Lives of all saints commemorated on April 13

Pascha (Easter)

Enjoy ye all the feast of faith; receive ye all the riches of loving-kindness.
(Sermon of Saint John Chrysostom, read at Paschal Matins)

The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is the center of the Christian faith. Saint Paul says that if Christ is not raised from the dead, then our preaching and faith are in vain (I Cor. 15:14). Indeed, without the resurrection there would be no Christian preaching or faith. The disciples of Christ would have remained the broken and hopeless band which the Gospel of John describes as being in hiding behind locked doors for fear of the Jews. They went nowhere and preached nothing until they met the risen Christ, the doors being shut (John 20: 19). Then they touched the wounds of the nails and the spear; they ate and drank with Him. The resurrection became the basis of everything they said and did (Acts 2-4): “. . . for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have” (Luke 24:39).

The resurrection reveals Jesus of Nazareth as not only the expected Messiah of Israel, but as the King and Lord of a new Jerusalem: a new heaven and a new earth.

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. . . the holy city, new Jerusalem. And I heard a great voice from the throne saying “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people. . . He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away (Rev. 21:1-4).

In His death and resurrection, Christ defeats the last enemy, death, and thereby fulfills the mandate of His Father to subject all things under His feet (I Cor. 15:24-26).

Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing (Rev. 5: 12)

THE FEAST OF FEASTS

The Christian faith is celebrated in the liturgy of the Church. True celebration is always a living participation. It is not a mere attendance at services. It is communion in the power of the event being celebrated. It is God’s free gift of joy given to spiritual men as a reward for their self-denial. It is the fulfillment of spiritual and physical effort and preparation. The resurrection of Christ, being the center of the Christian faith, is the basis of the Church’s liturgical life and the true model for all celebration. This is the chosen and holy day, first of sabbaths, king and lord of days, the feast of feasts, holy day of holy days. On this day we bless Christ forevermore (Irmos 8, Paschal Canon).

PREPARATION

Twelve weeks of preparation precede the “feast of feasts.” A long journey which includes five prelenten Sundays, six weeks of Great Lent and finally Holy Week is made. The journey moves from the self-willed exile of the prodigal son to the grace-filled entrance into the new Jerusalem, coming down as a bride beautifully adorned for her husband (Rev. 21:2) Repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation, prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and study are the means by which this long journey is made.

Focusing on the veneration of the Cross at its midpoint, the lenten voyage itself reveals that the joy of the resurrection is achieved only through the Cross. “Through the cross joy has come into all the world,” we sing in one paschal hymn. And in the paschal troparion, we repeat again and again that Christ has trampled down death—by death! Saint Paul writes that the name of Jesus is exalted above every name because He first emptied Himself, taking on the lowly form of a servant and being obedient even to death on the Cross (Phil. 2:5-11). The road to the celebration of the resurrection is the self-emptying crucifixion of Lent. Pascha is the passover from death to life.

Yesterday I was buried with Thee, O Christ.
Today I arise with Thee in Thy resurrection.
Yesterday I was crucified with Thee:
Glorify me with Thee, O Savior, in Thy kingdom (Ode 3, Paschal Canon).

THE PROCESSION

The divine services of the night of Pascha commence near midnight of Holy Saturday. At the Ninth Ode of the Canon of Nocturn, the priest, already vested in his brightest robes, removes the Holy Shroud from the tomb and carries it to the altar table, where it remains until the leave-taking of Pascha. The faithful stand in darkness. Then, one by one, they light their candles from the candle held by the priest and form a great procession out of the church. Choir, servers, priest and people, led by the bearers of the cross, banners, icons and Gospel book, circle the church. The bells are rung incessantly and the angelic hymn of the resurrection is chanted.

The procession comes to a stop before the principal doors of the church. Before the closed doors the priest and the people sing the troparion of Pascha, “Christ is risen from the dead...”, many times. Even before entenng the church the priest and people exchange the paschal greeting: “Christ is risen! Indeed He is risen!” This segment of the paschal services is extremely important. It preserves in the expenence of the Church the primitive accounts of the resurrection of Christ as recorded in the Gospels. The angel rolled away the stone from the tomb not to let a biologically revived but physically entrapped Christ walk out, but to reveal that “He is not here; for He has risen, as He said” (Matt. 28:6).

In the paschal canon we sing:

Thou didst arise, O Christ, and yet the tomb remained sealed, as at Thy birth the Virgin’s womb remained unharmed; and Thou has opened for us the gates of paradise (Ode 6).

Finally, the procession of light and song in the darkness of night, and the thunderous proclamation that, indeed, Christ is risen, fulfill the words of the Evangelist John: “The light shines in darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5).

The doors are opened and the faithful re-enter. The church is bathed in light and adorned with flowers. It is the heavenly bride and the symbol of the empty tomb:

Bearing life and more fruitful than paradise
Brighter than any royal chamber,
Thy tomb, O Christ, is the fountain or our resurrection (Paschal Hours).

MATINS

Matins commences immediately. The risen Christ is glorified in the singing of the beautiful canon of Saint John of Damascus. The paschal greeting is repeatedly exchanged. Near the end of Matins the paschal verses are sung. They relate the entire narrative of the Lord’s resurrection. They conclude with the words calling us to actualize among each other the forgiveness freely given to all by God:

This is the day of resurrection.
Let us be illumined by the feast.
Let us embrace each other.
Let us call “brothers” even those who hate us,
And forgive all by the resurrection. . .

The sermon of Saint John Chrysostom is then read by the celebrant. The sermon was originally composed as a baptismal instruction. It is retained by the Church in the paschal services because everything about the night of Pascha recalls the Sacrament of Baptism: the language and general terminology of the liturgical texts, the specific hymns, the vestment color, the use of candles and the great procession itself. Now the sermon invites us to a great reaffirmation of our baptism: to union with Christ in the receiving of Holy Communion.

If any man is devout and loves God, let him enjoy this fair and radiant triumphal feast. . . the table is fully laden; feast you all sumptuously. . . the calf is fatted, let no one go hungry away. . .

THE DIVINE LITURGY

The sermon announces the imminent beginning of the Divine Liturgy. The altar table is fully laden with the divine food: the Body and Blood of the risen and glorified Christ. No one is to go away hungry. The service books are very specific in saying that only he who partakes of the Body and Blood of Christ eats the true Pascha. The Divine Liturgy, therefore, normally follows immediately after paschal Matins. Foods from which the faithful have been asked to abstain during the lenten journey are blessed and eaten only after the Divine Liturgy.

THE DAY WITHOUT EVENING

Pascha is the inauguration of a new age. It reveals the mystery of the eighth day. It is our taste, in this age, of the new and unending day of the Kingdom of God. Something of this new and unending day is conveyed to us in the length of the paschal services, in the repetition of the paschal order for all the services of Bright Week, and in the special paschal features retained in the services for the forty days until Ascension. Forty days are, as it were, treated as one day. Together they comprise the symbol of the new time in which the Church lives and toward which she ever draws the faithful, from one degree of glory to another.

O Christ, great and most holy Pascha.
O Wisdom, Word and Power of God,
grant that we may more perfectly partake of Thee in the never-ending day of Thy kingdom
(Ninth Ode, Paschal Canon).

The V. Rev. Paul Lazor
New York, 1977

The Hieromartyr Artemon (Artémon) was born of Christian parents in Laodikeia (Laodίkeia), Syria in the III century. From his youth, he devoted himself to the service of the Church, and was a Reader for sixteen years. For his zeal, Bishop Sisίnnius ordained him as a Deacon. Saint Artemon also carried out this service with fervor and diligence for twenty-eight years, then he was ordained to the priesthood. In that position, Saint Artemon served the Church of God for another thirty-three years, preaching Christianity among pagans. When Emperor Diocletian (reigned 284-305) began his fierce persecution of the Church, issuing an edict ordering Christians to offer sacrifice to the idols, Saint Artemon was already quite old.

Knowing of the impending arrival of the military commander Patricius at Laodikeia, Saint Sisίnnius went with the priest Artemon and some other Christians into the temple of the "goddess" Artemis. There they smashed and burned the idols, reducing them all to dust.

Afterward, Saint Sisίnnius and Saint Artemon gathered the flock into the church and fervently exhorted the Christians to remain firm in the Faith, and not to fear the threats of torturers.

When he arrived in Laodikeia, Patricius celebrated a five-day festival in honor of the pagan "gods," and then entered the temple of Artemis to offer sacrifice. When he was told who had destroyed the temple, he went with a detachment of soldiers to the church where the Christians were praying.

As he approached the church, Patricius suddenly felt a chill, and then developed a fever, which left him scarcely alive. He was carried him home and put to bed. “The Christians have put a curse on me, and their God torments me,” he said to those around him. Although Patricius prayed to the idols, they did not relieve his sufferings. He sent a messenger to Bishop Sisίnnius, asking for his help, and promised to set up a gold statue of that Hierarch in the middle of the city. The Saint replied, “Keep your gold, but if you believe in Christ, He will heal you.”

Patricius was afraid of death, so he declared that he believed in Christ, and the affliction left him. But even this miracle did not affect the obdurate pagan's soul. Although he did not raise a hand against Bishop Sisίnnius, he did enforce the imperial edict against other Christians in the city of Caesarea.

Along the way he encountered Saint Artemon, who was followed by six wild donkeys and two deer. When Patricius asked how he was able to control these wild beasts, Saint Artemon replied that he held them with the Word of Christ. Patricius learned from the idolaters that it was Artemon who had destroyed the pagan temple of Artemis, so he ordered that Artemon be arrested and taken to the city of Caesarea. The Saint went with the soldiers without fear, but he told the animals to go to Saint Sisίnnius. Seeing the animals, Bishop Sisίnnius asked, “Why have these animals come here?”

A doe received the gift of speech from God and said, “The servant of God Artemon is being held by the impious Patricius, and is being brought to Caesarea in chains. He commanded us to come here to give you this news.”

Do not be astonished that the Lord, Who opened the mouth of Balaam’s ass (Numbers 22:28), also permitted the doe to speak. The Bishop sent Deacon Phileas to Caesarea to verify what he had been told.

At Caesarea, Patricius brought Saint Artemon to trial and tried to force him to offer sacrifice in the temple of Asclepius. In that pagan temple there were many poisonous vipers. The pagan priest never opened the doors, nor did he place the sacrifice before the idol. But Saint Artemon, calling on the Name of Jesus Christ, went into the temple and drove the snakes out. The pagans fled, but the Saint stopped them and killed the snakes by his breath. Vitalius, one of the pagan priests, believed in Christ and asked Saint Artemon to baptize him.

Patricius thought that Saint Artemon killed the snakes by sorcery, and again he interrogated and tortured him. Then the doe which had spoken arrived at Caesarea. She lay down at the Martyr's feet, licking his wounds. By God’s command the doe spoke again, denouncing the impious pagans. Addressing Patricius, the doe predicted that he would be seized by two birds of prey, and dropped into a cauldron of burning pitch. Patricius was enraged because he had been censured by a wild beast. He commanded his soldiers to shoot the doe with arrows, but she escaped. Afraid that the miracles performed by Saint Artemon would attract more people to him, Patricius ordered his execution.

An enormous cauldron was filled with boiling pitch, and the soldiers intended to throw Saint Artemon into it. But when Patricius rode up to the cauldron on horseback to see if the pitch was indeed boiling, two Angels in the form of eagles seized him and dropped him into the cauldron. His body was consumed so that not a single bone remained, but Saint Artemon survived.

Seeing this miracle, everyone ran away except Saint Artemon, who blessed and glorified God. When the Saint finished his prayer, a spring of water gushed forth from the ground. Saint Artemon baptized the pagan priest Vitalius and many pagans, who had come to believe in Christ. On the following morning, Saint Artemon communed the newly-baptized with the Holy Mysteries. Many of the baptized were ordained to the diaconate and the priesthood, and Vitalius was made Bishop of Palestine.

The Bishop of Caesarea came to visit Saint Artemon, noting the place where he had suffered. Subsequently, a church was built on that site.

Instructed by God's voice, Saint Artemon preached the Gospel in Asia Minor. Then an Angel appeared and transported him to the place which had been revealed to him, and there he converted many to Christ. The pagans arrested the Saint and beheaded him († 303).

In the Roman Martyrology, Saint Artemon is listed under October 8, while in Greek usage he is commemorated on April 12.

Saint Artémon the Presbyter of Laodikeia should not be confused with Saint Artemon the Bishop of Seleukeia (March 24).

The Holy Martyr Crescens (Kreskes) was descended from an illustrious family and lived in Myra of Lycia. When a throng of city inhabitants were on the way to the pagan temple, he urged them to forsake paganism and come to Christ. This incident became known to the city prefect.

When the prefect asked the saint about his parentage, the saint, not wishing to bring unpleasantness to his parents, said nothing except that he was a Christian. The prefect knew Saint Crescens’ father and wanted to do him a favor. He suggested that Saint Crescens only appear to offer sacrifice to idols, while remaining a Christian.

The holy martyr replied, “It is impossible for the body not to do as the soul thinks, since the soul governs and moves the body.” They beat the holy martyr Crescens and raked him with iron claws, and then burned him in a fire.

Saint Andrew of Crete (July 4) mentions the Martyr Crescens in his Sermon on the Feast of Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker (December 6), who also came from Myra of Lycia.

The Holy Martyr Thomais (Thomaίs) was born into a Christian family in the city of Alexandria. She was raised in piety, and loved to read spiritual books.

When she was fifteen, Thomais married a fisherman, who was also a Christian. The young couple lived in the home of her husband’s family, where Saint Thomaίs was loved for her mild and gentle disposition, and for her other good traits.

Her father-in-law, at the prompting of the devil, was captivated by her beauty. One night, when his son went out fishing, he attempted to lead his daughter-in-law into sin. Horrified, Saint Thomais admonished the senseless old man, reminding him of the Last Judgment and the penalty for sin. Infuriated by her steadfastness, he grabbed a sword and threatened to cut off her head. Saint Thomaίs replied: “Even if you cut me to pieces, I shall not stray from the Lord's commandments.” Overcome with passion, the old man cut Saint Thomais in two with the sword. Thus, the Saint received the crown of martyrdom in the year 476.

Divine punishment overtook the murderer. He was struck blind and could not find the door in order to escape. The next morning, the friends of the Saint’s husband came to the door. They saw her body, and the blind old man covered with blood. The murderer confessed his evil deed and asked to be taken to the judge for punishment. He was then beheaded for his crime.

At this time, Saint Daniel of Skete (Skḗtē) (June 7) happened to be in Alexandria. He told the monks of the Oktokaidekaton Monastery (at the eighteenth milestone on the road leading west from Alexandria) to bring the Martyr's body to the Monastery and bury her in the cemetery with the departed Fathers. Some of the monks were scandalized because he wanted to bury a woman’s body with the monks. Saint Daniel replied, “She is a mother to me and to you, because she died for her chastity.”

After the funeral Saint Daniel returned to Skete. Soon one of the young monks confessed to him that he was being tormented by carnal passions. Saint Daniel ordered him to go and pray at the grave of the Holy Martyr Thomais. The monk obeyed the Elder. As he prayed at the grave, he fell into a light sleep. Saint Thomaίs appeared to him and said, “Father, receive my blessing and go in peace.”

When he awakened, the monk felt joy and peace in his soul. After this, he told Saint Daniel that he was no longer bothered by the temptations of the flesh. Abba Daniel exclaimed, “Great is the boldness of those who have struggled for chastity.”

Many found both spiritual joy and release from their passions at the grave of Saint Thomais. Her holy relics were transferred to Constantinople to one of the women’s monasteries. The Russian pilgrim Archdeacon Zosimas venerated them in 1420.

Saint Thomais is invoked by those seeking deliverance from sexual impurity. Other Saints whose intercession we seek for this purpose are: Saint John the Much-Suffering (July 18), and Saint Moses the Hungarian (July 26).

Part of the Saint's Holy Skull is located in the Holy Monastery of Dionysiou on Mount Athos.

In Greek usage, Saint Thomaίs is commemorated on April 14.