[Published in The Greek-Australian Vema (April 2008) 10]

From Darkness to Resurrection and Beyond: A Glimpse of the Paschal Mystery

Revd Dr Doru Costache According to our tradition and in line with an archetypal religious perception, ritual (in spite of its misunderstandings in modern times) is not just a spectacularly intricate form of remembering past events, a mere memorial of the divine economy; ritual is, originally and essentially, the most appropriate way of experiencing the existential substance of faith. As such, recapitulating the living dimension of faith through the commemoration of the salvific events, ritual on the one hand recalls, or rather re-enacts, the past events and on the other transports and transforms the participants. Furthermore, ritual represents a mystical vehicle, a way of transferring the celebrating community illo tempore (to those times), beyond the immediacy of the present and the past of the original events, to the eschatological realities foreshadowed, signified and anticipated by those events. In other words, ritual builds a bridge over the abysses of history, creating a knot between present times, the remembered events and the Kingdom to come. As such, ritual produces the simultaneous metamorphosis of the participants into witnesses of the salvific events and partakers of eternal life, contributing to the renewal of Gods people. This complex function of ritual is abundantly evidenced throughout the Great Week of the Lords Passion, which begins with the Saturday of Lazarus (as suggested by the apolytikion, or dismissal hymn, of the feast) to end with the Holy Saturday, when we celebrate the glorious descent of Christ to Hades. It is a week that encapsulates the whole message of the New Testament by way of a dramatic Christological narrative punctuated by powerful eschatological suggestions , a week which actually transcends the cursory seven day pattern by paradoxically comprising the eight days between the two mentioned Saturdays. The same way, and symmetrically, the Bright Week an explosive manifestation of the eschaton (fulfilment) here and now, in the midst of Gods people comprises the eight days between the Sunday of Pascha and that of the Antipascha (in ancient times, the Higher Sunday). In the following, however, I will focus not on this symbolically symmetric architecture, choosing rather to refer to the mystical meaning, existential significance and transformative grace of the rituals between Holy Friday and the Pascha. Orthros (Matins) of Holy Friday (Thursday night)

The service of the twelve gospel readings guide us methodically toward the apex of the theodrama of the Logos incarnated and crucified for our salvation. The texts, starting with the first (prefacing the last stages of the journey through revealing the accomplishment of the New Covenant and depicting the serenity of Jesus facing death), represent an extremely dense narrative and indeed the vehicle of our transportation back to the historical setting of the events. We are no longer, therefore, mere listeners of a story. Hearing the sacred account, we become participants in the events that happen this very day: , , today is hanged on a tree the one who hung the earth upon the waters The storys threads absorb us progressively to finally place us among the disciples at the mystical supper and the last sermon, then making us witnesses of the betrayal, the disciples cowardice, the unjust condemnation and humiliating death of the Lord. The climax of the experience is reached with the presentation of the crucified Christ in the middle of the church as if on Golgotha, acknowledged and worshipped by the faithful as Creator God and Lord of glory. In light of the re-enacting function of ritual, however, Christ stands alone once again an embodied call to repentance on the cross, immolated for our salvation. He is again rejected, despised and mocked, although not by shouting crowds but by our sins and failures. Yet, celebrating full of reverence the tremendous mystery of divine humility, we evade the tragic choreography of irrational hate: it is as if we are ready to climb up on the cross together with the humble Lord of glory like all the martyrs of old to realise the fullness of him who fills all in all (Ephesians 1:23). Orthros (Matins) of Holy Saturday (Friday night) The Lordly burial service, the lamentation, finds us crucified with Christ. Paradoxically, we are once again active witnesses of the events, participants in their development and objects of a mysterious transformation. And indeed we are the beneficiaries of the Lords immaculate Passion; for us has he immersed into the waters of our transience and death; we are those to whom he descends to bring salvation. Witnessing the agony of the Lord, his death and interment, we contemplate both the all-encompassing salvific love of the Crucified one and the profound misery of a humanity failing to acknowledge its Lord. Now, we are the faithful disciples accompanying the Lord to the tomb, for this is the meaning of the lamentation and procession: , , you who are the life, O Christ, were laid in a tomb From another viewpoint, it is as if we perform our own memorial service together with that of Christ, while still travelling together with him toward the tomb. Being put to death every day (cf. Romans 8:36) for the name of the Lord (cf. Matthew 5:11), we are now literally interred together with him, willingly and compassionately. This is in fact the significance of us passing ritually under the holy epitaphion (a large cloth on

which is embroidered or painted the image of Christs preparation for burial), the very symbol of Jesus tomb and reminder of the day when in the baptismal waters we died to the old ways to walk the path of a renewed life (see Romans 6:3-4). The tomb remains the ultimate testimony of the entire drama and its unexpected end, the glorification of the Crucified one and of us, his faithful. The epitaphion being now laid on the altars holy table, there it will rest as unquestionable witness of Christs resurrection this time till the eve of the deifying ascent of the Lord. Made transparent by the resurrection, the tomb becomes a window to the promised Kingdom to come; for the moment, however, it offers no hope. Holy Pascha After the Saturday of the Lords descent to Hades where he found also us (this is why on this Saturday we do not eat, since the dead no longer need food), enslaved by our sinfulness , we meet again in the lightless church, a desolating scene of death and defeat. We were hoping that it was he who was going to redeem Israel (Luke 24:21). Living the fear and hopelessness of the old Israel (see Hebrews 2:15), it is as if we are not yet Gods people, a nation of trust, joy and light (see 1 Peter 2:9). Still dominated by the prince of darkness, we are terrified by the darkness of this world. The church is now an image of our own tomb and the tomb has no comfort yet to bring us. It is also, and properly, the cave where the Lord was interred and us with him: in the darkness of the tomb there is no horizon, no zenith, no escape We remain silent and disoriented, since there is no sign yet of a victory; the only thing that keeps us safe, above all insecurity, is the power of prayer. Suddenly, however, the joyful light emerges in the tomb and rapidly spreads from the Lord of glory (the Light which shines in the dark) toward us. We are now resurrected by him and together with him! Trampling down death by death and to those in the tombs bestowing life We are witnesses and participants, the righteous sanctified by his grace brought to the renewed life (cf. Matthew 27:51-3). Neither the soldiers have seen him first nor the myrrh-bearing women. It is us who have, since we are those being raised today together with him, a reality witnessed and poetically proclaimed by St John Damascene, the author of the divine Paschal Canon: / The day of resurrection, , / let us be radiant, O peoples! , , / Pascha, the Lords Pascha; , / for from death to life, , / and from earth to heaven, , , / Christ God has brought us, . / those chanting the hymn of victory.

 The gospel reading of the liturgy deciphers this mystery: Christ is the light shining triumphantly in the darkness (see John 1:5), transforming those who believe in him into sons and daughters of God (see John 1:12-3). The narrative of the sorrowful and glorious journey of Christ, the Lord of Glory, becomes in the framework of the ritual a pretext to explore our own spiritual journey as Gods people. We cannot achieve renewal without first dying mystically. Therefore, along with the ritual we have to learn to die to our old habits and rhythms, to our mind corrupted by the darkness of ignorance. Only in this way are we ready to enter the paschal week, an image of the eighth day, announcing the unending day of the Kingdom to come of the Kingdom that has already manifested its dawn in the radiant night of Pascha and in the glorious day of ascension. The transformative energy of this radiance will pervade the entire world and history through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in the Sunday of Pentecost, the eighth of the Pentikostarion.