The first week of Lent for our Church of the Annunciation in the year of our Lord, 2024, brought many joyful celebrations, for the Sunday of Orthodoxy, the Eve of the Feast of the Annunciation, the feast day of our Cathedral, and the Great Feast itself. These celebrations made for a very special weekend for our parishioners. As we can never fully celebrate the feast day of our Cathedral without the presence of His Eminence Archbishop and Metropolitan Nicolae in our midst, this year we were also honored by His Eminence's presence.
On Saturday evening, the 23rd of March, we had a meeting with His Eminence and the Parish Council to discuss the long awaited plan to build a new church. With the help of the Good Lord and the blessing of His Eminence, we hope to bring this project to fruition this year. This was followed by the Hierarchical Vespers and the Agape meal in the social hall.
On Sunday, the 24th of March, the Hierarchical Liturgy was celebrated, a Divine Liturgy that personally touched me because it was 5 years since, with the Mercy of the Good Lord, I was called to the wonderful ministry of the priesthood: praise be to God for everything. At the end of the Divine Liturgy, His Eminence delivered a word of teaching on the importance of this feast of the victory of Orthodoxy over all heresies:
“From the 4th century until 843, the Church was troubled by many erroneous teachings about the Person of the Savior, about the Person of the Holy Spirit, about how the two natures, human and divine, are united in the Person of the Savior, about the naming of the Virgin Mary as the Birth of God. The Church Fathers met in several Ecumenical Synods, seven total in number, beginning in 325 and ending with the Synod of 787 which already restored the right teaching on the honor due to holy icons. After 787, several years of turmoil followed, so that it was not until 843, with the Synod convened by Patriarch Methodius under Empress Theodora, that the teaching on the honoring of holy icons was restored and peace was brought to the Church. At that synod, all the decisions of the seven ecumenical synods were confirmed. With this confirmation, the teaching about the holy icons was strengthened, so that this synod considered that by this Orthodoxy was victorious over heresy. That is why this Sunday of Orthodoxy was established, the Sunday of the victory of the right faith over false teaching, a designation preserved to this day in the Orthodox Church.”
This was followed by a procession with icons brought by Sunday School children and a Christian meal, with traditional Lenten dishes, attended by the whole parish with joyful participation, having His Eminence as our guest.
Vespers for the Sunday of Orthodoxy took place at St. Theodosius of Cernigov Cathedral in Cleveland, Ohio (OCA), where His Eminence Metropolitan Nicolae was the guest of honor, who presided at the beautiful service and gave a beautiful homily:
“The possibility of representing Christ in the icon is based on the Incarnation of the Son of God, on the presence of the Savior Jesus Christ in the world, on His revelation as a man, like us. St. John, in the prologue of his Gospel, says: "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, the glory of one born of the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14). Very clear words that confirm how the Word, the second Person of the Holy Trinity, became incarnate, took on human flesh, took on our human image and let himself be seen by men... In the icon, therefore, we do not represent God according to His ungraspable, incomprehensible, infinite nature, but we represent God who took on a human face, the Incarnate Son of God, and, after this model, His Mother and the saints...
If the icon has its foundation in the Incarnation of the Word, the presence of Christ in the world, it also has its foundation in His Resurrection. For the image we honor in the icon is not only our human image, our human nature fallen into sin, but it is our human nature resurrected by Christ. We honor Christ who took on our nature, Christ the Man and God, the Man who rose from the grave and after the Resurrection ascended into heaven and sat at the right hand of the Father, raising our human nature to the right hand of the Father. In the icon, we honor a transfigured Body, a Body imbued with the power of the Spirit, with the light of the Resurrection. In honoring Christ and His Mother, in honoring the saints, we learn that for each of us there is an act of the Spirit of God.”
These days of joy continued onto the third day, Monday, the 25th of March, with the Hierarchical Liturgy at the end, in which His Eminence gave a teaching address showing the role of Christian mothers who have the responsibility of raising sons and daughters for God:
“On this day, when we honor the Mother of God, it is fitting to honor all Christian mothers, all mothers who gave life to their children and then took care to educate them in a Christian way. The child is brought into the world through the love of the parents, but then the child must receive the right education to become a good Christian and a son of the Church. The responsibility of motherhood is not only fulfilled through birth, but also through the education of children. Our educated children will also become parents and if they have received a Christian education, they will carry it on... I urge all of you to honor the Mother of God, to pray to her, to ask for her help in educating your children.”
Our feast was concluded by a rich fish meal lovingly prepared by our faithful parishioners. We thank God for everything and ask Him to bless the saving plans of our parish, organized with the blessing of His Eminence Nicolae, and to give us as many feasts of salvation as possible.
Pr. Petru Neaga
Olmsted Township, Ohio
