Great Lent Mid-point: Sunday of the Veneration of the Holy Cross

Categories: orthodox-life, hymns, great-lent

Date: 17 March 2012 22:57:16

Kontakion: Now the flaming sword no longer guards the gates of Eden; it has mysteriously been quenched by the wood of the Cross! The sting of death and the victory of hell have been vanquished; for You, O my Saviour, have come and cried to those in hell: "Enter again into paradise." As we reach the mid-point of Great Lent, the Orthodox Church celebrates the Veneration of the Holy Cross. Sadly, I am unable to attend today (not feeling well...), but thanks to the Internet, and Archimandrite Ephrem Lash in particular, whose site is a bounty of Orthodox hymnography and works of the Church fathers, I can read the hymns for this wonderful feast. Fr Alexander Schmemann, in his valuable book Great Lent: Journey to Pascha, writes on the reason the Orthodox Church has placed this Sunday where it has:

We are in Mid-Lent. On the one hand, the physical and spiritual effort, if it is serious and consistent, begins to be felt, its burden becomes more burdensome, our fatigue more evident. We need help and encouragement. On the other hand, having endured this fatigue, having climbed the mountain up to this point, we begin to see the end of our pilgrimage, and the rays of Easter grow in their intensity. p 76, 2001 edn

He also quotes the Synaxarion (an abridged collection of the lives of the Saints together with explanations of the feast days) which gives expands further on what Fr Alexander has written:

...when a king is coming, at first his banner and symbols appear, then he himself comes glad and rejoicing about his victory and filling with joy those under him; likewise, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is about to show us His victory over death, and appear to us in the glory of the Resurrection Day, is sending us in advance His sceptre, the royal symbol -- the Life-Giving Cross -- and it fills us with joy and makes us ready to meet, inasmuch as it is possible for us, the King Himself, and to render glory to His victory ... Christ comforts us who are as it were in a desert until he shall lead us up to the spiritual Jerusalem by His Resurrection.... for the Cross is called the Tree of Life, it is the tree that was planted in Paradise, and for this reason our fathers have planted it in the midst of Holy Lent, remembering both Adam's bliss and how he was deprived of it, remembering also that partaking of this Tree we no longer die but are kept alive ... p 77, 2001 edn

A blessed Sunday of the Veneration of the Holy Cross, and continued Lenten pilgrimage to Pascha, to all.