Services at St. Michael’s, Audley - April 2009

Wed. 1st 6.30pm Great Canon of St. Andrew of Crete and Life of St. Mary of Egypt.
Fri. 3rd 6.30pm Full Akathist to the Most Holy Theotokos.

Sat. 4th 6pm Great Vespers.
Sun. 5th 10am Matins; 11am Divine Liturgy
Wed. 8th 6.30pm Liturgy of the Pre-sanctified Gifts.
Fri. 10th. 6.30pm Great Vespers.

Sat. 11th Lazarus Saturday 10.30am Divine Liturgy.
Sun. 12th Palm Sunday 10am Matins; 11am Divine Liturgy and Procession.
2pm Matins of the Bridegroom.
Great and Holy Monday 13th 6.30pm Matins of the Bridegroom.
Great and Holy Tuesday 14th 6.30pm Matins of the Bridegroom.
Great and Holy Wednesday 15th 6.30pm Anointing Service.
( Make your confession before this service of Holy Anointing!)
Great and Holy Thursday 16th 11am Vesperal Liturgy.
6.30pm Matins with the Twelve Passion Gospels.
Great and Holy Friday 17th 10.30am Royal Hours; 2pm Vespers and Epitaphios Procession;
6.30pm Matins and Bier Procession.

Great and Holy Saturday 18th 11am Vesperal Liturgy;
11.30pm Midnight Office; Paschal Light; Christos Anesti and Liturgy of Pascha.
Pascha . Sun. 19th 2pm Paschal Vespers.
Tues. 22nd 6.30pm Great Vespers.
Wed. 23rd 10.30am Divine Liturgy of St. George’s Feastday.

Sat. 25th 6pm Great Vespers.
Sun. 26th 10am Matins; 11am Divine Liturgy.

Namedays in April.

23rd George Dobson; George Gandy;
Alexandra Davidchack; Georgia Winter;
Georgia Williams; Georgina Chiurlea.

Reposed

16th John Yeomans. (2002)

22nd Chad Makings.( 1999)

Patronal Feasts

23rd Our Cathedral of St. George in London .

HELP NEEDED FOR GREAT WEEK AND PASCHA

We have already begun to clean things !!!

EPITAPHIOS AND OTHER FLOWERS: Please remember that we have to buy lots of flowers for the Great Week and Pascha services. There are envelopes.at the back of the church for donations, or you can bring your own envelope marked “Flowers for Pascha”, or you can bring extra flowers.

For Great Friday help will be needed to decorate the Epitaphios canopy after the Royal Hours, around 12.30pm. This is for everyone to do, but is not a social occasion and is done fasting and in silence. The crucified Saviour is hanging in our presence.

For Great Saturday bay leaves and rose petals are needed for scattering and after the Vesperal Liturgy of St Basil on Great Saturday morning there is a lot to do. If everybody who comes to the morning liturgy stayed behind for half an hour after the liturgy to help we would get the whole thing done, instead of a small handful of people having to spend the whole afternoon at it!

For Pascha we need to dye red eggs (dye is available in the refreshment room during Great Week) and prepare food for the Feast.

John and Veronica Warden have again offered their home for the Feast after the Paschal Liturgy.
Cyril and Magdalene have offered their home to us for the feast after the Sunday Vespers of Love.
Bring something to share with everyone.

Bookstall

This is an invaluable source of income for the church, so please use it for your cards, gifts, books, CDs, DVDs and icons.

Great and Holy Week

We have an invitation (from the Aposticha of Holy Tuesday Matins) :

“Thou art more beautiful than all men, O Bridegroom.
Thou hast invited us to the spiritual banquet of Thy bridal chamber.
Strip me of the ugly garment of my sins as I participate in Thy Passion.
Adorn me in the glorious robe of Thy beauty that proclaims me a guest in Thy Kingdom, O merciful Lord.”

“Come, O faithful, let us work zealously for the Master, for He distributes wealth to His servants.
Let each of us according to his ability increase his talent of grace:
Let one be adorned in wisdom through good works:
Let another celebrate a service in splendour.
The one distributes his wealth to the poor; the other communicates the word to those untaught.
Thus we shall increase what has been entrusted to us, and, as faithful stewards of grace, we shall be accounted worthy of the Master’s joy.
Make us worthy of this, O Christ our God, in Thy love for mankind.”

In worship we encounter the living God, Who makes Himself present and active, drawing us into the realm of salvation. We do much more than remember the past events of the Passion and Resurrection and recall the promises for the future. We experience for ourselves the Risen Christ, making all that is past and all that is future present now in our liturgical celebrations.
We stand in the Garden of Gethsemane, having been there when Lazarus came out of his tomb at the call of the Saviour; having shouted “Hosanna” with the crowds at the entry into Jerusalem of our Lord and King.
We witness the arrest; we loiter in the courtyard of the high priest; we weep at the humiliation of our Lord God at the hands of the Roman soldiers; we follow Him to Golgotha and wait to see Him die.
We cry out ecstatically after the long night of His descent into the realms of the dead at His glorious resurrection.
The Church has made it easy for us to be there with the many services … let us not be found too busy, or worse still careless of what is happening.
Pascha, which is the climax of the whole of our salvation history, is the oldest, most venerable and
pre-eminent feast of the Church, the very centre and heart of the liturgical year.

Christ is risen …….. He is risen indeed! English

Al-Maseeh qam … Haqqan qam! Arabic

Christos anesti … Alithos anesti! Greek

Hristos a inviat … Adeverat a inviat! Romanian

Kriste agsdga … C’esmarit’ad agsdga! Georgian

Christos voskrese … Voistinu voskrese! Slavonic