Pascha

Last Saturday night (the night before Easter) I attended the Orthodox celebration of Pascha (pronounced paw-skuh, like you’re an old Russian guy). It’s basically an Easter service, except that it starts at 11:30 p.m.

And ends at 3:00 a.m. And there are no chairs. And you can’t fall asleep even if you manage to find a wall to lean on because you might drop your lit candle and set the church on fire.

Despite these conditions, I actually quite liked it.

I’d never been to any Orthodox service (or even a Catholic service) before, so just the initial entry into the small sanctuary was a bit of a shock. The room was dark, with only several dim chandeliers providing most of the light, supported by an array of candles resting around the room. A small stage sat at the front of the room, dominated by a lavishly decorated partial wall separating the greater part of the room from a holy area behind the wall reserved for clergy.

At the entryway to the sanctuary sat a small painting bearing the image of some saint, surrounded by more candles, before which entering practitioners would cross and prostrate themselves. As I followed into the sanctuary, an aged male voice somewhere near the front of the room was reading the book of Acts in a monotone voice that sounded not unlike the chanting of a Buddhist monk.

I claimed my piece of territory (meaning that I chose a spot where I would be standing for three and a half hours) and looked around the room. It felt like I had stepped into a church of the year 300 A.D. Moreover, it felt like that church would have been located somewhere East of the Mediterranean.

I’ve heard one of my favorite speakers, Rob Bell, talk about rediscovering Christianity as an Eastern religion. Rediscovering roots that we might look upon today as weird or foreign. That finally made sense to me as I stood there absorbing the crudely shaded artwork and monotone chanting that filled the room. I figure it was about as close to original church tradition as it gets, and it felt extremely unfamiliar.

The experience after the service was just as novel. Around 3:30, they really got the party started. The members of the congregation had basically followed a vegan diet for lent, so following the service, an outdoor feast featuring all different kinds of meat-centered dishes was unveiled. More interestingly, Orthodox folks seem to have quite the affinity for alcohol (which I'd actually heard about before). It was quite the transition going from the most reverent church service I've ever attended to a party with significant amounts of hard liquor. We didn't stay too long, mostly because it was cold outside.

The guys with whom I went to Pascha. Several are in one of my bible studies.

Needless to say, it was a very interesting night. I'm still digesting the whole experience. I've tried about five times to write out some of my intellectual feelings concerning the service, but each time I've found myself unable to even wrap my head around my thoughts. So perhaps in a future post.


For now, I can simply appreciate that it was a great complement to a regular Sunday morning Easter service.