Sermon
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Church Musicians’ Sunday-Divine Liturgy
It’s
amazing to see the power of repetition, how it leads to learning. We started reading books to our son Nicholas
almost from the day he was born. We
would read books to him about all kinds of things. Sometimes he would cry and wouldn’t pay much
attention at all. There were many times I wondered, “we keep reading the same
and the same and the same, is there any point to this? He has no idea what we are reading.” After Nicholas was a year old and came to
enjoy reading time, we found that he liked and still likes reading the same
books, sometimes multiple times in one sitting.
He doesn’t seem to mind the repetition. All of the parenting books we read told us to
just keep reading, reading, reading and eventually he will learn. So on and on we read, the same books—about
airplanes, things you see around the house, stories about animals, Goodnight
Moon, etc. And over time, Nicholas could
point to a picture in the book and say what it is, like an airplane or a pair
of shoes. Now he has gotten to the point
where he’ll notice a plane in the sky and say “Airplane,” followed by “go
The
Divine Liturgy is something that we as Orthodox Christians also do on a
continual basis. The Divine Liturgy is
something that prepares us to enter into God’s Kingdom and to survive the ride
until we get there. That may not be
understandable to many people in the congregation—how can a priest in
vestments, us lighting candles, listening to the choir singing, how can this be
like heaven. The end point of
understanding the Divine Liturgy is to understand that when we go to church for
the Divine Liturgy, we are going to stand in the presence of God, the angels,
the saints and the righteous people and we are going to pray with them, we are
going to commune with them. Because if
we make it to heaven, we will stand with God, the angels and the saints and the
righteous people and continually worship with them and commune with them.
The
Divine Liturgy holds all the things we need to know in order to properly
prepare ourselves to meet the Lord.
First, in order to be one with God, we need to pray. So we begin the Liturgy in prayer—in peace
let us pray to the Lord. For peace from
above and the salvation of our souls; for peace in the whole world, for
stability of the holy churches of God and for the unity of all; for this holy
house and those who enter in, not just anyone who enters it, but those who
enter with faith, reverence and the fear of God, for our Metropolitan, for
clergy and laity, that means all the members of our church and our families;
for our country, those in public service; for the cities in which we live; for
favorable weather; for those who are traveling, those who are sick or
suffering; and for deliverance from every kind of danger and need. This prayer, with which we open the Liturgy,
is called the Great Litany—how many things besides what I just listed are there
to pray for—this list pretty much covers everything. Offer this set of prayers and you’ve offered
a fairly complete prayer.
The
second thing needed to be one with God is a life that is in line with God’s
teachings. And here is another set of
petitions, the ones that follow the Great Entrance. For a perfect, holy, peaceful and sinless
day; for an angel of peace, a faithful guide, a guardian of our souls and
bodies; for forgiveness and remission of our sins and transgressions; for
things that are good and beneficial to our souls; that we may complete our
lives in peace and in repentance; and finally, do all these things and pray
that when life is over, we may have a Christian end to our lives, peaceful
without shame and suffering, and for a good defense before the awesome judgment
seat of Christ.
Holy
Communion helps to sustain us through this life by giving us the opportunity to
unite with God in a real and tangible way on a regular basis. So following the Creed, the focus of the
Liturgy changes to what is called the Anaphora, the offering of Bread and wine,
asking for God to consecrate them through the Holy Spirit. And finally, we receive Communion and thank
God for this nourishment as we prepare to leave church and face another week of
life.
Interspersed
with the prayers and petitions of the Liturgy and the other services of the church
are hymns. While scripture, prayer and
the sermon reach us on a rational and intellectual level, the hymns of the
church reach us on an emotional level.
Some hymns like Christos Anesti/Christ is Risen, evoke joy; while
others, like Aionia I Mnimi/Memory Eternal, may evoke sadness and
reflection. Some hymns praise God, like
the hymn Agios, Agios, Agios, that we sing before the consecration of the Holy
Gifts—“Holy, Holy, Holy Lord of Sabbaoth, heaven and earth are full of Your
glory. Hosanna in the highest, blessed is He who comes in the name of the
Lord. Hosanna in the highest.” Other hymns supplicate or ask God for
something—“Lord, have mercy” is the most basic of these. Another one is “Grant this O Lord.” The hymn we sing during Communion, “Receive
me today o Son of God as a partaker of Your mystical supper,” falls into this
category, as does the hymn “soson Imas Yie Theou,” “Save us o Son of God, who
rose from the dead, to You we sing Alleluia.”
The
overwhelming majority of the hymns we sing in church, however, neither
supplicate or praise God. They teach us
theology. Want to know the role of the
Virgin Mary in our church? The answer is
in a hymn—Through the intercessions of the Theotokos, Savior, save us. That means Jesus Christ, our Savior, is
saving us, but we have as an aid, the intercessions of the Virgin Mary. The Cherubic Hymn, which is sung before the
Great Entrance, reminds us to lay aside all worldly cares that we may receive
the King of All. This tells us that we
cannot be one with Christ if we are totally consumed by the cares of the
world. How should we react to receiving
Holy Communion? With total joy—the hymn
following Communion tells us that—“We have seen the Light, the true Light, and
have received the heavenly Spirit; we have found the true faith but worshipping
the undivided Trinity, who has saved us.”
And what should our focus be as we leave church and head back into the
world—again, the answer comes from a hymn—“Ei to onoma Kyriou,” “May the name
of the Lord be blessed from this time forth and forever and to all ages”—this
afternoon, tomorrow, this week, and forever.
The
hymns of the services help to keep the calendar for us. They tell us what saint’s day or feast day we
are celebrating. Every Sunday, there are
hymns of the Resurrection, reminding us that each Sunday is like a little
Easter and continually reminding us of the joy and the importance of the
Resurrection. Some hymns reach the depth of our souls—a line in the Great
Doxology reads, “I said, Lord have mercy on me, heal my soul for I have sinned
against You.” And in case you were
wondering “What does it all mean—Why it is important that I’m a
Christian?” Well, look no farther than
THE most important and well known hymn of the church year—Christos Anesti-Christ
is Risen. In case you were wondering why
any of this is important, well, “Christ rose from the dead, by death He
trampled upon death and to those in the tombs He bestows life.” That’s why this is important. We sing this hymn hundreds of times during
the Paschal season, and almost every Orthodox Christian can say it by memory—we
know the words, hopefully over time, we can fully grasp the meaning.
There
are people who rarely share in the Divine Liturgy, and who have a hard time
becoming literate, if you will, in the things of God. Just like my son will never become literate
in letters and numbers if we don’t read to him, an Orthodox Christian cannot
become literate in the Liturgy if he or she rarely attends. There are those who come to Liturgy often,
but don’t make the connection between words and meaning. That’s okay, keep coming. My son doesn’t make connections between words
and what they mean, but eventually he will.
We all know that. So keep coming
to Liturgy and eventually you will make the connections. And there are those who have learned to love
the Liturgy, who have made the connections between the words and their
meanings. And for these, Liturgy is a
joy and the end of life is something to be embraced, rather than feared. When I’ve said the alphabet to my son a
thousand times, or maybe ten thousand times, he’ll know the alphabet. Participate in the Liturgy a thousand times,
or ten thousand times, as many times as you can, learn the meaning and one day
you will know God.
When
Fr. Grigorios was here last Sunday, he spoke of how Liturgy is the work of the
people. We need different people to do
different things in order for the Liturgy to be offered. There must be a celebrant priest, people who
offer bread, wine, candles, incense, charcoal and the other things needed for
the service. There must be people to
open the doors, keep the church clean, assist in the altar, read the
scriptures, teach the children. And there
must be people who lead the singing of the hymns. The responses of the Liturgy belong to all
the people, not just to the choir or the chanter, but to all the people. But there must be a leader or a group of
leaders who lead the singing of the responses.
These people are not performers that we just watch, but rather leaders of
worship that we are to follow and sing along with. When we learn to sing the hymns of the
church, not only do we have a more meaningful celebration of the Liturgy, but
the hymns stay in our heads long after we leave church. I know from personal experience, that when I
am under stress, I sing or hum a hymn from church. I sing so many hymns and sing them so often,
that more often than not, when I wake up in the morning, there is a hymn
already in my head—this helps me to set the tone of my day, and keeps me
grounded in my Orthodox faith.
Each
year, the Sunday after October 1 is designated Church Musicians’ Sunday. October 1 is the feast of St. Romanos the
Melodist, the patron saint of choirs and chanters and all those who sing. St. Romanos was a deacon, a monk and a
hymnographer who authored many of the hymns we sing our church to this
day. The most important ministry of the
church is the liturgical ministry, gathering around God’s altar to practice and
to learn how we are going to live in heaven.
And the choir and the chanter play an integral part in this liturgical
ministry. Today we honor them, and we
thank them for this important service they offer to the church. And we encourage them to keep learning, to
keep singing and to keep teaching through their offering of music at each
service. I want to personally thank the
choir for your dedication and your hard work throughout the year. I want to thank you for the many Wednesday
evenings you spend practicing so that Sundays and other Holy Days come out
perfect. I want to thank you for the
interest you have taken in developing a good chemistry with me, many people
have said there is a good chemistry between us during the services. I want to thank Jim Leone, Jim is not
Orthodox nor is he Greek, but he knows all the nuances of our services and does
a great job in playing our organ. I want
to thank Artie Palios, our choir director for many years, for all the work she
puts in, not only directing and leading practices, but the many mornings she is
here alone, putting the right music in the books, getting everything ready for
the Liturgy on Sunday. And I want to
thank Nick Andreadakis, our chanter, who faithfully chants at ALL our services
throughout the year. And whether there
are three people or three hundred at a service, Nick always chants with
reverence and enthusiasm. Nick also
spends a great deal of time preparing to chant, and is very eager to have other
join him to either learn to chant or to read at the services when we have
Psalms and prophecy readings. Fr.
Grigorios last week told me that this choir is definitely among the top in the
Metropolis. I recently received a letter
from Metropolitan Alexios saying the same.
So I thank you for all your hard work and I pray that God will continue
to inspire you to open your lips in praise of Him every time we gather to
worship. And I thank the choir and Nick
for continuing to learn more hymns of our church in English, so that they are
even easier to understand and to sing along with.
I
encourage you, our faithful people, to learn the liturgy, to love the Liturgy
and to sing along with the choir. What a
beautiful thing it is when we all sing Christos Anesti, or Kyrie Eleison, or
even Aionia I Mnimi, because we are all singing it together. And I encourage
those who are interested to come and join the choir, and especially if someone
is interested in chanting, to come and learn.
You don’t have to come every service like Nick, but come and learn to
chant—we can’t go one-deep on the chanter position. You never see a football team that doesn’t
have a back-up quarterback. So please
see Artie if you are interested in joining the choir and see me or Nick if you
are interested in learning to chant.
I
will conclude this morning by asking the members of the choir and Nick to come
up here so I can recognize each of you individually. Artie-Athenagoras Award