A Reflection on the Saturday of Souls for the Eve of Pentecost

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

It is well known that, for our Church, although every Saturday is dedicated to the holy martyrs and to her departed faithful, there are two principal Soul Saturdays: the one on the eve of Meatfare Sunday and the one on the eve of Holy Pentecost. For this reason, on both of these days we hear the Synaxarion note: “On this same day, the most divine Fathers decreed that remembrance be made of all who from the ages have fallen asleep in piety, in the hope of the resurrection unto eternal life.”

For the Church, the departed do not constitute a part of the world that has “ended and passed away” — as many believe, those who have confined their existence within the suffocating boundaries of this present world because they have erased God and Christ from their lives. The departed are an organic part of the Church, that is, a part of the Body of Christ, because death is not the gate leading to nonexistence, but the gate opening into the embrace of Christ. Just as we faithful live within that embrace in this present world, so too — and even more so — at the hour of our death and thereafter. The Apostle Paul tells us this directly, basing his words upon the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself: “Whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.” In other words, whether we remain in this life or depart from it, we belong to the Lord.

Concerning Those Who Have Fallen Asleep in Faith (St. John of Damascus)

PROLOGUE

Here I wish to add a very important note of Saint Nikodemos the Hagiorite concerning Memorial Services:

“Since the present discussion concerns memorials, we note that the third-day memorials performed for the departed brethren signify, according to the sacred Symeon of Thessaloniki, that the departed brother was from the beginning composed by the Holy Trinity.

The ninth-day memorials signify that, having been dissolved into the elements from which he was composed, he is to be numbered among the nine immaterial orders of the Angels, being himself immaterial.

The fortieth-day memorials signify that, in the future resurrection, having again been re-constituted in a higher manner, he too is to be taken up as the Lord was, and, caught up in the clouds, to meet the Judge.

These three states of man are also signified by the three-month, six-month, and nine-month memorials; in general they are performed for the purification of the departed — especially the fortieth day, as is indicated by the example of our Lord, who in His three births kept three complete forties, thus imprinting our own life in Himself. For the day of birth and the death of each person are called a ‘birthday,’ according to the temple in Laodicea.

The Apostolic Constitutions (Book VIII, ch. 42) say that the third day is observed because Christ rose on the third day; the ninth day in remembrance of the living and the dead; and the fortieth day according to the ancient type — for thus also the people mourned Moses.

Some say the third day is for the purification of the threefold aspect of the soul; the ninth for the purification of the five bodily senses together with the generative, natural, and transitional faculty; and the fortieth for the purification of the four elements in the body — each of which served in the transgression of the ten commandments; and four times ten make forty.” (Pedalion, Athens 1886, p. 221)

Memorial Services for the Reposed

Memorial Services

By Fr. Theodosios Martzouchos

"The dead man has not lost his place 
in the conscience and the mind of people, 
because he is absent from their eyes." 
— John Henry Newman

More or less, all of us have attended a Memorial Service for a relative or acquaintance. All of us have taken part in “remembrances of the dead.” We have all experienced the awkwardness of the mournful atmosphere, in which we do not know how to react or what to think. We have all felt uncomfortable, offering cold and indifferent condolences that we did not truly feel. Memorial Services, whether for acquaintances or relatives, have taken their place in the lives of Christians without the “why” of them being self-evidently understood and accepted.

In our own day especially, Memorial Services tend to become a psychologically comforting habit and at the same time a rational denial and objection. I do “something” for my loved one who has departed and remain with a sense of communication through the offering. At the same time my mind “protests” as to whether all this has any substantial usefulness, since when you die… everything seems futile and useless, just as indeed all material human things are useless for the dead.

What truly happens? What is a Memorial Service and why are Memorials needed?

Something Deeper (A Poem for the Saturday of Souls)

 

By Fr. Ioannis Papadimitriou

Many times, out of good intention,
some people leave an electric candle
on the grave of their loved ones.
It is not bad in the sense of sin,
but our Church has taught something deeper.

We do not light the vigil lamp or the natural candle
because our departed are afraid of the darkness.
They do not need it in order to “see.”
The oil symbolizes the mercy of God
which drips like balm
upon our suffering souls,
and the candle symbolizes the person who melts
little by little from sacrificial love;
and because love is not activism or an idea,
but becomes incarnate in the Person of Christ,
who is both Light and Life,
as it burns it spreads light all around!

Prologue in Sermons: February 12

The Benefits of Praying for the Dying

February 12

(From a Homily of Saint Gregory, Pope of Rome, about a monk who was given to a serpent as food because of sin, and was delivered by the prayers of the brethren.)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

All of us, brethren, by Christian love are obliged to pray for one another at all times, as the Apostle says: "Pray for one another" (James 5:16); but our prayer must be especially fervent and heartfelt for those of our neighbors who are approaching death. The dying are in particular need of prayer, and earnest prayer for them frees them from the terrors of the hour of death, and sometimes even brings them recovery.

Saint Gregory, Pope of Rome, relates the following:

“In my monastery there lived a devout monk. One day his brother came to him and also asked to be admitted into the monastery. He was accepted. But alas! the newcomer lived quite differently from his brother. He showed no concern for his soul, did not keep the rule, judged others, dressed finely, and could not bear it when anyone began speaking to him about the life to come and repentance. Several times they intended to expel him, but each time, unwilling to grieve his pious brother, they left him.

Prologue in Sermons: January 29

The Benefit to the Souls of the Departed from Commemoration at the Liturgy

January 29

(The account of Saint Gregory the Dialogist concerning a monk who died under penance and was forgiven after thirty days of commemoration.)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

For the souls of those who have died in faith, but did not have time to bring forth fruits worthy of repentance, the prayers offered for them are salvific—prayers performed with faith in remembrance of their benefaction, and especially the offering for them of the bloodless sacrifice of the Body and Blood of Christ. Concerning the special propitiatory power of the bloodless sacrifice for the departed, Saint Cyril of Jerusalem says: “Very great benefit will accrue to the souls for whom supplication is made, when the holy and awesome sacrifice is set forth” (Mystagogical Catechesis, V, 9). Saint John Chrysostom teaches the same: “Let us not grow weary,” he says, “in helping those who have departed and in offering prayers for them, for there lies before us a common purifying sacrifice for the whole world… And without doubt it is possible to obtain for them forgiveness through the gifts offered for them and through being named together with them” (Homily 41 on 1 Corinthians). Finally, examples also confirm this teaching. Here is one of them.

Prologue in Sermons: October 30

On the Beneficial Effects of Parents' Prayers for Children

October 30*

(On How It Is Useful To Keep a Memorial of the Dead)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

If, according to the teaching of the word of God, we should all pray for one another (James 5:16), then parents, in particular, ought to pray especially and primarily for their children. Why? As the saying goes, a parent's prayer reaches even the bottom of the sea — that is, it is especially efficacious before God and produces the most beneficial effects for the children. We shall now, brethren, demonstrate this truth to you through action.

A young man, originally from the island of Cyprus, along with several of his compatriots, was captured by the Persians and imprisoned. After some time, some of his fellow countrymen managed to escape from captivity and arrived in Cyprus. The young man's parents began inquiring about their son, and those who had returned from captivity stated that their son had died on such-and-such a date and month, and that they themselves had buried his body. Meanwhile, it should be noted that the returnees were mistaken. They had indeed buried a young man abroad, but it was not the son of the inquiring parents, who remained alive. Nevertheless, the parents of the young man in captivity believed the words of those who had returned and began to pray for their son as though he were deceased, especially fervently praying for him three times a year: at Easter, Pentecost, and Christmas.

October: Day 26: Teaching 2: Holy Great Martyr Demetrios of Thessaloniki

October: Day 26: Teaching 2:
Holy Great Martyr Demetrios of Thessaloniki

(On the Meaning of Church Prayers and Alms Given on Behalf of the Deceased in the Church)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. According to ancient custom, today we commemorate our departed fathers and brothers. This is a sacred, time-honored custom: it is entirely consistent with the teachings of the Orthodox Church.

II. But how should we commemorate? What should the commemoration consist of?

a) First of all, commemoration should consist of the distribution of alms for the deceased. This kind of commemoration has great power. "The more sins the deceased has, the more necessary alms are for him; give alms to widows and the poor: this is the most important funeral accessory," says Saint John Chrysostom.

And St. Augustine also writes: "Alms given for the souls of the dead help them to be more merciful to the Lord than they deserve for their sins." 

Homily One on Saint Demetrios Ancestral Saturday (Archimandrite Kirill Pavlov)

 

 

Homily One on Saint Demetrios Ancestral Saturday

By Archimandrite Kirill Pavlov

(Delivered in 1961)

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!

"God is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to Him" (Luke 20:38), said the Savior to the Sadducees who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead.

Dear brothers and sisters, thanks be to the Lord that He tirelessly cares for our salvation and our attainment of the Kingdom of God and gives us the opportunity to pray and help with our prayers to ease the lot of our neighbors in their afterlife.

God, who created man for a blessed eternal life, by His good will desires for everyone to receive it as an inheritance, and therefore accepts the prayers of the living for the departed until the General Resurrection and Judgment, when they are brought with sincere faith and love for our departed neighbors.

Saint Demetrios Ancestral Saturday

In the spiritual experience of the Russian Church, veneration of the Holy Great Martyr Demetrios of Thessaloniki is closely linked with the memory of the defense of the nation and Church by the Great Prince of Moscow, Dmitry Donskoy (May 19).

Saint Dmitry Donskoy smashed the military might of the Golden Horde at the Battle of Kulikovo Field on September 8, 1380 (the Feast of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos), set between the Rivers Don and Nepryadva. The Battle of Kulikovo, for which the nation calls him "Demetrios of the Don," became the first Russian national deed, rallying the spiritual power of the Russian nation around Moscow. The “Zadonschina,” an inspiring historic poem written by the priest Sophronius of Ryazem (1381), is devoted to this event.

The Meaning of the Saturday of Souls Before Pentecost

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

It is known that for our Church, although every Saturday is dedicated to the holy martyrs and the faithful who have fallen asleep, there are two Saturdays for souls: that of the eve of Meatfare Sunday and that of the eve of Holy Pentecost. That is why on both of these days we hear the Synaxarion note: “On this day, the most divine Fathers have established that we remember all those who have fallen asleep piously from the beginning, that is, those who have departed from this world in the hope of the resurrection of eternal life.”

For the Church, the deceased are not part of the world that “has ended and is gone” – as many believe, who have enclosed their existence within the suffocating framework of this world, because they have erased God and Christ from their lives. The deceased constitute an organic part of the Church, that is, part of the Body of Christ, because death is not the door that leads to nonexistence, but the door that leads to the embrace of Christ. Just as we believers live in this embrace in this world, the same and even more so happens at the time of our death and afterwards. The Apostle Paul tells us this in a direct way, based of course on the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself: “Whether we are in this life or whether we depart from this life, we belong to the Lord."

March: Day 15: Teaching 1: Holy Martyr Nikandros

March: Day 15: Teaching 1:
Holy Martyr Nikandros
 
(How Should our Love for the Dead Be Expressed?)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. Saint Nikandros, whose memory is celebrated today, suffered during the reign of Diocletian, with whose name is associated the memory of the most terrible persecution that Christians ever experienced. Saint Nikandros was a physician; he visited the martyrs in prison and ministered to them. Once he was busy burying the bodies of the holy martyrs, who had been thrown to be devoured by beasts and birds. For this he was subjected to various tortures, then flayed alive and killed with the sword.

II. The Holy Martyr Nikandros expressed his love for the dead, namely for the holy martyrs who suffered for Christ, by burying their holy bodies. His example is also obligatory for us: we too must take care to give our dead neighbors an honorable burial in the hope of their glorious resurrection on the day of God's General Judgment.

Homily for Meatfare Parental Saturday - On the Prayerful Commemoration of the Departed (Archimandrite Kirill Pavlov)

Homily for Meatfare Parental Saturday

On the Prayerful Commemoration of the Departed

By Archimandrite Kirill Pavlov

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!

"God is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all are alive to Him" (Luke 20:38), said Christ the Savior to the Sadducees who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead.

Beloved brothers and sisters in Christ! The Holy Orthodox Christian Church, firmly believing these true words of the Savior, always publicly confesses the indisputable truth that with the death of a person his life does not cease. What do we see dying? Only the body, which is taken from the earth and again returns to the earth. The flesh decomposes and turns to dust, but the person himself, with all his feelings and with his immortal soul, continues to live, passing only from this world to another, to the afterlife. Consequently, communication between the living and the dead is not destroyed by death, but continues to exist.

February: Day 17: Holy Great Martyr Theodore the Tiro

February: Day 17:
Holy Great Martyr Theodore the Tiro
 
(Observing the Fast is Very Important)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. After the death of the Holy and Equal-to-the-Apostles Constantine the Great, who, as is well known, stopped all persecution of Christians and elevated the faith in Jesus Christ Crucified to the throne of the Caesars, the Roman Empire, and after several short successions, it fell to one of his relatives, Julian. As blessed Constantine was a chosen vessel of grace, so unfortunate Julian proved to be an obvious vessel of destruction and rejection. One of the first acts of his dark reign was that he rejected Christ and the gospel, and turned to the overthrown pagan idols. He did not initiate an open persecution of Christians, not out of pity for them, but out of confidence in its futility; instead, a cunning secret persecution immediately began. The apostate now degraded Christians from honors and dignity, as if contrary to their humility; then he deprived them of their property and wealth, as if incompatible with the poverty of the Gospel; then he forbade them to study science, under the pretext that everything necessary for Christians was contained in their Gospel; then he called heretics from prison, so that with their intrigues he could confuse the Church of Christ.

January: Day 19: Venerable Makarios the Great

 

January: Day 19:
Venerable Makarios the Great
 
(On Prayer for the Dead)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. Today we commemorate one of the great ascetics of the Egyptian deserts, Venerable Makarios of Egypt, who lived in the 4th century A.D.

One day, while walking in the desert, Venerable Makarios saw a dry human skull on the ground. Turning it with his staff, Makarios noticed that the skull seemed to make a sound. “Whose skull are you?” asked the Elder. And from the skull came this answer: “I was the head of all the priests who lived here; and you, Abba Makarios, are filled with the Spirit of God. When you pray for us, who are in torment, we experience some comfort.” “What kind of comfort is this for you, and what kind of torment?” asked the Elder. “As the sky is distant from the earth, so great is the fire in which we are tormented. We are scorched on all sides, from head to toe,” the skull answered with a groan; “and we cannot see each other. But when you pray for us, we partially see each other, and this gives us some comfort.” Hearing this, the Elder wept and said: "Unhappy is the day in which a man transgresses the commandment of God." Then he asked again: “Do you have other, greater torments?” A voice was heard from the skull: “Others are even deeper beneath us.” “Who are these?” the Elder asked again. “We, who have not known God, still experience some of God’s mercy,” the voice from the skull continued, “but those who, having known God, have rejected Him and do not keep His commandments, they experience even more severe, unspeakable torments beneath us.” The Holy Elder then buried the skull in the ground and went away in deep thought.

The Sarantaleiturgo of Christmas (Forty Consecutive Days of the Divine Liturgy on Behalf of the Reposed)

The Sarantaleiturgo is forty consecutive Divine Liturgies that start from November 15th and end on December 25th, Christmas Day. Every morning the priest recites thousands of names of the deceased, or as many have been submitted to him, during the Divine Liturgy. It is especially for those Christians who did not live a pious and devoted life close to the Church, and perhaps encountered death with no time for repentance. Since the Orthodox Church firmly believes there is no repentance in Hades, it is up to the persistent appeal of the Church to help those lost souls find rest and salvation, whether we offer alms in their name or have their names commemorated by priests during the bloodless sacrifice of the Divine Liturgy.

Below is a story told by Metropolitan Neophytos of Morphou that highlights the importance of this practice of celebrating forty consecutive liturgies during the Nativity season, which is the traditional period to do them:

Homily on Ancestors Saturday in the 2nd Week of Great Lent: About Prayer for the Dead

Homily on Ancestors Saturday* in the 2nd Week of Great Lent

About Prayer for the Dead

By Archimandrite Kirill (Pavlov)

(Delivered in 1961)

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!

Beloved brothers and sisters, you did well to come to church today, to gather together to offer up your fervent prayers to the Throne of God for departed fathers, brothers, sisters and all our relatives, for all deceased Orthodox Christians. The duty of love for our neighbors obliges us to pray for the departed who have passed into eternity. Their fate is unknown to us, but we must certainly pray for them, because this is very good for them and this is of great benefit to us. By praying for the deceased, we thereby testify to our love for them, express compassion and mercy. And the Lord said that blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy (Matthew 5:7). Moreover, if our neighbor, for whom we pray, has pleased the Lord, then he himself already has boldness before the Lord and can offer his prayers before Him for us.

Homily on the Commemoration of the Dead (St. Luke of Simferopol)

 By St. Luke, Archbishop of Simferopol and All Crimea

(Delivered on April 11, 1948 - 4th Sunday of Great Lent)

Much to my chagrin, some of you go to the gatherings of sectarians and there become infected with their false teachings.

Some also became infected with the false teaching that one should not pray for the dead, one should not make offerings for their repose. But you know that every Saturday during Great Lent, the dead are commemorated. Therefore, you must establish yourself in the Orthodox teaching about the commemoration of the dead, you must not believe what you hear from the renegades of the Church.

What does the Holy Church teach? We have authentic and ancient testimonies that the holy apostles already performed commemorations of the dead and prayed for them. There are evidences in the works of the Teachers and Fathers of the Church that have come down to us that already in ancient times, in the very first centuries of Christianity, they prayed for the dead and commemorated them.