Second Sunday of Pascha; Sunday of the Myrrh-bearing Women
Acts 6:1-7
Mark 15:43-16:8
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit Amen. Christ is risen! Truly He is risen!
I had the good fortune this last Friday to attend and sing at the funeral of our parish’s newest member: The servant of God, Lev, in the final moments of his earthly sojourn, consented to his family’s fervent desire that he be baptized and receive Holy Communion as an Orthodox Christian. At his funeral just a few days ago the church sang some of the boldest, most audacious words about our brother’s death and what most assuredly will someday be our fate as well:
Continue readingThou alone art immortal, [addressing Christ]/ Who didst create and fashion man; / but we mortals were formed of earth, and unto earth shall we return, / as Thou who madest me didst command and say unto me: / For earth thou art and unto earth shalt thou return, / whither all we mortals are going, / making as a funeral dirge the song: // Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
IKOS of Kontakion after Ode 6, Funeral Service
The details in the book about the resurrection of Christ are both simple to copy and complicated enough to be interesting. One picture displays Jesus Christ shining 20 times brighter than the sun and breaking the gates of Hades by destroying the power of death. The author Michael Elgamal creates art by transforming ancient icons into fun kids’ pictures. Here are some of my drawings of his illustrations: 
Sunday, April 30/May 13, 2018
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Christ is risen! St. John the Beloved begins his first epistle, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life.” (I John 1:1) And this morning’s Gospel also from St. John confirms this verifying faith through the testimony of another apostle, Thomas. Many identify him as doubting Thomas, a rather unfortunate label which casts a negative light upon his hesitancy to at first fully believe. But the Church in the Divine Services for today’s feast clearly proclaims Thomas’s unbelief or hesitancy to believe as good. So what is it about Thomas’s unbelieving belief that we can and should emulate? 
Christ is Risen! In this great season of the resurrection, I would like to post one of my all time favorite resurrection poems by John Updike entitled Seven Stanzas at Easter. In it, the poet delivers this one liner punch to those who would claim to be Christian, and yet not hold to the belief that Christ is raised from the dead, 
“If there were only one book left in the Bible, only one chapter, yea only one verse, it would have to come from Romans chapter 6.” I was used to hearing such hyperboles from our pastor and teacher growing up, so when he made this particular declaration, it did not make much of an impression on me at the time. I mean, if I had to lay my bets on the most seminal verse in Scripture, I might have chosen something about love like the ever-popular football verse, 
Like Mendicant Monks... 