The Many Dresses of Kassiani (Photios Kontoglou)

The Troparion of Kassiani

By Photios Kontoglou

The troparion of Kassiani is greatly beloved by our Orthodox people; even people who do not go to church go to hear it. Contributing to this is the inspiration with which it is written and the passion of the sinful woman who repents, as well as the story of Kassiani who composed it. But above all, in my opinion, what moved the people was its music, which is slow and majestic; for the teachers of our ecclesiastical music emphasized it with special love and care. However, one could say this about former times; now, I cannot understand what people hear in most churches where it is chanted — or rather sung — in some improvised way, with a supposedly European music, which is fashioned by people without Christian compunction and without any musical feeling, but with that dead and false conception of music, which they think is the music suited to our age.

First of all, chanting is one thing, and singing is another. Even this these “maestros” have not understood, who take as their ideal in everything the scale of Milan. In this we ought to be proud of our cultivated race. For, as happens in everything, we have surpassed the Europeans. Because for them secular music is different from religious music, whereas among us the music of the Church is becoming more worldly even than opera and even operetta. May we not be bewitched! These disgusting and insipid concoctions, which from time to time one or another fairy-struck fellow presents in church, have completely disfigured the modest and profound character of our Church, so much so that anyone who still has within him genuine Greek sensibilities falls into despair.

Prologue in Sermons: April 7

 What Evil Does Drunkenness Cause to a Person?

April 7

(An exhortation to kings and princes, to bishops and priests, and to all Christians, that they should not become drunk.)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

Whoever gives himself over to the vice of drunkenness, for the most part forgets everything around him. He has only one thing on his mind — where he might drink; he watches only for opportunities to satisfy his vile passion wherever feasts are held (Prov. 23:30). And yet, if he were fully to realize what a terrible evil he is doing — to himself, to his family, and to society — he would surely be horrified. Indeed, the harm caused by drunkenness, both to drunkards themselves and through them to others, is scarcely imaginable. Ruin awaits drunkards, if they do not abandon their passion — inevitable ruin; their condition is dreadful.

Prayer Before Holy Week (Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Mani)

Prayer Before Great Week

By His Eminence Metropolitan Chrysostomos III of Mani

Lord Jesus Christ, the only one who is Good and Lover of mankind, You who possess abundant mercy and incomprehensible compassion, hear us at this hour, Your sinful servants, whom You have deemed worthy to reach the threshold of Great Week, of Your own Holy and August Passion.

We thank You for this gift and earnestly entreat You: help us to live and to experience all that we shall hear in the Sacred Services of Your Church. Yes, Lord, we know that for our sake You were betrayed, You suffered, You were crucified on Golgotha, You died and were buried, and You rose again on the third day. All was for our redemption from sin, for our freedom from the captivity of the devil, whom You crushed.

Grant, O Lord, that we may never forget Your Holy Passion: the treacherous kiss, the blows, the mockery, the spittings, the sponge with vinegar, the scarlet robe, the nails, the Cross, the spear, and the saving death which You willingly accepted for our sake.

Homily on the Withered Fig Tree and on the Parable of the Vineyard (St. John of Damascus)

Homily on the Withered Fig Tree and on the Parable of the Vineyard 

Second Discourse

By St. John of Damascus

I am moved to speak by the personal Word of God the Father — He who did not depart from the bosom of the Father and was ineffably conceived in the womb of the Virgin; He who became for my sake what I am, He who is impassible in His divinity yet clothed Himself with a passible body like mine; He who rides upon the cherubic chariots and upon the earth mounts a colt (cf. Matt. 21:7–9).

The King of glory — He who together with the Father and the Spirit is praised by the Seraphim as holy and receives the lisping praises of children from their innocent tongues; He who is God and has the form of a servant and took the form of a servant; He who is immaterial and invisible God and yet accepted to assume a visible and tangible body; He who willingly went to the Passion, in order to grant me dispassion.

For when He saw man, the work of His hands, deceived by the guile of the serpent — man whom He had formed according to His image and likeness, yet who had fallen into the transgression of His commandment and had become subject to corruption and liable to death — He who is full of compassion could not endure the loss of the one whom He loved. Rather, He called him back in many ways to return and repentance, chastening him as an ungrateful servant, as a child of immature mind, in many and various ways, and devising every means to shake off the tyranny of the despot and return to his Creator.

Holy Monday Teaches Us a Fundamental Spiritual Law

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

“Jacob mourned the loss of Joseph, while the noble one sat in a chariot, honored as a king; for, having not been enslaved to the pleasures of the Egyptian woman, he was glorified by Him who sees the hearts of men and bestows an incorruptible crown” (Kontakion of Orthros, Great Monday).

The kontakion refers to one of the two themes that our Church commemorates on Great Monday: the person of the all-comely Joseph, son of the Patriarch Jacob, who prefigures — prophesies without words — the Lord Jesus Christ; his freedom from resentment and his humility point to the very author of our faith. The other commemorated event is the fig tree that the Lord cursed because of its barrenness — a symbol of the barrenness of the Jewish Synagogue of His time and, by extension, the barrenness of every person who is considered a believer in God throughout the ages, whose lack of fruits in life, that is, virtues, results precisely in his withering, as a cutting off from God.

What we particularly wish to emphasize, then, is the spiritual law that we see set forth by the Holy Hymnographer — a law that is grounded in and continually proclaimed by Jesus Christ Himself. What is this law? That what a person does, whether positively or negatively, brings about a corresponding result. Does one perform what is good? The Lord will look upon him with favor, glorifying him and offering him the “incorruptible crown,” that is, His very grace — the flooding of His presence within one’s being. Does one deny God, in the sense of turning passionately toward evil and sin? He will “receive” the corresponding outcome: the Lord will turn His face away from him, which means He will withdraw His grace, leaving the person exposed to the workings of the Evil One, literally at the mercy of his destructive intentions. For certainly no one remains “uncovered” and “ownerless,” alone with himself. Man is always “serving” somewhere. Thus, either he “serves” the Lord and is thereby exalted as His son, abiding within His blessed and beatifying embrace, being one with Him; or he “serves” his passions and the Evil One who stirs and inflames them, and thus becomes a slave to the most turbulent being in creation, already tasting that being’s hell even in this life.

Holy Patriarch Eutychios of Constantinople in the Hymnography of the Orthodox Church

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

Saint Eutychios was born around 512 A.D. in the village of Theia Kome in Phrygia. His father was a general in the army of Belisarius. Saint Eutychios became a monk at the age of 30 through the Metropolitan of Amaseia, and he lived in Constantinople as the apocrisiarius (representative) of the Metropolitan of Amaseia, eventually attaining the ecclesiastical rank of Archimandrite.

Saint Eutychios was held in high esteem by Patriarch Menas, and after the latter’s death, the Saint was elected Patriarch at the suggestion of Emperor Justinian. During the time of his first Patriarchate, specifically from May 5 to June 21 of the year 553 A.D., the Fifth Ecumenical Synod was convened.

In 564 A.D., he came into conflict with the Emperor over the heresy of the Aphthartodocetists. Saint Eutychios condemned this heresy despite the pressure exerted by the Emperor. On January 22, 565 A.D., while he was celebrating the Divine Liturgy for the feast of Saint Timothy, soldiers arrested him. Following this, he was deposed and exiled — first to Prinkipos and later to Amaseia in Pontus.

After the death of his successor, Patriarch John Scholasticus, the new Emperor Justin II recalled Saint Eutychios to the throne, and he returned to Constantinople in October of 577 A.D.

"Behold, the Bridegroom Comes..." (Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Mani)

By Metropolitan Chrysostomos III of Mani

Compunctious, filled with sacred awe, stands before us the Holy and Great Week. It is Great because of the great events which it so vividly and movingly brings to our remembrance: Jesus Christ, who comes to His voluntary Passion. And this is for our salvation from sin.

The inspired hymnography of the Church begins with the beautiful troparion: “Behold, the Bridegroom comes in the middle of the night, and blessed is the servant whom He shall find watching; and unworthy again is he whom He shall find slothful…”

Prologue in Sermons: April 6

 

 

The Wise Peacemaker

April 6

(A discourse about a monk who humbled his brother for the sake of the cell.)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

The seventh Beatitude reads: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matt. 5:9).

What does this mean? “It means that those who desire blessedness must not only behave toward all in a friendly manner and give no cause for discord, but must also, as much as possible, put an end to disagreements that arise among others and strive to reconcile those who are at enmity with one another. To peacemakers is promised, as a reward, the gracious name of sons of God and, without doubt, the degree of blessedness worthy of that name” (Catechism). Yet the labor of a peacemaker is not easy. Indeed, how difficult it is, for example, to restore broken friendship, to unite enemies, to extinguish between them mutual malice and hatred! Here, on the part of the peacemaker, there is required ardent love for one’s neighbor, often self-sacrifice, the wisdom of a serpent, and experience. And do you have all this? If not, let us learn how to act in matters of peacemaking from the saints of God.

On Palm Sunday (St. Chrysostomos of Smyrna)

On Palm Sunday

By the Holy Hieromartyr Chrysostomos, Metropolitan of Smyrna

“Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel” (John 12:13).

Truly a royal feast do we celebrate today; a royal visitation do we receive, and all things must be prepared in a royal manner, for where there is the presence of a king, there also preparation, order, and reception must be worthy both of the greatness of the feast and of the high dignity of the royal visitor.

To such a magnificent — indeed, one might say, God-fitting — preparation and reception, we are called from the depths of the ages by the ancient voices of the Prophets, which are also repeated by the innocent children, who, holding palm branches in their hands, today receive the coming King of the New Jerusalem, crying aloud and saying: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; proclaim, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold, your King comes, meek and bringing salvation.” And, raising their voices still more, they cry out: “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel.”

The Prophets call us to see what they desired to see and did not see, to hear what they longed to hear and did not hear — to behold that salvation and grace have appeared, that the King has come, and that the Conqueror of death is present.