CHRISTOS ANESTI!

Truly He has risen! I am so happy that I can go back to greeting people with "Christos Anesti!" As much as I loved the new phrase "Christos Almost Anesti" it just doesn't have that post-resurrectional enthusiasm to it...Nothing can really compare to the feeling of waiting in a sanctuary full of people silent, standing in complete darkness, with anxious anticipation to see the light of Christ emerge from the altar and fill the room. Actually, I should say that nothing can quite compare to the moment of which Father emerges from the altar holding the Paschal candle and saying "Come and receive the light from the light that is never overtaken by night!" I get goosebumps every year just thinking about what it would have been like for all of those who had been in the darkness of Hades when Christ descended, bursting through the gates in all His glory, destroying death and taking His righteous from the tombs and carrying them to Heaven. I can't even imagine what this was like even though the service gives us just a glimpse.

I am sitting here now, it's late Sunday night there is only 26 minutes of Pascha left and I am already feeling the post-Pascha blues. Everything about Lent is so beautiful, the services, the community feeling of seeing everyone every night of the week, the hymns, the Gospel readings, even the discipline of the strict fast, and focusing on prayer and almsgiving.

People say that it takes at least 30 days to make or break a habit. Don't you think this is true? Lent is a perfect example of this. The first week is a shock, beginning the fast, coming to the long Great Complines every night doing and countless prostrations but we enter into it with fervor. The second and third week are harder but then, at least for me, it starts to get easier, I suddenly enjoy eating hummus, cucumber and tomato sandwiches everyday and used to not eating meat and dairy, it just becomes natural. This for me, was just before Holy Week. Then Holy Week comes, and it is our last chance to pick up our cross and walk with Christ, each day coming closer to His death and resurrection. Each day making it through 40 or more pages of the big black service book. This year I couldn't believe it when Palm Sunday came, Stephanie was telling me about we weren't going to have Sunday school because of the Palm Sunday brunch and I was like "Really? It's Palm Sunday already?"

What I love most about Holy Week is how each Bridegroom service is so richly filled with a theme based around the scriptural event which took place on that day. Each day we gain a piece to the puzzle of our salvation history. Beginning with Sunday evening's service in which we read the parables of the withering of the fig tree, the two sons of the man with the vineyard and the landowner who leased his vineyard and sent many servants to check on it and each were murdered, finally he sent his son who was also murdered by the vinedressers each parable foreshadowing the Jew's rejection and crucifixion of Christ.

Monday we hear the parable of the ten virgins, five who are prepared with lamps full of oil and five who are not and are shut out of the Kingdom. Father spoke about how we need to "fill our lamps (lives) with the oil of virtue and good deeds" in preparation for Christ's return because "after we fall asleep there is no opportunity to buy more oil for our lamps." What a somber reminder of our purpose here on earth.

Tuesday the image of the harlot women who prepares Christ for his burial by breaking precious myrrh over him and washing his feet with her tears and drying them with her hair is juxtaposed against Judas the betrayer in the beautiful Idiomela Hymns:

"While the sinful woman was offering the myrrh, the Disciple was making terms with the lawless; she rejoiced in emptying out that, which was precious; he hastened to sell Him, Who was above all price. She acknowledged the Master, he severed himself from the Master; she was set free, and Judas became a slave to the enemy. Montrous was his callousness! Great was her repentance! O misery of Judas! He saw the harlot kissing the feet, and with guile he meditated the kiss of betrayal."

Wednesday we receive the healing sacrament of Holy Unction and hear the parable of the Good Samaritan which until this year had never heard that it was a metaphor of Christ and His Church. Like the Samaritan, Christ takes our wounded bodies and tends to them with His Body and Blood that we receive in Communion. He takes us to the inn, (His Church) and tells the innkeeper (the clergy) to take care of us until He returns and we will receive our ultimate healing-spending eternity with Him. Beautiful...

Thursday is so long and so beautiful. We hear the whole story of Christ's betrayal and crucifixion by reading all 12 Gospel excerpts. We rarely have a chance to hear the complete story read all at once, this somber service is a wonderful chance to reflect on the sacrifice that Christ made for us. The 3-D icon of Christ's crucifixion is brought out and provides a visual reminder of His Passion. I usually spend the most time staring at His hands and think about the suffering involved in having nails driven through them and then the weight of His body straining for hours on His stretched out arms embracing the world in His death and crying to His Father "Forgive them for they know not what they do!" The all night vigil afterwards is always a chance to truly reflect on the crucifixion by wrestling with sleep by staying up and reading the Psalms and staying close to His crucified body.

Friday is a day filled with many pieces to the salvation puzzle beginning with the Royal Hours in the morning. Our church has an all day retreat filled with activities for the kids, a service project for the youths and decorating of the tomb for people like me. I always look forward to decorating the tomb because it involves taking this wooden structure that spends most of its time forgotten in the corner of our church and making it shine for one brief but important day by adorning it with a magnificent array of flowers. At three o'clock we have Friday Vespers where we take Christ off of the cross at the ninth hour and then come back at 7pm for the funeral service of the Lamentations where we process outside with the tomb beautifully decorated and proclaim Christ's death to the world in all directions facing North, South, East, and West. This year I took pictures which turned out great! (Look for a link to them coming soon) I had forgotten how utterly beautiful the Lamentations are, the verses are so rich,

"It is fitting to magnify You, the Giver of Life, Who extended Your Hands upon the Cross, and shattered the power of the enemy.
It is fitting to magnify You, the Creator of all; for by Your sufferings, we are delivered from suffering and corruption.
The earth shuddered and the sun hid itself, when You, O Christ the Savior, the unwaning Light, sank down bodily to the grave.
The fearful Hades trembled when it saw You, O Immortal Sun of Glory, and hastily gave up its captives.
Now, all the faithful, redeemed from death by Your burial, extol with hymns Your Crucifixion and Your Burial, O Christ."

the tones in which we sing them are fitting for a lamentation as well. I imagine what His disciples and Mary were thinking on this night not yet being able to comprehend the end of the story. This service is sorrowful and joyful at the same time because we know what the puzzle will look like in the end, we know that this is just one more necessary piece to the puzzle whereas the disciples and the Theotokos mourned His death with confusion and disbelief.

Saturday we celebrate His descent into Hades and victory over death by covering the church floor in bay leaves. For more on this day you can see my post on "Holy Saturday"

Finally, Saturday night comes and we all descend into our little catacomb church a mass of bees buzzing with excitement for the return of Christ. We are all there, the first hour goes by and suddenly the lights go out and we wait anxiously. Then the pinnacle moment occurs, Father comes out proclaiming "Come receive the light from the light" and the light spreads throughout the church. The joyous hymn of "Christ is Risen, Christos Anesti!" fills the air cried by the voices of the young and old in many different languages proclaiming the good news to the world:

"Christ is Risen from the dead trampling Death by death and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!"

The rest of the service becomes a blur. Standing there in the darkness holding my candle and looking around seeing the faces of my fellow parishioners lit by the glow of their candles singing aloud and rejoicing in Christ's resurrection cannot be explained to someone who has not experienced it for themselves.

And now here I sit, my stomach is full, my body is exhausted from lack of sleep and playing football at the Pachal picnic, but my mind can't stop thinking about how full my experience of Holy Week has been. I am sad it is all over because although the Feast of Pascha is technically for the next 40 days and we get to sing and greet each other with "Christos Anesti" nothing can compare to the events and experiences of this past week. Our church schedule goes back to normal and we go back to our "normal" lives in the world struggling without the anticipation of Pascha at the end.

I know that you are probably thinking right now "She's wrong, we have something greater than Pascha to look forward to, to struggle for, that is preparing for Christ's return" and this I know but I think many of you know what I mean when I say that we all experience post-Pascha blues, I miss it already. Tomorrow I will be eating eggs, meat, cheese and chocolate milk but they won't be quite what I thought I was missing, they will not be as sweet as receiving Communion on Pascha and feeling the joy of shouting out "Christos Anesti!"