Is it Christmas until Epiphany?: A Liturgical Clarification

I keep seeing the above image on social media. As far as I know, given my admittedly limited knowledge of Western liturgical practice, this formulation, and the related notion of the 12 Days of Christmas, is entirely congruent with the celebration of Christmas in the Western tradition. However, many of the people I’ve seen sharing this are Byzantine-rite Eastern Orthodox Christians—and the formulation doesn’t really work in this liturgical context.

On the Particularity of the Saints—and Us

Note: For various reasons, I haven’t felt up to writing for a few months. I was surprised to see from the blog stats that people have evidently kept checking the site during that time! I’m not sure that I’ll get back to posting regularly, but in the past couple days I’ve felt one taking shape in my mind, so here we go…

Halloween was a few days ago, which naturally got me thinking about two things: death and saints. However much the modern American holiday may have strayed from its religious roots, the celebration of All Saints is still reflected in its very name. And on the Western liturgical calendar, All Souls’ Day (November 2) immediately follows All Saints’ Day.

Of Doubt and Closed Doors

Today, on Thomas Sunday, we celebrate the “most wonderful doubt” of Thomas. As I discussed in my previous post, Thomas’s doubt is most wonderful because it is through this doubt that he comes to certain faith. For Thomas, it is the physical act of touching the body of the risen Christ that turns his doubt to faith and elicits the joyful confession: My Lord and my God!

This is all very well and good, but where does it leave us? What about our doubts? We certainly don’t have the advantage of following Thomas in seeing, speaking with, and touching the risen Christ.

Most Wonderful Doubt of Thomas

The Apostle Thomas often gets a bad rep. “Doubting Thomas,” he’s called: the disciple who stubbornly refuses to believe in Jesus’ resurrection until he himself touches the wounds. But this isn’t how the Church remembers Thomas. On the contrary, on this first Sunday after Pascha, we celebrate his doubt as most wonderful:

“…and not to judge my brother.”

The prayer of St Ephraim the Syrian is the basic prayer of the Lenten season:

O Lord and Master of my life, give me not the spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk.

But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Thy servant.

Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou, unto ages of ages. Amen.

In the Middle of the Fast

It’s been some weeks since I’ve managed to write anything here. We’re now in the fourth week of Lent, and today we’ve been singing about reaching the middle of the Fast:

The Fast, the source of blessings,
now has brought us midway through its course.
Having pleased God with the days that have passed,
we look forward to making good use of the days to come,
for growth in blessings brings forth even greater achievements.
While pleasing Christ, the Giver of all blessings, we cry:
“O Lord, Who fasted and endured the Cross for our sake,
make us worthy to share blamelessly in Your paschal victory,
by living in peace and rightly giving glory to You
and to the Father and the Holy Spirit!”

On the First Week of Lent

By the grace of God, we have reached the end of the first week of Great Lent. Much more of it lies ahead; this is no sprint. But if you’re anything like me, you already have some cause to feel that you haven’t been keeping it quite as you’d hoped.

In a way, the Orthodox frequently tend to approach Lent like the general American population does January 1st—with a heightened sense of resolve, and every sincere intention to do better. But then a week rolls along (or two, or three….), and we find ourselves in much the same state we were at the beginning. Maybe we’re even keeping the fast from the specific foods we’re supposed to abstain from, but we’re still judging our neighbor, gossiping, getting short-tempered, or whatever our own passions may be. Even though we know that the food is the easy part to deal with, and that none of this is actually about food at all:

Sunday of the Last Judgment

Today is the Sunday of the Last Judgment, more popularly known as Meatfare Sunday, because it is also the last day to eat meat until Pascha. The hymnography for this week is about as fire and brimstone as we get in the Orthodox Church. For example:

When the thrones are set in place and the books are opened,
then God will take His place on the judgment seat.
Oh, what a fearful sight!
The Angels stand in awe, and the river of fire flows by.
What shall we do, who are already condemned by our many sins,
as we hear Christ call the righteous to His Father’s Kingdom,
and send the wicked to eternal damnation?
Who among us can bear that terrible verdict?
Hasten to us, O Lover of mankind and King of the universe;
grant us the grace of repentance before the end,
and have mercy on us! (Doxastikon at Lord, I Call)

Saturday of Souls

Today is the first Saturday of Souls of the year. Saturdays are always associated with the commemoration of the departed, per the weekly cycle, just as Mondays commemorate the Bodiless Powers, Tuesdays John the Baptist, and so on. But on these Soul Saturdays we remember our departed more fully: we serve additional services, we pray for the departed by name, we offer kollyva.

Last night at the seminary we served a general Panikhida, this morning we had Liturgy—and this afternoon we also happened to have a Baptism. There was something rather fitting about this scheduling coincidence. On the one hand, it’s always beautiful to see new life while also remembering those who have fallen asleep (in this case a baby was being baptized). But on deeper level, the message of the Baptism is the same as that of the Soul Saturday. In the Epistle reading for the Soul Saturday Liturgy we hear:

Sunday of the Prodigal Son: By the Waters of Babylon

As I noted in a previous post, last Sunday we opened the Lenten Triodion and so began the cycle of pre-Lenten Sundays that will lead us to Great Lent proper in a couple of weeks. Each week has a specific theme: last week’s was the parable of the Publican and the Pharisee, while today focused on the parable of the Prodigal Son—perhaps one of the best known passages of the New Testament. In addition to the hymnography specific to each week, there are some texts only sung at the Matins services of these pre-Lenten Sundays. Last week I discussed the special post-Gospel stichera “Open to me the doors of repentance, O Life-Giver…” We begin the other notable addition this Sunday. After the Polyeleos (Psalm 134/5 & 135/6) we sing Psalm 136/7: