Very Early in the Morning

Becky Thurner

I think it was three years ago that I made the leap. It was something that my heart had nudged me to do for awhile, but my comfort zone usually requires more than nudging to stretch outside its cushy perimeter. Especially if it means getting out of bed two hours early on Sunday morning.

I’m talking about attending Orthros (Greek for “morning”) at 8 a.m. before Divine Liturgy every week. It is a two-hour service that focuses on Christ’s resurrection and the ever-faithful part that the myrrh-bearing women played in it. Though I was born and raised Orthodox, the church I attended growing up did not offer this service, so it was never a part of my church-going routine. In fact, I’m not sure I even heard of it until we moved to Austin and began attending St. Elias. Fr. James offered a somewhat abbreviated Orthros service (just ask anyone who knew Fr. James what I mean by “abbreviated”), but my husband and I were already accustomed to having that time to sleep in before getting ourselves and our two children up and ready for Divine Liturgy.

Old habits are hard to break. Even after we switched churches and came to St. John’s, I knew that only a precious few people were attending this service. They were the ones who needed to be there: a chanter or two, our deacon and choir director, and maybe one or two parishioners. What I didn’t understand was that I needed to be there. So I continued to let them pray and chant away while I did my important work of sleeping.

It was about that time that Fr. Aidan was conducting a book study on the roles of men and women in the church, and also devoted one of his homilies to that subject. If you’re reading this and are not Orthodox, you may not know that the Church views the sexes as equally different, which I translate in my own “Orthodox for Dummies” way as meaning we are equally important and necessary to our own and the world’s salvation, but in unique ways. For instance, women can be nuns, but not priest(esses); we can be parish council presidents or choir directors, but cannot preach. You’ll have to do your own reading on the theology of this, but what it boils down to is that in the Church, women have loving, prayerful, and often quiet work to do. Just like the myrrh-bearing women did.

One of the ideas from that homily that I could not let go of was that throughout history, the silent, fervent prayers of women have undoubtedly helped keep Orthodoxy alive during periods of religious oppression. In the years when Communism flourished and worship was banned; when the light of religion was reduced to a covert flicker in a hidden icon corner, the thought that God answered the supplications of faithful women as they wore down the knots of their prayer ropes was not just eye-opening, but heart-opening. When I thought I wasn’t needed at Orthros, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Though the immediate survival of the Orthodox Church was not in danger, there were dozens of other problems and people out there needing prayers. In this world of quick fixes and self-help books and disintegrating communication, so many people consider prayer an afterthought or simply a “can’t hurt” kind of shot in the dark. I admit I’m not good at it; I’m not consistent with it; I often feel like I’m talking to myself, but every day I try to remind myself what Sister Magdalen of St. John’s Monastery in London told me when she visited Austin five or six years ago. She said in her sweet British accent, “People always want me to give them a recipe for how to fix their problems. I tell them to pray first, not as the last resort.”

So the next Sunday after that homily I set my alarm for 6 a.m. I’m not going to lie; my talent for procrastination kicked in and I was this close to turning it off and giving it a go again next week. But I didn’t; I just couldn’t keep relying on a few people to do all the work. I got ready quietly without disturbing Rob or the kids, and got to church a little after Orthros had started. There were only two women there besides the chanters, and in the stillness, I took a seat at the back of the nave and just listened to the psalms being read. I loved to read aloud to my kids, but now someone was reading to me. It was peaceful and calm and a new way for me to communicate with the most Holy Trinity.

Then the chanters sung the most beautiful Resurrection hymn commemorating what happened as the myrrh-bearers approached Christ’s tomb. It is called the Evlogitaria, and includes these verses which made my purpose as a woman within the Church as clear as the empty tomb:

Wherefore O women disciples, do ye mingle sweet smelling spices with your tears of pity? The radiant Angel within the sepulcher cried, unto the myrrh-bearing women: “ Behold the grave and understand that the Savior is risen from the tomb.”

Very early in the morning did the myrrh-bearing women run lamenting unto Thy tomb, but an Angel came toward them saying “The time for lamentation is passed. Weep not, but announce unto the apostles the Resurrection.”

Look at what these women did, and tell me if it is not how women are hard-wired, despite society’s insistence on messing with the circuitry. This trip to anoint Christ’s body was just the final act of devotion on their parts. They had followed Him throughout His earthly ministry, even providing for His needs out of their own means. They didn’t advise Him, they didn’t lobby Him, they didn’t covet His healing power or His ability to multiply loaves of bread. They didn’t ask for equal time on the Mount.

Instead, they followed Him to see Pilate and witnessed His scourging. On the road to Calvary, they watched helplessly as He buckled under the burden of the Cross. One woman in the crowd ran to wipe the blood and sweat from His agonized face with her veil, ignoring the ridicule and taunting of the frenzied crowd. They watched as the nails were pounded into His hands and feet and endured listening to the soldiers mock His nakedness. Finally, they heard Him ask God the Father to forgive His torturers, and then breathe the words, “It is done.”

They were there when His body was taken down from the cross and given to Joseph of Arimathea, who would wrap it in a linen shroud and lay it in his own new tomb. Because the Sabbath was quickly approaching, the women did not have the proper time to anoint the body at the time of burial. But as soon as the Sabbath had passed, very early in the morning, they returned to the tomb weeping at their loss and bearing sweet smelling spices. And of course it was here that an Angel cut short their tears of pity with the astounding revelation that Christ, being God, had risen from the tomb.

And the Angel told them to do these things: “Behold…” “Understand…” “Weep not…” “Announce unto the apostles…” Except for announcing to the apostles what had happened, the commandments given to these long-suffering women were quiet things, pretty much what they had been doing all along. The announcing part was short-lived: their mission was to tell the men what had happened, and the men would take it from there. If they were anything like me, one of the women would have said something like, “I’m not really sure what you’re going to do with this news since you couldn’t even admit that you knew Him, but there, I’ve told you.” But that’s the difference between a saint and a sinner.

Of course, absolutely, there were a few men who stood by Jesus during the dangerous times of His arrest and crucifixion and we honor them and reverence them in icons. But we all know who denied Him, betrayed Him and deserted Him; no one but the women stuck it out during the worst of times and saw it through to the end.

So why did they submit to being quiet, non-confrontational supporters from the get-go? No matter how societies throughout history view a woman’s role, there will always be those who seek power and glory and break rules to get there. For awhile there, Jesus was famous, popular and from all earthly perspectives, looked to be the golden ticket if you were going to ride on someone’s coattails. Other women might have tried to make it all about themselves as well, through manipulative attempts to sway His decisions or circumvent His actions or share the spotlight. But not these women. Instead, it is through their lack of this kind of intervention that we begin to understand their true relationship with Christ, and why they personify what God has called us to be.

In an article titled “The Myrrh-Bearing Women: Sacrificial Love” by Archimandrite Kirill Pavlov, he says:

“When Christ the Savior preached on earth, nobody sympathized with Him as much as women. Just as a woman’s heart is attracted to Him, so His heart is attracted to hers, because the Son of God, by His very nature, is love. He performed His feat on earth as a humble servant for all. The woman, therefore, who is also called to love will find in our Savior the One Who is intimately akin to her in her modest and humble service. If Christian faith is precious to the human soul, it is especially precious to the woman’s soul. A woman cannot be a true woman if she does not accept the Gospel as a real Christian whose place is by the side of the humble and loving Savior. In this lies her greatness, her holiness and her salvation.”

I rarely ever make it to Orthros on time, but I’m getting better. I don’t miss those two hours of sleep anymore because even my crazy dreams can’t compete with the images from the Psalms or the hymns. Not being a radical feminist, I don’t exalt in the fact that this service is about women, but I am humbled to be in the presence not only of those women, but with my sisters in Christ who dot the perimeter of our beautiful nave while we sit and pray, and who come forward to reverence the Gospel book after hearing of the Resurrection. I thank God the moment I walk in for the men who are there faithfully: Fr. Aidan, Father Deacon Basil, our chanters, my husband (who one Sunday decided it was easier to just get up with me than hear me getting ready, and was hooked from that moment on), and the several others who to me, represent those men who were there for Christ when the going got tough.

To sit in the unlit church and relive the morning that a tiny group of women learned the miracle of the world’s salvation is a blessing. I pray that I can be the person God created me to be and learn to wrap my 20th century head around the notion that it takes more strength to be quiet.

(Click here to read Archimandrite Kirill 's article in full -- ed.)