APPARITION OF THE HOLY CROSS – ST. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM On May 7 in the year 351, those living in Jerusalem witnessed an intensely illumined cross appear in the sky extending from Golgotha to the Mount of Olives; a span of almost two miles. As it remained visible for several hours, the population of Jerusalem assembled in the church to praise Jesus Christ for the miraculous sign, but this apparition not only affected the locals. St. Cyril the Bishop of Jerusalem wrote about the miracle in a letter to the Emperor Constantius of Constantinople who at the time, believed in the Arian heresy which denies Jesus is God, and claims He was a created being, subordinate to God the Father. Upon reading the letter, Emperor Constantius was deeply moved and returned to the orthodox teaching of the Church that Jesus is God, equal in nature to the Father. The Armenian translation of this letter is read on the Feast of the Appearance of the Holy Cross «Երեւումն Սուրբ Խաչին» during the Անդաստան service. St. Cyril writes, But you, most pious Lord Emperor, have surpassed your father’s piety with an even greater reverence for the divine, and in your time miracles have now appeared no longer from the ground but in the heavens: the trophy of the victory which our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the Only-begotten Son of God, won over death – I refer to the blessed Cross – has been seen flashing like lightning over Jerusalem. In these holy days of the Easter season, on May 7 at about the third hour, a huge cross made of light appeared in the sky above holy Golgotha extending as far as the holy Mount of Olives. It was not revealed to one or two people alone, but it appeared unmistakably to everyone in the city. It was not as if one might conclude that one had suffered a momentary optical illusion; it was visible to the human eye above the earth for several hours. The flashes it emitted outshone the rays of the sun, which would have outshone and obscured it themselves if it had not presented the watchers with a more powerful illumination than the sun. It prompted the whole populace at once to run together into the holy church, overcome both with fear and joy at the divine vision. Young and old, men and women of every age, even young girls confined to their rooms at home, natives and foreigners, Christians and pagans visiting from abroad, all together as if with a single voice raised a hymn of praise to God’s Only-begotten Son the wonder-worker. They had the evidence of their own senses that the holy faith of Christians is not based on the persuasive arguments of philosophy but on the revelation of the Spirit and power (cf. I Corinthians 2:4); it is not proclaimed by mere human beings but testified from heaven by God himself. (trans. Edward Yarnold, S.J. Cyril of Jerusalem, Routledge, 2000) The Cross still appears in the world around us. Wherever there is opportunity for sacrifice, healing, forgiveness, mercy, redemption, and love in the name of Jesus Christ, there is the Cross. Pray that God opens our eyes to its appearance.

The Appearance of the Sign of the Cross Near Athens in 1925   In 1925, on the eve, of the feast of the Exaltation of the All-Honourable and Life-giving Cross of our Saviour, 14 September according to the Orthodox Church calendar, the all-night vigil was served at the church of St. John the Theologian in suburban Athens. By 9 o’clock that evening, more than 2,000 of the true-Orthodox faithful had gathered in and around the church for the service, since very few true-Orthodox churches had been accidentally left open by the civil authorities. Such a large gathering of people could not, however, go unnoticed by the authorities. Around eleven P.M. the authorities dispatched a battalion of police to the church “to prevent any disorders which might arise from such a large gathering.” The gathering was too large for the police to take any direct action or to arrest the priest at that time and so they joined the crowd of worshippers in the already over-flowing courtyard of the church. Then, regardless of the true motives for their presence, against their own will, but according to the Will which exceeds all human power, they became participants in the miraculous experience of the crowd of believers. At 11:30 P.M., there began to appear in the heavens above the church, in the direction of North-East, a bright, radiant Cross of light. The light not only illuminated the church and the faithful but, in its rays, the stars of the clear, cloudless sky became dim and the church-yard was filled with an almost tangible light. The form of the Cross itself was an especially dense light and it could be clearly seen as a Byzantine cross with an angular cross bar toward the bottom. This heavenly miracle lasted for half an hour, until midnight, and then the Cross began slowly to raise up vertically, as the cross in the hands of the priest does in the ceremony of the Elevation of the Cross in church. Having come straight up, the Cross began gradually to fade away. The human language is not adequate to convey what took place during the apparition. The entire crowd fell prostrate upon the ground with tears and began to sing prayers, praising the Lord with one heart and one mouth. The police were among those who wept, suddenly discovering, in the depths of their hearts, a childlike faith. The crowd of believers and the battalion of police were transformed into one, unified flock of faithful. All were seized with a holy ecstasy. The vigil continued until four A.M., when all this human torrent streamed back into the city, carrying the news of the miracle because of which they were still trembling and weeping. Many of the unbelievers, sophists and renovationists, realizing their sin and guilt, but unwilling to repent, tried by every means to explain away or deny this miracle. The fact that the form of the cross had been so sharply and clearly that of the Byzantine (sometimes called the Russian Cross) Cross, with three cross-bars, the bottom one at an angle, completely negated any arguments of accidental physical phenomenon. The fact that such an apparition of the Cross had also occurred during the height of the first great heresy must strike the Orthodox with an especial sense of the magnitude of the importance of the calendar question and of all that is connected with it. No sensible person can discuss this issue lightly, with secular reasoning or with worldly arguments. Renovationists, like the Arians in 351, are left without extenuation or mitigation. From Orthodox Life, Vol. 22, No. 2 (March-April, 1972), pp. 18-20. Eyewitness Accounts Eyewitness Accounts of the Appearance of the Cross over the Church of St. John the Theologian at Mt. Hymettus, September 14, 1925. I was one of the men from the Police Institute who were sent to stop the vigil that night, some fifty years ago, at the country Church of St. John the Theologian. The Old Calendarists were keeping vigil there, because it was the eve of the feast of the Exaltation of the Precious Cross (according to the Church Calendar, not the papist! —ed.) Since many people had gathered – more than two thousand individuals – we did not attempt to seize the priest as we had been ordered, but we sat down quietly in the nearby court and waited for them to finish. At about 11:30 at night, we heard a loud and strange uproar coming from the shouts of the multitude. Without any delay, we ran to see what was happening – and we saw. The whole multitude of the faithful was in a state of excitement. Some were weeping and others, crying out “Lord, have mercy,” were kneeling and had turned their eyes toward heaven, and yet others were fainting, overwhelmed with great emotion. Then we too looked and beheld the marvel: an enormous radian Cross, very high above the church was illumining the whole area. At first, we were seized with fear, but immediately we came to ourselves and, forgetting the purpose for which we had been sent, we fell to our knees and wept like little children. Of course, it is superfluous for me to tell you that, filled with emotion, we attended the rest of the vigil to the end – no longer as persecutors, but as faithful Christians. In the morning when we returned to the Institute, we told everyone about the great marvel which we had been deemed worthy to see. Afterwards there was an investigation and all of us swore under oath that we had seen the Precious Cross clearly, high in the sky. John D. Glymis Retired Police Officer, 78 years of age 73 Aristotle Street Peristeri ( a suburb of Athens) On that night in 1925 when the Precious Cross appeared, I was making the last run with the tram which I was operating. I had reached Omonoia and was going around the square when I saw everyone looking up toward heaven and crying, “Look! – the Cross! – the Cross!” Immediately I stepped on the brakes and stopped the vehicle. I stuck my head out the tram’s door and I, the unworthy one, also saw the Precious Cross of Our Lord – may His Name be glorified; it was shining over Mount Hymettus. I don’t remember how long this lasted. I know only one thing – the Precious Cross which I saw the night turned me into a different man. Since then, everyone in my family has become a faithful child of the Church of the True Orthodox Christians. Athanasios Primals Retired Tram Conductor, 80 years of age 17 Kavales Street Nicea (a suburb of Athens)

Orthodoxy and Western Christianity: Convert Testimonies Holy Tradition: The Road That Leads Home, by the Rev. Dorraine Snogren (The True Vine, #5). A Journey of Fear and Joy, by John Craton. From his testimony: “Please note that this revision is intended primarily for readers who are themselves part of the Campbell-Stone restoration movement (identifying with the Church of Christ, Christian Church, or Disciples of Christ). Others from similar fundamentalist-type churches may also find much to identify with in this work.” On Becoming and Remaining an Orthodox Christian. A Talk given at the Orthodox Pilgrimage to Felixstowe in August 2001. Contours of Conversion and the Ecumenical Movement: Some Personal Reflections, by Hieromonk Alexios Karakallinos. A talk delivered at the September, 2004 conference “Ecumenism: Origins, Expectations, Disenchantment”, sponsored by the School of Pastoral Theology, The Aristotelian University, Thessaloniki, Greece. Are There Many Christian Churches, or Is the True Church One?: An Interview with a Former Protestant Missionary and Wycliffe Bible Translator. From First Baptist to the First Century: A Spiritual Journey, by Clark Carlton Chapter One from A Tiny Step Away from Deepest Faith, by Marjorie Corbman. The author, a teenager, is a very thoughtful writer with a capability beyond her years. This profound little book describes her search for meaning, which ended with her reception into the Orthodox Church. Joel Kalvesmaki’s Journey to Orthodoxy, A Baptist Missionary Becomes Orthodox Fr. Seraphim Holland’s Personal Testimony Fr. George Johnson’s Personal Testimony: a former Anglican American Salvation: The Place of Christianity in Public Life, by Albert J. Raboteau. From Boston Review (April/May 2005). “I was drawn in part by a sense of profound similarity between Orthodoxy and the ethos of African-American Christianity. In both there is a quality of sad joyfulness, a sense that life in a minor key is life as it is; an emphasis on the importance of suffering as a mark of the authenticity of faith.” See also Professor Raboteau’s book A Sorrowful Joy. Two Paths, One family’s departure from Roman Catholicism and entrance into Orthodoxy. Excerpt from the book by Michael Whelton Seek and ye shall find… A couple’s journey to Orthodoxy, by Reader Peter Jackson. Journey to Orthodoxy, a collection of articles from Orthodox America. Why Isn’t Clendenin Orthodox?, a two-part series from Orthodox America about a Protestant who has written many largely sympathetic books and articles about Orthodoxy, but remains Protestant. See also “A Reply to Dan Clendenin.” My Work With English-Speaking Converts: An Interview with Fr. Artemy Vladimirov. Look for Part I of a superb three-part interview of this wise and  experienced Priest of the Russian Orthodox Church. It was originally published in the Orthodox journal, Road to Emmaus (view other articles in past issues). The issues containing Parts II and III of this edifying and informative interview can be ordered from Road to Emmaus. Reconsidering the Meaning of Conversion: Fr. John Whiteford responds to a recent Christianity Today essay by Sam Torode. Converts – Chapter 88 from Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and Works, by Hieromonk Damascene.

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