Holy Trinity Orthodox Church

A blessed Feast of the Falling Asleep of the Mother of God!

What a joy the Liturgy was today! 3 priests and a deacon!

Fr. Alexander Schmemann wrote the following about the Mother of God in his book, The Celebration of Faith:

More hymns of Transfiguration:

He Who once spoke through symbols to Moses on Mount Sinai saying: I am He Who is! Was transfigured today upon Mount Tabor before the disciples. In His own person He showed them the nature of mankind arrayed in the original beauty of the image. Calling Moses and Elijah to be witnesses of this surpassing grace, He made them sharers in His joy, foretelling His death on the Cross and His saving Resurrection!

David, the ancestor of God, foreseeing in spirit the sojourn with mankind of the only-begotten Son in the flesh called the creation together to rejoice with him, and prophetically lifted up his voice to cry: Tabor and Hermon shall rejoice in Your Name! For having gone up the Mount with Your disciples, You were transfigured, O Christ, and made Adam's darkened image to shine again as lightning, transforming it into the glory and splendor of Your own divinity. Therefore we cry aloud to You: Lord and Creator of all things, glory to You!

Continuing in the celebration of Transfiguration, here a few hymns from the Feast:

When You were transfigured before Your Crucifixion, O Lord, the mountain became like heaven and a cloud spread itself out like a canopy and the Father bore witness to You. There were present Peter with James and John, since they were to be with You at Your betrayal, that seeing Your wonders they might not be dismayed at Your sufferings. Grant in Your mercy that we too may be counted worthy to venerate these Your sufferings in peace!

Taking the disciples up into a high mountain before Your Crucifixion, O Lord, You were transfigured before them, enlightening them with the bright rays of Your power. From love of mankind and in Your sovereign might, it was Your desire to show them the splendor of Your Resurrection. Grant in Your mercy as the Lover of mankind, that we too may be counted worthy of this splendor in peace, O God.

What a joyous Liturgy! In the midst of the Dormition Fast, we continued to celebrate the Great Feast of Transfiguration, we remembered St. Ignatius of Jableczna whose relics are in our altar table, we remembered the Glorification of St. Herman of Alaska in 1970 and we heard about Christ walking on the water and saving Peter (Matthew 14:22-34). Wow!

Immediately after feeding the 5,000 men (besides women and children), Christ went to be alone on a mountain. Common sense! We all need time to be alone, quiet and chat with God. Ironically, people will read this comment on their computer's--one of the things that now takes up so much of our time! Maybe when someone reads this, they'll finish and turn off their computer and take 5 minutes to be quiet! And then Christ comes to meet the Apostles and they see him walking on the water. Peter asks Him, "Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water." (Matthew 14:28) And, of course, Peter is now able to walk on the water--UNTIL he feels the wind. He is distracted! Do we get distracted? Absolutely! And how do we get back on track? Peter gives us the answer: "Lord, save me!" Common sense! The Savior is Christ!

 O Holy Father Herman, pray to God for us!

Half-way through the Dormition Fast it's always a great joy to celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration. It's a shame that so many choose not to pay attention to this Fast or to participate in the services of these two great Feasts. It's ironic that one of the characteristics of Mary that we look up to so much is obedience, and yet, we often choose not to be obedient to the wisdom of the Church.

Sunday we celebrate the Glorification of St. Herman of Alaska, and again, are reminded of how we are all called to be saints. St. Herman was far from successful in an earthly sense, but chose the route of humility and obedience. What was the outcome? He was able to prevent a monsoon from hitting Spruce Island!

On a lighter note, where did the summer go? Seems like just yesterday we were celebrating Pascha and now we're only a few months away from the beginning of the Nativity Fast!