." ( Gospel Women, p. 295)

If "fear and trembling seized them" when they departed from the empty tomb (MK 16:8), perhaps in our more focused moments we, too, can experience that same "fear and trembling" when we again read or listen to St. Mark's account in the Gospel.

There is something unforgettable and awe-inspiring about that ever-memorable morning when the sun was just rising and the stone to the tomb had been rolled away; followed then by the appearance of the "young man" dressed in "white robes" announcing:

"Do not be amazed; you seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen, he is not here; see the place where they laid him" (MK. 16:8). 

The angel understood their amazement, because the women sensed the numinous presence of God filling that empty tomb with an other-worldly reality. Their own disorientation at this unexpected turn of events when they left the tomb is probably behind their initial silence. (This does not mean that the women failed to fulfill the command of the angel to tell the disciples that they would see Jesus in Galilee. It probably means that they did not share this news with others until the time the risen Christ appeared to His disciples confirming the proclamation of the angel that He had indeed risen).

We, in turn, have to always guard against over-familiarity dulling our response to the Good News of Christ's Resurrection from the dead. This is not a message to be nonchalant about! The Resurrection has changed the world and certainly change the lives of Christian believers. And we, too, are "witnesses of these things" (Lk 24:48). 

The role of the Myrrh-bearing Women has always been treated with great respect and recognition within the Church. In one of our most beloved paschal hymns, "Let God Arise," two of the stanzas are dedicated to the myrrh-bearers and their witness. These hymns build upon the scriptural accounts of their visit to and discovery of the empty tomb, poetically developing those terse scriptural verses in a more embellished manner that weaves together a host of scriptural messianic images together with the Gospel accounts:

Come from that scene, O women,
bearers of glad tidings,
And say to Zion:
Receive from us the glad tidings of joy,
of Christ's resurrection.
Exult and be glad,
And rejoice, O Jerusalem,
Seeing Christ the King,
Who comes forth from the tomb like a
bridegroom in procession.

The myrrh-bearing women,
At the break of dawn,
Drew near to the tomb of the
Life-giver.
There they found an angel sitting upon 
the stone.
He greeted them with these words:
Why do you seek the living among the
dead?
Why do you mourn the incorrupt amid
corruption?
Go, proclaim the glad tidings to His
disciples. 

As an aside of sorts, when listening to Rimsky-Korsakov's "Russian Easter Overture," I always feel that he musically captures the excitement and energy of the myrrh-bearers discovering the empty tomb. 

The myrrh-bearing women did not mysteriously disappear following the Resurrection of Christ. There were many of them, and we have the names or a reference to at least the following:

• Mary Magdalene
• Mary the mother of Joseph the Little and Jose, 
• Salome, 
• Mary of Clopas, 
• Mary and Martha, the sisters of Lazarus, 
• Susanna, 
• and the mother of the sons of Zebedee. 

And, of course, the "mother of Jesus," as she is referred to by the Evangelist John (19:25), was at the foot of the Cross. They must have shared their experience innumerable times, and their credibility is what lies behind their inclusion in the Gospels. They must have therefore been very prominent figures in the apostolic era of the Church.

I would again stress their presence in the liturgical services of Pascha. Their presence permeates these services as the empty tomb is always an object of pious and reverential celebration:

Before the dawn, Mary and the women came
and found the stone rolled away from the tomb.
They heard the angelic voice: "Why do you 
seek among the dead as a man the one who is
everlasting light? Behold the clothes in the grave.
Go and proclaim to the world: The Lord is risen.
He has slain death, as He is the Son of God, saving
the race of men." (Hypakoe)

To again include a fine summary by the New Testament scholar, Richard Baukham:

"As prominent members of the early communities, probably traveling around the communities, they were doubtless active in telling the stories themselves. They may not usually, like the male apostles, have done so in public contexts, because of the social restrictions on women in public space. But this is no reason to deny them the role of authoritative apostolic witnesses and shapers of Gospel traditions, since there need not have been such restrictions in Christian meetings and since they could witness even to outsiders in women-only contexts such as the women's quarters of houses." (Gospel Women, p. 302-303)

Jesus turned things upside down by proclaiming joy to the world through the Cross. Overcoming social prejudices, He raised to great prominence these humble women who would otherwise be unknown to the world. He granted them an integral role in proclaiming the Good News to the world that the sting of death has been overcome through His rising from the dead. As long as the Gospel is proclaimed, we will venerate and celebrate the memory of the Myrrh-bearing Women and rejoice with them. Women have always been integral to witnessing to Christ and the truth of the Gospel. Over time, that witness has been diminished by "traditions" that can only be perceived as "the precepts of men." (Mk. 7:7) Their full voice and their role in the ministries of the Church need to be re-established for the very spiritual health of the Church and its witness to a world starving of divine presence.

PASCHA - Day Thirteen — 'Set our cold hearts on fire'

 

The Encounter on the Road to Emmaus

Dear Parish Faithful, CHRIST IS RISEN! INDEED HE IS RISEN! Our mind cannot grasp the divine mysteries, how the Source of Life rises after slaying death. Therefore, it is only in our heart that we experience the joy of the Resurrection, and enlightened by it, with a voice of spiritual gladness we sing to You: Jesus, You pass through the locked doors, enter the house of our souls.  Jesus, having met Your disciples on the road to Emmaus, meet us on the journey of life.  Jesus, You enflamed their hearts with Your words, set also our cold hearts on fire.  Jesus, You and Yourself known in the breaking of the bread, grant us to know You in the Divine Eucharist.  Jesus, You promised the Holy Spirit to Your disciples, send down to us also this Spirit Comforter from the Father.  Risen Jesus, resurrect our souls. (Ikos 2 of The Akathist Hymn to the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ) ___ We chanted this Akathist Hymn to the Resurrection yesterday morning in church. Akathist Hymns are very rhetorical and rather creative in how they employ scriptural passages and images. I found this particular Akathist both uplifting and humbling in that it continually kept the focus of the Lord's Resurrection on our own lives and on our capacity to assimilate the deepest truths of the Resurrection for what we call "Christian living."  Can we today have a "road to Emmaus experience?" If we expand the meaning of that initial encounter between the Risen Christ and Cleopas and an unknown disciple on that first paschal morning, to include our own "journey of life" as expressed in the hymn, then this is possible. Perhaps even more significant is the hymn's exhortation that we "set our cold hearts on fire," thus echoing the disciples on that morning who said to each other after Christ disappeared from their presence: "Did not our hearts burn within us, while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?" (Lk. 24:32)  The paschal season allows us the opportunity to "think on these things."

PASCHA - Day Eleven — Break On Through (To The Other Side) !

 

Paul sees the Risen Christ on the Road to Damascus

 

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

Christ is Risen! Indeed He is Risen

The Orthodox Church’s claim that Pascha is “the Feast of Feasts” is far more than poetic rhetoric. On the most basic level, it reminds us that the very existence of the Church is dependent upon the reality of Christ’s bodily resurrection “from the dead.” The Feast of Pascha makes that abundantly clear with an intensity that can be overwhelming. This, in turn, reinforces the blunt apostolic insight from the St. Paul: “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain” (I COR. 15:14). No amount of modern “reinterpretation” of the Lord’s resurrection to the contrary can effectively silence or refute what the Apostle wrote. The Christian Faith – and the Church – stands or falls on the truthfulness of the bodily resurrection of Christ.

The Apostle Paul further warns us that a non-resurrected Christ has even worse consequences for those who would mistakenly proclaim a resurrection that never actually occurred: “We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified of God the he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true the dead are not raised” (v. 15). Finally, and with a brutal honesty that reveals the Apostle’s clarity of thought, he does not shrink from exposing the futility of purpose that a non-resurrected Christ would collapse into: “If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all men most to be pitied” (v. 19). That assessment sounds just about right to me.

Yet after decisively dealing with such theoretical scenarios, St. Paul confidently proclaims the Gospel that he had himself received (literally that which was “handed over” or “traditioned” to him): “But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep” (I COR. 15:20). Therefore, when someone dies, we do not have to “grieve as others do who have no hope” (I THESS. 5:13). Christian hope is directed to the future and the eschatological fulfillment of God’s providential care for, and direction of, our common human destiny, culminating in a transfigured cosmos and “the redemption of our bodies” (ROM. 8:23). This is only possible if the “last enemy” – death itself – has been overcome from within, revealed to the world in and through the Risen Lord. Little surprise, then, that Pascha is the “Feast of Feasts” and “Holy day of Holy Days” if all of the above is what we indeed celebrate! Pascha has inaugurated the current paschal season of forty days – culminating in the Ascension - during which we intensify our focus on the Lord’s triumph over the sting of death. We, too, with the Apostle Paul exclaim with glad hearts: “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I COR. 15:57).

The natural cycle of life and death can weary the human heart with the inescapability of its endlessly reoccurring patterns: “Vanity of vanities! … All is vanity…. A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever” (ECCLES. 1:2,4). “And therefore,” according to Fr. Georges Florovsky, “the burden of time, this rotation of beginnings and ends, is meaningless and tiresome.” Our dissatisfaction with this closed cycle undermines the very claim that it is all “natural,” and therefore acceptable to the human spirit. On the contrary, human beings are always seeking an escape into whatever “reality” will allow us at least some temporary relief from the oppressiveness of a closed universe forever marred by corruption and death. If not Stoic resignation – “the impassibility or even indifference of the sage” (Fr. Florovsky) - then perhaps a desire to transcend the limitations imposed upon us by “nature,” will lead to a desperate search for an ecstatic experience – the dionysian impulse.

If I may indulge in a pop culture reference from the heady rock music of the past (over fifty years ago now!), there exists a song that more-or-less captures this inchoate desire for liberation: “Break on Through (to the Other Side).” For the moment forgiving the fatal excesses and self-indulgent pretensions of the singer-songwriter of this popular song; we can hear in its strained lyrics the human need to pass over (“break on through”) into a realm (“the other side”) that promises a heightened experience of reality that our mundane world cannot deliver. Of course, this can begin with “religion” or what we call “mysticism” (often a dangerous combination of mist + schism as I have heard it described). 

On a more secular level, the search for transcendence can be attempted through science or art. Within the context of the song we are now discussing, however, this possibly/probably refers to the rebellion associated with transgressing moral and ethical norms that seem to be restrictive and not liberating. This would be the dead world of bourgeois middle-class values supported by an insufferably bland moralistic Christianity. In other words, to all that the word “suburbia” implied in the 60’s. This is justified by the individual desire for self-autonomy, “freedom,” or a stance against hypocrisy. Only God knows how much of this was only a self-justification for indulging the passions and acting irresponsibly. In other words, the quest for freedom can easily degenerate into “license.” When the imagination fails, there is always the more prosaic and ever-popular “eat, drink and make merry, for tomorrow we die.” When practiced with serious abandon, though, this leads to a “breakdown” rather than a “breakthrough.” (Alas, this was the fate of our singer-songwriter).

All of these attempts to “break on through to the other side” can be both exhilarating and dangerous; heroic or pathetic; inspiring or disgusting. When pursued with a seriousness that reveals the human spirit’s refusal to submit, not only to mediocrity, but to the laws that eternally legislate the “house of the dead” that our world has become through human sinfulness, then such attempts at self-transcendence can earn our respect. Yet, an air of futility permeates all such autonomous attempts at self-liberation, for the human person has no such inherent capabilities apart from the power of God. A wholly different issue is raised by promethean pride that resists any “authority” greater than the self – including God. (It was the anarchist Bakunin who said: “If God exists, then I am a slave”). Here we cross over into the world of “mystical insolence” and demonic rebellion.

It is only Christ who has truly “broken through” to the “other side.” Again, this claim can only be made based upon the “fact” of His bodily resurrection.

 

Yet, it is only Christ who has truly “broken through” to the “other side.” Again, this claim can only be made based upon the “fact” of the bodily resurrection of Christ. Death itself – the fear of which subjects us to “lifelong bondage” - has been transcended in the voluntary death of Christ; a “resurrecting death” that was revealed to the Lord’s astonished disciples when He appeared among them following His burial and said: “Peace be with you.” (JN. 20:19) This was not a case of resuscitation and the resumption of natural life within the time and space of this world. For the Apostle Paul writes: "For we know that Christ being raised from the dead will never did again; death no longer has dominion over him” (ROM. 6:9). 

The human spirit’s “natural” desire for self-transcendence is no longer wasted on rebelliousness, utopian dreams, or nihilistic despair. Now it is Truth itself which has set us free. And this Truth is Christ. It is actually the will of a merciful and loving God that desires this for us; and God has acted to make this possible by raising Christ from the dead, the “first fruits” of a general resurrection that we await in patient expectation of God fulfilling the promises made to us “according to the Scriptures.”

We can close these “fragments” with again turning to Fr. Georges Florovsky who, employing some of the remarkable liturgical hymns that illuminate our celebration of Pascha, describes the one meaningful “breakthrough" - our liberation from death - in the following manner:

Amidst the darkness of pale death shines the unquenchable light of Life, the Life Divine. This destroys Hell and destroys mortality. “Thou didst descend into the tomb, O Immortal, Thou didst destroy the power of death” (kontakion). In this sense Hell has been simply abolished, “and there is not one dead in the grave.” For “he received earth, and yet met heaven.” Death is overcome by Life. “When Thou didst descend into death, O Life Eternal, then Thou didst slay Hell by the flash of Thy Divinity” (Vespers of Great and Holy Friday).

PASCHA - Day Ten — 'The disciples were glad when they saw the Lord'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

CHRIST IS RISEN!

INDEED HE IS RISEN!

"Having beheld the Resurrection of Christ, let us worship the holy Lord Jesus ..."

In the narrated scene in St. John's Gospel (heard yesterday in church) in which the Risen Lord appears to the disciples even though they are behind closed doors "for fear of the Jews" (Jn. 20:19), Jesus will immediately drive that fear out by his sudden appearance and the calming words: "Peace be with you." (v. 20) After showing his disciples both his hands and his side, we read: "Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord." It has always struck me that this description of St. John's as to the reaction of the disciples to the presence of the Risen Lord, is one of the great understatements found in any of the Gospels! Can "gladness" possibly capture what they experienced on the "first day of the week?" (v. 19)

However, we need not underestimate the biblical use of the expression of gladness. We need to recall that in the Farewell Discourse of Jn. 13-17, we hear Jesus say to his confused disciples as he speaks of his departure: "When a woman is in travail she has sorrow because her hour has come; but when she is delivered of the child, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a child is born into the world."(16:21) The crucifixion of the Lord was, in a sense, the birth pangs of the Messiah. But when the Lord was "delivered" of his anguish and placed Himself into the hands of his heavenly Father (Lk. 23:46), and then appeared to his disciples, they rejoiced with what we could call a biblical joy/gladness. For the Lord further added: "So you have sorrow now, but I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one shall take your joy away." (Jn. 16:22) The disciples were seeing the Lord again as he promised them; and we are left with the distinct impression that no matter what the hardships they were forced to endure in their respective apostolic ministries, their joy was never taken away.

To further strengthen this point, we have the words of the eminent biblical scholar, Raymond Brown, who commented: "In Jewish thought peace and joy were marks of the eschatological period when God's intervention would have brought about harmony in human life and in the world. John sees this period realized as Jesus returns to pour forth his Spirit upon men." So, when the disciples "were glad when they saw the Lord," we can be assured that this was that eschatological (end-time and Kingdom-oriented) joy/gladness that takes us far beyond our usual sense of gladness as a fleeting experience that may expire as quickly as it overcomes us. 

Life is too demanding and filled with such challenges that we can hardly expect to maintain that joy so that no one could take it away. But if life is stronger than death in the Risen Lord, then we can trust that it is "there" even when it seems to be absent.

 

PASCHA - Day Nine — The Glorious First and Eighth Day of the Week

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,


CHRIST IS RISEN! 

INDEED HE IS RISEN!

In St. John's account of the first appearance of the Risen Lord to the disciples as a group (Jn. 20:19-31), we find the liturgical structure of the Church as it exists to this very day in his account of this incredible encounter. For St. John records: "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week ..."(20:19). The first day of the week is the day after the Sabbath, and that would be our Sunday.

It was on this day that the risen Christ appeared to his bewildered, dejected, and frightened disciples in order to convince them that He was risen from the dead. "Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord" (20:20). That “glad” sounds like a classic understatement, in all due respect to the Evangelist John! Jesus returned to further convince the unbelieving Thomas that He was indeed risen. And significantly, this next appearance was "eight days later" (20:26). Which means, of course, the following Sunday.

Since those memorable two days until today, we use the language - with all of its symbolic meaning - of the First and Eighth Day of the week for our liturgical assemblies on the Lord's Day - Sunday. In a deep sense, the first day of the week is the eighth day, if we understand the "eighth day" as taking us beyond the seven days of the week as a kind of anticipation of the Kingdom of God which is beyond the "time" of this world.

St. Gregory Palamas (+1359), Archbishop of Thessaloniki, in a homily entitled "On the Sabbath and the Lord's Day," explains it like this:

You will see that it was Sunday when the disciples assembled and the Lord came to them. On Sunday He approached them for the first time as they were gathered together and eight day later, when Sunday came around again, He appeared to their assembly. Christ's Church continually reflects these gatherings by holding its meetings mostly on Sundays and we come among you and preach what pertains to salvation and lead you towards piety and a godly way of life.

Yet, as a pastor, St. Gregory continued his homily with this admonition:

Let no one out of laziness or continuous worldly occupations miss these holy Sunday gatherings, which God Himself handed down to us, lest he be justly abandoned by God and suffer like Thomas, who did not come at the right time. If you are detained and do not attend on one occasion, make up for it the next time, bringing yourself to Christ's Church. Otherwise you may remain uncured, suffering unbelief in your soul because of deeds or words, and failing to approach Christ's surgery to receive, like divine Thomas, holy healing.

To our modern sensibilities, even these words of pastoral admonition may seem over-stated if not harsh to us today. But the saint was trying to reinforce the sense of commitment that the believer needs to have towards the Lord's Day Liturgy which brings us directly into the presence of the Risen Christ - "Christ is in our midst!" - as we joyfully exclaim at the Liturgy.

St. Gregory's homily clearly places commitment over convenience. This is our first priority. He was writing to a Christian society that was not as pluralistic or diverse as our own, there is no doubt. That means that the pressure for us is "out there" to conform to those "worldly occupations" that St. Gregory warns us about. Today, that could even have a bearing on our presence at the Sunday morning Liturgy. As one example from among many: How many Orthodox parents have to deal with their child's sports events scheduled these days on Sunday morning? So, we can see that the challenges are out there.

In the light of the Gospel revelation about the glorious first and eighth day of the week, we should at least think hard about any such choices. To be in church on Lord’s Day for the Liturgy; to hear the words of Christ that we use to this day: “Peace be to you;” to be gathered as disciples of the Risen Lord; and to receive the Eucharist together as the meal anticipating the Kingdom. This is to receive gift upon gift. Let us glorify the living God for these wonderful gifts!

Christ is Risen!

 

BRIGHT FRIDAY — Pascha to Pentecost: On 'Not Bending the Knee'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

Christ is Risen! Indeed He is Risen!

Perhaps not everyone is aware of a traditional liturgical discipline associated with the paschal season, and that is the practice of not "bending the knee" (kneeling) from Pascha to Pentecost. But the practice actually applies to each and every Sunday of the liturgical year, not simply the paschal season. This was thought to have been a practice important enough to be the subject of one of the canons from the First Ecumenical Council (Nicea 325): "Forasmuch as there are certain persons who kneel on the Lord's Day and in the days of Pentecost, therefore, to the intent that all things may be uniformly observed everywhere (in every parish), it seems good to the holy Synod that prayer be made to God standing."

I was reading about this practice in Sister Vassa's new book, Praying in Time, within which she devotes a section to this theme in one of the book's chapters. This section concludes with the following paragraph that serves as a good explanation behind the practice:

Why are we not to kneel on Sundays? Saint Basil the Great (+379) explains that by standing upright on Sundays, rather than kneeling, we symbolize or re-present with our own bodies the bodily resurrection of the Lord, our having risen from the dead together with him, and seeking "the things above" (On the Holy Spirit 27, cf. Canon 91 of St. Basil the Great). Thus the "kneeling prayers" of Pentecost Sunday, attributed to St. Basil, are not read at the vigil or Vespers or Matins of Pentecost Sunday, but at the Vespers of the following day, Pentecost Monday, so as to avoid kneeling on Sunday.

Even while for practical reasons this Vespers service, with the kneeling prayers of Pentecost Monday, is usually celebrated immediately after the Divine Liturgy on Pentecost Sunday, the liturgical tradition is bending over backwards (or forwards, in this case) to avoid kneeling on a Sunday by placing the kneeling prayers outside the liturgical cycle of Pentecost Sunday and within the Vespers of the next day. (p. 91)

We can apply this liturgical principle and practice to our personal prayer also.

 

BRIGHT THURSDAY — 'Eucharistic Joy'

 

Pascha is eucharistic joy.  

The Lord was not separated from us in the Ascension but left for us a connection with Him in the Holy Communion. In partaking of the heavenly bread and of the cup of life, we palpably feel the coming Christ and praise Him then with the hymn of the Resurrection: ‘O great and most holy Pascha, Christ; O Wisdom, Word, and Power of God! Grant that we may partake of Thee fully in the unfading day of Thy Kingdom’ (from the Paschal Canon, ode 9). 

The Paschal triumph is already this unfading day, and the Paschal joy is akin to the joy of communion. The faithful are filled with Christ; the Lord is close to us; He appears to us just as He appeared to the apostles before the Ascension. Pascha is the sacrament expressly bestowed upon the Church by the Holy Spirit in order that it know the risen Lord: ‘Having beheld the resurrection of Christ, let us worship the Lord Jesus.’

From Sergius Bulgakov’s homily entitled “Divine Joy” from his book Churchly Joy.

_____

The paschal mystery is the basis of the Eucharist, and every Eucharist is the presence of the paschal mystery. Perhaps this truth more than any other is behind the the choice of the title Churchly Joy for Fr. Sergius Bulgakov's collection of homilies from which the last two Bright Week meditations have been drawn.

 

BRIGHT WEDNESDAY — 'Easter is the anticipation of the Heavenly Jerusalem'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

CHRIST IS RISEN!    INDEED HE IS RISEN!

“Earthly colors fade in the shining of the white Paschal light, and the soul sees only ‘the unapproachable light of the resurrection’: ‘now all things have become full of light — the heavens, the earth, and the under-world.’ During the Paschal night, man is permitted to know in anticipation the life of the future age, to enter into the Kingdom of Glory, into the Kingdom of God… 

"Easter for us is not just one of the feast days; it is ‘the feast of feasts, the celebration of celebrations.’ All of the major feasts of the Church give us knowledge of the Kingdom of God in the works of God as events of this age. But Easter is not a remembrance of such an event, for it is directed toward the future age. 

"Easter is the earthly preparation for the revelation of the glory about which Christ prayed to the Father in His high-priestly prayer. Easter is the anticipation of the heavenly Jerusalem, which at the end of time will descend, according to the prophetic vision, from heaven to earth: ‘Shine, shine, New Jerusalem. You are radiant with the glory of the Lord.’ Easter is eternal life, consisting of knowledge of God and communion with God.”

—Excerpts from Sergius Bulgakov’s homily entitled “Divine Joy” from his book Churchly Joy

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Fr. Sergius Bulgakov was one of the great Orthodox thinkers and writers of the 20th c. This passage is a wonderful indication of his many gifts. In this short passage, he combines a theological vision of the Resurrection that is Kingdom-oriented with a host of liturgical hymns from the Paschal service organically interwoven into his homily.

 

BRIGHT TUESDAY — 'Let no one go hungry away!'

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

CHRIST IS RISEN!      INDEED HE IS RISEN!

Wherefore, enter you all into the joy of your Lord; and receive your reward, both the first, and likewise the second. You rich and poor together, hold high festival. You sober and you heedless, honor the day. Rejoice today, both you who have fasted and you who have disregarded the fast. The table is full-laden; feast ye all sumptuously. The calf is fatted; let no one go hungry away.

- St. John Chrysostom

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I believe that we are all familiar with the Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom: Its rhetorical splendor through which the depth on St. John's images and scriptural allusions deliver the Gospel of Life as revealed in the Lord's Resurrection from the dead. This mere fragment from the Homily (read in the church during the Paschal Matins) is enough to remind of us of the fact that a parish priest will not "dare" deliver a homily of his own on Pascha!