Perfect Ending to a Downer Week

This Third Sunday of Lent is the Sunday of the Cross. I did not remember, until doing our Saturday evening "Vigil" here at home, that there is a beautiful glimpse forward to Pascha! When I picture this service, I picture prostrations; I picture almost a burial procession with the cross on a bed of flowers. There is one thing I had forgotten: in Matins, we sing the hymns from the Paschal canon...
This is the day of Resurrection. Let us be illumined, O people. Pascha, the Pascha of the Lord. For from death to life and from earth to heaven has Christ our God led us, as we sing a song of victory!
For "Vigil" tonight, here at home, we read Small Compline inserting the appropriate canon from the Triodion. Using Compline was a choice to stay simple, since it can be read from the prayer book with no extra resources (way easier than trying to put together Vespers). Inserting material from the Triodion is more "fancy", but I was only intending to read the canon, which is easy if you have it.

That is when I realized that the canon uses the Paschal hymns (the irmoi hymns at the beginning of each ode of the canon). So, I went back to the prayer book, and sang those hymns using the Paschal Canon listed there. As it turns out, those used the exact same wording as I was used to singing, so that worked out well for me, personally.

There is a Triodion online, and you could read through the canon from the 3rd Sunday in Lent if you want...just scroll down to Matins and find "Ode 1".

After such a strange week, self-quarantined, schedules changing, struggling with how to set up life in a totally different rhythm, I found it incredibly encouraging to see this ray of hope on the horizon. "For from death to life and from earth to heaven has Christ our God led us, as we sing a song of victory!"

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