The Shepherd, May 2005
THE COMING MONTH
FR ANTONOV’S starting on the Great Lenten services coincided exactly with our starting that period of the year. Unfortunately, we are now out of phase, and he is approaching Passion Week, whereas this issue will reach you at the end of the second week in Pascha. It will probably therefore be useful to say something about the commemorations in May.
The third Sunday in Pascha (2nd / 15th May, this year) is that of the Ointment-bearing Women and Sts Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, the disciple by night. They are hymned by the Church as those who showed extraordinary love of our Saviour in ministering unto Him when He had died, burying Him and then, after reverently keeping the Jewish Sabbath, returning to tend Him on the Sunday morning. This, at a time when the Eleven had abandoned Him and were hiding away from fear of repercussions. It was, of course, the Women, who thus became the first witnesses of the the truth of the Resurrection, and were sent to the eleven to tell them the good news, thus becoming Apostles to the Apostles. Their love of our Saviour and their unique ministry in proclaiming the news that Christ is Risen, are hymned by the Church on this day.
On the subsequent Sundays in Pascha, we do not commemorate events intimately linked with the event of the Saviour’s triumph over death, but miracles which He worked during His earthly ministry which show the power of His Resurrection being imparted to others. Thus on Sunday 9th /22nd May we have His healing of the Paralytic at the Sheeps’ Pool, on Sunday 16th /29th His meeting with the Samaritan Woman and His bringing her from mis-belief to true belief, and on Sunday 23rd May / 5th June His healing of the Blind Man both of his spiritual blindness and of his physical blindness.
The Great Feast of the Lord’s Ascension also falls within May this year (27th May / 9th June). It is one of the Twelve Great Feasts of the Church Year and one of the most joyous, for in it we see one of our kind, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who, being True God, had become man, seated on the Throne of Divinity. This festival is rather neglected in popular observance and undeservedly so, but perhaps because it always falls on a Thursday. It is in fact the culmination of all our hopes, and one of the most joyous festivals of the year.
The feast day itself is followed by the Sunday of the Holy Fathers of the First Œcumenical Council. This Council was held in the year 325 in the city of Nicaea under the sponsorship of the Emperor St Constantine the Great. During it, the erroneous teachings of Arius were condemned by the Fathers and the Apostolic Faith proclaimed. The greater part of the Symbol of Faith (the Creed), that we recite daily in our prayers and at every Liturgy, was drawn up at this Council. The celebration is observed now because the anniversary of the Council falls at about this time of year, and because Arius’ teaching disputed the Divinity of our Saviour. The Ascension is a festival in which this truth is most emphatically proclaimed, by His being seated on the Throne of the Most High at the right hand of the Father. 
|
