Saturday night I went to the Pascha service at Holy Theophany Orthodox Church. It began at 11:30pm.
I felt tension the entire time. It's not because I stood reverently for 2 and 1/2 hours (and that wasn't even the whole service). It's not because I only knew a couple people there and felt out of place. It's not because I feel uncomfortable with Orthodox theology and practice (you may know me well enough to know that that's not true).
I felt tension because I didn't know whether to open my eyes or close them. If I closed my eyes, the beautiful singing and the enchanting incense captured me soul in a special and healing way. If I opened my eyes, the devotion of the worshipers and the beauty of the iconography drew me deep into adoration and reflection.
It is not often that we encounter something so beautiful that we know not whether to open our eyes or close them in order to fully experience it. Shouldn't our celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ be one of those things?
So going forward from Easter (a month ago in our Western Protestant practice and this past weekend in Eastern Orthodox practice) let's live with our eyes opened at times and our eyes closed at times in order to fully encounter the beauty of God.
To learn more about the service, you can check out a couple different sites: Holy Pascha from the Orthodox Church in America website, Pascha from OrthodoxWiki, and the texts for the service of Pascha.
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