Great Vespers for Sunday Divine Liturgy.  Not far from the temple in Jerusalem was a pool called Bethesda, which means house of mercy.  Beside the pool lay many people who were sick, blind, lame and withered.  They were waiting for the water to move because an angel of the Lord stirred the water on occasion.   Whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was healed of his disease.  Jesus Christ visited the pool and saw a man there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years.  Jesus asked him if he wanted to be healed.  The sick man answered he had no one to help him into the pool when the water is stirred.  Someone always enters before he is able to do so himself.  Jesus Christ then said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.”  At once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.  Since it was the Sabbath, the Jews told him it was not lawful for him to carry his bed.  He replied  that the man who healed him told him to take up the bed and walk.  They asked the healed man who was this man who healed him, but he did not know who he was.  Later they saw each other in the temple and Jesus told him to sin no more.  The healed man then told the Jews who it was that healed him.  After this, the Jews sought even more to persecute Jesus Christ and kill Him since he performed this act on the Sabbath.     

Divine Liturgy - Sunday of the Paralytic.  Not far from the temple in Jerusalem was a pool called Bethesda, which means house of mercy.  Beside the pool lay many people who were sick, blind, lame and withered.  They were waiting for the water to move because an angel of the Lord stirred the water on occasion.   Whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was healed of his disease.  Jesus Christ visited the pool and saw a man there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years.  Jesus asked him if he wanted to be healed.  The sick man answered he had no one to help him into the pool when the water is stirred.  Someone always enters before he is able to do so himself.  Jesus Christ then said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.”  At once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.  Since it was the Sabbath, the Jews told him it was not lawful for him to carry his bed.  He replied  that the man who healed him told him to take up the bed and walk.  They asked the healed man who was this man who healed him, but he did not know who he was.  Later they saw each other in the temple and Jesus told him to sin no more.  The healed man then told the Jews who it was that healed him.  After this, the Jews sought even more to persecute Jesus Christ and kill Him since he performed this act on the Sabbath.     

Great Vespers for Sunday Divine Liturgy.  Jesus, wearied with His journey to a city called Sychar, sat on a well there to rest.  His disciples went into the city to buy food and while Jesus sat there, a woman came to the well to draw water.  Jesus asked her for water and she was amazed that He did so because the Jews had no interaction with the Samaritans and she was a Samaritan.   Jesus went on to say that if she had asked Him for water, He would have given her living water.   Jesus said, “Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again; but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.”  He continued, “But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship Him.  God is a Spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”  She answered Him, “I know that the Messiah cometh, Who is called Christ;  when He is come, He will tell us all things.”  Then Jesus Christ said to her, “The Messiah – I am the One, Who is speaking to you.”  After this, Jesus and His disciples stayed and taught the Samaritans and they believed in Him.

Divine Liturgy for the Sunday of the Samaritan Woman.  The fifth Sunday following Pascha deals with a woman of Samaria with whom Christ spoke at Jacob’s Well.  The theme is “the living water.”  The Savior called His divine teaching  the living water.   It is also where Christ is recognized as “The Messiah.”  By tradition, it is known that the Samaritan woman spent the remainder of her life preaching the Gospel of Christ.  The Holy Church celebrates her memory on March 20.  Her name is Holy Martyr Photina (Svetlana in Russian).

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Trustees' Meeting for May.

Great Vespers for Sunday Divine Liturgy.  The sixth Sunday following Easter commemorates the healing of the man blind from birth.  Jesus’ disciples asked Him who sinned, this man or his parents.  Jesus Christ answered, “Neither this man sinned, nor his parents; but that the works of God should be manifest in him.”  He then spat on the ground, and made mud of the spittle, and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay.  He then told the blind man to go, wash in the pool of Siloam.  He returned, seeing.  His neighbors brought him to the Pharisees.  They did not believe the man and called for his parents, and asked them if he was indeed born blind.  They answered that this was their son and he was indeed born blind.  But how he came to see, they said ask him yourself.  He is of age.  They once more called the man who had been born blind and asked him again how this happened.  The man said I have told you already and you do not believe me.  He said, “Whether He is a sinner or not, I know not; one thing I know that whereas I was blind, now I see.”   (John 9:1-38)

Divine LIturgy for the Sunday of the Blind Man.  “I come to Thee, O Christ, blind from birth in my spiritual eyes, and call to Thee in repentance:  Thou art the most radiant Light of those in darkness!”  (Kontakion)

Great Vespers with Litiya for the Ascension of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.   On the fortieth day after his Passover, Jesus ascended into heaven to be glorified on the right hand of God.  (Acts 1:9-11  Mark 16:19;  Luke 24:51).  The ascension of Christ is His final physical departure from this world after the resurrection.  It is the formal completion of His mission in this world as the Messianic Savior.  It is His glorious return to the Father who had sent Him into the world to accomplish the work that He had given Him to do.  The Holy Scripture stresses Christ’s physical departure and His glorification with God the Father, together with the great joy which His disciples had as they received the promise of the Holy Spirit who was to come to assure the Lord’s presence with them, enabling them to be His witnesses to the ends of the earth. 

Divine Liturgy for the Feast of the Ascension of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.   “Thou hast ascended in glory O Christ our God, granting joy to Thy disciples by the promise of the Holy Spirit.  Through the blessing they were assured that Thou art the Son of God, the Redeemer of the world!  (Troparion)

Great Vespers for Sunday Divine LIturgy.   Councils of Bishops, pastors, and teachers of the Church from the known world were convened for the struggle against the heretics and for the instruction of all Christians in the correct Orthodox faith.     These general conferences called Ecumenical Councils, maintained the truth of Christ by the guidance of the Holy Spirit and participation of the entire Christian Church.  There have been seven Ecumenical Councils.  At the First and Second Ecumenical Councils the Symbol of Faith or Creed, was composed.  The Creed is a short statement of all the tenets of the Orthodox Christian faith and is sung at the Divine Liturgy.  Every Orthodox Christian is obliged to know it. 

Divine Liturgy for the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council.   “The apostles’ preaching and the fathers’ doctrines have established one faith for the Church.  Adorned with the robe of truth, woven from heavenly theology; great is the mystery of Orthodoxy which it defines and glorifies.”   (Kontakion)