Mission Monthly Newsletter April 2003

...Meditate on These Things. Phillipians 4.8

"Listening to the Hymn of Kassiani (sung on Holy Tuesday) ‘The woman who had fallen into many sins…’ one cannot help thinking… Have we not all fallen into many sins? But how else could we have felt the Miracle of His [Forgiveness] and His Love? This is why all of us, who worship the Lord, are aware that without His help, His intervention, we would be wallowing in the mud permanently."

            Mother Gavrilia  

    While we continue along on our Lenten journey there is nothing wrong with looking ahead with some anticipation to the celebrations that await us at the end of this holy season.  Holy Week is just a few short weeks away, and while we still have much to do between now and then there is something encouraging about remembering the end.

     One of the many beautiful aspects of North American Orthodoxy is our exposure to many different “local” traditions of world Orthodoxy.  There are theological, sacramental, liturgical, iconographic, architectural and ethnic traditions which are all Orthodox, all beautiful, and all gifts bringing us to Truth and Salvation.  Hopefully, even though some traditions may be “different” from what we are “used” to, our continued exposure to this great variety can be a source of thanksgiving.

     One of those varied traditions is how the Hymn of Kassiani from the Matins Apostika of Holy Tuesday evening is sung by the Greeks and is a liturgical highlight not only of Holy Week but of the entire liturgical year.  It is set apart to a special Byzantine chant melody.  It is uniquely beautiful, haunting, and long, giving us not only immense richness of meaning as we consider the sin, repentance, and forgiveness of the sinful woman who anointed Jesus’ head before His burial, but also time to think about it (I believe it takes over five minutes to sing).  [Other traditions treat this hymn very differently, singing it to a common chant without any distinguishing elements from the other hymns that are sung around it.]

     Mother Gavrilia was Greek and undoubtedly she knew this hymn well.  I can say that I am only now beginning to know this hymn and feel the anticipation of hearing it sung once again on Holy Tuesday.  Courage, repentance and confession of sin, forgiveness and righteousness are the themes of that evening’s service, especially in remembering Jesus’ words to this woman’s courageous and loving act, “Why do you trouble this woman?  For she has done a beautiful thing to me… wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her” (Matthew 26:6-13).

     In order to understand forgiveness one truly needs to understand sin, and the hopeless struggle of our fallen nature without the Death and Resurrection of Christ.  In order to understand forgiveness one needs to understand how deeply God loves us and understands our weaknesses.  We hear about this at the beginning of every Matins service “For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust” (Psalm 103:14).  Sin is indeed a mysterious reality.  Some would prefer to deny its existence.  As Orthodox, we prefer to admit it.  We freely admit it not out of cruelty but rather as a means of our Salvation.  As horrible as our sins are we accept that God allows them in order that we might come to know the “Miracle of His Forgiveness and His Love.”  How can this tragedy which separates us from God actually be for our salvation?  Certainly our sins do not exclude us from the possibility of faith and thankfulness.  Forgiveness is the great hope that God has provided us to fight back against those ugly, hidden secrets of our heart.  It is this hope that we are trying to find during the “bright sadness” of the Lenten journey as we seek relief from our distractions of sloth, despair, lust of power, idle talk, food, entertainment and wasteful activity, and increase our vigilance in prayer, worship, hope, sacrifice, self-examination and the confession of our sins.

     Most who have joined themselves to Christ, indeed like the sinful woman, have known the Miracle of Forgiveness.  It is always good to be reminded of how much we have been forgiven!  For those who are not only struggling with sin but also with the idea that God forgives, let this be a beginning of hope and conviction that our faith and worship begin and end in the truth of God’s loving and miraculous forgiveness, mightily proclaimed in these ultimate words of hope and victory, “CHRIST IS RISEN!”