Paschal Epistle of Bishop Andrei
Beloved in our Lord, Fathers, brothers, and sisters,
Christ is Risen!
“Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and on those in the tombs bestowing life” – this is how we sing again and again in the Paschal Troparion.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the Firstborn from the dead, the Firstfruits of those who have died. (Col. 1:18; 1 Cor. 15:20,23) – He was the first to rise from the dead, though there will be an innumerable multitude of those to resurrect after, who are joined with Christ in the one body of the Church. That’s why the Son of God assumed our nature, became man, died and rose again so as to deliver us from eternal death and to resurrect us with Him.
In the Mystery of Baptism, we died with Christ and rose with Him to a new life. We carry within us, in our heart, the pledge of resurrection and eternal life, by the words of the Lord: “Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day” (John 6:54). Partaking of Holy Communion – this is the surety of our immortality and eternal life.
Christ bestowed life on “those in the tombs”. We all are “those in the tombs”, because only a short period of time – miniscule in comparison with eternity –separates us from the tomb.
“O Lord, there is no death for us, Thy servants, when we leave the body and come unto Thee, our God, but a transition from things most sorrowful unto things most beneficial and most delightful, and unto repose and joy” – says St. Basil the Great in the Pentecost prayer.
Why is death so fearsome to us? Why is it always accepted as a catastrophe? After all, we know that it’s inevitable, that it awaits all of us. Death is a natural, logical conclusion of our lives. If our earthly life had no end, it would turn into complete nonsense. Death gives meaning to our lives, just as harvest does to a crop: just as a successful conclusion of work gives meaning to the expenditure of effort.
Having rejected the belief in resurrection, humanity is fearful of death and tries to distance all mention of it from itself. At the same time, contemporary humanity strives to prolong earthly life at any cost and even aspire for immortality – but only on this earth.
Faith in Christ is leaving the world and in its place there is only emptiness. Disbelief is a brazen rejection of one’s Creator: an unwillingness to acknowledge a higher authority over oneself and recognising oneself as the centre of the universe. Disbelief is a refusal to carry the responsibility for one’s life, a refusal to acknowledge any meaning in it.
Physical laws affirm that in the material world, nothing disappears but changes from one condition into another. If with death the human body is not annihilated but decomposes into component elements, then how can the incorporeal soul be destroyed with death? It’s known that a man is unable to even imagine himself as non-existing. His soul, his individuality was created in the image of God as immortal and indestructible. A man has the beginning of his being, but doesn’t have the end.
We are continually observing that evil in the world is multiplying rapidly, uncontrollably, unhindered, and this indicates the approach of apocalyptic times. For more than a year there has been a war in Ukraine. Each one of us is helpless to influence these terrifying events in any way. The only thing within our power is to give them a moral evaluation.
We are fully aware of the complexity and ambiguity of political circumstances, but this doesn’t change the obvious reality: Russia is waging a war against a fellow Orthodox and brotherly people, a war that is as senseless and aimless as it is criminal and heinous.
The greatest tragedy is in that the majority of Russian people endorse this war and agree with it. This is a horrendous spiritual downfall. The blood of many thousands, both Ukrainians and Russians, shed in Ukraine, cries out to God. And the responsibility for this crime rests not only with those that have unleashed this war, who give criminal orders and those that carry them out, but to a certain degree with those who mindlessly justify this war.
But let us not forget that the triumph of evil in the world is always only seeming. The devil has already been defeated by Christ’s Cross and Resurrection, and every year the joyous Paschal night gives witness to that.
I congratulate all of you with the holy day of Pasha. May the joy of Christ’s Resurrection soothe the pain of our sorrow.
“O Christ, Thou great and most sacred Pascha! O Wisdom, Word and power of God! Grant us to partake of Thee more fully in the unwaning day of Thy kingdom” (Canon of Pascha. Ode 9).
Amen.
Christ is Risen!
Bishop Andrei
Melbourne. Pascha 2023.