When the Homily is about Immunology

Getting it backwards

And there was evening, and there was morning-the first day…And there was evening, and there was morning-the second day…And there was evening, and there was morning-the third day…

you get the picture.

So when did we make the switch? At some point, the setting sun no longer indicated the beginning of a new day. It is difficult for us to imagine anything other than midnight (the more technical divisor) or sunrise (the more practical divisor) as being the demarcation of newness? We are ingrained with the contemporary understanding of day-hood. But the Church isn’t. She still keeps the same patterns handed down since the beginning, even if it tends to confuse and complicate things in our modern life – perhaps we ought to look at it the other way around: our modern life confuses and complicates the life of the Church. Maybe we can learn something from our ecclesiastical daily, weekly, and yearly cycle?

Vespers, the EVENING service marks the beginning of the daily cycle. I can still recall the first time that I noticed in a Vespers service that they were celebrating the Saints for the following day! When “liturgical time” was explained to me, I immediately recalled the old apologetic defense explaining how Jesus could be considered in the tomb and dead for three days…which doesn’t jive if we keep time according to today’s methodology. We were taught to show that the Jews kept time differently. Well what do you know…so did (ahem…DO) the Christians.

Now that we have come to the setting of the sun, and behold the Light of evening…