Understanding The Theology of Our Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Faith — 20150809
August in our Church is, probably one of the liturgically more intense months of the year in terms of the individual feasts that we celebrate. There are three major feasts during this month:
The Transfiguration of our Lord, August 6th
The Dormition of the Mother of God, August 15th
The Beheading of John, the Baptizer & Prophet, August 29th
These three feasts honor the major persons in our Christian history.
Last week we celebrated the feast of the Transfiguration of our Lord. Next weekend we celebrate the Falling Asleep or Dormition of the Mother of God. Then at the very end of the month we remember the Beheading of John, the Baptizer.
Of these three feasts, one, that is the Dormition of the Mother of God, has a fast connected with it (August 8th-14th). Each of these feasts explicitly reveal to us something about our faith.
The Transfiguration reveals to us that God is the life-force within us. The Dormition reveals to us that human life is eternal. The Beheading of John reveals to us the importance of living in accord with what we say we believe. All three serve as an encouragement to us as we attempt to discover the meaning and purpose of life here on earth.
This highlights the fact that our Church not only remembers a saint almost every day of the year, but also a number of major feasts that can help us understand our religion and the revelation of God.
It is important to understand, if we belong to a particular religion and Church, that religion is all about helping people discover the meaning and purpose of human life. We are not just the result of an accidental happening in the universe and exist without any real meaning or purpose! We are not alive for just a limited number of years and then fall into complete non-existence. Rather there is a reason why we are here and why earthly life is like it is.
The various Feasts and Saints of our Church share with us this belief. We see in the feasts the things that happened to people who helped formulate our religion. We see in the remembrance of the various saints how other humans have responded to the challenges of life, and hopefully, gain courage to meet the challenges of our lives.
All things in our Church, our calendar, our services, our dogmas and our doctrines are all meant to help us find the meaning and purpose of life. As I have shared before, people find it more important to find meaning in life than happiness. True happiness comes with finding meaning and purpose.