Pascha 2024

It is May 4th and on this particular day in this particular year in the Orthodox Church we are approaching the great feast of Pascha.

At the present moment it is 9:30pm and the paschal service begins in two hours, so the waiting begins.  I typically would be preparing to go to bed in the next hour or so but sleep will not come until early tomorrow morning for me.

Between then and now something wondrously peculiar happens with everyone meeting in what will become a darkened church just prior to the midnight hour.  All the lights will be extinguished and we will capture glimpses of our fellow shadows that breathe and sway in place, like being in a mass grave that is expectant rather than morose or morbid.

Inside the altar a candle is lit and flickers as the priest begins to chant and the royal doors are opened so the light can come out to meet us.  The shadows become faces of people we know that illuminate one by one as the flame is passed from the priest to others and moves person to person.  

When all the candles are lit we exit the side door and process singing solemnly around the outside of the church and to the back doors that are closed to us.  There is meaning in everything.  I sometimes wonder what it looks like or how it is experienced by those out and about on this Saturday evening coming from or going to campus parties in the area when they stumble upon such a scene.

At the stroke of midnight the doors to the church are thrown open and all of the lights are on inside as we re-enter the church and begin exclaiming for the next few hours “Christ is Risen!  Indeed He is Risen!” Throughout the course of the service it is repeated in a fashion that I can only describe as “exuberant”.  And at the end of all of this processing, singing, and proclaiming we go upstairs for a feast of the bleary-eyed but satisfied.  

The drive home in and of itself is a surreal experience as the streets and roads are empty but we are full.

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