Divine Liturgy tomorrow

Today is the Lesser Feast of the Circumcision of Christ.

It was on the eighth day after His Nativity that our Lord Jesus Christ was circumcised in accordance with the Old Testament Law.  All male infants underwent circumcision as a sign of God’s Covenant with the holy Forefather Abraham and his descendants [Genesis 17:10-14, Leviticus 12:3].

After this ritual, the Divine Infant was given the name Jesus, as the Archangel Gabriel had declared on the day of the Annunciation to the Most Holy Theotokos [Luke 1:31-33, 2:21].  The Fathers of the Church explain that the Lord, the Creator of the Law, underwent circumcision in order to give people an example of how faithfully the divine ordinances ought to be fulfilled.  The Lord was circumcised so that later no one would doubt that He had truly assumed human flesh, and that His Incarnation was not merely an illusion, as certain heretics had taught. In the New Testament, the ritual of circumcision gave way to the Mystery of Baptism.

Tomorrow is the Divine Liturgy of the Forefeast of Theophany, 10:30am to 12:15pm in English. The first day of the Forefeast of Theophany falls on January 2 and one of the hymns at Matins tomorrow says that the coming Feast of Theophany will be “even more radiant” than the Feast of the Nativity.

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