First Sunday of Lent
Dear brothers and sisters, greetings as we follow the sombre, penitential days of the first week of the Fast and the Great Canon of Repentance with today’s joyful celebration of the restoration of the holy icons and the Triumph of Orthodoxy.
We were a thin on numbers, which was surprising, given that it was the culmination of the first week of the Fast and such an important day on the Church calendar, but were celebrated joyfully and fully, with the synodikon of Orthodoxy following the Liturgy.
During this Lenten season, the Liturgy of St Basil is celebrated on Sundays, with its considerably longer priestly prayers, and extended settings of sacred chant. As there are generally more faithful to confess during the fast, may we prompt you not to leave confession till late in the Hours, so that both Father Mark and I are able to celebrate the whole Liturgy in this sacred season.
Thanks to all who contributed to the daytime and evening services with the Great Canon, last week. Our students were dedicated in their reading, and also in working on our media presence, sharing scenes from the week’s Lenten parish life.
In the coming week, the Liturgy of the Pre-Sanctified Gifts will be celebrated in Llanelli at 18:30, on Wednesday. This is essentially a vesperal Liturgy in which an additional Lamb, consecrated on Sunday is broken and distributed in Holy Communion. This ancient Liturgy of St Gregory the Dialogist, Pope of Old Rome, replaces the Divine Liturgy on Lenten weekdays. Anyone communing should fast from noon at the latest.
In Cardiff, we will chant Great Compline in Nazareth House at 18:00 on Thursday, and I will hear confessions. This order of compline is celebrated during the Fast and on the eves of Nativity, Theophany and Annunciation, and has considerably more Psalms and hymns than Small Compline – and will give our young brothers plenty of reading to share!
On Friday, we will celebrate a service to the Lord’s Divine Passion in the Oratory Church at 15:00, and will use the new Lenten vestments which arrived from Ukraine, last week, and were blessed by Father Mark before Sunday’s Liturgy. We also look forward to using new Lenten analoy covers sent by Joanna’s mother, from Poland. I will be available to hear confessions both before and after this Passion service.
Next Sunday, we will return to St Philip’s, now replete with a lovely, large kitchen. We will be reorienting our worship to avoid entering next to the altar, turning our set-up by 90 degrees and hopefully finding this arrangement much more conducive to worship.
May I remind you that our next Sunday Liturgy will be followed by our annual general meeting, so there will be no shared trapeza, and you are asked to bring a personal packed lunch.
At mid-Lent, on the Sunday of the Cross, we will mark the thirtieth anniversary of the death of Archimandrite Barnabas, the great pioneer of Orthodox mission in Wales, and look forward to Father Luke joining us for the Divine Liturgy and a post Liturgy memorial for this greatly loved figure, who reconciled Welshness and Orthodoxy – proving that there is nothing antithetical about them, but rather an essential spiritual harmony, in the footsteps of our great Welsh Saints.
We look forward to the hierarchically led Rite of Holy Unction (soborovanie) the following weekend – on Saturday 21 March – with the mysterion for the Southern part of Britain being celebrated in the cathedral at 14:00. Please offer spare car places to fellow parishioners if you are able to head to Chiswick for this important occasion.
We ask your prayers for matushka Alla, Anastasia and Tomasz, who are travelling (matushka returning from the USA on Tuesday and Anastasia and Tomasz affected by military action in Iran), and for the sick servant of God, Diamantis.
Asking your forgiveness, for Christ’s sake.
May God bless you.
Hieromonk Mark