On my Facebook page the other day, I wrote about the beauty of the Orthodox Vespers service.  If my opinion matters, I do believe that the Vespers is the most beautiful of all of the Orthodox Liturgies that I have the honor of serving.  There is something about standing in the center of the church, in almost complete darkness, praying “let my prayers arise as incense.”

Hanging in front of all of the Icons in the Church are lamps, ours are not oil lamps, but they are lit and illumine the faces of the Icons.  Standing there in the darkness, with the flicker of the flame and the illumined faces staring back at you, puts you in the mind of prayer.  All of the distractions of the world seem to melt away in that darkness.

Sure the lamps should be oil, and perhaps I am lazy, but candles seem to work better for us.  I think part of the issue is we do not heat the Church during the week and, believe it or not, oil will get solid in the cold.  We have a bottle of oil, the oil blessed at the Unction Service on Holy Wednesday that always gets solid this time of year so I can only imagine how the oil lamps would fair.

However, in my house, in my Icon corner, I have an oil lamp that burns most of the time.  The oil lamp is a constant reminder that we have to be ready to receive the bridegroom when he comes, just as the wise virgins in Scripture were ready.  Preparedness is the theme of this season of Advent, preparing for the coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the Flesh.  Keeping the lamps of our hearts and minds trimmed until He comes is what will keep us on the path toward Theosis.

Is your lamp lit?

I find it interesting that the topic up for discussion today on the Pastoral Blogging exercise is the Snowflake, because as I sit here and write this it is snowing outside my window.  Well not really snowing as much as it is freezing rain, and that I do not like.

I am not sure what it is but there is something about falling snow that relaxes me, as long as I do not have to drive in it.  I like to stand in the window, drinking a cup of tea or coffee, and watch the snow falling.  As they fall, they all work together to form a pile, they cannot do it alone, they need each other.  Just like all of us, alone we are just that, alone, but if we join with others it is amazing what we will be able to accomplish.

I know snow can be a big pain and eventually I have to go and move all of those individual snowflakes, but I still like to stand and watch as it falls.  The white snow covers up the dead brown grass and leaves that the fall has left behind but it is only temporary.

Eventually that snow will melt and we return to the bleakness of the season.  Our lives can be the same unless we have a life in the Church.  Without Christ our lives are simply bleak and contain nothing, but if we know the Lord of Life then we have everything.

Some of my favorite childhood memories revolve around the Christmas tree.  On Christmas morning my brothers and I would wake up be we could not come out into the living room until my parents, and my grandmother, were in their spots and ready to go.  Then we would come running in to see what Santa brought us.

We used to have one of those silver Christmas trees; you know the one that looked like tin foil.  We had this gizmo on the floors with a flood light in it and a color wheel in front of it so the tree would change colors.  It was great!

The Christmas tree was the item in the house that we would all gather around and open the gifts.  We would linger there all day, in the glow of that flood light, and just be with each other.  Now, in this fast world we live in, things move so fast that we do not spend much time just sitting around.

Slow down and enjoy the view!

There is the old axiom “It is better to give then to receive” but I prefer to receive gifts than to give them, not because I am cheap but because I hate shopping!  But gift giving is important as it does show that we care.

I do hate to shop!  When I go shopping I got to get what I need and get out as fast as I can.  I try to make a list, know exactly where I am going, and “git her done” and move on to the next thing, unless I am going to Tractor Supply I do like to roam around that store.

It was decided a few years back, that the members of my family would not buy for each other.  We would but gifts for my parents and my nieces and nephews but my brothers and I would not buy for each other.  This lightened the load significantly.

I usually end up giving gift cards to various places.  Why buy something they won’t like, to only have to return it after the holiday anyway, when I can give a gift card to their favorite store and give them the joy of shopping.  I also wait for the last possible minute to go!

Gift Giving is a nice and thoughtful thing to do and it usually means a lot to the person getting the gift, so the tradition continues.

It is not the gift that really matters, it is the thought behind the gift that matters most.

“Let my prayer rise like incense, the lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice.” Psalm 140:2

These words from Psalm 140 are used during the celebration of Vespers in the Orthodox Church.  The priest, standing before the altar, raises the censer up as the cantor, or choir, sings these words.  He then proceeds to use the incense around the altar, the Icons on the Iconostasis, and then people who are also Icons.  The Incense is used as a blessing for the holy objects.

It has been said that Orthodoxy Liturgy is a sensory experience and that all of your senses are used during the services in the Orthodox Church.  I have often said that if you can see the altar you did not use enough Incense.  It is hard to think of Orthodox Liturgy separate from Incense.

As some of you reading this might know, I spent several years in an Evangelical Church, in fact I say that if it was not for those years in that Church I never would have found Orthodoxy.  When I think back on those days I think how sterile the “liturgies” were.  No vestments, no color, certainly no incense, just the preacher standing there preaching.  Now if the preaching is good, cool, but there is still something lacking.  In an effort to reform some of the abuses in the historical Church, the reformers threw out the baby with the bath water and have lost the sense of worship.  All of the mystery is gone, and that is what drove me away from Evangelicalism and back towards a liturgical Church.

Orthodox Liturgy is designed not to be a spectator sport, this is why I detest the invasion of the Western Pew into Orthodox Liturgy.  When I was in Romania, the people coming to Liturgy moved around, venerating Icons, lighting candles, praying, going to confession, all the while Liturgy was going on.  Liturgy washes over us and becomes part of us; it is hard to do that when you are corralled in a pew like sheep and goats.  Time for the heresy of the pew to end!

Like the Psalm I quoted above states, let my prayer rise like incense!

One of the things I like best about the Christmas season is the music.  Not the modern junk that is out there, although I do like some of the Celtic Christmas music and the Country Christmas Music is also pretty good.  I have to say that Handel’s Messiah is one of my all-time favorites.

In what seems like another life, I had the honor and privilege of singing in a chorus that presented Handel’s Messiah.  We rehearsed for months to get it all right and then performed it for two nights if memory serves.

To quote from the blog of Fr. John Peck:

The glorious English-language oratorio composed in 1741 by George Frideric Handel, with a scriptural text compiled by Charles Jennens from the King James Bible, and from the Psalms included with the Book of Common Prayer. Most of his quotations come from the Old Testament. It is one of the best known and most beloved choral works ever, spanning 4 1/2 hours to perform in its entirety. He wrote the entire oratorio in 22 days.

Wow 22 days!  That is just amazing.

One of the more famous pieces from the entire work is the Hallelujah Chorus.  I have embedded a video of the Royal Choral Society performing the Hallelujah Chorus at the Royal Albert Hall in 2012.

Fr. John is really trying to stretch my imagination with the topic of today, the foot.  The foot has to be the ugliest part of the human body, no wonder it is located where it is!

However, the Bible has much to say about feet, especially the washing of them.  One of my favorite passages is the passage where Jesus washes the feet of His Apostles.  Washing of the feet was always done by the lowest servant in the household so for Jesus to do this must have been very upsetting.  In fact Peter, in his usual I don’t quite get it yet way, refuses to have his feet washed by Jesus.  But Jesus reasons with him very gently and Peter eventually allows this, but, again in his go overboard fashion, now wants Jesus to wash all of him.  You gotta love Peter!

This past Holy Week, we restored the ancient custom washing feet.  The rubrics follow the Gospel story I just alluded to above.  The priest removes his vestments and ties a towel around his waist and proceeds to wash feet of those gathered.  In one of the most moving moments of the service, the priest will kiss the foot he just washed; again this is a sign of service and of humility.  This past year I chose the parish council, just as Jesus chose His Apostles, this shows that we never be to grand and we should strive to serve all.

Back when I was a monk in a Benedictine community, the abbot would wash the feet of the youngest in the community.  Not the youngest chronologically but the youngest in years of profession. One year this fell to me.  In the same fashion, the abbot would kneel before the monk and wash his feet.  The leader of the community washing the feet of the lowest.

We are called to imitate the life of Christ in our own lives and this is one way that we have to do that.  We must continually humble ourselves for our own spiritual well-being lest we get to haughty and then the evil one will take hold of us.  We cannot ever forget, no matter what position we ascend to, that we are still servants.

So the holiday season is upon us.  For some this is a time of great excitement and for others this is a time of depression.  Maybe they have lost a loved one over the holidays and are still grieving, maybe their family lives too far away for them to spend time with, or any of the other reasons people fall into depression. How do we avoid holiday depression?

Here are a few tips from an Orthodox perspective, about avoiding holiday depression during the holiday season.  These tips come from the blog Again and Again in Peace written by V. Rev. Archimandrite Nektarios Serfes.

1. An Orthodox Christmas Can be a Remedy for Christmas Depression and Holiday Blues

The birth of Christ brought joy and hope to these who had been in darkness and the way the Orthodox celebrate Christmas is designed to let people feel that hope again. The Orthodox Church teaches that Advent represents the time before Christ, when God’s people were lost and disconnected from God. Instead of “pre-celebrating” the Christmas holidays during Advent, Orthodox Christians participate in a solemn, six-week Nativity fast (started on November 15th until December 25th) during this time. It is a spiritual practice that helps people grieved their losses,endure their sadness, feed their souls, and ultimately, experience joy on Christmas day – the Holy Nativity of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ.

2. The Orthodox Nativity Fast Can Help Those Who Struggle with Depression

During the fast, all meat, cheese, eggs and wine are avoided on most days and primarily vegetarian diet is kept. Fish is allowed except on Wednesdays and Fridays and the last week of the Nativity of our Lord. In place of food, drink and partying during Advent, the faithful are asked to nourish their souls with prayer, communion with their fellow parishioners, and drawing closer to God. For those who are struggling with personal problems, this period can give them a spiritual boost. This helps Orthodox Christians prepare to receive the joy that Christmas day brings. We can spiritually look forward to the joy of the birth of our Lord and this can help take away the blues, as after all we do celebrate the birth of our Lord for ten days afterwards.

In addition to fasting and increased prayer, almsgiving is expected to increase during the Nativity fast. This means, specifically, giving money to relieve poverty and material need. Doing this offers a counterbalance to people’s urges to overspend and over-indulge in material goods during Christmas. It brings the faithful in contact with others who are far worse of financially, quelling feelings of personal deprivation that tends to arise in this culture where so many have so much.

3. The Orthodox Christmas Nativity Fast Helps People Feed their Souls

These acts of almsgiving restore Orthodox Christian’s connection with humanity. They remind the faithful of Jesus’ Great Commandment to love one another, which is the primary act Christians are in charge with. It is a reminder that life has more meaning than the consumption of material goods. It helps Orthodox Christians get out of the rut of the day to day life and put their spirituality first.

4. The Orthodox Feast of the Nativity of our Lord is the Opposite of Depression

The faithful are prepared to experience true joy on the Nativity of our Lord that is Christmas Day. Toward the end of the fast, people feel like they have accomplished something difficult. On Christmas day they break the fast, exit the period of darkness and celebrate the light. The feast is that much sweeter because of the famine which proceeds it. Because they have done the work of nourishing the soul they are now free to indulge in the God-given blessings of food, drink, material things, family, friends and fun. Orthodox Christians believe that God wants people to be joyful.

Even those who are lonely or poor, having their souls filled, may see a path to a more satisfying life, or a way to comfort their pain and experience joy in small things after breaking the fast. The baby in a manger offered hope to the world, Christians are called to follow in His footsteps and to be the light of the world. No person is too faulted or too ordinary to make a difference, according to Orthodox teaching. Each person is called by God to do good in the world and to love one another.

May you have a spiritually rewarding fast in preparation for the Great Feast of the Holy Nativity of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ. Keep Christ our Lord focused in your lives during these holy days of preparation and celebration. Peace to your soul! God love and bless you! Humbly in Christ our Lord.