Just a few things:

1.  Vespers at 5:00 p.m. this Saturday.

2.  Divine Liturgy: Hearing of confessions and the reading of the hours at 9:30 a.m.  Divine Liturgy at 10:00 a.m.  This Sunday is also kid’s sermon.  Yay!!!!!!!!

3.  In honor of Mother’s Day, Holy Cross will be collecting baby layette items for new mothers in need for the Thelma Wynne Project located in Winnipeg.  The Thelma Wynne Project has been in existence in one way or another for over 50 years. For much of that time it has been located within St. Matthew’s church building. Dedicated women from Anglican churches in the city make or collect items and then prepare layettes for newborns. The layettes are distributed through social agencies in the city to new mothers who need them. The project has evolved somewhat over the years but originally was started by Thelma Wynne after whom it is named.  The items are to be new and include:  diapers, blankets, sleepers, caps, booties, baby soap, lotions, etc.  Holy Cross will be collecting these items for the month of May until May 30.  You can bring your donation to Holy Cross on Sundays or you can contact either Fr. Evan or Sylvia Kitzul at 256-8370 and we can arrange a pick up.

4.  This Sunday is Holy Pentecost, or as I like to refer to it, Rider Sunday.  Why?  Because Fr. Evan gets to wear green and white vestments.  Woo-hoo.

I came across a quote by St. Gregory Nazianzus.  “So that by gradual increase…and progress from glory to glory, the light of the Trinity might shine upon the more illuminated…for this reason it was, I think, that He gradually came to dwell in the disciples.  He measured Himself out to them according to their capacity to receive Him:  at the beginning of the gospel, after the Passion, after the Ascension, making perfect their powers, being breathed upon them, and appearing in fiery tongues…”

I find the line “He meaured Himself out to them according to their capacity to receive Him” really interesting.  Each and every one of us is on an individual spiritual journey.  It is true that we come together in common confession of faith and belief that will shape our journey, that we can share that journey with family, with friends, but when all is said and done, the journey is a singular one.  Our Lord and Saviour is not only the Saviour of humanity as a whole, but is the Saviour of the individual.

The reason I make mention of this is that the spiritual journey that each of us is on is not always going to be easy.  There will be moments that we will feel that we are totally closed off from God, that our prayers go unheard, that we will feel that we have not deepened our spirituality, failed in our ascetic attempts.  And then there will be days that we will feel like the Apostles on Holy Pentecost, feel the power of the Holy Spirit, that we will be bursting with love and joy.

What we have to remember and hold onto each and every day of our life is that just as Christ Himself gradually came to dwell in the apostles, so to does Christ gradually come and dwell in us.  As we mature spiritually our capacity to receive Christ into our hearts grows.  There will be times in our life when our capacity to let Christ fill our lives will great, and there will times when it is not so great.  That is why constant prayer is so important.  Prayer is our asking Christ to be a part of our life because we are engaging Him, asking Him to fill us.  Holy Confession is so important.  It is realizing that we have filled our heart, filled our soul with so much sinful junk that we have made it impossible to allow Christ in.  Holy Confession is the emptying out of the bad to allow the good in.  The Holy Eucharist is so paramount to our spiritual health because it is the actual filling of the vessel that is us with Christ Himself.

What we have to remember is that it is progression.  Just as it was for the Apostles, so too it is for us as well.  I guess what I really want to say is, never get discouraged, never give up.  Christ is there, Christ is always there and He responds to our needs in the most perfect way, His way.

5.  Don’t forget!  Holy Cross has a newly designed webpage. Check it out.  You can download any missed bulletins.  Maybe make a collection of them.  Get them bound in fine Corinthian Leather or genuine Saskatchewan Seal Skin, gold lettering on the cover, and Fr. Evan will personally autograph each copy.  Our website is: www.holycrosswpg.ca Take a look, post a comment, let us know what you think.

Answer to last week’s question:
Jesus only once gave someone a name in His parables.  Who was it?  Lzarus the beggar.

This week’s question:
How many loaves of bread did Jesus use to feed the 4000?

See you in church.

In Christ,

Fr. Evan

The Way of the Cross – May 23, 2010

Just a few things:

1.  Vespers at 5:00 p.m. this Saturday.

2.  Divine Liturgy: Hearing of confessions and the reading of the hours at 9:30 a.m.  Divine Liturgy at 10:00 a.m.

3.  Mother’s Day is fast approaching.  In honor of that, Holy Cross will be collecting baby layette items for new mothers in need for the Thelma Wynne Project located in Winnipeg.  The Thelma Wynne Project has been in existence in one way or another for over 50 years. For much of that time it has been located within St. Matthew’s church building. Dedicated women from Anglican churches in the city make or collect items and then prepare layettes for newborns. The layettes are distributed through social agencies in the city to new mothers who need them. The project has evolved somewhat over the years but originally was started by Thelma Wynne after whom it is named.  The items are to be new and include:  diapers, blankets, sleepers, caps, booties, baby soap, lotions, etc.  Holy Cross will be collecting these items for the month of May until May 30.  You can bring your donation to Holy Cross on Sundays or you can contact either Fr. Evan or Sylvia Kitzul at 256-8370 and we can arrange a pick up.

4.  So, driving home from my banjo lesson, I passed by a church and the message it had on the outside announced the upcoming Sunday’s sermon topic:  “Encounter Christ – Walk away changed”.  It got me thinking as I was driving home and thankfully took my mind off the fact that I did not play the “Stitches in my britches” polka very well.  Although my banjo instructor said I played very well.  His words of encouragement were, “You have improved Evan.  It doesn’t sound like you are hurting the banjo anymore.”

If one encounters Christ, do they walk away different?  Does something change?

The answer, at least from a scriptural point of view, is yes.  Take a look at the Sundays that follow the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
St. Thomas Sunday - Thomas won’t believe until he can physically see and touch Christ.  Once he does, he is changed.
Sunday of the Myrrhbearing Women - They encounter Christ as they make their way back from the empty tomb.  They get to share the good news of the resurrected Christ with the Apostles.  These women, after encountering Christ, their lives are changed.
Sunday of the Paralytic - The man encounters Christ and is healed, his life is changed.
Sunday of the Samaritan woman - She encounters Christ at the well, and she comes to realize that she has met the Messiah and she shares that information with her fellow people.  Her life and the lives of those around her are changed by their encounter with Christ.
Sunday of the Blind Man - A man who had been blind since birth, encounters Christ, and his sight is restored.  His life is changed.

Anyone who encounters Christ in Holy Scripture walks away changed.  Every healing Christ did changed a life.  Every sermon He gave changed a life.  Every parable, every action, all of these encounters changed lives.

In each of these Sundays listed we can find ourselves.   We are like Thomas who doubts.  We are like the myrrhbearing women who walked with fear and uncertainty of the unknown.  We are like the paralytic when we become paralyzed by sin, by fear, by anger.  We are like the samaritan woman who did not understand why this man she encountered at the well would talk to her, a “second class citizen”, that she believed herself not worthy.  We are like the blind man, except our blindness to God’s love and mercy is a result of us looking at everything else instead of God.

But in each case, an encounter with our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ changed all that and it can be the same for us if we truly open our lives to God’s love, to God’s commandments, to the teachings of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.  Doubt is erased.  Fear is overcome.  The spiritual, emotional, and mental paralysis as a result of sin on our part is healed.  We learn that in God’s eyes, we do have a value, we do have worth.

I sometimes wonder if we try and avoid Christ.  We try to do everything in our power to not encounter Him.  Get lost in the crowd, hide away at home, try to avoid where He will be.  Truth is, we can’t hide from Christ.  We can choose to ignore Him, close our eyes and pretend He is not there, close our ears and not listen to anything He says, but the reality is that we are just fooling ourselves.  We can’t hide from Christ.  And the awesome thing about that is that it is a good thing.  We are so loved by God, that He sent His only begotten Son among us for the sole purpose that we would encounter Him and we have the evidence of what the results of those encounters were like.

Make that effort to encounter Christ.

Answer to last week’s question:
What sin was Jesus condemning in His parable about the Pharisee and the tax-collector?  Pride

This week’s question:
True or false?  Jesus was sold into slavery by his brothers?

See you in church.

In Christ,

Fr. Evan

May 2010 Calendar

The Way of the Cross – May 2, 2010

1. Great Vespers at 5:00 p.m. this Saturday. We are back. Woo-hoo! There will be a special choir rehersal at 3:00 for specific parts of the Holy Week services. At 4:00 there will be a general choir rehersal for everyone interested in learning some of the basic melodies for the Holy Week services. Make sense? I hope so because I have a head cold and things are a bit fuzzy for me right now.

2. Divine Liturgy at 10:00 a.m. with the hearing of confessions and the reading of the Hours at 9:30 a.m. Please be advised that we will be blessing the pussy willows at the beginning of the service so that you may hold them during the liturgy, and espeically during the reading of the Gospel, “13. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting, “Hosanna! How blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel!”, we can all wave our pussy willows and proclaim with joy the entry of our Lord King into His city.

3. Just a reminder of the schedule of services:
Holy Wednesday, (March 31) – Holy Unction at 7:00 p.m. at All-Saints in Transcona
Holy Thursday, (April 1) – Reading of the 12 Gospels at 6:00 p.m. at Holy Cross
Holy Friday, (April 2) – Shroud Service at 3:00 p.m. at Holy Cross
Holy Saturday, (April 3) – Vesperal Liturgy at 11:00 a.m. at Holy Cross
Holy Pascha, (April 4) – Paschal Matins at 5:15 a.m., Divine Liturgy to follow. We will be breaking the fast together in the multi-purpose room in the basement at St. Andrew’s College so you are invited to stay.

4. Holy Cross has a new webpage/blog set up. Thanks to the hard work of Bob Kaminsky, we have revamped our web-page. Now you can be up to date on everything that is happening in the wonderful world of Holy Cross, and let’s be honest, your lives were just a little bit empty not knowing, right? No? You were doing okay? I don’t believe you. You are all just putting on a brave face. You can check out the new site at www.holycrosswpg.ca

Anyhoo, we have revamped the site. You can now check out pictures of some of the activities Holy Cross has been involved with. You can catch up on missed bulletins. Heck, you can now collect them all, maybe get them bound in a book, put it on the shelf. If you ask nicely I will even autograph it for you. No, no one is asking? Anyone? did I mention that the site is www.holycrosswpg.ca?

Check it out. We would love to hear from you. If your own parish has a webpage let us know so that we can post a link to it. Let us know what is going on in your parish, in your part of the world. www.holycrosswpg.ca

5. Came across an interview that I wanted to share a portion of with you. The interview is with Ed Dobson, who is the subject of the book, “The Year of Living Like Jesus”. The book records his journey of eating kosher, attending synagogue, observing the Sabbath, celebrating feasts and festivals, and trying to think and act like Jesus Christ. (sounds like he was trying to be, oh I don’t know, say…Orthodox?)

One of the quotes from the interview that struck me as really interesting is this one: “When I pastored at Calvary Church (Grand Rapids, MI), we canceled all programs for a year – all youth activities, outreaches, Christmas and Easter programs, everything. We only had Sunday and Wednesday services. We read the Bible, shared the faith, and invested in relationships. We lost hundreds of members who were attached to the programs.”

One of the big things a priest will be asked is, “How active is your parish?” Do you have a Sunday School program, Bible Study, Catechism Classes, an active women’s group/sisterhood, an active men’s group? Do you have youth programs? Do you have an outreach program? And if the priest says no then the priest is seen as a failure. That the church is dying. And here we have a pastor that cancelled all of that and got down to what is the basic fundametal activity for a Christian: Worship and glory of God.

In my humble and sinful opinion I think the success of a church is not in the financial success of the perogie dinners it puts on, it is not in number of members in the women’s organization, it is not even in the number of paid members.

The true measure of the life a church, its health, is on that Sunday morning, or at the various other opportunities that we are called to come together and worship and give glory to God and whether or not the faithful come to that. You will have many that will say, “I do my part. I express my devotion to the church in the kitchen, in the meetings, etc.” They are sadly, attached to the programs…and not the church.

Pastor Ed Dobson tried to reverse that trend in his church. He spent a year eating kosher. For Orthodox Christians, the equivalent is following our fasting guidelins. He attended synagogue. For Orthodox Christians, the equivalent is attending the Divine Liturgy. He observed the Sabbath and celebrated feasts and festivals. For Orthodox Christians the equivalent is actually making an effort to participate in the liturgical calendar of our Holy Church. He cancelled the programs and told his flock that it was time to get down to basics.

It is time for all of us to get attached to our Church again it is time for us to get to the basics again. To make the worship and glory of God the reason for attending and allowing the joy and spiritual fulfillment that comes from it, then, and only then, inspire everything else we do in God’s name.

Answer to last week’s question:
Who did Jesus say would be remembered whenever the gospel was preached throughout the world? The woman who poured expensive perfume on Jesus’ head.

This week’s question:
What are the final words of Jesus, as recorded in the Book of Acts?

See you in church!

In Christ,

Fr. Evan

The Way of the Cross – March 28, 2010