Although Catholics and Protestants are already in the Easter season, we Orthodox are in the middle of Holy Week. Lent is ended, and it’s the final push to Pascha.

There are a few small ways I’m bringing my attention to Holy Week for the next few days. Inspired by Kh. Destinie from The Ascetic Life of Motherhood, I’m playing music quietly in the background while I do my daily chores. My current choice is also from Kh. Destinie: Apostolos Hill English Orthodox Chant.

I’m also taking a few moments to read main passages from the services I’ll be attending this week. I know my attention will be divided between worship and making sure Michael doesn’t accidentally throw a toy at the priest: it’s helpful if I’ve looked at the service beforehand so I can recognize the snippets I hear while distracted.

Today is suspended on a tree He who suspended the earth upon the waters.
The King of the angels is decked with a crown of thorns.
He who wraps the heavens in clouds is wrapped in the purple of mockery.
He who freed Adam in the Jordan is slapped on the face.
The Bridegroom of the Church is affixed to the Cross with nails.
The Son of the Virgin is pierced by a spear.
We worship Thy passion, O Christ.
We worship Thy passion, O Christ.
We worship Thy passion, O Christ.
Show us also Thy glorious resurrection.

Antiphon Holy Thursday Evening

I love the church’s Holy Week hymns. It was hard to choose just one to feature as a quote for this post. They’re profoundly moving, and I find them running through my mind as I go about my day.

Even with the daily church services and the preparation for the Paschal celebration, the homestead still requires attention. Plants need to be watered, lawns mowed, garden beds assembled and filled, meals made, eggs gathered — the list goes on.

Happy in their new coop, our chickens continue to lay beautiful eggs. I love the variety of colors we get, and look forward to dying the brown ones with onion skins to make red eggs for Pascha. My dad also hung the signs that my mom ordered for the coop — I think they’re absolutely adorable.

I’ve been taking advantage of the warmer weather and doing what garden and yard work I can with Michael following me. I have 1.5 more beds to assemble, and a handful of seedlings waiting to be planted. I’m wonderfully sore from all the shoveling as I moved dirt into these beds — the physical labor is so satisfying.

Two beds are filled and planted, the garden shed is organized, the bird feeders are installed and filled, and my dad mowed down the weeds for us. It’s so exciting to see it look more like a yard and less like a construction zone.

My evenings after our church services are still filled with knitting or mending or sewing or spinning. I’ve even knit up a little of my hand-spun yarn, and I love it in all of its beautiful imperfection.

Once upon a time, I would’ve wondered if my daily work was a distraction from the holiness of this week. Somehow though, the presence of these daily chores doesn’t lessen the solemnity and profundity of Holy Week. If anything, they make it even holier.

I go from chasing a toddler through my house to chasing him in the narthex of the church. I go from gardening to doing prostrations during the Lenten Prayer of Saint Ephram, dirt still under my fingernails.

O Lord and Master of my life, take from me the spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk. 

But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Thy servant. 

Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou, unto ages of ages. Amen.

Lenten Prayer of Saint Ephram

This is what I love about liturgical living: the eternal meets the mundane and transforms it. Even the simplest tasks can be pierced through with holiness, if we let them.