Renewal Wednesday - You Renewed the Corrupted Nature of Mankind (Fr. George Dorbarakis)

 

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

“We unceasingly venerate Your life-giving Cross, O Christ God, and we glorify Your three-day Resurrection; for by it You renewed the corrupted nature of mankind, O Almighty, and showed us the ascent to the heavens, as the only good and lover of mankind” (Resurrectional Sticheron, Tone 4).

The Holy Hymnographer calls us to glorify the Resurrection of the Lord. For it was this that gave new life to human nature, which had been wounded and corrupted by sin and the wicked devil. The choice of sin by the first-formed humans was, unfortunately, a choice of death. Thinking that they were gaining eternal life, according to the deceitful suggestion of the devil-serpent, they saw with terror that they had turned against themselves, were irreparably wounded, and entered into the dark tunnel of corruption and hell. Their life thereafter was indeed pain and groaning; they fell into a valley of mourning and tears. Their only hope was the consoling voice of the Creator that in the future a descendant of the woman would crush the devil and restore them to their former state — and even more. And this, of course, came to pass with the appearance of the daughter of Nazareth, Mariam, who gave birth, from the Holy Spirit and through her own cooperation, to the Son of God as man. Christ now, the second Adam, assumed human nature and united it to His divinity; thus, in Christ, man was redeemed — he saw again the face of God. Whoever is now united with Christ, within His living Body, the Church, lives a new life, beyond the compulsive inclination toward sin; he already lives eternal life, that is, the life of Christ as love toward God, toward neighbor, toward all creation. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation,” as the Apostle says. “Behold, I make all things new,” according to the assurance of the Lord Himself. The believer in Christ is already on the path toward Heaven — better yet, he already lives Heaven from now, because he walks upon Heaven itself, the Way who is Christ.

Prologue in Sermons: April 15

Both Sorrow and Joy Can Serve for Salvation

April 15

(A Word from the Paterikon about two monks who took wives.)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

In the Prologue we read: “Two monks once fell into a grievous sin. But after some time they repented and said: 'Well then, what profit did we gain by leaving the angelic life and falling into a defiled way of living? Does not eternal torment await us for this? Let us go again into the desert and repent. The Lord will receive our repentance.' Having said this, they went to a monastery, confessed their sin to a spiritual father, and he imposed a penance upon them. He commanded them to remain shut in seclusion for a whole year and sent them there only bread and water, to both in equal measure. A year passed, the time of the penance was completed, and it was revealed to the elders of the monastery that the monks had been forgiven. Opening the cells where they had been confined, the fathers brought them out. And what was seen? One monk was very thin and pale and came out in despondency, while the other was joyful, his face radiant, and he was rejoicing. The fathers were amazed at such a contrast, especially since, as we have said, the monks received the same food in equal measure. And so they first asked the sorrowful brother: 'How did you spend your time in your cell?' The monk answered: 'I thought about the evil I had done and pictured to myself the torment of hell into which I ought to go.' They asked the rejoicing monk: 'And you, what did you think about in your cell?' He said: 'I glorified God, Who rescued me from a defiled life and brought me back again to the angelic state, and, praising God, I rejoiced.' Then the elders said: 'The repentance of both was pleasing to God, for He forgave them both.'”

Holy Newly-Revealed Martyrs Raphael, Nicholas and Irene in the Hymnography of the Orthodox Church

 

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

The Holy Newly-Revealed Martyrs of the Lord whom we celebrate today, Raphael, Nicholas, and Irene, are not the only ones who were “discovered” through a vision that God permitted to devout believers. We have a multitude of other Saints whose tombs with their relics, their holy heads, or various icons were hidden and “by judgments known to the Lord” at some time came to light, in order to be honored by the Christ-named fullness of the Church. Let us mention as simple examples the head of the thrice-great John the Forerunner and Baptist (whose finding we celebrate even three times), or the countless icons of our Panagia - the Panagia Portaitissa, the Panagia Trypitē, and others. Therefore, among this multitude of Saints who were found with their relics are also included the Saints celebrated today. According to the blessed and now Venerable Gerasimos Mikragiannanitis, the poet of their Service, Christ “from the depths of the earth revealed” the Saints “for the strengthening of the faithful” (Vespers Sticheron). And He revealed them “through many visions and dreams” (Sticheron) of the Saints themselves, so that there would be no doubt whatsoever about the truth of their words.

Renewal Tuesday - We Celebrate the Death of Death (Fr. George Dorbarakis)

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

“We celebrate the death of death, the overthrow of Hades, the beginning of another life, eternal life, and leaping for joy we hymn the Cause of these things, the only blessed God of our Fathers and most glorious” (Ode 7 of the Resurrection Canon).

One of the most well-known and beloved troparia of the Resurrection Canon is the above hymn, not only because of the immediacy of its meanings, but also because of the particular love that the Holy Elder Porphyrios of Kavsokalyva had for it — everyone knows the dialogue that took place between the Saint and the late professor of cardiology at the University of Athens, George Papazachos, precisely about this troparion. What does the Holy Hymnographer and great Father of the Church, John of Damascus, tell us? We are called to hymn and glorify our only mighty and all-glorious God, the One who alone was blessed and foretold by the Patriarchs of the Old Testament, the Lord Jesus Christ, because by His Resurrection:

– First, He put death to death and overthrew the kingdom of Hades — "we celebrate the death of death." Death, therefore, no longer truly exists, since the One who is the source of life entered into its depths, into what we call Hades. Death, which came as an addition to human life because of sin — God did not create death; rather, immortality was the original calling of man — has been abolished and destroyed. And although it still appears to exist even after the Resurrection of the Lord, it does so only in its biological dimension for a time: until the time of His Second Coming, which potentially is an event of every moment. The last things, with Christ, have already entered human history, and the believer lives with this expectation and longing: “Come, Lord Jesus!” “Maranatha.”

Sunday of Holy Pascha (3-5 of 15)

...continued.

3. The Homily of Saint John Chrysostom

Christ is Risen!

“Whoever is devout and loves God,” – whoever truly honors God and sincerely loves Him, “let him enjoy this good and radiant feast,” – the most glorious Resurrection of Christ, which we now celebrate, and in which the Lord has wondrously shown both His goodness toward the human race, His wisdom in redeeming it from eternal destruction, and His power over the enemies of our salvation.

“Whoever is a wise servant,” who does not hide in vain in the earth the talents given him by God – time, strength, and abilities – nor spends them only on earthly affairs and pleasures, but wisely uses them in the service of the Lord and for the gaining of eternal blessedness, “let him enter rejoicing into the joy of his Lord,” let him become a participant in that spiritual joy which the Lord has prepared for His faithful servants, redeemed by the blood of the Savior.

“Whoever has labored in fasting,” – whoever during the past fast did not remain idle, but diligently labored in the work of his salvation, “let him now receive the denarius,” – he will receive in the gracious fruits of Christ’s Resurrection that reward which God has promised to good workers.

April: Day 14: Teaching 2: Holy Apostles Aristarchus, Pudens and Trophimus of the Seventy

April: Day 14: Teaching 2:
Holy Apostles Aristarchus, Pudens  and Trophimus of the Seventy*
 
(On the Reasons for the Hatred of the Apostles by the World of their Time)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. The Holy Apostles Aristarchus, Trophimus, and Pudens, whom we commemorate today, were co-workers of the Holy Supreme Apostles Peter and Paul in their apostolic ministry. All of them were beheaded under Emperor Nero.

Aristarchus was converted to Christ by the Apostle Paul; mentioned in the Epistle to the Colossians (Col. 4:10), he was bishop in Apamea of Syria. His end came under Emperor Nero; he was beheaded at the same time as the Apostles Paul, Pudens, and Trophimus.

Saint Pudens, mentioned in the Second Epistle of Saint Paul to Timothy (2 Tim. 4:21): “Eubulus greets you, as well as Pudens and Linus and Claudia and all the brethren,” was a Roman senator and a pious man; he received into his house the Holy Supreme Apostles Peter and Paul and all Christians, so that his house served as a kind of church.

Prologue in Sermons: April 14

 To the Common People, That They Also Can Be Heirs of the Kingdom of God

April 14

(A Word from the Paterikon about the vision of Abba Samuel.)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

To you, common people, will our word be today, and this is what we shall say to you.

Once the Venerable Samuel, while sitting with the brethren, suddenly felt himself caught up in ecstasy and fell face down. After quite a long time he rose and began to weep bitterly. The brethren begged him to tell them the reason for his weeping. For a long time he did not answer them, and at last he said: “I, brethren, was taken up to judgment and saw a multitude of people going to torment, and a multitude of common people going into the Kingdom of Heaven.”

And so for you, common people, this is a consoling lesson from the Venerable one, that for you also there is great hope to inherit the heavenly dwellings.

But you will no doubt say to me, as is your custom: “I am simple and ignorant; I know nothing — how then shall I enter there?” Very simply, brethren: act as I tell you, and you will seize for yourselves the Kingdom of Heaven.

Sunday of Holy Pascha (1-2 of 15)

Sunday of Holy Pascha

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

1. The Bright Resurrection of Christ

There are many bright and solemn feasts in the Holy Orthodox Church; but none is brighter and more solemn, none more joyful and comforting than the great day of the Resurrection of Christ, when all is clothed in light, the heavens rejoice, the earth is glad, and the whole world celebrates the great victory of our Savior over death and Hades.

This is what the Gospel relates about this glorious and great event. Great Saturday had passed, on the night of which Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemos buried the Body of Jesus. The tomb in which He was laid was sealed with a great stone; a guard stood by it — the chief priests and Pharisees persuaded Pilate and set it there to guard the tomb until the third day, lest the disciples of Christ come by night, steal His body, and say to the people: 'He has risen from the dead" (cf. Matt. 27:64). But on the third day after His sufferings on the Cross and His death, Jesus Christ rose from the dead, according to the writings of the prophets. This took place after midnight from Saturday to the following day (now Sunday). The soldiers who stood guard saw that after the Resurrection of the Savior an Angel rolled away the stone from the tomb, and they were witnesses of the earthquake that occurred at that time. The appearance of the Angel who rolled away the stone, according to the Evangelist Matthew, was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow (cf. Matt. 28:3). This appearance of the Angel, his radiant garment, was a living expression of his heavenly joy and the bright triumph in heaven, which on this great day, according to the testimony of the Holy Church, was filled with a special light. Struck and terrified by this miracle, the soldiers fell down and for some time remained as if senseless. Coming to themselves, they went and told everything that had happened to the chief priests. And they, bribing the soldiers, instructed them to say to the people that during the night, while they were asleep, the disciples of Jesus Christ came and stole the body of their Teacher. But this malicious and absurd invention of the enemies of Christ did not succeed: the truth of Christ’s Resurrection was in a short time testified to the whole world and became its possession.

Renewal Monday - Let Us Be Radiant (Fr. George Dorbarakis)

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

“It is the day of Resurrection; let us be radiant, O peoples; Pascha, the Lord’s Pascha; for from death to life, and from earth to heaven, Christ God has led us across, as we sing the hymn of victory” (First Ode of the Resurrection Canon, Tone 1).

Saint John of Damascus, in the festal and triumphant first tone, offers us the outburst of his heart — an outburst of every believer who truly knows — for the feast of feasts, the Resurrection of the Lord. This is not, of course, the Passover of the Jews, during which they celebrate their passage through the Red Sea and thus their liberation from the slavery of the Egyptians — this event functioning as a prefiguration and prophecy of the Christian Pascha — but rather the Passover of the Lord, His Resurrection. By it the Lord, as the almighty God, having destroyed the kingdom of death by entering into it, granted eternal life to all the sorrowful souls of the dead — that is, He transferred them from death to life; and even more, He transferred all people from the earth, to which they were exclusively oriented, to heaven, where one can behold the face of God, where one now lives one’s true homeland, the Kingdom of God. For, according to the Apostle, after the redemptive work of the Lord, “we have no abiding city, but we seek the one to come,” which coming city is already experienced by the Christian in this world within the Church. “Therefore you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God.”