My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Only True Lord, God, and Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
Observing and Celebrating Sacred Events in the Life of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Prophets, and the Holy men and Women of God.
It is a general practice in Orthodox Christian Tradition to commemorate and honor important events in the life of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, holy Prophets, Saints, Martyrs, Confessors and holy men and women of God throughout the year. For the Orthodox Christtians these observances are not simply a custom but most meaningful and inspirational and essential to the spiritual growth of all the faithful. These feasts, known as Great Feasts and Saint’s days, are understood as opportunities to participate in the past and present through liturgical worship.
These commemorate Major Events in the Divine Life of our Lord and God Jesus Christ, such as His Nativity,, Baptism, Annunciation, Transfiguration, Crucifixion, and Resurrection, Ascension, Pentecost, among others. The Greatest of all Feasts is the celebration of Christ’s Resurrection which is the climax of the liturgical year. These Sacred Feasts mark Christ’s Ascension into Heaven and the Descent of the Holy Spirit. There are Twelve Great Feasts observed by Orthodox Christians which are fixed or movable feasts that commemorate significant happenings in the life of our Lord and God Jesus Christ and the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary.
In the Orthodox Christian Holy Tradition the holy Prophets, Saints, Holy Fathers of the Church, holy Martyrs, holy Confessors are role models indeed and intercessors, who are honored and venerated but not worshipped. The glorification of the Saints is a process conducted. by the Church to recognize individuals whose lives have been pleasing to God and whose lives serve as an example for the faithful to emulate. The Saints, when still on earth, penetrated in spirit into the world above. Some of them saw choirs of Angels, others were blessed to behold the image of God (Isaiah, Ezekiel), and still others were exalted to the Third Heaven and heard there mystical, unutterable words, as for example, the Holy Apostle Paul. All the more when they are in heaven, are they capable of knowing what is happening on earth and of hearing those who appeal to them, since the Saints in heaven "are equal unto the angels" [Luke 20:36).
Our Holy Church has always held the teaching of the invocation of the Saints, being fully convinced that they intercede for us before God in heaven. This we see from the ancient Liturgies. In the Divine Liturgy of the Holy Apostle James (Iakovos) it is said: "Especially we performed the memorial of the Holy and Glorious Ever-Virgin Mary, the Blessed Theotokos. Remember her, O Lord God, and by her pure and holy prayers spare and have mercy on us." Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, explaining the Liturgy of the Church of Jerusalem, remarks: "Then we also commemorate (in offering the Bloodless Sacrifice) those who have previously departed: first of all, patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, so that by their prayers and intercessions God might receive our petition."
Numerous are the testimonies of the Holy Fathers of the Church and Teachers of the Church, especially from the 4th century onwards, concerning the Church's veneration of the Saints. But already from the beginning of the 2nd century there are direct indications in ancient Christian literature concerning faith in the prayer of the Saints in heaven for their earthly brethren.
Again, we do not merely commemorate the past, but we make the past present. We actualize the event being celebrated so that we are also participating in it. The celebration of a Great Feast of the Church is never a one-day affair. There is the "afterfeast" and htne, finally, the "leavetaking" (Gr. "Apdosis"). There are wonderful and most inspiring hymns or troparia which reveal the significance of the celebration and Divine Acts of our Lord God Christ, as well as the life of the particular Saint, Prophet, Evangelist, Martyr, etc. Everything that is conducted in the Orthodox Christian Tradition has a profound effect on the believers. Nothing is trivialized or made static and routine.
Today especially when people are seeking to find meaning in their mundane lives they need not look any further for the Orthodox Christian Faith provides everything that one needs to find spiritual fulfillment, hope, agape, and inspiration. All lead to the Almighty God and Creator. It is the grace of God that accomplishes all when the person looking has faith. The believer experiences constant spiritual renewal and life-long growth. Those who truly practice the Holy Gospel and adhere to the commandments of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ find inner peace and enduring joy.
Some contemporary Christians are confused about what it means to be a Christian and to live a Christian life. Others are struggling and move from one Christian denomination or tradition to another searching to find the one where they will find happiness and contentment. They are looking for the authentic Church of Christ, true and unadulterated Christianity which remains steadfast, uncompromising, consistent and traces her roots to the Divine Founder and Head of the Church Jesus Christ.
The whole history of the Church has been built on struggles: at first the sufferings of the holy Martyrs in the earliest Christian age; then the self-sacrificing labors of the pillars of the Church, the hierarchs and then the personal ascetic struggles, spiritual attainments in the battle with the flesh, on the part of the Desert Dwellers and other strugglers– "earthly angels and heavenly men," the righteous ones who have lived in the world without being defiled by the world. And thus up to now Christianity is adorned with Confessors and Martyrs for faith in Christ. And the Holy Church supports in believers this duty of self-restraint and spiritual cleansing by means of instructions and examples from the Holy Gospel and the whole Sacred Scripture, by the example of the Saints, by the rules of the Church typicon, by vigils, fasts, and appeals to repentance. Such is the lot not only of each separate Christian but of the Church herself as a whole: to be persecuted for the Cross of Christ, as was shown in the visions to the Holy Apostle John the Theologian in the Apocalypse (Revelation).
We must one obey the Church and not some man whose thinking is opposed to that of the Church, eminent or intellectually gifted though that man may be? Because the Church was founded by the Lord Jesus Christ and is guided by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God. Also because "the Church" signifies the community of the Saints, an orchard of choice, fruit-bearing trees. It a person remains opposed to the community of the Saints, that means that he is unholy. Why, therefore, listen to him? "The Church is an enclosure," says the wise Saint John Chrysostom. "If you are within, the wolf cannot enter, but if you stray outside, the wild beasts will get you… Do not wander from the Church; there is nothing more impregnable than the Church. She is your hope and your salvation. She is higher than the heavens, firmer than rock, wider than the world; she never grows old, but is forever renewing her youth." [Resources: Orthodox Dogmatic Theology and The Prologue from Ochrid]
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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
– Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Glorious and Divine Descent upon the Holy Apostles,
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+ Father George
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Ethos 