The Pentecostarion

The fifty day period following Easter and leading to Pentecost is called, in ecclesiastic­al lingo, the Pentecostarion period.

There is a whole area of knowledge, a science, so to speak, called Liturgics, which deals with the study of religious ceremonies and ritual practices. We often use the word Liturgy to indicate the Divine Liturgy, like what we are in right now. The same word, Liturgy, can have a broader meaning, that includes all religious ceremonies and ritual practices of the Church. Things like church services, the rubrics that describe the exact content and order of those services, the church calendar, the lists of saints days and other holidays that will be celebrated.

So, the term Pentecostarion is used in discussing our Church’s liturgics. It can mean a couple of things. Obviously it has some­thing to do with fifty, and specifically the day of Pente­cost, which was fifty days after our Lord’s resurrection and each year fifty days after Easter.

There is a church book that contains all the special hymns to be sung in church from Easter till Pentecost, actually till the Sunday after Pentecost. That book is called the Pente­costarion. You recall a couple of months ago I described the book that contains the hymns used during the Lenten period. It is called the Triodion, and also the period of three weeks leading up to Lent is called, by association, the Triodion Period. A similar thing applies here too. The book is called Pente­costarion, not because it has 50 hymns, or the canons have 50 odes, but because it covers a 50-day period. And that period, by association, is also called Pente­costarion. So, we are in the middle of the Pente­costarion period.

Speaking about liturgics again, Pascha is a holiday of the highest importance. And Pentecost is of equal importance. So Pascha and Pentecost are on the same level. Associated with Pascha are a series of church services we know as Holy Week. Pentecost also has its associated services: Saturday of Souls; Great Vespers on Saturday evening; Matins and Liturgy on Sunday morning; Kneeling Vespers on Sunday evening, and Monday of the Holy Spirit. And this year, we will be doing all those services, which is something new for us here at St. Nektarios.

Halfway through this period there is a holiday called Mid-Pentecost. That would be this Wednesday. In some places that have a full liturgical cycle, there will be church services for that day. Forty days after Easter there is the feast-day to remember the Ascension of our Lord. That is a great feast as well. I will talk about that another time. On the day just before Ascension, there is a day called the Leave-taking of Pascha. That means that it is the last day to sing Christ is risen for the year. Here at St. Nektarios we will do a special service to mark the leave-taking of Pascha. It will be on that Wednesday evening, right before we do Great Vespers for Ascension.

Then for the next nine days the prevailing theme in church will be the Ascension, leading up to day fifty, which, as we said, is Pentecost.

This is the liturgical framework within which our Church celebrates these events that are crucial for our salvation. I will speak about the meaning of those events and the associated feast days in the Sundays to come.

Sunday of the Myrrh-bearers

Today is the third Sunday of Pascha. The specific theme for today is to remember the so-called Myrrh-bearers. These were the two men, Joseph of Arimathea and Nikodemus, who took Jesus’ body down from the cross, prepared it for burial, laid it in the sepulcher; and also the several women who, after the resurrection, visited Jesus’ tomb and found it empty.

Joseph of Arimathea was a wealthy man, an “honorable counselor” of the Jews, who had some sway with the Roman governor. Joseph was able to pull strings, so to speak, and get permission to take possession of Jesus’ body and to bury it, because otherwise it might have been disposed of dishonorably. It is said that Joseph was treated badly by the Jewish authorities for burying Jesus, that he was tied up and thrown into a pit. But Jesus appeared to him after He rose from the dead, to confirm His resurrection. Joseph escaped and went to his estate in Arimathea. He was a first-hand witness of the Resurrection.

Nikodemus was a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin; so he was aware of the motives and plots behind the scenes that led to Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion. He is probably the source of that information in the Gospel accounts. Because he spoke openly about this and the resurrection, he was permanently removed from the Jewish Council.

There were many so-called Myrrh-bearing Women, who went back and forth to Jesus’ tomb several time and in different groups. That explains why the multiple accounts of them in the four Gospels vary so much. Each account in the Gospels describes a particular group or visit.

Patristic tradition has it that, when He rose from the dead, Jesus appeared first to His mother, the Virgin Mary, that the Angel (probably the Archangel Gabriel) removed the stone from the tomb specifically for her to see that it was empty. The evangelists did not explicitly describe Jesus’ first appearance to His mother, because they felt it would present a conflict of interest, namely the testimony of a family member, and thus diminish the credibility of their account. So they focus on Mary Magdalene and call the Virgin Mary “the other Mary,” or “the mother of James.”

Concerning Mary Magdalene, legend has it that sometime after Pentecost, she traveled to Rome and told Tiberius Caesar what Pontius Pilate had allowed to happen to Jesus. Some sources trace the red Easter egg tradition to this audience with Caesar. According to this account, Mary Magdalene, holding a plain egg, greeted Caesar and said, “Christ is risen!” He said, “It is just as likely that Christ rose from the dead as it is likely that the egg you hold will turn red.” And then the egg turned red, and Mary preached Christ to Caesar and the imperial household.

The term “Myrrh-bearers” is a misnomer and an incorrect rendering of the Greek word Μυροφόροι. The women prepared “spices and ointments” or “fragrant oils,” to anoint Jesus, not myrrh. Myrrh is a kind of gum or resin, not the fragrant oil that the women brought. Nikodemus is the one who brought “a mixture of myrrh and aloes.” The Greek word for myrrh is σμύρνα, not μύρα. Μύρα means ointments or fragrant oils. Φόρος is a suffix that means, “one who bears, holds, carries.” So, Μυροφόροι γυναῖκες, describes the women who brought ointments and fragrant oils to Jesus’ tomb.

Thomas Sunday

Today is Thomas Sunday. You will remember how on Easter Sunday evening, the Apostles were sort of in hiding in an upper room, probably the same one they had the Last Supper in a few days before. The doors were shut and locked. And Jesus came in without opening the doors and appeared to the Apostles. That is why they thought maybe He was a ghost. Jesus was not a ghost, or spirit; He was there in body. He ate something in front of them, in order to prove that He was not a ghost or spirit, but physically resurrected from the dead. Thomas came later, after the Lord had left. He found it difficult to believe it, and he wanted tangible proof that the Lord had risen from the dead.

That opportunity came the next Sunday, like today. As we heard in the Gospel reading, the Lord entered once again through the closed doors, and told Thomas to touch the scars on His hands and side, to confirm for himself that He was risen.

So, Jesus rose from the dead, physically. That is, His soul returned from Hades, after demolishing it, reentered His body, and He rose from the sepulcher, and there was no need for the stone to be removed for Him to exit. Now resurrected, His divine attributes are no longer hidden or suppressed. He demonstrated super-human abilities, like walking through doors, appearing in other forms, and other things. And yet, He ate with His Disciples. He did not need to eat in order to live, like we do now. He ate in order to prove that He is fully human as well as fully divine. The food He ate was completely consumed by the fire of His divinity. He had no need to go to the bathroom. All those baser functions were inoperative after the resurrection.

This resurrected physical state of the Lord is a preview of what lies in store for human beings after the general resurrection at the end of time. We will also have resurrected bodies that will be bright and spiritual, or not, to the extent that each individual has prepared themselves in this life.

The Lord purposely kept the marks on His body that were made by the nails and the spear. That does not mean that our wounds, physical and spiritual, will not be healed. The Lord purposely kept His scars as a kind of badge of His love for us and also to prove that it was He.

So, Thomas touches the Lord’s scars. His fingers were not burned off from touching the body of God, but rather his mind and soul were illumined, and he believed and proclaimed that the man he was touching was also his Lord and God.

This Sunday is sometimes called Anti-pascha, which means Sunday after Pascha. It is also called the rededication of the resurrection of Christ, which means a re-celebration of the resurrection. This re-celebration will happen each and every Sunday until we get to Palm Sunday next year.

Today is also known as the second Sunday of Pascha, the first one being Easter Sunday itself.

Today also marks the beginning of the eight-week cycle of the eight modes of our Church’s hymnography. This cycle will continue until the end of Lent next year.

And finally, this past week was Bright week and there was no fasting at all. As of this week, we resume our regular fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Pascha and Easter

This past week, which is called Great and Holy Week, we have observed the annual com­memoration of the events that led up to the death and burial of our Lord Jesus Christ. Saturday morning, the theme was the resurrection, when Jesus came back to life and rose from the tomb where he had been buried. And tonight, we are in the full-blown celebration of the resurrection; and we call our feast Pascha and Easter.

Pascha is a Hebrew word, and it means Passover. The Jews celebrate Passover, and it refers to the historical event when the Israelites were saved from the bondage of Egypt, and Moses led them out and they passed over the Red Sea, passed over from slavery to freedom.

Today, we Christians also celebrate Passover, the ultimate and spiritual Passover, where instead of Moses we have Christ, who opened the way for us to pass over from slavery to the devil to freedom in God, to pass over from death to eternal life. So, when we say Pascha, we ought to remember that it means passing over from death to life.

Easter is an English word that refers to the Resurrection of Christ. The origin of the word Easter is similar to that of east, which has to do with springtime, sunrise, and shining. Easter, as another name for Pascha, is much like the Greek word Λαμπρή, which is also another name for Pascha, and which means bright and shining.

Sepulcher

When Jesus was crucified, He died on the Cross sooner than expected. This indicates that He was in control and that He died when and because He wished to. He was buried in a tomb. Another word for tomb is sepulcher. In Jerusalem, the church that enshrines the site of the Lord’s burial is called the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

Descent into Hades

While Jesus’ body was in the tomb, His soul went down into what is called hell or Hades. He went there by dying, like everyone before Him. Everyone else, however, even the holy people, (and I mean their souls), were being held there by the devil, like in a prison. So Jesus went down there and with the glory of His divinity, He smashed the prison bars and gates, and filled that place with His divine light and glory.

While it is difficult to speak of these events with complete certainty, what is universally endorsed is the teaching that Christ mortified death and destroyed hell, and He preached the Gospel in hell. Many Church Fathers maintained that Christ freed all who were held captive, while others thought that only the Old Testament righteous were liberated. Another group believed that only those who came to believe in Christ and followed him were saved. In any case, now, all who believe and are baptized do not go to Hades.

Many Orthodox authors think that in Hades there is an enduring memory of Christ’s descent there, and that all who were not baptized, when they die, receive the opportunity to believe and to be saved.

The Stone of the Tomb

When Jesus’ soul returned to his body, He rose and exited the tomb without the stone being removed. Later, an Angel came and removed the stone, and this caused the earthquake. The Angel removed the stone, not so that Jesus could get out, but so that the Myrrh-bearing women could see that it was empty.

Today is Palm Sunday. Lent is over, and Holy Week is beginning. Lent, with the fasting and praying and church services and charity, was supposed to be our chance this year to prepare ourselves to celebrate spiritually the annual commemoration of our Lord’s Passion, Crucifixion, and Resurrection.

Reverence

One of the intended outcomes of following the discipline and regimen of Lent is a heightened sense of fear, faith and love for God, which can be encapsulated in the word reverence.

Reverence is the attitude that is best suited for any genuine relationship with God, whether one is a saint or a sinner. Since reverence is a virtue, the church doesn’t legislate it, because then it would no longer be a virtue but a rule.

However, the way reverence is expressed in action, and specifically reverent behavior in church, needs to defined for any given place and time. For example, while someone may very reverently and for the love of God want to do cartwheels down the center aisle on their way to Holy Communion, this is not permitted, at least not here at St. Nektarios.

Etiquette

So today, since there are so many more people who will come up for communion, it seemed best to underscore some points on church etiquette and on how to receive communion, that you can also read about in the church etiquette brochure.

No Lipstick

Lipstick stains have ruined precious and expensive objects that we use in church. Someone has to clean up the lipstick residue on the icons etc. and it is unpleasant. Fr. Steve is quite firm about this. Do not touch your lips to any sacred object, be it an icon, the cross, or the communion spoon, if you are wearing lipstick of any kind. This means that you must remove it before receiving communion.

How to Receive Communion

When it comes time for communion, please wait for the direction of the ushers. When approaching for communion, do not make any sudden movements that could upset the chalice. If you make the sign of the cross, do so before it is your turn. You do not need to hold the cloth when there is an acolyte present. Keep your hands down or crossed on your chest, like some folks do. Stand upright; do not bend or bow. Say your Christian name, tilt your head back a little, open your mouth, don’t do anything with your tongue, and let the spoon in. Our Bishop prefers that we close our mouth on the spoon and let the priest or deacon pull it out. That is one more reason why you can’t wear lipstick. After you receive communion, there is no need to wipe your mouth with the cloth. Do not attempt to kiss the chalice, even if you were taught to do so. It is just too risky. For those who come up on to the solea, after you receive communion, walk behind the other clergy to get back to your seat.

New and Official “Christ is Risen”

Last month, the Archdiocese issued an official English text and music for the hymn Christ is Risen. It is different from what we have been singing. We are changing it this year, and hopefully we won’t change it again for a long time.

Recap of Lent

Today is the Fifth, and final, Sunday of Lent. From this vantage point, you can look back and see what you’ve done so far, for the love of God and your personal improvement, and you can look forward and anticipate what still lies ahead.

So what have we done so far?

It was eight weeks ago that the first an­nounce­ment of Lent went out. And I’m referring to the Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee, and the beginning of the so-called Triodion period. In those three weeks that followed, we were presented with the Church’s teachings on prayer, repentance, forgiveness, Judgment Day, and mankind’s eviction from Paradise.

Once Lent began, there were three additional evening services during the week. Each Monday, there was Great Compline, which featured Psalms and prayers highlighting the themes of repentance, spiritual warfare, and God’s help and deliverance.

Each Wednesday, there was the Presanctified Liturgy. During this service, we read or heard passages from the Bible, from the books of Genesis and Proverbs. From Genesis, we heard once again the stories of the creation and the fall, Cain and Able, Noah and the Ark, Abraham and the rest. And, of course, there was the additional opportunity to receive holy communion.

Each Friday, the Salutations to the Mother of God were sung and recited. This past Friday, the entire Akathist Hymn was sung to the Theotokos, to honor and thank her for her role in our salvation.

Two weeks ago, on the third Sunday of Lent, we all venerated the holy Cross, in order to draw strength and encouragement to finish Lent.

This past Wednesday, I read aloud the biography of St. Mary of Egypt during the Lenten dinner that evening. And afterwards, our young adults read the 250 hymns of the Canon of St. Andrew of Crete, who used examples from the Bible to talk about spiritual sickness, sin, and repentance.

Our young adults also participated in a meal packing event sponsored by Kids Against Hunger. And our Ladies Philoptochos made sandwiches for St. Peter’s soup kitchen.

There are five more days left in Lent, which officially ends this coming Friday. If there is an eleventh hour in Lent, it’s just about now. If you haven’t done much or anything yet, this would be the time start. For fasting, prayer and charity, there is one rule: not to talk about it. Each person knows if and how they have benefited.

There is still time to fast and pray. There is still time to repent and go to confession. There is still time give to charity. And I’m not talking about stewardship, which is not charity but our duty. There are plenty of charities, even within the Church, that we can give to.

So, Lent ends this Friday. The next day, Saturday, we will remember the raising of Lazarus. That day, Fr. Steve will also explain the Liturgy. And next Sunday is Palm Sunday. Keep in mind that the palms will be blessed and distributed during the Matins service, which begins at 8:15.

The Annunciation

Today is March 25. In our Greek Orthodox Church, this is the day of the great feast known as the Annunciation of the Theotokos. As I said last week, this feast celebrates the event when the Archangel Gabriel was sent to the Virgin Mary to announce that she was chosen to be the Mother of God. She accepted, and then the incarnation took place, and God, and specifically the person of the Holy Trinity who is called the Son and Logos of God, assumed human nature, and entered her womb, and grew there for nine months until He was born.

The Hymns

As a Church, we worship our God for His love, wisdom and power, which He demonstrated in this event; and we honor the Virgin Mary for accepting her role in it. We honor her in sacred hymns, many of which were written 1200, even 1500 years ago.

The most popular hymn to the Theotokos is the “Τῇ Ὑπερμάχῳ, O Champion General.” It was composed at a time of national crisis in the Eastern Roman “Byzantine” Empire. During this crisis, the Patriarch of Constantinople led the people in prayer to God, and also to the Mother of God for intercession. When the crisis was averted, the people gave thanks to her, and the Church instituted the Akathist Hymn, to be sung in honor of the Theotokos every year in the fifth week of Lent. We will be doing that here at St. Nektarios this coming Friday at 7 PM.

Hymnographers

There are many more hymns that will be sung on Friday to honor the Mother of God. We call the writers of these hymns hymnographers. They were poets, but also experts in the Bible, in the writings of the church fathers, and also in ancient literature. So their hymns are full of images from these sources, images they use to honor the Mother of God.

Poetic Images

Some of those images will sound very strange to you, unless you understand this genre of poetry. First of all, this style loves to use hyperbole, which means exaggeration. So you will hear words like most-holy, most-blessed, higher, and  highest. Of course in the case of the Theotokos, these are not exaggerations but statements of fact.

Also you will hear the Mother of God called animal names, like: heifer and ewe, which are female cow and sheep respectively. These are not insults, but rather affirmations of Jesus’ person and divinity. Here’s how: Before Christianity, God accepted burnt offerings from His people. One of the prominent sacrifices was of a young bull as an offering for sin. Jesus is the ultimate offering for sin. He was prefigured by the young bull. So, in figurative speech, if Jesus is the young bull, the mother of the young bull is… a heifer. So, in calling the Virgin Mary heifer, we are poetically affirming that her son, Jesus, is the expiation of our sins. Jesus is called the Lamb of God. Figuratively, then, His mother would be “the ewe that yeaned (gave birth to) the Lamb of God.”

There are many more such poetic references to the Mother of God. I encourage you to come this Friday evening, to hear them, to be sacredly entertained and spiritually uplifted, and most importantly to honor and give thanks to the Mother of God for everything she has done and continues to do for all of us.

Third and Fourth Sundays of Lent

Today is the third Sunday of Lent, which is called the Sunday of the Veneration of the Cross. As I said it would, last week, the veneration of the Cross took place here just prior to the beginning of the Divine Liturgy. That is the correct time for it. And everyone who entered the sanctuary after that has had the opportunity to venerate the Cross in the narthex. The reason we have the Veneration of the Cross on the third Sunday of Lent is to encourage us to persevere with the fast for second half of Lent. It’s only three more weeks till Palm Sunday and Holy Week.

The Annunciation

Next Sunday will be the fourth Sunday of Lent. This year falls on March 25th, which is the feast of the Annunciation of the Theotokos. This feast is a remembrance of the day that the Archangel Gabriel was sent by God to announce to the Virgin Mary that she was chosen to become the mother of God. This event was depicted in our parish Christmas Program last December.

As we read in the Gospel according to Luke, the Virgin Mary was astonished, not so much by the appearance of the Archangel, but by what he said to her. She even asked for an explanation of how she would conceive a child, since she was a virgin. And Gabriel said, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.” And Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.”

Shortly after that, the Holy Spirit came upon her, and the power of the Most High over­shadowed her, and the incarnate Logos and Son of God as an embryo entered her womb to gestate and grow for nine months, until He was born.

The feast of the Annunciation / conceiving of the Virgin Mary has a deep theological meaning, since this is when the incarnation took place. This is when God united with human nature in the person of Jesus Christ, albeit just an embryo. Christmas is about the nativity of Christ, which presupposes the incarnation.

So, next weekend we will celebrate this great feast starting with Great Vespers on Saturday evening at 5 PM, and then on Sunday morning, Matins and Liturgy at the regular time. After church there will be a community luncheon, with fish on the menu. Since it is a great feast, the Lenten fast is relaxed somewhat, and fish is added to the menu for this day.

Veneration of the Holy Cross

Next week will be the third Sunday of Lent. The third Sunday of Lent is called in Greek Σταυροπροσκυνήσεως, which means Veneration of the Cross. It is one of the two principal feasts of the Cross. The other major feast of the Cross is the Exaltation, on Sept. 14.  My points today will be on: What the Veneration of the Cross is, why we have it on the third Sunday of Lent, and how we will do it here.

What It Is

The Veneration of the holy Cross is a special service during which you will be invited to venerate a replica of the Cross.

The word venerate means to regard with love and respect. The Greek equivalent, προσκυνῶ, means to bow in worship and to kiss. The Greek word προσκυνῶ is actually used to indicate the worship due to God, as well as what we do to holy icons and the Cross. In English, we use venerate with reference to holy icons and the Cross, while for God we use the word worship.

This goes to show that what is important is not the language or the specific words that we use, but rather the intended concepts and the context we use them in.

Christians everywhere venerate the holy Cross as a way of honoring the implement that was used to accomplish our salvation, and as a way of remembering our Lord’s Passion. In some places, the worshipping communities have a piece of the wood of the actual Cross. So when they kiss the Cross, they are venerating the actual Cross of Christ. Most of us will show our reverence by venerating a replica of the Cross. Either way, what is important is the attitude of reverence and the fear, faith and love for the Lord that one has (or does not yet have).

 Why Venerate the Cross on the Third Sunday of Lent

We do the service of the Veneration of the Cross on the third Sunday of Lent because that day marks the middle of Lent. This is when people who have been keeping the fast start to get tired of it. So, in order to receive strength for the rest of Lent, we do this Veneration of the Cross. It reminds us that the whole of Lent is a period when we can be crucified with Christ.

Some people who don’t know any better remember it as the day we get a flower. It’s not flower day. The appropriate way of thinking about this is to anticipate, and then remember it, as the day we venerate the holy Cross.

How We Will Do It Here

In many places the Veneration of the Cross is done after the Divine Liturgy. That usually ends with kissing the priest’s cross, getting a flower, and taking your own antidoron; or it can end in nothing, because you were dismissed before the end of the service.

The correct time for this service is right at the end of Matins, before the Liturgy begins. That’s how we will do it here next week. Once everyone present has had a chance to venerate, the Cross will be placed in the narthex for latecomers to venerate properly when they arrive. This will give everyone the opportunity to bow and kiss the Cross, thoughtfully and reverently.

ICONS

Today is the first Sunday of Lent, and it is also called the Sunday of Orthodoxy. On this day we are reminded about the Church’s teaching regarding the holy icons. Our sanctuaries and homes are full of holy icons. So it is good to know what the Church teaches about them:

What an icon is; What an icon does; What we do with icons.

What An Icon Is

The word Icon is from the Greek word Εἰκόν[-α], which simply means image. Both in Greek and in English, the word icon can be used in different contexts, and it is not reserved only for church use. So, we need to qualify it and say “holy icon.”

A holy icon is a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ, or of the Virgin Mary, other Saints, or of historical events and allegorical themes from the Bible and the Church’s history.

A holy icon is usually two-dimensional, although some are bas-relief. Holy icons are typically depicted on walls, wooden panels and paper, using paint and ink. You may see digital holy icons as well.

A holy icon indicates who or what is depicted, and the holy personages are shown with halos around their heads. Since it is ecclesiastical art, the depiction must be made using a style that is accepted by the Church. If these criteria are not met, then it is simply a religious painting or picture.

What An Icon Does

Here is what a holy icon does. It reminds us of the Church’s teachings. It is not enough just to look at icons and get the full picture. Behind the icon is the full teaching of the Church.

Icons of Christ affirm our faith in His incarnation, that God really became human. Since God became man, He can be depicted. To reject the depiction of Christ is tantamount to rejecting His incarnation.

Icons bless, so they don’t need to be blessed. There is a pious custom to have one’s personal icons stay in the church for 40 days. This is a fine practice, but we should not think that this somehow activates the icon. The holy icon is activated, so to speak, by virtue of who or what is depicted.

Some icons have been known to effect miracles, to speak, weep, bleed, and exude fragrant oil.

What We Do With Icons

Here is what we do with icons. Someone has to make them. Those people are called iconographers. Iconography is a sacred art that is taught and learned, as part of our Church’s tradition. Books are written, and holy icons are painted. There is no need to confuse the terms.

Some holy icons are said to have been made not by human hand, but by some miraculous means. These are very rare. Most holy icons are painted, or printed and mounted.

Most of us will buy or receive holy icons. We display them in church, in our homes, in the workplace, and in our vehicles. It is correct and appropriate to show reverence to the holy image depicted in an icon, as long as you keep in mind that the honor you show to the image of Christ or a saint is mystically transmitted to the person depicted. Also, grace is mystically conveyed from the icon to the person who venerates it. The usual way to venerate a holy icon is to bow and kiss it.