The Vesperal Liturgy of St. Basil the Great

Today, we began our preparation for our Lord's coming with the chanting of the Royal Hours, each with their three psalms and Scripture readings from the Old Testament, an Epistle of St. Paul to either the Galatians or Hebrews and the Gospel accounts of Christ's birth.. Anyone who dares think that we Orthodox don't reverently treat or read Scripture within our own services doesn't know what he is talking about. Then we proceeded into the Vesperal Liturgy, which I never had the privilege to chant before. It was glorious. The history of our creatin, decline and the prophecy of our salvation rang through the eight selections from the Old Testament. Then we moved to the Liturgy.

The feast of the Nativity is odd, at least liturgically. Only on Nativity and on Theophany can a Liturgy be celebrated twice (once as part of Vespers and then following the Orthros) for the same Liturgical day. It is magnificent. What is even more magnificent is that the Liturgy following Vespers is not of St. John Chrysostom, but that of St. Basil the Great. St. Basil's Liturgy is only served about ten times a year (Vesperal Liturgy on Nativity Eve, Vesperal Liturgy on Theophany Eve, on St. Basil's Day, the five Sundays of Great Lent, Holy Thursday and Great and Holy Saturday). It is rather unfortunate that we as Orthodox, especially who are not clergy do not to get to hear and pray the wonderful anaphora of this liturgy because it is served so seldom.

Here is the prayer of the Anaphora following the Sanctus:

With these blessed powers, O Master and Lover of Mankind, we sinners also cry out and say: "Holy are You, truly all-holy!" There is no limit to the majesty of your holiness. You are revered in all your works, for in righteousness and true judgment You have ordered all things for us. When You created man and had fashioned him from the dust of the earth and had honored him as your own image, O God, You set him in the midst of a bountiful paradise, promising him life eternal and the enjoyment of everlasting good things by keeping your commandments.

But when he disobeyed You, the true God Who had created him, and was led astray by the deceit of the serpent, he was made subject to death through his own transgressions. In your righteous judgment, O God, You exiled him from paradise into this world and returned him to the earth from which he had been taken. But You provided for him the salvation of rebirth which is in your Christ Himself.

For You did not turn Yourself away forever from your creation whom You had made, O Good One, nor did You forget the work of your hands, but You visited him in different ways. Through the tender compassion of your mercy, You sent forth prophets. You performed great works by the Saints who in every generation were well-pleasing to You. You spoke to us through the mouths of your servants the Prophets who foretold to us the salvation which was to come. You gave us the Law to aid us. You appointed angels to guard us. And when the fullness of time had come, You spoke to us through your Son Himself, through whom You had created time.

Being the Brightness of your Glory and the Stamp of your Person, and upholding all things by the power of his Word, your Son did not think of equality with You, Who alone are God and Father, as something to be grasped. And so, although He was God before time began, He appeared on earth and dwelt among us. He was incarnate of a holy virgin and emptied Himself, taking on the form of a servant and being conformed to the body of our lowliness so that He might conform us to the image of his glory. Since sin entered the world through a man and death through sin, so your Only-begotten Son, Who is in your bosom, our God and Father, was well- pleased to be born of a woman, the holy Birth-giver of God and ever- virgin Mary. He was born under the Law, so that He might condemn sin in his own flesh, so that those who died in Adam might be made alive in Him, your Christ.

He lived in this world and gave us commandments for salvation. He released us from the delusions of idolatry and brought us to the knowledge of You, true God and Father. He procured us for Himself as a chosen people, a royal priesthood and a holy nation. Having purified us with water, He sanctified us with the Holy Spirit. He gave Himself as a ransom to death by which we were held captive, having been sold into slavery by sin. He descended into the realm of death through the Cross, that He might fill all things with Himself. He loosed the sorrow of death and rose again from the dead on the third day, for it was not possible that the Author of Life should be conquered by corruption. In this way He made a way to the resurrection of the dead for all flesh. Thus, He became the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep, the first-born of the dead, that He might be first in all ways among all things. Ascending into heaven, He sat at the right hand of your Majesty on High, and He shall come again to reward each person according to his deeds.

Where else is the Gospel so well expressed in our liturgies or prayers? Where else is the history of our salvation so laid out with such optimism and trust in an ever compassionate and loving God? Where else do we hear such profound depth as shown by the emptying of our God to become as we are? The answer is: no where, or at least I can't find it.

I love this prayer of the Anaphora of St. Basil. The opportunity to offer this prayer to God in behalf of all the people is almost enough to make me want to be priest save for the fact that I am unworthy to even consider such a calling in life.

Glory to God for all things! Christ is Born!

Does it really matter if Mary is "ever virgin"?

As we now draw closer and closer to celebrate our Lord's Nativity in the flesh for us and for our salvation, as many Christians go to church services tomorrow and on the feast itself, most of them will invariably hear from the Gospels that the Man-God Jesus Christ was born of the Virgin Mary. There can be no disputing that this is what happened. However, there always seem to arise questions regarding Mary's virginity or possible lack thereof following the birth of her son. Catholics and Orthodox as well as some Lutherans (since Mary is called ever-virgin in the Book of Concord to which Lutherans must make quia subscription as the faithful and correct exposition of their dogma) and even some High Church Anglicans do not doubt that Mary was ever virgin (semper virgo) but such a thought today is considered absolutely ludicrous because what sane person would pass up on the opportunity for sex? So, does Mary's ever-virgin title as given to her by the Orthodox and Catholics really matter? Why do we make such a big deal about it?

I think that even in the time of St. Basil the Great, some of the faithful were making a big deal about it as well. He spoke:

For "he did not know her" - it says - "until she gave birth to a Son, her firstborn." But this could make one suppose that Mary, after having offered in all her purity her own service in giving birth to the Lord, by virtue of the Holy Spirit, did not subsequently refrain from normal conjugal relations. That would not have affected the teaching of our religion at all, because Mary's virginity was necessary until the service of the Incarnation, and what happened afterward need not be investigated in order to affect the doctrine of the mystery. But since the lovers of Christ [that is, the faithful] do not allow themselves to hear that the Mother of God ceased at a given moment to be a virgin, we consider their testimony sufficient

. St. Basil the Great, homily [PG 31, 1468]


St. Basil appears to say that Mary's ever-virgin status and our subscription to it is not necessary for our the faithful to believe. But he does say that the testimony of the faithful in itself is sufficient. Scripture has no words on this exactly (though I do find the explanation given by St. Jerome regarding the garmmar, in particular the Greek word "eos" is convincing enough), but notice that Scripture is NOT what St. Basil appeals to. He appeals to the testimony of the faithful, the lovers of Christ, as St. Basil specifically calls them, as being sufficient in of itself.

St. Vincent of Lerins describes the tenets of the Catholic [Orthodox] faith as that which has been believed, always and everywhere. St. Basil is making the same appeal here, that Mary's ever-virginity is not something to be clawed out with linguistic devices and textual proofs, which most western Christians claim as infallible hermeneutics to defend their often liberal and, frankly, heretical positions. St. Basil is more or less saying, "Sit down and shut up. This is what we believe. Get over yourself."

But does it really matter? I suppose not. I can only imagine that when I am called to make answer before the dread judgement seat of Christ, I am going to be asked to defend my sinfulness and why I should be allowed to partake of the glory of God. I really don't believe that Christ will say that He will let me partake of His glory in eternity only if I believed that His mother was an ever virgin. At least, I hope not.

Many of those who will insist that Mary was intimate with Joseph after Christ's birth, do so to emphasize that Mary was nothing special. Even if you don't believe in the ever-virginity, how can one honestly say that Mary was nothing special? She carried the Logos in her womb, the uncontainable God. How many times do we see, particularly in the Older Testament, that whenever God touches something he created, it burns or it is destroyed? Too many to count. But Mary was unharmed from carrying God, yes, the very God, in herself. "For He made thy womb a throne and more spacious than the heavens" we sing in the Megalynarion of St. Basil the Great. Mary is preserved from all harm that comes when one expects the Creator and created to be in such union together. Hence, that is why Nestorius could not believe that Mary gave birth to God and denied the incarnation. It made no sense to him.

After one has been touched by God, so intimately and so physically, though how can one believe that after such an encounter that Mary would still insist on carnal relations with Joseph? We partake of God mystically, in the Sacraments and, in particular, in the Eucharist. Mary partook of Christ, the Logos constantly for nine months. God was in her. Creation and creator were unified physically, way beyond a mystical or spiritual manner.

In our society today and perhaps for all time, people have viewed sex as a way of completing oneself with someone else. I see nothing wrong with this view provided that it is understood that you should only complete yourself with your spouse. But how can that completion in any way compare to God dwelling within us? I don't know, but I can only imagine.

Thus, Mary was something special. And since she unified in herself both the creator and the created, I don't see why one would partake of earthly pleasures when such an intimacy can only pale as a shadow to the creator's intimacy. But is it necessary for salvation? St. Basil seems to say no, but also dismisses those who would innovate as not being lovers of Christ. He says that those who love Christ would naturally love His mother as ever-virgin. I just think that the arguments of those who deny the ever-virgin have a very specious argument, lack an understanding and humility of just how incomprehensible it is to have creator and created joined together, and, I think have a very negative view of virginity in general especially in this "sexually charged" society of ours.

Arguing about it is pointless, but I foresee no change in the hymnography of the Orthodox Church, especially when we chant the O Monogenes which says:

O only begotten Son and Word of God,
Immortal as you are,
You condescended for our salvation to be incarnate
of the holy Theotokos and ever Virgin Mary,
and without undergoing change You became man,
You were crucified, O Christ God,
and You trampled Death by Your death,
You who are One of the Holy Trinity,
equal in glory with the Father and the Holy Spirit,
Save us.

Don't know if this would solve the Christmas "problem"

As we draw closer to our Lord's Nativity, born in the flesh for us and for our salvation, the more articles on people's home pages and news reports talk about last minute shopping for gifts and the economic effects of said purchases. Along with that, we see a counterpunch, mainly lead by American evangelicals and others, to that materialism reminding Christians to put the Christ back into Christmas or put the Mass back into Christmas or to remind us that Jesus is the reason for the season or that December 25 is Jesus' birthday (I really HATE that one), etc.. Catch phrases are just that, catchy. They really have no substantive value and what is even more ironic is that while these statements decry the rampant commercialism which they (rightly) say debases Christmas, they are making a mint from selling these on bumper stickers, billboards, T-shirts, etc.

For the Orthodox Christian, it is very difficult to observe this time of preparation with fasting, (increased) prayer and alms-giving. It is very easy to give money. All we do is sign a check or give a credit number or drop a few dollars into the salvation army bucket, but when it comes to prayer and restricting our diet from the more salivating courses we see our friends and family offer at get-togethers this year, it is very difficult. And for many of us, who are alone in our Orthodoxy (i.e. we are not married and have no family or close friends who are Orthodox), the struggle is even greater, especially as we are asked to simply "give-in" and just "go with the flow" with regards to the days before the Nativity. Many of us will break the fast and many more of us will not pray except when we go to church on Nativity Eve. So, is there a solution? I think I have one.

If we are pulled so much by the secularization of Christmas, even by other Christians, in order to separate ourselves from it, we should celebrate our Lord's nativity when the vast majority of the Orthodox world does--on January 7. Of course, I am referring to the Old (Julian) Calendar.

Oh, no, not another calendar debate. I don't want to get into a shooting match as to which calendar is better, though I do sympathize with the Old Calendarists. 70% of the world's Orthodox Christians are Old Calendar and those jurisdictions who have "opted" for the New Calendar have only done so since 1923, though the Church of Bulgaria only adopted it in the 1960s. But regardless of whether or not individual jurisdictions have the "right" to change the calendar or whether or not a decision should only be decided by ecumenical council, let me posit two very good pastoral reasons for doing this while debunking a specious reason for keeping things as is.

1) On the Old Calendar, Nativity would be 13 days later than the Western Christmas so there would be less and less temptation out there to divert us from the path of preparation by fasting, prayer and alms-giving. If the rest of the world is getting back to their "normal" practices, that gives us ample opportunity to be ignored and to let us practice our faith from outside intereference. Of course, regardless of what season it is, there will ALWAYS be temptation to steer away from our praxis. Such temptation does not soley come from our non-Orthodox friends and family, but the evil one, I'm sure will redouble his efforts. Still, what a wonderful opportunity this would be for witnessing as well.

2) As I said earlier, about 70% of the world's Orthodox Christians will celebrate our Lord's Nativity on January 7. Why don't we celebrate this feast with them? The only feasts we celebrate together are Pascha, Ascension and Pentecost, no others since they are fixed dates and differ by 13 days. We are told, mainly by (liberal) Western Christians that we should celebrate Christmas with them so as not to give a divided witness to the world! News flash: we are giving a divided witness to the world. Many (by no means all), a great many of Western Christians deny, absolutely deny, the coming of our Lord in the flesh. Or they deny that Christ is God. Modern day Nestorianism, condemned at the Third Ecumenical Council of Ephesus in 431 A.D., is running rampant as is Apollinarianism, also condemned. For many Western Christians, Nativity is not about Christ as it is about themselves, about how they can better themselves and do good, while forgetting and/or denying that it was Christ's coming and God's work which allows us to be good in the first place! That is not the Orthodox way of celebrating Christmas.

And many of our hierarchs still give into this. The council called in 1923 with its canons needs to be rescinded. Why is it more important to celebrate our Lord's death and Resurrection together, when we hold to the same theological importance and not our Lord's incarnation? Why are we worried more about giving a divided witness to the world with western Christians when we are actually giving a divided witness among the Orthodox?

I believe that the adoption or, more accurately, the readoption of the Old (Julian) Calendar can solve more issues than leaving things as they are among the different jurisdictions. I am not calling New Calendarists heretics but we really need to honestly take a look and see if this calendar is what we should be using when there is nothing wrong with the old calendar. So what if it doesn't correspond to the civil calendar? It might be harder to get Orthodox Christmas off than Western Christmas but if we're worried more about days off than worshipping our one God in purity in truth, then nothing is going to be solved.

It's an idea, one that is unpopular, I grant especially with our hierarchs, many of whom don't want to offend the Western Christians by doing things differently. But the fact is this: We Orthodox Christians are different from western Christians.

Mother of God vs. Mother of Jesus

Today is my parent's 40th wedding anniversary (God grant them many more years together) and so when I got home from my church, my parents informed me of what went on with their service. I think my parents paid extra special attention since I'm sure that they were mindful of all the blessings and headaches (i.e. me) that have come with 40 years of marriage. Anyway, they mentioned to me that the theme of this the fourth Sunday in Advent was about Mary and Elizabeth. (On a side note, Fr. Peters over at Pastoral Meanderings has a blog on his flock's response to Mary in today's service) I responded that in our church, the Sunday before Christmas is referred to as the Sunday of Genealogy where we read the forefathers and foremothers of Christ our God, born in the flesh and that we stress that God did not simply appear but became as we are to make us what He is. I then asked a question, because I was genuinely curious: Did the pastor refer to Mary as "Mother of God" or "Mother of Jesus?" Nearly instantly, my parents responded "Mother of Jesus." I had to shake my head in disbelief and responded with a typical shockingly "What?" My parents thought I was making a big difference over nothing. But then again, I wonder how many Orthodox (cradle and convert alike) would also assume that there is no fundamental difference in the terminology.

I would never, ever accuse Lutherans of holding a heretical Christology, never. Then again, I think, as with the case of my parents, they see (and probably many Lutheran clergy) that there is no difference in "Mother of God" versus "Mother of Jesus" even though there is quite a difference in those two descriptions. I then responded that to call Mary the Mother of Jesus is to make a Nestorian distinction between the Logos and the man, Jesus. My parents, in all honesty, did not know what Nestorian means.

As far as I understand the term (and I have been reading +Fr. John Meyendorff's book, The Person of Christ in Eastern Thought lately so that sort of helps), a Nestorian understanding of the person of Jesus Christ arises when one believes that there can be no union of the divine and the created together in one substance since that would presuppose that as the mortal part grows old and dies that hence God would die as well, which, of course is impossible. Also, Nestorius said that in His very nature, God could not assume that which He is by nature not (i.e. creator assuming the created). Hence, Mary gave birth to Jesus Christ only and gave her the epithet "Christotokos" which is Greek for "Mother of Christ." Now, to be fair to Nestorius (though he was condemned as a heretic by the Council of Ephesus in 431 A.D.), and like most other heretics who were without doubt pious men, he probably just felt that the idea of Mary giving birth to the Divine God with human attributes would somehow rob the Godhead of the glory that is due to Him. So Nestorius' solution to his own problem was that there were in fact two persons, the Divine Logos and the human Christ and Mary was the mother of the latter.

Of course orthodox Christian doctrine (notice I use the small "o" deliberately to refer to Christian confessions such as Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Anglicans and some other Protestant sects as well as the Orthodox) is that Jesus Christ was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary (Nicene Creed) and thus he is both God and man in one union. There is only one person, Jesus Christ, but there is present two substances, which, clarified by the Council of Chalcedon in 451 which were neither commingled nor confused but contained in one hypostatsis, i.e. the God-man, Jesus Christ.

But let's get back to Mary. Lutherans, it seems, will object to the term Theotokos for Mary because it assumes that Mary is supplying the Divine chromosome, so to speak. Of course, this is not Orthodox theology or belief. But to say that she only gave birth to a human is to deny the reality of the incarnation. Again, Lutheran theology, especially as it is contained in the Book of Concord which are the Lutheran confessions, is very orthodox (again, notice the small "o") on this point since it explicitly says that Mary gave birth to ONE person, the God-man Jesus Christ. Thus, Lutherans do accept the tenets of the Council of Ephesus, but, according to them, the only reason they do is because they say it agrees with Scripture (that's an argument for another time).

It's easy for me to shake my head in disbelief when I hear Lutherans call Mary only the Mother of Jesus since I know that they are not heretical in this regard. But when you insist that there is a vital difference in calling her Mother of God versus Mother of Jesus, it will often result in a "it makes no difference" or "well, that's your way of looking at it." I think, though, that if people (and I mean all Christians who accept the incarnation as an article of faith handed down by the Church) really understood that one description does damage to the understanding of why God became incarnate, without which we could not have possibly been saved, then I think the terminology will take care of itself. The only remedy, for Lutherans and Orthodox alike, is continued catechesis and insistence that the two titles do NOT mean the same thing.

Make ready, O Bethlehem

Today, December 20 is the Forefeast of the Nativity of our Lord and God and Saviour Jesus Christ. At the cycle of services, we are privileged to chant this hymn:

Make ready, O Bethlehem for Eden hath been opened for all. Prepare, O Ephratha, for the Tree of Life hath blossomed forth in the cave from the Virgin. For her womb didst appear as a supersensual paradise in which is planted that Holy Vine. If we should eat thereof, we shal live and not die as Adam of old. Verily, Christ shall be born, raising the image that fell at the beginning.

I love this hymn especially since it is chanted on the hard chromatic (hijaz-kar) scale of the fourth mode. In other words, it sounds more like a plagal second, but musically speaking, it is fourth tone. But another reason why I love this hymn so much is because this short little hymn synthesizes so much of our faith: our ancestral curse, the incarnation, the eucharist, the resurrection and the redemption of mankind from mortal corruption and sin.

Here is a recording of this hymn with a litte video that I made. And it's in English, though I myself prefer Greek.

Appeal for comments

I wonder if really anyone reads what I write. I grant it's not the most profound or enlightened string of thoughts ever put together, but I would really appreciate if more of you would like to leave comments here. Perhaps this is pure ego speaking, but I would really like feedback. Many thanks.

What people should not be doing in church

In the service books of the Orthodox Church, there is a firm line between what the priest does and what the people/choir do. Of course in modern Catholicism and Protestantism which still use some form of the historic Western Liturgy, many people erroneously claim that the prayers that the priest and/or deacon prays should also be reserved for them. Oftentimes, while the people/choir are singing a hymn or antiphons, the priest is praying and we only hear him at a Doxology. Many people suggest that the choir/people sing the hymn and then the priest and the people pray together. Such is dangerous for it eliminates the sacral nature of the ministry and makes the priest into a mere leader rather than as the leader and intercessor of his flock before the dread judgment seat of Christ as represented in the altar. Such is why it is always appropriate that the priest always face the altar and pray not the people. In a courtroom, you don't plead your case to the judge with your back turned to him and plead it to those in the seats who have no bearing whatsoever on the actual decision, do you?

One of the things that really bothers me is the "democratic" mentality that has infused many Orthodox, both cradle and convert alike. The prayers of the priest are everyone's they claim. They forget that the ordination to the priesthood is a sacrament. St. John Chrysostom says that after the Incarnation of our Lord and God and Saviour, the most important gift God gave to mankind is the priesthood. The priest has been called away and is signed with the countenance of our God to adminster the mysteries for the flock faithfully. Such is what he will be judged for at the last judgment. I can only imagine the dread and terror that would strike me if I were given the lamb in my hands at my consecration and told that I will have to make answer to the Judge that I did this with reverence and fear and did it with the spritual well being of my flock in mind (for receiving and not receiving alike). The priest, in the sacred scheme of things is thus not like you or me. We celebrate together but not in the same fashion. We complement each other.

Thus, the priest's and deacon's prayers are not meant for us. This is especially true at the epiclesis, where the priest (not us) calls the Holy Spirit to descend and "Make this body the True Body of Thy Christ" and "This to be the True Blood of Thy Christ", "changing them by the Holy Spirit." Now, the service books will indicate, wrongly, that the first two of these petitions are responded to by the people with "Amen" and at the third petition, the people will respond, "Amen, amen, amen!" All of this is absolutely and unequivocally WRONG! The "Amens" are to be spoken by the deacon and the deacon only! The modern service books do not say this, but such a practice of the people usurping the deacon's role is again to suggest that there is no difference between the clergy and the people, when there is. Even the epiclesis itself is to be chanted silently by the priest as we should be in terror and awe and even on our knees (if not a Sunday) for the transformation that is about to take place. Here is another source which confirms what I say.

It is not for us to usurp the roles which are granted to the clergy exclusively. The people are not priests. If they are called to be, that is different, but make no mistake that to blur the distinction between clergy and people is to blur the distinction between the creator and created, between substance and likeness, between Christ and His Church.