Paschal celebrations continue all week, and end only on Thomas Sunday as the 8th day of Easter. The resurrection transforms the world and brings us joy:
Their sound is gone forth into all the earth, and their sayings to the ends of the world.
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Yesterday, Easter service was extra long, as one could expect (it’s the major feast of the year). I went to Matins which begun at 8:45, and services went on until 11:40. Nearly three hours! Of course, the hardest part is standing up for most of the time! And of course, St Gregory’s had many people in it I’ve never seen before. There was an old couple in front of me which seemed confused at what was going on — they were trying to flip through many books to find where we were in the services, not realizing they were looking at the wrong books for most of the time. I could tell they were frustrated — and being Easter, things of course were more difficult to follow than normal, if one uses the books, because of the variations which happens for the feast.
