The Placing of the Precious Robe of Our Most Holy Lady and the Mother of God in the Church at Blachernae in Constantinople; Verkhratska weeping Icon of the Mother of God (1688)
Hebrew 9:1-7; Luke 10:38-42, 11:27-28
Polyeleos Feast.
Read Hebrew 9:1-7
Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
In our reading today we see St. Paul commenting on the Jewish Temple worship of the Old Covenant. The priests perform liturgical rituals in the outer temple, and the High Priest, once a year, enters the Holy of Holies in order to atone for himself and the people. Today in celebrating the Placing of the Precious Robe of the Theotokos at Blacharnae, we celebrate the fact that this earthly Temple has been replaced by the true Temple of Mary Herself. Our Lady contains within her womb God Himself, not those things simply touched by, or signifying God. Mary, the first of redeemed humanity shows us to the way forward in our faith to accomplish what all our earthly churches are ordered towards: to become temples of the Holy Spirit- pregnant with God!
St. John Cassian writes:
If you wish to achieve true knowledge of Scripture, you must hurry to achieve unshakable humility of heart. This is what will lead you not to the knowledge that puffs a person up but to the love which illuminates through the achievement of love. It is impossible for the unclean of heart to acquire the gift of spiritual knowledge. Therefore be very careful that your zeal for scriptural reading does not, because of empty pretentiousness, prove to be a cause of perdition instead of being for you the source of knowledgeable light and of the endless glory promised to the one enlightened by knowledge…And thus your soul will not only become the ark of God’s testament, but it will be carried forward into a priestly realm. And, by its unfailing love of purity, its concentration upon the disciplines of the spirit, it will implement the priestly command imposed by the lawgiver, “He will not emerge from the holy place, lest he profane the sanctuary of God. That is, he will not depart from his own heart, where the Lord promised to live continuously when he said, “I will live and walk among them.