Bong Bong and Imee

07/05/2024

O Death, where is your sting?
O Hell, where is your victory?
Christ is risen, and you are overthrown.
Christ is risen, and the demons are fallen.
Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice.
Christ is risen, and life reigns.
Christ is risen, and not one dead remains in the grave.

07/05/2024

07/05/2024

The Bright Week and how to pray during the days of the first week after Pascha.

Bright Week, otherwise known as Renewal Week, begins on Pascha Sunday and ends on the following Sunday of Thomas. The name probably originates from the fact that the newly baptised catechumens from Pascha are newly illumined and bright. For them it is a time of regeneration and renewal. These newly baptised in ancient times wore all white for a week, hence the week sometimes being called White Week.

It is a week of concentrated and illustrious celebration of Christ's Resurrection.

This is a fast-free week of constant celebration and spiritual exhilaration.

The hymns chanted every day are identical to those chanted on the Sunday of Pascha, with the exception of a few parts that are taken from the Octoechos (the "Book of the Eight Tones"). Each day has a different tone assigned to it: Easter Sunday is Tone One, Bright Monday is Tone Two, and so on through the eight tones (skipping Tone Seven, the "Grave Tone").

During the Bright Week instead of the Morning Prayers and the Evening Compline we recite the following Resurrectional Prayers:

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Christ is risen from the dead, by death trampling down upon death, and to those in the tombs He has granted life.

Having seen the Resurrection of Christ, let us worship the Holy Lord Jesus, the only sinless one. Your Cross do we worship, O Christ, and Your holy Resurrection do we hymn and glorify. For You are our God, we know no other but You, we call upon Your name. Come all the faithful, let us worship the holy Resurrection of Christ; for behold through the Cross, joy has come in all the world. Ever blessing the Lord, we extol His Resurrection. For enduring the Cross for us, He destroyed death by death.

When the women with Mary had come before dawn, and they found that the stone had been rolled away from the sepulcher, they heard from the Angel, "Why do you seek among the dead, as a mortal man, the One who exists in everlasting light? See the grave clothes in the sepulcher. Run and proclaim to the world that the Lord has risen and put death to death; for He is the Son of God who saves the human race."

Though You went down into the tomb, O Immortal One, yet You brought down the dominion of Hades; and You rose as the victor, O Christ our God; and You called out "Rejoice" to the Myrrh-bearing women, and gave peace to Your Apostles, O Lord who to the fallen grant resurrection.

In body were You inside the sepulcher, and with Your soul in hell, as God in Paradise were You as well with the Robber, and on the throne with Father and Spirit, O Christ, filling all things, being uncircumscribed.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
How full of life and even more beautiful than paradise, and by far more splendid than any king's royal chamber has Your sepulcher, O Christ, been shown to be, and the source of our own resurrection.

Both now and ever and to the ages of ages. Amen.
Divine and hallowed habitation of the Most High God, rejoice. For through you, O Theotokos, has the joy been bestowed on us who cry aloud to you, O Lady, blessed are you among women, all-blameless one.

Christ is risen from the dead, by death trampling down upon death, and to those in the tombs He has granted life.

07/05/2024

The first week after the Resurrection is called Bright Week

07/05/2024

May 07 (Tuesday of Pascha): Apostle and Evangelist Mark (see April 25)

Saints Raphael, Nicholas and Irene of Lesvos

On the island of Mytilene (Lesvos in ancient times), near the village of Therme, the villagers had a custom of ascending a certain hill on this day to celebrate the Divine Liturgy in the ruins of a small chapel, although no one knew whence this tradition sprang. In the year 1959, certain villagers began seeing persons who spoke to them, first in dreams, then awake, both by day and by night. Through these wondrous appearances, which were given to many people independently, the holy Martyrs Raphael, Archimandrite of the Ancient Monastery, and Nicholas, his deacon, together with the other saints martyred on the island, told the villagers the whole account of their martyrdom, which had taken place at the hands of the Moslem Turks ten years after the fall of Constantinople in 1463. The twelve‐year‐old Irene had been tortured, then burned alive in a large earthenware jar in the presence of her parents. On Tuesday of Renewal Week, Saint Raphael had been tied to a tree and his head sawn off through his jaws; Saint Nicholas had died at the sight of this.

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
On Lesvos, ye strove in contest for the sake of Christ God; ye also have hallowed her with the discovery of your relics, O blessed ones. O God‐bearer Raphael, with thee, we all honor Nicholas the deacon and Irene the chaste virgin, as our divine protectors, who now intercede with the Lord.

Kontakion in the Fourth Tone
On this day Thou hast appeared on the world like stars first as ascetics, then as athletes slain for Christ, and were translated to the heights, through the great torments that ye endured; and them that praise you, ye keep and protect, O Saints.

07/05/2024

SOME INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT BRIGHT WEEK

The first week of the Paschaltide is called the Bright Week. This year it's between May 5 and May 11.

Bright Week is not like any other week in the liturgical calendar because of some particularities:

There is no fasting throughout the week, even on Wednesday and Friday, because the entire week is considered to be one continuous day.

The Orthodox Christians greet each other with a joyous «Christ is Risen» and a response «Indeed (or Truly) He has Risen» throughout Bright Week and Eastertide.

During Bright Week the Church celebrates its services with open Royal and Deacon Doors, which symbolizes the opened tomb of Christ.

All church services on Bright Week are performed according to the Paschal order.

After each Divine Liturgy, a cross procession is held around the church, which symbolizes the myrrh-bearing women who walked to Christ’s tomb.

There are no prostrations made during Bright Week and all the way until Pentecost.

Instead of morning and evening prayers, the Paschal Hours are read.