December 17, 2010

Christmas - the Capital of Feasts


“The Feast of the Birth of Christ as a man is the capital of feasts, as St. John Chrysostom says. All the other feasts of the Lord – Epiphany, the Transfiguration, the Passion, the Cross, the Resurrection and the Ascension of Christ – follow from the Nativity. Without the Nativity there would have been no Resurrection, but also without the Resurrection the purpose of the divine Incarnation would not have been fulfilled. All these feasts of the Lord are unified. We separate them in order to celebrate them and to look more closely into their content. In every Divine Liturgy we live through all the events of the divine Incarnation. Therefore, according to the Fathers, it is always Christmas, always Easter, always Pentecost.”

- Metropolitan Hierotheos Vlachos, The Feasts of the Lord.