Of Easter Fires
[ by Charles Cameron — the beauty and the burning ]
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Today was Easter Day for the Orthodox, and the Resurrection was celebrated with what Fr Janjic describes as Holy Fire in Jerusalem.
Holy Fire has descended in church of Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem https://t.co/2LRvGqwCxd pic.twitter.com/G0s742Ft3m
— Sava Janjic (@SavaJanjic) May 1, 2016
Fr the Orthodox, this event is both a liturgy, spreading from Jerusalem around the globe —
Orthodox Easter spreads "holy fire" around the world https://t.co/yxyfhSJ878 (Photo: AFP) pic.twitter.com/fK00sEPCjD
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) May 1, 2016
— and a miracle — an intersection of the divine with earthly existance:
simplyorthodox:
The Orthodox Christian miracle of Holy Fire,… https://t.co/3Bn5XQxOqk
— MORNING STAR (@FiguroUSA) April 30, 2016
Thus one might say the vertical enters the horizontal plane.
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Sadly, a similar celebration in New York was followed shortly thereafter by tragedy:
NEW: Firefighters battling large fire at Serbian Orthodox church in NYC https://t.co/fy7sXfw8E1 #LiveOnK2 pic.twitter.com/RFVHY0E3Ut
— KATU News (@KATUNews) May 2, 2016
Much of beauty was consumed:
St. Sava Serbian Orthodox church in NYC, before the 4-alarm fire on Easter Sunday (photo: https://t.co/OQmOBTTUZ8) pic.twitter.com/ae8GToWORr
— RT America (@RT_America) May 2, 2016
— and in an eerie echo half way round the world, a church in Australia blazed
@RT_America @RT_com And Macedonian orthodox church burnt down Australia https://t.co/hjePewFcVe
— Tony Magrathea (@dickybeacholdie) May 2, 2016
**
For more on the miracle, see the Description of the Miracle of Holy Light (Holy Fire) that happens every year in Jerusalem:
The ceremony, which awes the souls of Christians, takes place in the Church of the Resurrection in Jerusalem. The date for Pascha is determined anew for every year. It must be a first Sunday after the spring equinox and Jewish Passover. Therefore, most of the time it differs from the date of Catholic and Protestant Easter, which is determined using different criteria. The Holy Fire is the most renowned miracle in the world of Eastern Orthodoxy. It has taken place at the same time, in the same manner, in the same place every single year for centuries. No other miracle is known to occur so regularly and so steadily over time. It happens in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the holiest place on earth, where Christ was crucified, entombed, and where He finally rose from the dead.
One celebrant, the late Orthodox Patriarch Diodoros of Jerusalem, described the miracle thus:
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