After He has MIRACULOUSLY Ascended...

"Christ has no body now on earth but yours,
  
    no Hands But  Yours ... 

      no feet but yours. 

Yours are the eyes through which Christ's

compassion looks out on the world. 

Yours are the feet with which Christ is to 

          go about doing good.          
                                                                         

Yours are the hands with which Christ is to

Bless all people now.    St. Teresa of Avila

Joyous Feast of the Ascension!!!

++ Blessed, Joyous Ascension!!  Here we are at the 40th day after Pascha... how befitting and how perfectly our faith prepares us for each moment... each feast, each little thing that the Lord wants to show us, to teach us... to truly live our lives each day... each moment, as though we were walking with Christ by our side, in the time that He lived!  We DO WALK each moment with Christ, with our precious Lord and Savior by our side... and each and every day and feast is a reminder to us, to our children, to our hearts, to our souls.  We have all just been JOYFULLY proclaiming EVERY DAY FOR 40 days and 40 nights... CHRIST is RISEN!  XRISTOS ANESTI!  Not only do we say it as a greeting when we awaken, throughout the day, when we answer the phone, and when we say good bye and good night, but we sing it in our morning and evening prayers!!!  Not just one time, THREE TIMES!!  We open AND close our services and our prayers by singing this MOST JOYFUL hymn, proclaiming: "Christ is Risen from the dead, by death, He has trampled... down... death, and to those in the tombs bestowing life!!!" This hymn is so very joyful and the children love singing it so much... the joy is so full in our prayers... one can see if on the faces of the youngest to the oldest!  Christ lived for 40 days among his disciples and loved ones, and on the 40th day, just as we celebrate today, He miraculously ASCENDED to Heaven, and was seated at the right hand of the Father.   How truly unworthy we are, and how BEAUTIFUL, that each of us celebrates this glorious Divine Liturgy today, and take part in the day of His Ascension.  Bishop Savvas spoke so beautifully today and at the Vespers last night about the Ascension of Christ.  He brought to our minds... the memory of what these 10 DAYS MUST HAVE BEEN LIKE, AS THE DISCIPLES AWAITED THE HOLY SPIRIT... THE COMFORTER... THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH, to come and be with them.  We know the end of the story, just as on Holy Friday... we are never able to fully  comprehend what the disciples and his loved ones must have felt felt after this most Holy day of Christ's Ascension... until Pentecost, 10 days later!!  

And now may we all truly prepare a place worthy for the Holy Spirit to stay in our souls- and touch others with love each moment, as the Lord would call us to, as we prepare for Pentecost/ the Holy Spirit on this coming Sunday, the 50th day after Pascha/Easter!!   love always in +Christ, georgia

 

Joyous Leave-Taking of Pascha!

Below is the sharing I wrote from my heart 4 years ago, when i truly discovered this glorious service of the Leave-taking of Pascha.  +   :)

                                                                              

We were at Antiochian Village 4 yeas ago over Mem. Day Wkend for a wonderful Orthodox family retreat, and after the weekend, we were able to go to the Monastery right by there, for this amazing service....  Thanks be to God, their little house was available so we ended up being able to stay there....  for the leave-taking of Pascha. This is the glorious service we have on the 39th day of Pascha!!! They had Vespers and Orthros the eve before with the Litugy the next morning. After that we were heading to Detroit so we would have completely missed that evening service if we had had the long drive to Detroit that day. This service is soooooooo AMAZING. For any of you who aren't that familiar with it, it is a 2nd PASCHA. IT is the EXACT same service that begins after we receive the Light on Pasha evening!!! It is such a blessed service to be in with your children, especially in a monastery or somewhere where it is done in its entirety! We sang Christos Anesti /Christ is Risen sooooo many times, even though we tried to remain somewhat calm, we were so filled with joy, we could hardly stop smiling!!!!!!

   Father Demetri was so joyful and these were some of the most joyful services I have EVER experienced. Many many times throughout the services, Father Demetri was walking down the aisle, to the back, into the Nathex, and back down the middle censing all of us, the icons, the angels and saints all around, and LOUDLY JOYFULLY TRIUMPHUNTLY calling out  "CHIRSTOS ANESTI" / "CHRIST IS RISEN!" and we would all respond back-"ALITHOS ANESTI! / Truly He is Risen! "  it was triumphant - it was a 2nd Pascha, it was a level of Paradise I have not been to before. Glory to God for all things! How could it be that I didn't totally experience and realize the blessings of this iincredible leave-taking service until I was 40 years old... unworthy though I am... Again and agian, with the beautiful chanting of the nuns and the children's voices---we all sang Christos Anesti so many times... Pascha...Pascha (that incredible hymn)... the angel cried... fotizo fotizo... shine shine.... awwwwww- it just got better and better and better- throughout those services that evening and the next morning,

   

  I remember feeling this joy some of the other Pascha nights in my life and especially when we have been blessed to be in vigils at Holy Cross, at St. Nektarios, at other monasteries and in when we have been blessed to be in  Arizona with Yeronda Ephraim for Holy Week/Pascha. Yeronda Ephraim has this same kind of contagious joy which Father Demetri had, it is something which is very difficult to describe in words-- it is Salvific, it is peaceful - it is joyful-- it is Holy Spirit filled- it is full of Light and Love and Hope -- it is Transforming -- it is contagious -- it is a taste of Paradise and when you are experiencing it, you are IN PARADISE... in the Kingdom of Heaven.  Father Alexios and Father Kyrilos, who had this vigil at St. Nektarios last year have this incredible joy!!!  

     At the monastery a few years ago, when we went to that service, we went downstairs after the service with Father Demetri,  and we asked him if he could tell us a miracle, as we often love to do with the children at monasteries or when we are around priests or just hanging out with people in our home or anywhere in these very special blessed moments of life. Father Demetri replied to us with his prayerful, faithful eyes and voice, "I'll tell you a miracle... it's the service that just happened upstairs and the fact that the Lord brought us all together in exactly the way He did... he went on to say and put into words exactly what we were feeling in our hearts-- he said something about the place in Paradise where he had been. We needed no exchange of words... we were all feeling the same. the Holy Spirit had touched each of us in such a special way. Father Demetri also said that he didn't want the service to end. That was EXACTLY what I was feeling. There was something so beautiful also about the children's responses as he would proclaim Christ's resurrection as he walked down the aisle and the children would look up to Father Demetri's heartfelt, loving faithful, repentent, joyful eyes and respond right back with their big hearts and souls and eyes.... there is someithing about "the little children" especially after the 40 day Paschal period which we had experienced this year.

         ( I will explain: Being at Holy Cross this year during the 40 days after Pascha was really really incredible. Because we go to so many services and activities there each day, we are constantly running in to many people within the community and proclaiming again and again " Christ is Risen!!!" Truly He is Risen!! Being so interconnected with your community is such a blessing and we all had Christos Anesti written all over the tablets of our hearts and souls and bodies!!! Father Gerasimos had also given a sermon on how this is truly the way we should all be greeting one another morning and night each time we see someone, when we awaken, when we answer the phone, b4 we sleep, etc. Then, even more people started saying it around our community, it was so BEAUTIFUL... We were proclaiming the truth ALL over the place. Glory to God in the Highest- it was so beautiful. .. The children and Philip and I were proclaiming it in MANY different languages morning and night as we closed our prayers..... it covered us with so much JOY!!!!! Have you ever tried to say Christ is Risen/Christos Anesti!!!! with a frown? It is impossible! ) So my heart was almost beginning to mourn the end of the Paschal period, though I know the ascension is also such a blessing and I yearn to ascend up to Heaven with Christ in my heart... and then await for the Holy Spirit to come down once again... Anyway my final point in my heart is that the Lord truly heard and knew our whole experience- of the 40 days- for the children and for us... and he gave us EXACTLY what we needed to end the forty days and be filled with a peace in letting that time period go, and begin another... he gave us the MOST BEAUTIFUL, FULL Leave-taking of Pascha that we could've ever imaginged, which also truly prepared us walk toward the Ascension and Pentecost. ++ 

++ May we all prepare a place worthy for the Holy Spirit to stay in our souls- and touch others with love each momnet as the Lord would call us to, as we prepare for His Ascension on the 40th day, and for Pentecost/ the Holy Spirit on the 50th!!   love always in Christ, + georgia&co.

Glory to God! The Unfading Rose CD is OUT!!! See UnfadingRose.com for details!

 UnfadingRose.com

THE MOMENT WE HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR, and SO MANY OF YOU HAVE BEEN REQUESTING and ASKING ABOUT HAS FINALLY HAPPENED!  Thank you so much for your love and prayers.  Please let us know what you think of the website and if you have any questions or comments.  You can listen to a sample of the a hymn in Greek and English on the website!  Please let bookstores and other families know about this great resource... to be able to learn the hymns of the Great Feasts in our homes... and for when we attend these beautiful Divine Liturgies of the Great Feasts!  People who want more than on CD and bulk orders are able to order off our website at a discount!  Blessings to you all as we begin 2010.  

Exciting NEWS: New CD coming out with the Hymns of the Great Feasts!

Children's Byzantine Choir Unfading  Rose 

Παιδικός Χόρος  Ρόδον το Αμάραντον

Apolytikia of the Great Feasts
Coming Soon!


 We are moving forward with the publication of: Our first CD which you can listen to and learn these beautiful hymns! What so many of you have been waiting for is finally happening, to the Glory of God!   
Thank you all for you prayers for this big endeavor to finish quickly and smoothly, and always be... to the Glory of God.  Joyous Feast of the Nativity!  Christ is Born, Glorify Him!  +

About the Byzantine children's choir:

Unfading Rose

Unfading Rose ~ Three of our girls recorded the CD with three daughters of our dear friends, and their mother, who directs and sings with them.  Their parents are extremely blessed with the knowledge of and ability to chant!  They are from Greece, and learned Byzantine Music/Chanting in our Homeland... where it originated!  Our girls have been learning hymns for many years, and have been blessed to study byzantine music and chanting with various seminarians at Holy Cross... who we are very thankful for!  
Thank you especially to Nektarios and Michael Razouk!  
      Each time many of you would hear the hymns... on our phone msg. or elsewhere...  you have all been so encouraging and yearning to learn these beautiful hymns!  It has finally happened!! Our two families were so blessed to find one another... to combine the gifts which our children have been blessed with, and God-willing, to bless each one of you in this journey of our precious Orthodox Faith..

This recording represents the end result of an endeavor of love, from our two families, to your family, to make available the most common hymns from our Church year to families in the United States and Greece. As parents we discovered that our children take into their hearts, and learn very quickly, whatever music they hear. Exposing our children to the hymns of the Church is the best way to write these words on the tablets of our children’s hearts and engage our children in a life of prayer. As our children learned the hymns of the church in our home, they felt increasingly at home in the Church.  This first CD of Unfading Rose, are the Apolotikia of the Great Feasts in Greek and English!


We're are schedule for a first of the year release and CD's may be purchased through our website. Go to www.unfadingrose.com to make your order... we'll be up and running soon!
Stay tuned to find out more about the CD and about the icon of Panayia, "Unfading Rose" and how this came to be the name for our Byzantine Children's Choir... Joyous feast for the Nativity of our sweetest Jesus... who was born in such a lowly, humble manger.  May we always follow His example, and always try to create a place befitting for this lowly, humble  King - in the manger of our souls.  
Christ is Born! Glorify Him!



Unfading Rose

Day 2+ Sharing, from me-

+ + + Hello all!  November 21  + + + Joyous Feast for the Presentation of the Theotokos in the Temple!      We had a glorious feast  for the Panayia today at Holy Cross!  I wish every one of you could have been with us.  It is also my dear hubby's birthday... so we were celebrating double! ;)  There was an icon of the Presentation that was very beautiful and had flowers all around it, though the one below is actually the icon from two year's ago at Holy Cross...   I remember this icon like I was at this Liturgy one day ago, not one or two years ago~ do you see how the colors of the flowers they used, so AMAZINGLY bring out the colors in the icon?  It brought us to tears... and our hearts to Paradise.  There is something so beautiful, so unexplainable in words that happens, by the grace of God, when we adorn... (with flowers,our time, our prayers, with our tiredness, with love...)...when we adorn our sweet Lord, His Holy Mother, and the blessed Saints/Angels of our Holy Faith!!  

I want to encourage those of you whose churches do not decorate icons for the Great Feasts, or for the Divine Liturgies when we celebrate the lives of the Saints throughout the year, to think about doing so!  As so many things about our holy faith bless us...  the icons, the beautiful chanting/singing, the voice of the priest... his prayers, petitions, and sermons.... the icons, the incense, the candles...  when a special icon is adorned, decorated...  it will bless your soul, the moment you step foot in the church.  Somehow, it draws our hearts and souls even more into the event we are celebrating or the life of the Saint who we are remembering that very day.  I feel like I am in Paradise, right next to them, and they are also right here by our sides!  The young women at Holy Cross Seminary have made an imprint on our hearts forever.  They take such time, tenderness, care and prayer, as they decorate, and our children have been so blessed to help them on certain feasts and learn a bit about this beautiful talent, and self-less giving which they do here... EVERY WEEK, feast after feast, saint after saint... and each time we walk into church and there is an icon decorated, it is as beautiful or more ~ than the one before.  We have started to try to decorate the icons in our home... especially for our own Saints and the Great Feasts!  Even if we do not have time to decorate them all around... we can pick flowers/roses/greenery from our gardens, and garnish the icon in front of it- where it sits, or floating in a glass of water that sits in front of the special icon that draws our mind, heart, and thoughts to that Saint or event all throughout the day! 

I was thinking the other day as I stared from the inside of my heart into one of these beautifully decorated icons... that we ought to take this same kind of time, to  endure and decorate our faith... our patience...  our prayers... the hearts of our children... our homes... our challenges... our filoxenia(hospitality for others)...  our forgiveness... our humility...the list goes on and on.  Our priest, Father Peter, was speaking today about how the Panayia at such a young age of 3 years old, was presented to the Temple... and how she is also a Temple, and was a Temple for Christ, as she bore him in her womb(the very event we are all preparing to celebrate).  As we prepare, what a blessing to take time, throughout these 40 days... a bit more -away from the world... to truly prepare a place, a Temple, in us, which would be fit for this most humble, lowly King, who was born in a manger...   "Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you?  If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple." 1 Cor 3:16-17(NIV)   May we remember this each day of this joyous period of the Nativity fast, and though it may be difficult in the world we live in... with all the ways it is seeking to pull us, our children... and perhaps God-forbid to destroy us... may we take time to flee those things! (be it certain kinds of music, tv, news, food... busy-ness...our pride...laziness...gluttony...) Thank God for our Holy Faith, which gives us these 40 day periods, fasting days, etc... to prepare our bodies to truly become a beautiful, fitting place for this sweet baby Jesus and to truly become "a Temple of the Holy Spirit."  May we all be inspired by the Virgin Mary, who at the age of three, being led by her guardian angel... ran up the steps of the Temple, and may we RUN to the Panagia, to Christ, to prayer, to our icon corners, to hug our children, to our prayer ropes/the Jesus Prayer... all instead of reacting or responding too quickly... before and after all we do, especially during this period as we prepare for the nativity, and then may this kind of running be a part of our innermost being.  Yesterday,  Konstantina wrote/shared so beautifully and humbly from her heart!  Many of you emailed me how blessed you were by her!  I join all of you in thanking her... and encourage you to read and re-read her precious words... about exactly what i have been sharing about, and becoming Saints!  We all truly basked in the  grace that was OVERFLOWING in her... after she had been to that vigil, venerated St. Gregory Palamas'  holy RELICS... Philip and i read her beautiful sharing last night...we were so blessed-i was brought to tears, to Paradise...had chills everywhere... 

+I pray that the Lord and His Most Holy Mother the Virgin Mary, whose entrance into the Temple we celebrated today, will have mercy on you and keep you and all of your beautiful families under their Holy Protection! + Joyous Feast! ~with so much love in +Christ, georgia 

i will try to download the tracks of the Hymn for this Great Feast of the Presentation of the Theotokos in the Temple... in Greek and in English.  If anyone reads this who has a blog w/ blogspot and you can give me any advice on this, i would GREATLY appreciate it!  ;)

Pride

In the book The Path to Confession, it says that Pride is loathsome and disgusting.  "Pride is disgusting in adults, bet it is equally unpleasent in those who are younger." Just like a thundercloud hides the sun so that we can't see it, spiritual light and warmth are hidden by Pride. "A proud person dosen't see the Lord." He will not be let in the gate of Heaven. You can easily see the person who has the disease of Pride. Until recently, most of us have thought that "I" was the first letter of the Alphabet, like "I want this," - "No I don't." Every single person struggles with that, but we have try to not be prideful, and learn to be humble.~ alexandra