Family Forum / Parenting / Mothers / March 2005

(snippage)

Hey, Broke -- I just posted this to rec.food.cooking -- I was talking
about my ethnic Easter celebration.  I'm not proselytizing at all--I
just think the language of hope within is quite beautiful:
From the Russian Orthodox Church Easter Vigil service, this is the
Easter Catechetical Address of Saint John Chrysostom:

LET ALL PIOUS MEN and all lovers of God rejoice in the splendor of this
feast; let the wise servants blissfully enter into the joy of their
Lord; let those who have borne the burden of Lent now receive their pay,
and those who have toiled since the first hour, let them now receive
their due reward; let any who came after the third hour be grateful to
join in the feast, and those who may have come after the sixth, let them
not be afraid of being too late, for the Lord is gracious and He
receives the last even as the first. He gives rest to him who comes on
the eleventh hour as well as to him who has toiled since the first :
yes, He has pity on the last and He serves the first; He rewards the one
and is generous to the other; he repays the deed and praises the effort.
 
Come you all: enter into the joy of your Lord. You the first and you the
last, receive alike your reward; you rich and you poor, dance together;
you sober and you weaklings, celebrate the day; you who have kept the
fast and you who have not, rejoice today. The table is richly loaded:
enjoy its royal banquet. The calf is a fatted one: let no one go away
hungry. All of you enjoy the banquet of faith; all of you receive the
riches of his goodness. Let no one grieve over his poverty, for the
universal kingdom has been revealed; let no one weep over his sins, for
pardon has shone from the grave; let no one fear death, for the death of
our Savior has set us free: He has destroyed it by enduring it, He has
despoiled Hades by going down into its kingdom, He has angered it by
allowing it to taste of his flesh.

When Isaiah foresaw all this, he cried out: "O Hades, you have been
angered by encountering Him in the nether world."

Hades is angered because frustrated, it is angered because it has been
mocked, it is angered because it has been destroyed, it is angered
because it has been reduced to naught, it is angered because it is now
captive. It seized a body, and, lo! it discovered God; it seized earth,
and, behold! it encountered heaven; it seized the visible, and was
overcome by the invisible. O death, where is your sting? O Hades, where
is your victory?

*  Christ is risen and you are abolished,
*  Christ is risen and the demons are cast down,
*  Christ is risen and the angels rejoice,
*  Christ is risen and life is freed,
*  Christ is risen and the tomb is emptied of the dead:

for Christ, being risen from the dead, has become the Leader and Reviver
of those who had fallen asleep. To Him be glory and power for ever and
ever. Amen.