2007
Gathering at Midnight
On the Great and Holy Feast of Pascha, Orthodox Christians celebrate the life-giving Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This feast of feasts is the most significant day in the life of the Church. It is a celebration of the defeat of death, as neither death itself nor the power of the grave could hold our Savior captive. In this victory that came through the Cross, Christ broke the bondage of sin, and through faith offers us restoration, transformation, and eternal life.
Holy Week comes to an end at sunset of Great and Holy Saturday, as the Church prepares to celebrate her most ancient and preeminent festival, Pascha, the feast of feasts. The time of preparation will give way to a time of fulfillment. The glorious and resplendent light emanating from the empty Tomb will dispel the darkness. Christ, risen from the dead, cracks the fortress of death and takes “captivity captive” (Psalm 67:19).
Traditional Orthodox Pascha Service begins just before midnight on Holy Saturday in a darkened sanctuary with a symbolic representation of the Tomb of Christ.
Year |
Western Easter |
Orthodox Holy Pascha |
| 2007 2008 2009 2010 |
08 April 23 March 12 April 04 April |
08 April 27 April 19 April 04 April |
| 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 |
24 April 08 April 31 March 20 April 05 April 27 March 16 April 01 April 21 April 12 April |
24 April 15 April 05 May 20 April 12 April 01 May 16 April 08 April 28 April 19 April |
At midnight the Easter procession begins. The people leave the church building singing: The angels in heaven, 0 Christ our Savior, sing of Thy resurrection. Make us on earth also worthy to hymn Thee with a pure heart.
The procession circles the church building and
returns to the closed doors of the front of the church.
The people re-enter the church building and continue the service of Easter Matins which is entirely sung. The canon hymns of Christ's resurrection. ascribed to St John of Damascus, are chanted with the troparion of the feast as the constantly recurring refrain.
The building is decorated with flowers and lights. The vestments are the bright robes of the resurrection. The Easter icon stands in the center of the church showing Christ destroying the gates of hell and freeing Adam and Eve from the captivity of death. It is the image of the Victor "trampling down death by his own death."
There is the continual singing and censing of the icons and the people, with the constant proclamation of the celebrant: Christ is risen! The faithful continually respond: Indeed he is risen!
Christ Is Risen! Indeed He Is Risen!
The celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church, therefore, is not merely an historical reenactment of the event of Christ's Resurrection as narrated in the gospels. It is not a dramatic representation of the first Easter morning." There is no "sunrise service" since the Easter Matins and the Divine Liturgy are celebrated together in the first dark hours of the first day of the week in order to give men the experience of the "new creation" of the world, and to allow them to enter mystically into the New Jerusalem which shines eternally with the glorious light of Christ, overcoming the perpetual night of evil and destroying the darkness of this mortal and sinful world:
Shine! Shine! O New Jerusalem! The glory of the Lord has shone upon you! Exult and be glad O Zion! Be radiant 0 Pure Theotokos, in the Resurrection of your son!