HolyTransfigurationOrthodoxChurcH

Royal Hours and Nailing service:

HOLY AND GREAT FRIDAY

Great Friday is the most solemn day of Holy Week. In awe and trembling, we stand before the Cross on which our Saviour died and we see the image of Him dead, lying in our midst, on the Epitaphios (the Winding Sheet).

During the Service of Matins, which by anticipation is chanted on Thursday evening, we will hear some of the most awe-inspiring hymns of the ecclesiastical year. The following is but a one example:

On this day the Liturgy of Saint Basil the Great is celebrated together with Vespers.

GREAT AND Holy Thursday

The Gospels of Holy and Great Thursday tell how our Saviour and His disciples came to Jerusalem to celebrate His last feast of the Passover, how He washed their feet. They tell the account of that Mystical Supper when our Lord ordained the Mystery of His Most Holy Body and Blood ‘for the remission of sins and life everlasting.’ They speak of Christ’s instruction to the Apostles, and how He told them that they would all forsake Him that night; they speak of Peter’s rash promise that he would always remain faithful; of Christ’s

On Holy Wednesday night the Orthodox Church administers the sacrament of Holy Unction for the bodily and spiritual health of the participants. At this sacrament, the oil is consecrated by prayer and the clergy anoint the people.

(From Lenten Resources)