Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death (lots of pics, so expect long download)

For me, this was probably the best Pascha yet. This time I feel like I got a real sense of the timing of things. This time I got a real sense of the emotion of the event. When Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus, I understood the emotional side of it (at least to some extent). Father Justin, (see pic to the left) did a good job reading the Gospel. Of course, he just read (canted) it, perhaps it would be better to say that I did a better job than in the past of understanding, listening, contemplating, and empathsizing with the Gospel readings this year.

Every year the tomb area looks fantastic, and this year was no exception. As you can see in the picture on the right and below, there were a ton of flowers that greatly accented the service and “framed” the alter area - specifically “the doors” area.

The team that purchases and arranges these do such a good job each year. I think that the added beauty that they provide adds such a fantastic setting and “ambiance” to the services. Having been to several funerals recently and seeing people laying in state, and the amount that we pay for flowers to be arranged in baskets, to be hung on metal frames, and to be “just right” to help us deal with the dieing.

This is especially interesting in the midst of reading ”For the Life of the World” by Alexander Schmemann - may his memory be eternal - specifically chapter six, “Trampling down Death by Death” and the comparrison of Religion, Secularism and Christianity and how Religion and Secularism both try to make death something that is either “normal” - i.e. the funeral home looks like a “normal” house, the corpse looks “good” - or is a natural condition - “death is a part of life”, “we all die, so live life to the fullest”. Christianity, on the other hand, is not here to be a help. It is here to show truth. The truth is that “death” is one of the enemies (along with sin and the devil). Life is a Sacrament - a Mystery in which we are called to experience and commune with God - and thus, death takes us away from this, and is thus an enemy.

The Ressurection Icon was framed well as well as you can see to the left. I tried to capture the scene of Christ entombed, but it is dark (gee, all the lights are low and using a flash probably wouldn’t be a good idea), but you get the picture (pun intended) from below right.

The picture is shown double the size of the other ones so that you can get a better view of the detail. It didn’t look right at 320x256 so I made it 640x512 even though the actual pic is double that.

Some of the things that stuck out to me this year are…

1) The juxtaposition of Judas counting the cost of the Harlot’s gift to Christ versus his determination of the value of the the life of Christ (which would be immeasurable).
2) The juxtaposition of the Harlot’s kiss of humility and repentance vs. Judas’ kiss of betrayal
3) The “attack of presence” that Jesus did - cf. John 18:3-6 -

Judas got a band of soldiers 3 and guards from the chief priests and the Pharisees and went there with lanterns, torches, and weapons. Jesus, knowing everything that was going to happen to him, went out and said to them, “Whom are you looking for?” They answered him, “Jesus the Nazorean.” 4 He said to them, “I AM.” Judas his betrayer was also with them. When he said to them, “I AM,” they turned away and fell to the ground.

The closest that Hollywood can do to the impact that “I AM” has here, has to be “ I know what you’re thinking. Did he fire six shots or only five? Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I’ve kinda lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya punk?”

Of course, Dirty Harry had fired six, and God still had all his cylinders full… cf. ”Gospel of Nichodemus, Part II”.