Three Special Celebrations This Weekend

THREE SPECIAL CELEBRATIONS THIS WEEKEND Fr Luke A Veronis Today, during this weekend we combine three special, yet quite different, celebrations. First, we remember the birthday of the Virgin Mary. We honor the nativity of the Queen of Heaven, the Mother of God, the most blessed and ever-Virgin Mary who is the Mother of All of Us and the prototype of who we are called to be. Just like we make a big deal about birthdays in our families and with people we know, how much more should we celebrate and rejoice on this birthday of one of the most important figures in all of history of the world, the Birth-Giver of God! We also commemorate today the Sunday before the Exaltation of the Holy, Precious and Life-Giving Cross. This major feast day is September 14th, but it’s such an important feast that both the Sunday before and the Sunday after its celebration we have special Gospel readings related to the importance and centrality of the Cross, the best known symbol of our Faith. Simultaneously, this weekend our Saints Constantine and Helen Church Family celebrate our annual Greek Festival, remembering and highlighting the heritage and history of our Church with its Greek roots. We invite our Central Mass and Northeast CT neighbors to come and enjoy our Greek foods and pastries, our dancing and fun! Yet, the celebration of our Greek Festival is much more profound than simply inviting the local community to taste and enjoy Greece for a day. We invite the local community to “come and see,” to experience what a Christ-centered, loving, and warm Church Family is all about. We are not simply the Greek Church in Webster, as some old timers call us, but we are the “one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church,” the Body of Jesus Christ here on earth. We are followers of the Lord Jesus, born miraculously of the Virgin Mary after she consented to become the Mother of God, crucified on the Cross to take the sins of the world upon Himself and through this Cross conquering death and all darkness, thus revealing to the world His Divine Love. As we heard in today’s Gospel reading, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have life eternal. For God didn’t send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.” This is a summary of what we believe, and it highlights how today’s three celebrations come together. First, we honor and celebrate the Birth of the Virgin Mary. She represents all humanity and shows us the way of life. She dedicated her life to God, growing up in the Temple from the age of two and then being ready to become a vessel in God’s hands. When the Archangel Gabriel appears to her as a young teenager, although she is bewildered and uncertain, she has the humble faith to respond “Here I am, the handmaiden of the Lord. Let it be to me according to His will.” And her response put into play the divine plan of salvation for the entire world. Today’s hymns highlight this reality: “Your Nativity, O Theotokos, imparted joy to the entire earth, for out of you has risen the Sun of Righteousness, Christ our God. He nullified the curse and gave His blessing; causing death to be neutralized and granting eternal life to us all.” “Both Joachim and Anna from their sterility’s stigma, and Adam and Eve from their mortality’s ruin have been set free by your blessed nativity, O Holy Virgin. For this we celebrate, redeemed from the guilt of transgression as we cry out, “The barren one gives birth to the Theotokos, the Nourisher of our Life.” Thus, we celebrate the beginning of our salvation through the birth of the Virgin Mary. Second, we turn our attention to the upcoming Feast of the Holy Cross, remembering what the central purpose of God becoming human is all about. God became man so that this Divine Man would embrace the entire human condition, including the evil of death itself, and then conquer Satan and sin, suffering and evil, darkness and death. The Cross, even though it was the symbol of death during the time of Jesus, becomes the symbol of Life Eternal for us. “Through the Cross joy has come into the world” we say every Sunday. Through the Cross we learn that evil and darkness will not prevail. Through the Cross the sins of the world, our sins, are forgiven and we receive life anew. Through the Cross death has been vanquished and our Lord has opened the door to eternal life. Today, these two events of the birth of the Mother of God and preparation to celebrate the Exaltation of the Cross summarize who we are as a community of faith. Yes, our church was founded by Greek immigrants and we highlight this heritage during our Greek Festival this weekend. Yet, our Church Family is so much more than just this. From a Greek community, look around at us today and see how we have become a diverse family representing different ethnicities and peoples of the world. We are third and fourth generation Greek Americans. We are Albanians, Romanians, Russians, Ethiopians, Lebanese, and Copts. We are converts coming from Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Evangelical backgrounds. We are faithful believers coming from non-religious and atheistic backgrounds. We are God’s Family planted here in Webster, trying to offer a witness of His Love and striving to proclaim the Good News of His salvation to our neighbors, co-workers, friends, and the entire community outside the doors of our Church. We are a community of believers who dedicate our lives to following His Way, His Life, and His Truth on a life-giving journey that is counter-cultural to our world’s ways. We are not only disciples of Jesus Christ, but we are His apprentices, striving to learn how we can imitate His Life and bring His Presence to a lost, confused, and hurting world. As we hold our annual Festival and have hundreds and hundreds of visitors come to our Church, let us look at this as a very special opportunity to radiate the Light of Jesus Christ upon all our visitors. Whatever we do this weekend - how we serve on the food and pastry line, how we set up and clean up, how we work in the kitchen or serve the loukoumades, in whatever role we hold at the Festival - let us remember that we are first and foremost ambassadors of Jesus Christ, offering a witness of our faith through our words, our actions, and all we do. Let us tell people with our words and through how we live our lives about the joy and good news of the Virgin Mary’s birth, the celebration of the Holy Cross, and how this is all a part of the Good News of Salvation which comes from our Lord Jesus Christ which is for all people.