Christ is Risen!

I probably should have taken the time to put this post up on Monday. But Pascha takes a lot out of a person. I was tired, and after having taken a lot of time off during Holy Week I was anxious to get some work done.

Of course, I wouldn't have it any other way. I think church is supposed to take a lot out of you. It is supposed to be demanding, not convenient. I remember when I was a pastor and we made Easter morning into a huge production. There were slides, song specials, and scripture readings, as well as an unusually short sermon. Liturgically we tried to cram Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday into one action-packed 90 minute service. The result was something shallow. Easy, but shallow. It felt very much like the performance it was.

Last Friday morning Stephanie took Kyla to decorate the bier where they would lay an icon of Christ for the service of Divine Lamentations. I stayed home to make preparations to break the fast. In other words, I was cooking what we would eat on Sunday morning.



That night, I took Kyla to the Divine Lamentations service where she stood with some of the teenagers singing around the body of Jesus. She probably could have picked up the tune, but I think she was struck with a bit of shyness.



One of the highlights of the night was when all the young girls were able to march around the church throwing rose petals. (I'll post pictures as soon as I get them).

Saturday morning we got up early to attend Holy Saturday services, where we commemorate Christ's entrance into Hell to release its captives. Several catechumens were also chrismated at this service. Then I tried to get the kids down for a nap (pretty much unsuccessfully) while Stephanie returned to the church to decorate it for that night. That evening, I had to cook some more food while Stephanie started getting the kids ready.

We arrived at church at 10:00. I apologize for the poor quality of these next pictures. I was trying not to use the flash, so it's a little blurred, but I wanted to get an image of the arch that Stephanie helped put together.


At about 11:00 or so the lights were dimmed as the voice of the priest rose above the hushed sounds of the congregation, "Come ye, take light from the Light that is never overtaken by night; come glorify Christ, risen from the dead." (That quote may not be exactly right since it's from memory.) Then we began to light our candles from the flame the priests and deacons were holding. After processing around the church, the priest announced that Christ is risen, while we responded, "Oh Christ is risen from the dead! Oh Christ is risen from the dead! Trampling down death by death and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!" This continues after we enter the church, with the priests marching down the aisles shouting in various languages, "Christ is Risen!" We shouted back, "He is risen indeed!"

These moments in particular were hard for George, who kept falling asleep but then would wake up every time a priest began censing his way down the church (but we finally got him to sleep).



That service lasted about three hours. So by 2:00 in the morning we were all very tired, but ready to continue our celebrations together by feasting.


The good news is that we were able to sleep in the next morning... Except we have kids. Scratch that. George was up by 7:30 and Kyla was up by 8:30.


After a great big breakfast (Pascha bread makes great French toast), we headed to a church-league softball game and then back to church for Agape Vespers. I read the Gospel in German. Others read in Russian, Greek, Japanese, Arabic, French, and Thai. This traditions expresses the universality of the message of the resurrection.

Being Southern and Orthodox we finished our Pascha celebrations with barbecue. The kids had an Easter egg hunt.

Some of the men sat outside enjoying their cigars.


Some of the women were dancing.


We got the kids to bed by 7:00 that night. They were out in a matter of minutes. Stephanie and I also tucked in early.

Of course, the celebrations don't really stop. This week is Bright Week. We will continue to sing Christ is risen until Pentecost, or is it Ascension? In any case, the celebrations will last for weeks, which is only fitting, since the preparations also lasted for weeks. This is the kind of toll church is supposed to exert on our bodies. It is how the church disciplines us, readies us for the Kingdom of Heaven. I have a black belt in Jujutsu. One of the techniques my sensei would use was very much like what the church does. Especially on cold mornings, he would have us do the same drill a hundred times until we were panting and out of breath. Then he would have us spar, but amazingly being so exhausted made sparring seem more natural. The church does something similar. It trains us by asking a lot of us. But the next time (the next Pascha) what we are asked to do doesn't seem quite so hard. The church also lets up on us a little bit. It asks us to sacrifice, but then it rewards our sacrifice with celebration. The fact that we fast before we feast is significant, because in that discipline the material and the spiritual merge together. Our desire for the resurrection is in some ways indistinguishable from our desire to eat together and to celebrate. Right now we are in a kind of special time (what the Greeks would call kairos). When Pentecost comes and we begin to enter normal time (chronos), putting an end to our celebration, but not really ending it, because we know that even as we leave this Pascha behind us, we are already getting ready for the next one to come again.

Lenten Reflection 10: Pascha Bread

It's Holy Friday. George is taking a nap. Kyla and Stephanie have gone to decorate the bier (where the icon of Christ will be laid after he is taken down from the cross). I am home to get ready for tomorrow night. I am making Pascha Bread. I've tried this before with limited success. This is a new recipe, but they are all variations on a theme: lots of butter, sugar, and about a dozen eggs. It's like a large, baked donut.

The bread is rising right now. I am reflecting in the meantime on baking as worship. This is something I struggle with. Baking can be more of a frustrating experience for me. But at times I take joy in preparing food that my family loves to eat. I will make my famous shortbread cookies later, to thunderous applause. OK, it's actually Betty Crocker's recipe, but the point is that there is a kind of sacrifice that goes into the art of cooking, a way you put your soul into every knead.

Orthodox women understand this. For the family matriarchs -- the real power-holders in the church -- cooking is something mystical, maybe magical. I get that sense when I read my Orthodox recipe book, with a list of contributions from families from a church in Massachusetts. It's like cooking something they just know how to do. Asking them to explain the steps to the process reads like asking a spider to explain how she weaves a web. So the directions are always difficult to follow.

But I have learned a couple of things so far. First, I have learned that I need a bigger bowl. My original plan was to double the recipe and save some dough to use later. But I would need a bathtub for that. It's hard to cram 15 cups of sifted flour, a dozen eggs, three cups of butter, and a cup of sugar into the biggest bowl I have. The second lesson I had learned before, but in this case I had forgotten. When preparing traditional Orthodox meals, I need to cut the recipe in half. Not only would the ingredients fit better into my bowl, but I would be able to eat it. Looking at the large ball of dough sitting on my counter top (that I'm praying rises properly), I have no idea how we are going to eat it all.

Actually, we will eat it all, if it turns out OK. We will eat the baked donut, the cookies, eggs, and chocolates, and we will love every minute of it...tomorrow (Sunday, if you want to get technical).

Lenten Reflection 9: Holy Unction

The most beautiful part of last night's Holy Unction service actually had very little to do with the service itself. For the curious, Holy Unction is a sacrament in the Orthodox Church. The faithful receive the sign of the cross made in oil on their foreheads, cheeks, chins, and palms. Its purpose is to strengthen their souls and bodies for the remaining days of Holy Week. I like to think about Holy Unction as a reaffirmation of the Chrismation I received when I joined the Orthodox Church (though the two sacraments are not the same thing). While this probably doesn't count as an official theological explanation, I look at Holy Unction as a renewal of the commitment I made at Baptism.

After a very tiring day watching the children, I gathered the kids and went to church. George had been clingy. Kyla had been ornery (hooking George's ankle with a coat hanger while he tried to get away...It's already begun!). Stephanie was running late from work and would meet us there.

At some point near the beginning of the service I noticed that the priests and deacons, standing around the table where the holy oil was, seemed to be making some rather awkward pauses as they were reading. I also observed that a few people were starting to cough. Then the coughing began to spread, working its way back toward my row.

The service stopped momentarily as Fr. Steven inexplicably walked toward the back of the church (I didn't see where he went). A moment later he walked toward the front of the church, stopping in the middle. I forget his exact words, but they went something like this, "Forgive the interruption brethren, but someone has sprayed pepper spray in the church. That is why some of you are having difficulty. Whoever has the pepper spray needs to take it out now!."

Mothers began to rush their children out of the church. I debated about what to do for a minute, until I felt myself begin to cough. So I took my kids to the narthex and waited with the moms by the front doors. In hindsight I think I was just having a psychosomatic response. The spray probably never got to my row. Kyla, who has some asthma-like symptoms, didn't start to cough until I told her, "Somebody sprayed something that makes people cough in the church."

Once I was confident that the air had sufficiently cleared, I retook my seat with my daughter and son. Stephanie still had not arrived.

A few more minutes into the service, I noticed more commotion near the front of the church. The clergy had stopped reading. Fr. Steven stepped forward and faced the congregation. "Pardon the interruption again, brothers and sisters, but before we continue I need to ask your forgiveness. I allowed myself to become irritated a moment ago. Forgive me." His confession was followed by a full prostration before the entire congregation. Those who knew what to say (I was somewhat flabbergasted) seemed to utter something like, "We forgive you Holy Father." It might have been "I forgive you..." or maybe "God forgives you..." In any case, forgiveness was exchanged.

Personally, I thought he hadn't done anything wrong. When he first warned us of the pepper spray, I thought, "Father is miffed!" But I didn't think it was wrong for him to be upset. Miraculously, the clergy, who seemed to be closest to where the spray was released, continued to lead us in the liturgy. I'm sure they had difficulty too. I figured his irritation was justified!

I supposed that a child had gotten into his mother's pepper spray. A lot of women I know carry pepper spray on a key chain. Stephanie used to have some as well. So I pictured Bart Simpson (with horns beneath his hair) somewhere up in the front row, mischievously turning off the safety, pointing the spray at the floor, and pushing the button to see what would happen. I thought to myself, "Someone is going to get it when they get home!"

But the priest sets the tone for the church. And after he asked for our forgiveness, I felt the tone begin to change. Other scenarios began to play themselves out in my mind. I pictured one of our frazzled Hausfrau's juggling her children, in a hurry, somehow sitting on her key chain and accidentally turning off or breaking the plastic safety and releasing the pepper spray at the same time. I pictured a rather innocent child, with no idea what she was doing, playing with buttons (like my son George does whenever he goes after my wireless router).

I also pictured Bart Simpson, but he began to look much less devilish and much more curious or foolish.

I also imagined the embarrassment of his parents. It occurred to me how I would feel if my daughter did that. By the way, I love my daughter very much. And she would do that (Stephanie constantly reminds me of how much alike we are)! I also thought of how bad she would feel about it after she received a tongue-lashing from me.

I tend not to think of our priests as supermen. I am very aware of how human they are. Maybe it's because I was in ministry for a time. I was a youth pastor for only about three years, so I am hardly an expert. But I have something of a sense of their many, many obligations and commitments, the balancing acts that I have no desire ever repeat (God-willing, I will never be called into the priesthood!). I can barely juggle my two kids!

Nevertheless, the priests are examples. This is what we ask them to be! Last night, before Father's confession, I had been thinking of all the juicy gossip that would take place on the front porch of the church. After his confession, I was much more inclined to be sympathetic. I'll probably end up finding out what happened at some point. The difference is that now I am less likely to do it in a way that follows my own natural inclinations to be gossipy and judgmental towards whom is sure to be my rather embarrassed sister or brother.

Lenten Reflection 8: Palm Sunday

Yesterday marked a passage between times, from the end of Great Lent to the beginning of Holy Week (we don't calculate the days of Holy Week as part of Great Lent). Now the "askesis" of the faithful becomes a little more intense. Our family will try to cut back further from "worldly distractions," attend more services this week, and prepare ourselves for the Resurrection.

Holy Week begins with Palm Sunday, for me a day of celebration tinged with a little sorrow. The church reenacts the entry of Christ into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey's foal. On the Saturday before, Kyla and I took time to decorate her candle for the procession (Stephanie had to work). The next day, after Eucharist, each member of our family took palm branches from the front of the church. Even George got in on the action. He waved the palm around a bit, turned it over, and stuck the stem in his mouth.


After the blessing, the congregation exited the church and formed two lines outside. The acolytes and deacons led a process, while those outside cried (or were supposed to cry) "Hosanna!" as it passed by.


Behind the deacons were the children of the church (who always play a big part in these processions). They were followed by Fr. Steven carrying an icon of the Triumphal Entry of Christ into Jerusalem.


I have to admit, I am always a little befuddled by the proclamation of this event as the "triumphal entry." That word triumph is a kind of mask. Jesus was riding into Jerusalem as a king, leading an "insurrection" that was sure to draw the attention of the Romans. He clearly knew he was riding to his demise, even if the disciples had no idea. Jesus was triumphantly riding to his defeat.

Let me preface what I am about to say by making the following observation: I have never seen any church treat the death of the Incarnate God with as much sorrow as the Orthodox Church. Unlike some well-intentioned evangelical churches I know, we don't cram Good Friday and Holy Saturday into one action-packed Easter Sunday morning. In the coming days we will mourn the death of Christ like we will mourn one of our own. We will sing around his body. The youth of the church will stay up all night to read the Psalter in the presence of his corpse. But nowhere in our theology do we see the "defeat" of Christ on the cross as a failure. It is his triumph, his glorification. Sorrow-joy-sorrow-joy! These are the emotions that hold themselves in an uncomfortable tension in my body until Pascha night/morning. The triumphal entry of Christ into Jerusalem is also a victorious funeral march, a march to his "glorious" and "life-giving death."

Lenten Reflection 7: Kyla's Confession

The other day my daughter, Kyla, was in the mall with me. We had gone there so she could by a doll for her birthday. It was the day Fr. Steven returned my call about scheduling a confession. After I got of the phone with Father, Kyla began to ask me about what confession was. I explained to her that confession is something we do to get ready for Pascha. We tell Jesus our sins -- the bad things we do -- and we ask him to help us not do them. At that point Kyla declared that she wanted to do confession.

I should add that one of Kyla's little friends has also had her first confession. Nadia is her name. Her older brother, Aiden, made his first confession when a lot of children do (when he turned seven). So I am sure that Kyla would not have been as gung ho had her friend not already done this. On the other hand, she has also genuinely embraced a lot of the festivities surrounding Lent. She might have wanted to do this even if Nadia hadn't already gone before her.

So when I spoke to Fr. Steven at my confession I asked him about Kyla. He explained to me that when small children Kyla's age make confession he keeps it very simple. He asks them if they understand what confession is. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they don't. Then he has them face the iconostasis and tell Jesus what they are sorry for. Sometimes the child goes through a litany of sins. Other times they freeze up and don't know what to say.

Before the Presanctified liturgy I ran into Fr. Steven and asked him if we had time for Kyla to make her confession. He was obviously in a hurry, but he said that we probably had enough time. So he went behind the iconostasis to get his stole (a purple band he wears over his shoulders) while Kyla went up to the front of the church.




I have to admit, it was a little tempting for me to want to overhear what Kyla was saying, but dad did a good job. I kept my nose out of it. The above picture was taken from the back of the church, out of earshot, using the digital zoom (which is why it looks so rotten). Here's one of Kyla being covered with the priest's stole.



I am very pleased and proud of Kyla. I did not prod her into this at all. I may have even tried to dissuade her a little bit. I just wanted her to be sure that she knew what she was doing, as best she could. I also didn't want confession to become like a punishment, something she had to do. But I have to say, Kyla seemed to fully embrace the experience. When it was over, Fr. Steven hugged Kyla and went back behind the iconostasis, while Kyla turned and walked toward me with a great big grin on her face!

Lenten Reflection 6: Confession

Contrary to popular misconception, confession is not a burden Orthodox Christians must endure. Personally, I find it a joy. Being Lent, it is proper to make a confession of my sins before Pascha. Naturally, most of what I confessed is between me and my priest. But I will attempt briefly to convey something of the experience.

In the first place, get images of confessional booths out of your mind. There is no "bless me Father for I have sinned." Instead, I approach the icon of Christ at the front of the church. The priest stands behind me. Any power the priest has to forgive our sins is given to him by Christ. He is there not to accuse or to judge me, but to support me. He "has my back."

Then I begin reading a short confession. The point of this is not to leave no sin unturned, to confess everything just in case I forget something. The point is to be honest with myself and with Christ. One of the prayers prayed during vespers asks God to keep us "from making excuses in sin." This is the worst of all human habits isn't it? To excuse ourselves of our sinfulness. We justify ourselves.

After this the priest asks me if I have any other sins I would like to confess. We are taught to be so private, especially in our culture. Talking about our shortcomings with another person can be excruciating. But every time I have found that I feel relieved, but not because I have unburdened myself of my guilt. The point of confession is to receive some spiritual direction. I am relieved because after making this confession I know how to proceed. I get wonderful advice from Fr. Steven, a man who has read the church fathers not in the same way I do, for theological tidbits to work into a system. Instead, he draws from a storehouse of practical, spiritual wisdom that he brings to bear on my situation.

That's all there is to it. I kneel before the icon of Christ. Fr. Steven places his stole over me as a sign of the forgiveness of Christ, and I receive forgiveness am admitted to the sacraments of the Church.

Once a Protestant friend said that I shouldn't confess my sins to a priest. I just needed to confess them to Jesus, privately. Of course, private confession is part of my discipline. And even confession with a priest is still confession before Christ. It just happens to be within earshot of a person who can help me. That's what I find most helpful about "public" confession. I am not as free to make excuses for my shortcomings when I know that I need to tell them to somebody else. The desert fathers taught that to expose a sin was to rob it of its power. It is in secret, even when they are hidden from ourselves, that our sins can control us. So, rather than make a blanket "just-in-case" confession to Christ, something like "Dear Jesus, forgive me just in case I did anything wrong," I prefer to confront my many, many sins, to expose them, and offer them as sacrifices to One who has the power to save me from them.

Lenten Reflection 5: "Hail O' Sacred Heifer..."

The full line from the title of this post comes from the Friday akathist hymns to the Mother of God. "Hail O' sacred heifer who bore the spotless calf," along with many other "Hails," most of which I cannot remember. When you take the kids to church, tending to them becomes an act of worship in itself. I think there might have also been something about an "seashell" and a pearl.

In that spirit, I want to reflect a bit on the Mother of God. This isn't going to be so much a theological reflection for me, which I can do, but I'd prefer it be more devotional. Perhaps an alternate title for this post would be "What Mary Means to Me."

The Orthodox Church does not consider Mary to have been one out of a pool of randomly selected virgins. "At the fullness of time" Mary was born, miraculously though not immaculately. Subject to original sin,* but not guilty of personal sin, she is not the passive victim of (the male) God's omnipotent will. The annunciation does not read for us, as I once heard a Unitarian student suggest, like a rape narrative. Mary actively receives the Word, giving flesh to God. The heavens themselves hinge upon her answer. In a manner of speaking the kenosis of God begins prior to the Incarnation itself, when the Most High waits to hear the answer of a 14 year old girl.

Accordingly, Mary is for me a reminder of what humanity can be, though not in any kind of positivistic way. Narratives of a steadily progressing human evolution are hardly tenable today. Rather, if grace and nature can interact in such a way as to produce her, then there may be hope for us yet. That should mean a lot coming from someone who's usually so cynical.

Therefore, she is also my personal ideal. When I say that, I hear the voice of Feuerbach rise from the grave to accuse me of projecting ideal, virginal femininity onto the heavens. I suppose anything is possible, but I cannot rightly say that I feel drawn toward Mary as a sexual object in accordance with his theory (perish the thought!). When I think about Mary's ever-virginity, I don't think about a physical purity proper to the Mother of God. That kind of thinking looks at sex as somehow inherently dirty or polluting, which seems not to accord with Scripture or the best of the tradition. I see her ever-virginity, as St. Paul suggested, as an expression of her total commitment to God, which for her is identical to her commitment to her Son. During his earthly ministry she has some understanding that he is divine, though she has to grow into this knowledge. Her virginity is thus less an expression of her physical purity as it is her total devotion to God. She thinks about "how to please the Lord," instead of "how to please her husband." It is in this sense that she is my personal ideal. I have to admit that I don't think much about imitating Christ. For a number of reasons (most of them Feuerbachian), WWJD just doesn't work for me. But when I think about Mary, I think that maybe it is possible for me to give everything I am over to Christ.

Finally, I am given hope for the world when I think about the prayers of the Mother of God on its behalf. A Son listens to his Mother. When the Mother of God prays for mercy, I have hope that God will be merciful to us. Not that we deserve it, but when everything I see with my cynical eyes tells me we are doomed – wars and rumors of wars, the poisoning of the earth and seas, the suffering we inflict upon others, and my own complicity with all of that – I have hope that maybe Christ will not give us – give me – what I deserve. Perhaps, by the prayers of the Most Holy Theotokos, he will have mercy on us all.



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*Some of my readers will probably want to know why I used the term "original sin." It is true that Orthodox Christians tend to prefer the term "ancestral sin" in order to distance themselves from the Augustinian notion that we all inherit the guilt of Adam (which is the basis of his belief that unbaptized infants burn in Hell). Ancestral sin refers to the "structural" conditions of a fallen world that interact with the weakened human condition to produce personal sins. Though I reject the notion of inherited guilt, I have no problem with the term "original sin." I find the term "ancestral sin" to be overly polemical. It perpetuates an Eastern misunderstanding about Augustine's theology. There is much less of a genetic component to Augustine's doctrine of sin than Eastern (and many Western) Christians tend to think. He does not begin to reflect on sin by thinking about a kind of "sin gene," (to borrow a term from Kira Dault) as many Eastern theologians tend to read him. Rather, he begins from the fact of human sinfulness, which he observes begins at a very young age (with a toddler who would deny his infant brother his mother's milk), to a rather complex anthropology that explains this fact. Inherited guilt is a part of that anthropology, but I would argue it need not be an essential component. Furthermore, modern scholars in the Western and Augustinian tradition are also rejecting the notion of inherited guilt to explain the fact of human sinfulness more structurally. So my self-conscious incorporation of a controversial term from the Western tradition into my Eastern lexicon is actually something of an ecumenical endeavor, an attempt to rehabilitate Augustine to the East and to accentuate the common ground between the two traditions.