Via Crucis on the Eastern Church?

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Sunflower15

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I would like to know if the Eastern Catholics do Via Crucis [Stations of the Cross] during Holy Week?

Maybe I should first ask whether there is a Holy Week tradition in the Eastern Church.

How is it observed?

Any food restrictions? Special rituals?

Thanks.🙂
 
Holy Week has its own unique cycle of services in each particular Eastern Catholic Church. Stations of the Cross may remain in some places, but it is generally seen as a recent latinization.

The Holy Week schedule can include Bridegroom Matins and Liturgies of the Presancitfied Gifts Monday through Wednesday, with an anointing service on Holy Wednesday evening. This continues with Vespers and Divine Liturgy on Holy Thurday during the day, the Passion Matins with the 12 Gospels (Gospel accounts of the Passion) on Holy Thursday evening, Royal Hours on Friday, and Vespers with the procession of the Plashchanytsya (Burial Shroud of the Lord) on Friday afternoon or early evening. Friday evening later is the Jerusalem Matins and Vespers with the Divine Liturgy of St. Basil and the reading of the Prophecies is Saturday afternoon. Late Saturday or early Sunday morning is the graveside service (Nahdrobnoe), Paschal Matins, and the Paschal Divine Liturgy.

Regarding fasting, many Eastern Christians fast and abstain from meat and dairy the entirety of the Great Fast (which ends the Friday evening before Lazarus Saturday and Palm Sunday) and Holy Week.
FDRLB
 
Diak said:
Holy Week has its own unique cycle of services in each particular Eastern Catholic Church. Stations of the Cross may remain in some places, but it is generally seen as a recent latinization.

The Holy Week schedule can include Bridegroom Matins and Liturgies of the Presancitfied Gifts Monday through Wednesday, with an anointing service on Holy Wednesday evening. This continues with Vespers and Divine Liturgy on Holy Thurday during the day, the Passion Matins with the 12 Gospels (Gospel accounts of the Passion) on Holy Thursday evening, Royal Hours on Friday, and Vespers with the procession of the Plashchanytsya (Burial Shroud of the Lord) on Friday afternoon or early evening. Friday evening later is the Jerusalem Matins and Vespers with the Divine Liturgy of St. Basil and the reading of the Prophecies is Saturday afternoon. Late Saturday or early Sunday morning is the graveside service (Nahdrobnoe), Paschal Matins, and the Paschal Divine Liturgy.

Regarding fasting, many Eastern Christians fast and abstain from meat and dairy the entirety of the Great Fast (which ends the Friday evening before Lazarus Saturday and Palm Sunday) and Holy Week.
FDRLB
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Abstain from meat and dairy from Monday to Friday? What is “Lazarus Saturday” ? I have never heard of that…is it connected with the Lazarus that Jesus brought back from the dead or is it something else/
Thanks for your reply:)
 
Sunflower15 said:
Abstain from meat and dairy from Monday to Friday? What is “Lazarus Saturday” ? I have never heard of that…is it connected with the Lazarus that Jesus brought back from the dead or is it something else/
Thanks for your reply:)
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Lazarus Saturday is the Saturday before Palm Sunday and commemorates the raising of Lazarus from the dead. It is also a prefiguring of our own resurrection. Coming from a Latin background I’m not surprised that you haven’t heard of this – it’s a Byzantine tradition.

Deacon Ed
 
Deacon_Ed said:
Lazarus Saturday is the Saturday before Palm Sunday and commemorates the raising of Lazarus from the dead. It is also a prefiguring of our own resurrection. Coming from a Latin background I’m not surprised that you haven’t heard of this – it’s a Byzantine tradition.

Deacon Ed
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That makes perfect sense! I’ve always wondered why we don’t have any devotion/feast/mystery/something associated to this EXTREMELY important event…the perfect foreshadowing of our own resurrection by the Lord!
When praying the Rosary, I always felt it should be there somewhere…talk about a mystery!

Did you say dairy abstinence as well as meat? Maybe I can use that one…you see, I’m vegetarian, so the meatless abstinence doesn’t mean much to me…I don’t drink milk…but cheese, yogurt…maybe I should do that one!
Thanks!👍
 
This answer relates to your previous inquiry as well.

Byzantine spirituality and prayer is strongly liturgical, even in private devotions. Lay people’s prayer books are mostly extracts from the service books, with relatively few private devotional prayers.

The Divine Office pretty much fell into disuse as a staple of public prayer in parishes in the Latin Church. Its place was filled by novenas, Way of the Cross, Rosary, and the like, which were actually originaly private devotions, even when performed publicly.

The Orthodox never lost, and the Byzantine Catholic Churches are returning to, regular celebrations of Vespers and the Little Hours before the Divine Liturgy.

Matins is a major production and is not as common, except maybe for Bridegroom Matins the first three days of Holy Week.
 
The Way of the Cross is relatively common in at least two Oriental Churches: the the Maronite Church and the the Chaldean Church, and it remains quite popular in both. (I would probably be safe in suggesting that the Syro-Malabar Church observes it as well, but since I have no direct experience with that Church, I will leave that for someone else to address.)

Whereas, as Diak has already alluded, the Way of the Cross is really a Latinization, the nature of the devotion fits in nicely with Middle Eastern custom. FWIW, my position on the Way of the Cross is that it’s a supplementary practice that was adapted to Maronite & Chaldean use (i.e. neither uses the exact same form or text as the Latin Rite original), and is actually a rather Middle Eastern-type of practice in the first place. As long as it remains supplemental to the ancient traditional liturgical practices of the individual Churches, I see no harm in it despite its Latin Rite (mainly Sicilian) origin.
 
PASSIJA (пассия)

This is a “latinized” service of Orthodox great fast. This service first appeared in 17th century among Ukrainian Orthodox near Poland- its name is Passio (Latin for suffering) from Roman Church. However, now is a common service during Lent in Ukraina and Rossia.

It is remembring suffering in Gethsemanskij Sad and cross carrying of Jesus. These readings and singings of the Passia can be before each Evening Service of the Sundays of the Great Fast. This could be like your Via crucis ceremony.
Always held before a large crucifixion:

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
Volodymyr said:
PASSIJA (пассия)

This is a “latinized” service of Orthodox great fast. This service first appeared in 17th century among Ukrainian Orthodox near Poland- its name is Passio (Latin for suffering) from Roman Church. However, now is a common service during Lent in Ukraina and Rossia.

It is remembring suffering in Gethsemanskij Sad and cross carrying of Jesus. These readings and singings of the Passia can be before each Evening Service of the Sundays of the Great Fast. This could be like your Via crucis ceremony.
Always held before a large crucifixion:

http://content.foto.mail.ru/mail/ilya_guzey/pasxa2008/i-450.jpg
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How beautiful! Thanks VERY much!
I can see that the Eastern Church uses as much imagery and sense perceptions as the Western one!
 
During the Matins of the Redeeming Passion of Holy Friday (sometimes called the Passion Gospels, celebrated on Holy Thursday evening in parishes usually), 12 accounts of the Passion are read, from the Mystical Supper in the Upper Room (John 13-18) to the Etombment.

Frequently a large Crucifix is placed in the midst of the Church, and the Gospels are read facing it.
 
In the Syriac and Malankara Tradition, on Holy Friday, the Cross is carried by the priest on his shoulder, processed opposite to the usual processional direction, after funeral prayers, the cross is placed on the altar, in a white cloth, sprinkled with holy water, and frankincese, wrapped, and buried within the altar until Easter. The altar is sealed and guarded by the liturgical fans (which are used during the Divine Liturgy and represent the Holy Seraphim), the main altar is not used again until Easter Sunday.

Part 1: youtube.com/watch?v=-gkzu4NOT-o&feature=channel_page
Part 2: youtube.com/watch?v=_sFw2yZIhyA&feature=channel_page
 
I thank Volodymyr for bringing up пасія/Passiya. It was actually written by St. Peter Mohyla as a sort of Ukrainian traditional-style replacement for Stations of the Cross. By “traditional-style” I mean that while it was a newer service it was developed along the traditional format of existing services rather than just assuming a paraliturgical devotion that was not part of the liturgical or spiritual corpus.

There are some differences between the Ukrainian and Russian order of Passiya/пасія (the Russian form more integrated with Vespers on Sunday evenings, the older Ukrainian form used on Friday or Sunday evenings and taking more of a “moleben” form that was also sometimes taken with Compline). In any case this service became very popular, and remains a very well-attended Lenten service in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and parishes of the diaspora where it is celebrated.

It and the Akafyst to the Passion (also very popular in Lent in Ukrainian parishes, taken with or without пасія) are examples of how newer forms of worship can be developed consistent with the overall received tradition and fitting with the spiritual “tone” of Great Lent.
 
The reason I asked this question was not only in regards to keeping tradition and as a remembrance of the Agony and Passion of Our Lord, but because I have noticed that whenever I have adversity in my life, it helps when I look back to the Via Crucis for guidance.

For example, Our Lord fell 3 times, but on one of those times, He simply couldn’t get up by Himself with the weight of the awful cross He was carrying. Someone was commanded to help him. That person, *, did NOT offer, nor did he have the slightest intention of helping…but he was told to. Therefore, he did and by doing so, kept Jesus on His redemptive action.

My point is that sometimes in life, when we need help, someone will reluctantly help, even without meaning it, and that aid will keep us moving “along” to what needs to be done. Those “random” acts of reluctant help always remind me of this Station of the Cross.

In essence, I meditate on the Via Crucis as a way to live…to cope with life in adversity. He even taught us HOW to suffer, while He was suffering for our Salvation…

Thanks be to God.

I would like to know about other Lent and Holy Week traditions of fellow Christians, and if you feel like sharing, maybe a “lesson” you derived from it…
 
I think for me it is the victory at Pascha, the singing of “Christ is Risen” “Christos Voskres” and “Christos Anesti” that assures me in any difficulty that the victory has been won, and any adversity, even death, is overcome by the saving Pascha of our Lord. Sadness, wounds and death give way to everlasting life.

To me there is no other consolation like this when the Plaschanytsia (the burial Shroud of our Lord) is removed in our Churches by the priest during the grave-side service at the Tomb of our Lord either late Holy Saturday or just before dawn on Pascha (Resurrection Sunday). The Shroud is then placed on the Altar until the vigil of the Ascension, and after placing the Shroud on the altar Paschal Matins beings, the most joyful liturgical celebration of the entire liturgical year.
 
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