This Week

Sunday of St. Mary of Egypt, April 14
9:00 AM: Orthros; 10:00 AM: Hierarchical Divine Liturgy, Sunday School

Monday, April 15
7:00 PM: Great Compline, followed by Confessions

Friday, April 19
9:00 AM: Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts

Saturday of Lazaros, April 20
9:00 AM: Divine Liturgy, Youth Retreat; 5:00 PM: Great Vespers

Palm Sunday, April 21
9:00 AM: Orthros & Blessing of Palms; 10:00 AM: Divine Liturgy; 11:30 AM: Fish Luncheon; 7:00 PM: Bridegroom Service

Fasting this Week
Sun & Sat: Wine & Oil Allowed; Mon-Fri: Strict Fast; Palm Sunday: Fish Allowed

Announcements & Future Events

This morning, we welcome His Eminence Metropolitan METHODIOS of Boston to our parish. His Eminence has just celebrated 35 years on the Hierarchical Throne of the Diocese, and later Holy Metropolis, of Boston. The Parish Council invites everyone to Coffee Hour and Fellowsip with our Metropolitan following Divine Services. Εις πολλά έτη Δέσποτα - Many years Your Eminence!

Yesterday's Fundraiser: Many thanks to all those who participated in yesterday's Spring Take-Out Dinner & Bake Sale: both as guests and especially all of our gracious, hard-working volunteers. Our Spring and Fall fundraisers, as well as the Summer Festival, are key in our mission "to preach faithfully and worshipfully the Gospel of our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ to the faithful Orthodox Christians and people of the metropolitan area of Burlington, VT."

Schedule Change: please note that we will not have the Presanctified Liturgy on Wednesday (there will be a Liturgy on Friday morning). Fr Andreas will be in Boston for the funeral of Fr Asterios Gerostergios. Fr Asterios fell asleep in the Lord this past week, having just recently retired from serving the Cambridge, MA parish for 40 years. As many of you know, Fr Andreas was assigned to that community as a Seminarian, and then served with Fr Asterios as a Deacon. Eternal memory!

Next Weekend: on Saturday of Lazaros (Apr. 20) we will have Divine Liturgy at 9:00 AM followed by a Youth Retreat until noon. As Fr Andreas has done for the last few years, this will be a teaching/explanatory Liturgy. On Palm Sunday, everyone is invited to a Fish Luncheon provided by the Parish Council - there is no charge, but donations to offset the food costs are greatly appreciated.

WELCOME VISITORS — WE ARE PLEASED THAT YOU HAVE JOINED US TODAY! The Orthodox Church teaches that Holy Communion is a sign of unity. In order to receive Holy Communion in the Greek Orthodox Church, you must have been baptized or chrismated in the Christian Orthodox Faith. If you are interested in learning more about Christian Orthodoxy, please contact our Parish Priest, Father Andreas. Communicants should prepare themselves through fasting, prayer and confession. All Christians are invited to come forward at the end of Divine Liturgy to receive the Antidoron, holy bread, which is offered to all as a blessing.

Saints and Feasts

April 14

Sunday of St. Mary of Egypt

The memory of this Saint is celebrated on April 1, where her life is recorded. Since the end of the holy Forty Days is drawing nigh, it has been appointed for this day also, so that if we think it hard to practice a little abstinence forty days, we might be roused by the heroism of her who fasted in the wilderness forty-seven years; and also that the great loving-kindness of God, and His readiness to receive the repentant, might be demonstrated in very deed.

April 14

Aristarchus, Pudens, Trophimus the Apostles of the 70

Saint Aristarchus is mentioned in the Epistle to the Colossians (4:10), and also in the Epistle to Philemon (v. 24). By his ascetical manner of life, this Saint proved to be another Saint John the Baptist. He became Bishop of Apamea in Syria, and brought many to the Faith of Christ. Saints Pudens and Trophimus are mentioned in II Timothy 4:20-21. Also, Acts 21:29 mentions that Trophimus was from Ephesus. According to sources that Saint Dorotheus of Tyre (celebrated on June 5) found written in Latin in Rome, these Apostles were beheaded in Rome during the reign of Nero (54-68).

April 20

Lazarus Saturday

Lazarus and his sisters Martha and Mary, the friends of the Lord Jesus, had given Him hospitality and served Him many times (Luke 10:38-4z; John 12:2-3). They were from Bethany, a village of Judea. This village is situated in the eastern parts by the foothills of the Mount of Olives, about two Roman miles from Jerusalem. When Lazarus - whose name is a Hellenized form of "Eleazar," which means "God has helped," became ill some days before the saving Passion, his sisters had this report taken to our Saviour, Who was then in Galilee. Nonetheless, He tarried yet two more days until Lazarus died; then He said to His disciples, "Let us go into Judea that I might awake My friend who sleepeth." By this, of course, He meant the deep sleep of death. On arriving at Bethany, He consoled the sisters of Lazarus, who was already four days dead. Jesus groaned in spirit and was troubled at the death of His beloved friend. He asked, "Where have ye laid his body?" and He wept over him. When He drew nigh to the tomb, He commanded that they remove the stone, and He lifted up His eyes, and giving thanks to God the Father, He cried out with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come forth." And he that had been dead four days came forth immediately, bound hand and foot with the grave clothes, and Jesus said to those standing there, "Loose him, and let him go." This is the supernatural wonder wrought by the Saviour that we celebrate on this day.

According to an ancient tradition, it is said that Lazarus was thirty years old when the Lord raised him; then he lived another thirty years on Cyprus and there reposed in the Lord. It is furthermore related that after he was raised from the dead, he never laughed till the end of his life, but that once only, when he saw someone stealing a clay vessel, he smiled and said, "Clay stealing clay." His grave is situated in the city of Kition, having the inscription: "Lazarus the four days dead and friend of Christ." In 890 his sacred relics were transferred to Constantinople by Emperor Leo the Wise, at which time undoubtedly the Emperor composed his stichera for Vespers, "Wishing to behold the tomb of Lazarus . . ."

Hymns of the Day

Resurrectional Apolytikion in the Plagal 1st Mode

Let us the faithful give praise and worship to the Logos, co-eternal with the Father and the Spirit, born of the Virgin for our salvation; for of His own goodwill He consented to ascend the cross in the flesh and endured death and raised from the dead by His glorious resurrection.

Apolytikion for Sun. of St. Mary of Egypt in the Plagal 4th Mode

In you, O Mother, is preserved undistorted what was made in the image of God; for taking up the cross, you followed Christ and by example taught, that we should overlook the flesh, since it passes away, and instead look after the soul, since it is immortal. And therefore, O devout Mary, your spirit rejoices with the angels.

Apolytikion of Church of the Dormition in the 1st Mode

In giving birth you did retain your virginity. In your repose, you did not forsake the world, O Theotokos. You have passed into life, you that are the Mother of Life. And by your intercessions, you redeem our souls from death.

Ἐν τῇ Γεννήσει τὴν παρθενίαν ἐφύλαξας, ἐν τῇ Κοιμήσει τὸν κόσμον οὐ κατέλιπες Θεοτόκε. Μετέστης πρὸς τὴν ζωήν, μήτηρ ὑπάρχουσα τῆς ζωῆς, καὶ ταῖς πρεσβείαις ταῖς σαῖς λυτρουμένη, ἐκ θανάτου τὰς ψυχὰς ἡμῶν.

Gospel and Epistle Readings

Epistle Reading

Sunday of St. Mary of Egypt
The Reading is from St. Paul's Letter to the Hebrews 9:11-14

BRETHREN, when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the Holy Place, taking not the blood of goats and calves but his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. For if the sprinkling of defiled persons with the blood of goats and bulls and with the ashes of a heifer sanctifies for the purification of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify your conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

Gospel Reading

Sunday of St. Mary of Egypt
The Reading is from Mark 10:32-45

At that time, Jesus took his twelve disciples, and he began to tell them what was to happen to him, saying, "Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death, and deliver him to the Gentiles; and they will mock him, and spit upon him, and scourge him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise." And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him, and said to him, "Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you." And he said to them, "What do you want me to do for you?" And they said to him, "Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory." But Jesus said to them, "You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?" And they said to him, "We are able." And Jesus said to them, "The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared." And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant of James and John. And Jesus called them to him and said to them, "You know that those who are supposed to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of man also came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."

Wisdom of the Fathers

For that throne is inaccessible to all, I do not say to men only, and saints, and apostles, but even to angels, and archangels, and to all the powers that are on high... But for whom is it prepared? For them who could become distinguished by their works... Hear at least how this same John, he who now came to Him for these things, everywhere gives up the first place to Peter, both in addressing the people, and in working miracles, in the Acts of the Apostles. And he conceals not Peter's good deeds, but relates both the confession, which he openly made when all were silent, and his entering into the tomb, and puts the apostle before himself.

St. John Chrysostom

Homily 65 on Matthew 20, 2,3,4,6. B#54, pp.399-401,403., 4th Century

Before He humbled Himself, only the angels knew him. After He humbled Himself, all human nature knew Him. You see how His humbling of Himself did not make Him have less but produced countless benefits, countless deeds of virtue, and made His glory shine forth with greater brightness? God wants for nothing and has need of nothing. Yet, when He humbled Himself, He produced such great good, increased His household, and extended His kingdom. Why, then, are you afraid that you will become less if you humble yourself?

St. John Chrysostom

On the Incomprehensible Nature of God. 8.46-47. Taken from: Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture. Vol: Mark. Intervarsity Press, 2005, p. 143.

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