Dear Faithful,

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed.      Krisdos 3aryav i my-ylox1

Where does the church become THAT which she was called to be?  Is it in acts of charity?  Is it in increasing membership?  Is it in successful programming?  Is it in attendance in the pews?  Is it in a perfect power point presentations or attractive new marketing tools or effective "strategic planning" initiatives?

I would submit that it is not in any of those things that the world normally uses to judge its success or failure, but precisely in the faithful, regular and discerning discovery of Christ in the "sacrament of the gathering," the Eucharist where Christ Himself is distributed among us, "pa,qi i mi]i myrovm" (see Divine Liturgy pew book p. 47) where the church becomes what she is - the Body of Christ.

The Parish Council of St. Mary answered this issue in a practical way and yet, a way unheard of in the Armenian Church.  Adjusting the weekly collection sheet, they removed attendance figures and replaced it with the number of recipients of Holy Communion.  In other words, tabulating the number of individuals who literally receive the Body and Blood of Christ on any given Sunday!  Why did they do this?  Simple.  True attendance is related to true participation. True participation means communing in the cup of Christ, for only in Him do "we live, and move, and have our being."  (Acts 17:28)

While even members of Parish Council may not have realized the significance of what that means to me, suffice to say that I am exceedingly overjoyed to see how these faithful servants of our church, place the central, essential and integral aspect of our entire faith at the focus of our being and that each of them understand the true nature of our faith and our lives in Christ.

In Holy Communion we enact, embody and proclaim in spirit and in truth what it means to say "Christ is Risen from the Dead." For as the apostle Paul teaches us "For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes," (1 Corinthians 11:26)  everything in the Church leads to the Eucharist, and all things flow from it.  It is the completion of all of the Church's sacraments -- the source and the goal of our lives personally and collectively. 

In it, as an important reminder of the Easter season and the remembrance of the Genocide and "Armenian Golgotha", we comprehend that "neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:38-39)

Following our 40 day fast and the time that we collectively refrained from Communion in examination of conscience and like the wandering Israelites subjected to penitence, in order that we too learn "man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord," (Deut. 8:3; Mat. 4:4; Luke 4:4) we rejoice and proclaim the Lord's Victory with the words "Christ is Risen," and respond to His invitation, one and all, to "taste and see how sweet is the Lord," (Psalm 34:8; Divine Liturgy p. 47) and see that in His Cup, from which we are called to, "In holiness taste of the holy, holy and precious Body and Blood of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ," in which there is "life, hope of resurrection, expiation and remission of sins." (see Divine Liturgy book p. 44)

In Christ's Love

Der Shnork