A story of faith on the leper island of Spinalonga
A photo of Hrysanthos Katsoulogiannakis, the leper priest
The tiny island of Spinalonga located in the Gulf of Elounda in north-eastern Crete was the last leper colony in all of Europe from 1903-1957. At it’s peak, the colony was comprised of nearly 400 inhabitants. It was recorded that the lepers who lived on Spinalonga island were angry at God, the reason being that their ailment was a huge, unbearable ordeal. It was an isolating and tragic life as they were unable to leave the colony, although it was possible for their families to visit.
A priest from Ierapetra town in Crete had dared to visit them once, to perform a Liturgy together with the colony's new settlers. The church in which he invited the lepers to gather was falling into ruin. Sadly, not a single soul turned up for the first Liturgy in the humble church.
The lepers listened to the chanting, stubbornly remaining inside their cells, sometimes drowning it out with their groans and sometimes with their curses. But the priest went there again. During that second visit, one of the patients bravely showed himself at the doorstep of the church, with the following statement: "Priest, I will sit through your Liturgy, but only under one condition. At the end, you will give me Communion. And if your God is as almighty as you say, you will afterwards conclude the Liturgy (by partaking of what was left in the same Chalice) and not be afraid of my leprosy".
The priest nodded compliantly. These words were overheard from the neighboring cells and various individuals began to gather near the side of the church, where there was a small gap in the crumbling wall that offered them a limited view of the inner sanctum. The lepers remained in waiting until the end of the Liturgy and watched the priest, in tears and kneeling before the Sacred Table of Offering, as he concluded the ritual.
A month went by. The lepers waited for him. They were convinced that this time he would come as a patient and not as a priest. And yet, the priest returned, healthy and rosy-cheeked, and with his morale invigorated began to ring the church bell of the old chapel.
From that time on, and for at least ten years, Spinalonga island had a priest of its own, this priest. The lepers restored the church by themselves, and along with the church, they restored their faith. They took Holy Communion regularly and they would always secretly observe their priest during the conclusion of the Liturgy, to make sure that the "miracle of Spinalonga" was repeated, over and over again.
In 1957, with the discovery of antibiotics and the cure for leprosy, the leprosarium was shut down and the island was deserted. Only the priest remained on the island, until 1962, offering memorial services for the lepers, until 5 years after their death.
A more through account of the story (in Greek) is posted at: https://www.romfea.gr/prosopa/1721-enas-theostaltos-agios-sto-nisi-ton-kataramenon
Faith with Works (OCF Lenten Retreat)
Further thoughts and recommendations concerning COVID-19
As many of us have become aware from the news, the first case of death from COVID-19 in California has happened in Kaiser Roseville. This is then an opportunity for us to learn what we can about the virus and also to attempt to limit its spreading within the community. We do so remaining prayerful for those who have been exposed to the virus (and other ailments), and also thankful for those who look for cures and those who tend to the ailing. We must also never forget that we are a prayer, faithful, hopeful and joyful people, firmly grounded in the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
One of our physicians has prepared the following information for us:
COVID-19 infection presents with flu-like symptoms, fever, cough, and sore throat, as well as abdominal pain and diarrhea in some cases. Adults age 60 y.o. or above, and people with weakened immune system (for example, on biologics, chemotherapy, with history cancer or lung disease) are at risk for severe illness due to respiratory failure (inability to breathe effectively).
Most common ways the virus is transmitted is through contact with infected body fluids (for example touching a contaminated surface of an object within 6 feet of an infected person who was coughing or sneezing, then touching your eyes, mouth, or nose). Virus lives outside the human body for about 2 days. So good cleaning and hand hygiene are very important.
The second most common way to contract the virus is through droplets of bodily fluids from coughing, sneezing, or eating within 6 feet of a person who has an infection. The way to protect yourself from this mode of transmission is through wearing a simple surgical mask.
The least common way to get sick from the COVID-19 is airborne transmission. There are special masks that can be purchased online, however they do have to be fitted in order to work properly. Additionally, non medical personnel purchasing them has led to a shortage in some hospitals. Therefore, if you travel to the Emergency room, a hospital, an airport, on a plane, or in a crowded situation with higher risk of exposure to sick people, consider a surgical mask, along with safety googles and hand sanitizer..
At the parish, we will do the following:
provide alcohol based hand sanitizer and wipes in the Narthex to help maintain good hand hygiene.
sanitize surfaces in and around the parish, including icons and the blessing Cross.
provide surgical masks in the Narthex, which you may wish to put on if you have a cough (though best to stay home if you are sick) or if you are over 60 or have a weakened immune system.
Thankfully, little children are much less likely to get severe illness from COVID-19. They can however pass the infection to others even if they themselves may have mild illness, because they commonly won't cover their cough or wear masks withe ease. If a child is sick, consider keeping him/her at home out of respect for those who are older and or with weakened immune systems.
Again, thank you to all of our medical professionals at the Parish. May God continue to inspire them in the care of the ailing through the intercessions of Ss. Cosmas and Damian, Ss. Kyros and John, S. Panteleimon, S. Luke of Crimea, and all of the physician saints. May the Lord be merciful to all!
La Divina Liturgia, Holy Cross Church Sacramento
COVID-19: Practical and Spiritual Considerations
In each and every service of the Orthodox Christian Church we pray in general terms for the whole of creation. Appropriately, we also call to mind instances and circumstances that demand our specific prayers, always asking God to have mercy. In recent days, our prayers ought to include those who are ailing, those who are caring for the sick, and those who researching, ever looking for cures that bring forth healing.
As news of the spread of the novel coronavirus (now referred to as COVID-19) has continued, it provides us the opportunity to pause, to pray and to consider our response as Orthodox Christians. I therefore share with you a few of my thoughts.
To help prevent the spread of respiratory viruses, including Covid-19 and the flu, the CDC has suggested the following:
· Wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. If soap and water are not available, use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer.
· Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands.
· Avoid close contact with people who are sick.
· Stay home when you are sick.
· Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue, then throw the tissue in the trash.
· Clean and disinfect frequently touched objects and surfaces.
Of course, these suggestions are just good habits for all us in any season and at any age. We take logical steps to ensure our wellbeing as well as to care for all of our brothers and sisters in Christ. Why not clean our icons and the blessing Cross between services, for instance? We should always take any and all appropriate measures to stay healthy regardless of season. And, as other recommendations are made, we incorporate them into our routines, be it at home, in the work place or at the parish, thanks be to God!
As a brother priest shared with his community though, fear and anxiety often increase at moments like this. Thankfully, Christians are not defined by fear. Rather, we put our trust and hope in Christ who is Himself Life. He is the One, the Physician, who brings healing of both body and soul, through the intercessions of the saints in the Church, which is likened unto a hospital. All of us then who are ailing in soul and or body, in each and every generation, find healing in Christ, in His Church and in His Mysteries.
How fitting it is that we will pray Holy Unction on Monday evening at 6pm as has been our tradition. Together, after asking one another for mutual forgiveness in Great Vespers on Sunday evening, we will in obedience to our Lord ask the Holy Spirit to consecrate olive oil so that when we are anointed by the priests, in fulfillment of Scripture, it will be unto our healing, forgiveness and salvation. Truly, God remains wondrous and glorious!
I should also add that the other practices of our Orthodox Christian Faith will continue to bring healing, most notably, the Holy Eucharist. Although the instruments that we are using, that is the chalice and the spoon are imperfect, for well over a millennia, they have held and passed to us He Who is Perfect, He Who is Life, He Who is healing. Again, we are not receiving symbols, rather we are receiving the actual Body and Blood of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
For those who are unaware, I should add that regardless of setting, be it in a monastery, in the parish or even in a hospital, the deacon or priest consumes whatever remains in the chalice or on a spoon after communing the faithful. We consume what remains of the Holy Eucharist with thanksgiving knowing full well that it is Life, regardless of who receives before us. Is this not an ongoing miracle that takes place around the world in every monastery, parish and cathedral of our Orthodox Christian Church and in each and every generation? Simply, we continue to humbly heed the admonition of the Deacon who directs us in the Liturgy, to receive the Holy Eucharist with “the fear of God, with faith and with love”...unto salvation, regardless of circumstances, because of He Who Is Christ our True God.
I would be remiss though we’re I not to write that all of the practices and disciplines of our faith, even the reception of the Holy Eucharist, are done voluntarily. There is no coercion to do something with which we are uncomfortable. God is big enough to handle any of our questions and concerns, because He is patient, long-suffering and abounding in mercy towards and for all of us. Guilt is not attached to any practice; a spirit of humility is what characterizes our response to each and every awesome expression of God’s love for us.
In closing, these are simply my thoughts as we prepare to enter Great and Holy Lent and as we consider the spread of COVID-19. Of course, I am not a medical doctor, but I do have the privilege of being a physician of souls, so to speak, in spite of my sins and unworthiness. Let us then pray most fervently that Christ, Who is the Physician, will continue to heal and sustain all of His creation.
Catechetical Homily of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew on the beginning of Holy and Great Lent, 2020
Prot. No. 188
CATECHETICAL HOMILY
AT THE OPENING
OF HOLY AND GREAT LENT
+ BARTHOLOMEW
BY GOD’S MERCY
ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE – NEW ROME
AND ECUMENICAL PATRIARCH
TO THE PLENITUDE OF THE CHURCH,
MAY THE GRACE AND PEACE
OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST,
TOGETHER WITH OUR PRAYER, BLESSING AND FORGIVENESS
BE WITH YOU ALL
***
We offer hymns of thanks to the God of love as once again we enter Holy and Great Lent, the arena of ascetic struggle, fasting and abstinence, of vigilance and spiritual awareness, of guarding our senses and prayer, of humility and self-knowledge. We are commencing a new and blessed pilgrimage toward Holy Pascha, which has “opened for us the gates of paradise.” In Church and as Church, as we behold the Risen Lord of glory, we all journey together along the way of deification by grace that leads to the heavenly goods “prepared by God for those who love Him” (1 Cor. 2:9).
In the Church, where “the eternal mystery” of divine Economy is realized, all things have their unwavering theological foundation and pure soteriological reference. The incarnation of God and the deification of man are the pillars of the Orthodox faith. We move toward our eternal destination in the love of Christ. Our God, Who is “always for us,” can never be reduced to some “higher power” enclosed in transcendence and the grandeur of almightiness or its holiness. Instead, He is the pre-eternal Word of God, Who “assumed our form” in order to invite humankind to the communion of His holiness, of the genuine freedom. Man, who from the beginning “has been honored with freedom,” is invited to freely accept this divine gift. In the divine-human mystery of salvation, our synergy also functions as a witness in the world of the blessing that we have experienced—“what do you have that you did not receive?” (1 Cor. 4:7)—through the love for the ‘brother.”
Holy and Great Lent is par excellence a period of experiencing this freedom bestowed by Christ. Fasting and ascesis do not comprise a discipline imposed externally, but a voluntary respect of ecclesiastical practice, obedience to Church Tradition that is not a sterile letter but a living and life-giving presence, a permanent expression of the unity, sanctity, catholicity and apostolicity of the Church. The language of theology and hymnography speaks of “joyful sorrow” and “the spring of fasting.” This is because authentic asceticism is always joyful, springful and bright. It knows no dualism or division; it does not undermine life or the world. “Depressive ascesis” that leads to an “aridity of human nature” has nothing to do with the spirit of Orthodoxy, where the ascetic life and spirituality are nurtured by resurrectional joy. In this sense, fasting and ascesis contain an alternative proposal for life before the promised false paradise of eudemonism and nihilistic pessimism.
Another essential element of Orthodox ascetic spirituality is its social character. The God of our faith is “the most social God,” “a God of relations.” It has rightly been said that the Holy Trinity is “the negation of loneliness.” The individualization of salvation and piety, the transformation of ascesis into an individual achievement, overlook the Trinity-centered essence of the ecclesial event. When we fast for ourselves and according to our whim, then fasting does not express the spirit of the Orthodox tradition. Spirituality is the life-giving presence of the Holy Spirit, Which is always “a spirit of communion.” The genuine Orthodox spiritual life always refers to the ecclesial dimension of our existence and not to some “spiritual self-realization.”
In adhering to the dedication of this year by the Holy Great Church of Christ to “the pastoral renewal and due concern for our youth,” we call upon our Orthodox young men and women to participate in the spiritual struggle of Great Lent in order to experience its anthropological depth and liberating spirit, to understand that Orthodox asceticism is a way of freedom and existential fulfilment in the context of the blessed life in the Church, whose core is to “speak the truth in love.” Our Orthodox youth is called to discover the holistic character of fasting, which is praised in the Triodion as “the commencement of spiritual struggles,” as “food for the soul,” as “mother of all good things and all virtues.” It is not simply an abstinence from certain foods, but a struggle against self-love and self-sufficiency, a sensitivity toward our suffering neighbor, and a tangible response of support. It is a Eucharistic use of creation, existential fulfilment, communion of life and solidarity. Ascesis, fasting, prayer and humility convey the fragrance and light of the Resurrection, from which they receive meaning and direction. As the quintessence of ecclesial life and its eschatological orientation, the Resurrection inseparably links the ascetic life with the Divine Eucharist, the sacrament of foretaste of the ineffable joy of the Kingdom of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. The fact that the Divine Eucharist is preserved as the center of the life in the Orthodox Church is associated with the fact that the Resurrection is the foundation of our faith and the bright horizon of our ascetic spirituality as well as of our good witness in the world.
With these thoughts, we humbly invoke upon all of you the mercy and blessing of the God of love, so that we may pursue the race of Holy and Great Lent with devout heart, reach the saving Passion of Christ our God and, glorifying His ineffable forbearance, shine brightly for the feast of His splendid Resurrection that leads us from death to endless life.
Holy and Great Lent 2020
+ BARTHOLOMEW of Constantinople
Fervent supplicant for all before God
ENCYCLICAL OF ARCHBISHOP ELPIDOPHOROS FOR HOLY AND GREAT LENT 2020
ENCYCLICAL OF ARCHBISHOP ELPIDOPHOROS FOR HOLY AND GREAT LENT 2020
Protocol Number 31/2020
March 2, 2020
The Beginning of the Holy and Great Lent
“You may freely eat of every tree of the garden”
(Genesis 2:16)
The Most Reverend Hierarchs, the Reverend Priests and Deacons, the Monks and Nuns, the Presidents and Members of the Parish Councils of the Greek Orthodox Communities, the Distinguished Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Day, Afternoon, and Church Schools, the Philoptochos Sisterhoods, the Youth, the Hellenic Organizations, and the entire Greek Orthodox Family in America
Beloved Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Today we commence our journey of the Great Lent that leads us inexorably to the Holy Passion of the Lord and the Pascha of unending joy. It is a time of determination and concentration, one in which we are encouraged to abstain from certain foods and drink, to practice more active charity and philanthropy, and to look within at the values and principles by which we live our lives.
Yesterday, on the last Sunday before the Fast, we commemorated the story of the “fall” of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Paradise. They were cast out because they ate of the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil,” from which they had been forbidden by the commandment of God. Most of us know the story from our youth, but we often miss the verse before, that every other tree was theirs to enjoy. The denial of the one tree was not a punishment, but an opportunity. It was a calling for Adam and Eve to exceed themselves, and to give up something for the sake of love. Real love cannot be forced; it can only be offered freely. The seeming prohibition was in fact and invitation for them (and us!) to become truly free.
Therefore, as you fast for the next forty days, take time to offer whatever your strength allows in the freedom of love, always remembering every other “tree of the garden” with which you have been so richly blessed. Then, Lent will not be a season of deprivation, but one of abundance, an overflowing of the love, mercy, and forgiveness for which we journey to the Holy Resurrection of the Conqueror of death.
With paternal love in our Lord Jesus Christ,
† ELPIDOPHOROS
Archbishop of America
Summer Excavation at Hippos-Sussita
The discoveries Hippos-Sussita provides insight to Christian liturgical architecture and the coexistence of multiple Christian churches in the Decapolis city!
Hippos-Sussita, located near the Sea of Galilee, was an important Roman site during the first century. Located near this site is the ancient city of Tiberius, Tabgha- the location of the multiplication of Loaves and Fish, Capernaum- the location where Jesus visited and the site of Peter’s house that still has an active church, and Kursi- the location where Jesus cast the demons into the pigs. In this rich historical and theological landscape, we have an abundance of evidence of Christianity, but surprisingly, we have no mention of Hippos-Sussita in the New Testament!
Though we have no mention of this place in the New Testament, we have seven significant churches located on the site. Six churches were previously uncovered, but one remained left to be discovered. This was uncovered in 2019.
In 2005, the apse of this small church was discovered, but no further work was completed. However, once the excavation progressed, it was discovered that it was a Byzantine church, known as the “Burnt Church”, evidenced by an inscription and limestone reliquary within the apse. During the 2019 season, the building was completely uncovered, exposing the foundation of the church and the mosaic floor. On this floor, beautiful images were seen on the newly discovered mosaic scenes, detailed inscriptions with the name of a martyr, and special findings were found. We have now dated the church to the middle-late 5th century A.D.
This summer, I will go back to the “Burnt Church” and will supervise the work, under the supervision of the University of Haifa. We will continue uncovering the church, working in the adjacent room which has not been seen, cleaning and reading the mosaics, and various other tasks that arise.
The season will last for four weeks, 28th-July 23rd, but participants can come for two weeks if desired. No prior knowledge of the history, location, archaeology or experience is required – I will show you the ropes!
For those interested, please feel free to contact me with any questions! rentz@cua.edu. The official website: http://hippos.haifa.ac.il/index.php/join-the-dig
In Christ,
Jessica Rentz, PhD Candidate, Liturgical Studies/Sacramental Theology
Catholic University of America, Washington DC.
