Archpriest Georgy Goncharenko, rector of St. Vladimir's Church:“Beloved brothers and sisters in Christ! We all have the happiness of being called disciples and followers of Jesus Christ. But we must not only be called, but also be such: like the myrrh-bearers, love Jesus Christ, serve Him, preach about Him, keep His word, fulfill His commandments. Moreover, to love Him means to love our neighbors, not excluding our enemies, and to love as He loved us all - even to the point of being willing to lay down our souls for them. To serve Him means to do deeds of compassion, mercy, charity, and brotherly help to each other.

But we have a great grief that we do not realize, a great tragedy that we do not notice. This is our loss of love, the most important treasure of Christians. How often do we fulfill established instructions and rituals, but in our hearts we have hatred and malice towards a person. Therefore, our faith without love is a lifeless corpse. The loss of love is the loss of eternal life.

Brothers and sisters! The greatest joy is the ability to love. The greatest happiness on earth is to be able to forgive with all your heart. Love is the secret of the next century. Let us learn this from the holy myrrh-bearing women, so that together with them we can hear in the Kingdom of Heaven: “Rejoice!” Amen".

Elijah, singer of the Church choir of St. Vladimir's Church: “Over the course of two thousand years of the existence of the Church of Christ, the women and her faithful children have constantly confirmed that they are continuers of the work of the holy myrrh-bearing women. In the recent past, their feat of fidelity, love and mercy was repeated by our great-grandmothers and grandmothers, who remained with Christ and His Holy Church during the days of severe persecution, when all the evil of this world took up arms against the Holy Church, trying to destroy Orthodoxy and even the memory of it. The women accomplished an unnoticed feat. They taught the truths of the faith of Christ to their children and grandchildren, despite any threats they visited the temple of God, participated in the Sacraments of the Church, preserved and sacredly passed on church traditions.

In our days of globalization, politicization, feminization and other fruits of civilization, the feat of bringing the Truth of Christ does not lose its relevance: the body of the Church is tormented by schisms and sects: the veneration of Christ, unfortunately, still remains an external “tribute to fashion”; society itself is destroying the foundations " small church» - Christian family. But “white handkerchiefs,” as Saint Tikhon, Patriarch of Moscow, called women, as always overflow the churches, offering up their prayers to Christ for the salvation of the world.

Dear sisters and mothers! We congratulate you on your holiday - the Day of the Holy Myrrh-Bearing Women! We appreciate your feat - the feat of a Mother, the feat of a Spouse, the feat of a Friend, the feat of a Christian. Very often we don’t notice it – not because of its absence, but because of routine. We are accustomed to your love and tenderness, to your care and mercy, and therefore all this seems to us self-evident and inalienable. However, deep down in their souls, everyone realizes that the loss of your support is catastrophic. We thank you for your prayers that you pour out for your men, for the Light of the Faith of Christ that you bring to us with your patience and fidelity!

Low bow to you for your efforts! Many and blessed summers to you!

Senior sexton of St. Vladimir's Church Igor:“Today is a truly women’s holiday - the holiday of the Myrrh-Bearing Women! To understand the meaning of this day, let us mentally transport ourselves to that great morning when our Lord Jesus Christ appeared to the first myrrh-bearing women after the Resurrection. Why should they? Because the Lord knew the hearts of women and men. The myrrh-bearing women directed all their strength, all their zeal to serve Him, the Lord Jesus Christ. They did all the women's work that He needed.

But this is not the only merit of the myrrh-bearing women. Their merit, first of all, is that their hearts were pure, holy and perfect before God. The Lord knew that women, first of all, myrrh-bearing wives, would perceive the truth completely differently than men - than His holy Apostles. He knew how difficult it would be for some of His apostles to believe that the Risen Christ stood before them, and for his myrrh-bearing wives, because of faith, hope, devotion and female perception, it would be easier. That is why the myrrh-bearing women were awarded this greatest honor, this greatest happiness - to be the first to see the Risen Lord! After 40 days, the Lord ascended to heaven, and it became impossible to serve Him in a visible way.

Returning to today, we see that Christian wives, despite the high intensity of their lives, bear the difficult cross of their home, family, parental, industrial and social responsibilities. They find time, without missing out on the succession handed down by the holy myrrh-bearing women, to serve the visibly invisible Lord. And they serve Him in a different way - to give alms to the beggar, to visit the sick, to help and calm the suffering, to come to the prisoner and comfort him. And they serve Him in holy Orthodox churches and bring faith, hope, love, devotion and the depth of female heartfelt perception in the vessels of their hearts. And for this, low bow to everyone!

On behalf of the honor of the church and all brothers in Christ, we congratulate you, dear wives and young girls, on a truly women's holiday - the holiday of the holy myrrh-bearing women! We wish you mental and physical health, peace, love, patience and true purity of heart. “...Blessed are those who are pure in heart, for they will see God”... (Matthew: 10, 5).

Our dear man.

On Orthodox Women's Day, we send heartfelt and warm congratulations to all Orthodox wives and young women. But I would like to say special words expressing sincere respect and admiration to Mother Natalia, the wife of Father George.

We are all parishioners or employees of our Church. We are all somehow accustomed to thinking that the temple is run by our shepherd. And we hardly think about the fact that next to the priest stands a woman, an assistant and guardian, who is not without reason called by the kind word “mother”.

Mother is not an ordinary profession, but a merit; she bears enormous responsibility for the order and life support of the Church. Before such a woman, on whose shoulders the temple rests, it is impossible to stop admiring and being amazed at her ability to love people. After all, not every person is endowed with such qualities as mercy, hard work, modesty and kindness.

Only a truly Orthodox woman can have these virtues. And these are exactly what Mother Natalia is endowed with. Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh noted: “Faith is required from a priest’s wife, genuine faith, which helps the husband to act, gives him a feeling of trust and support of his wife, even when she does not have the right to fully understand his actions...” And only faith in God helped mother realize very many things in life, get answers to your pressing questions.

Our dear mother Natalia! We thank you for carrying your difficult cross of serving God and people with such zeal and a smile. In many ways, through your prayers and your labors, Father George was able to realize his plans and aspirations, create a parish here, and leave a good mark on other churches where he served.

You never lose heart, but only people close to you know how much mental and physical strength you give to the life of the parish, to each of us. The Lord has given you many talents: both in the choir and in the refectory you are successful and irreplaceable. Your external beauty is inseparable from your spiritual beauty. For us, you are a true example of piety, chastity, purity, patience and humility, friendliness and hard work, meekness and simplicity, courage and resourcefulness.

We thank you and wish you spiritual ascent, love, God's blessing, salvation of the soul. May every drop of your labor turn into a fragrant lily in the Heaven of the Hall. May the Lord never leave you and fulfill all your requests. Have a long and prosperous summer!

A woman's heart is meek
Knows how to love and feel sorry.
And the beggar and the orphan
Maybe it will warm it up.

It will respond sensitively
To our sadness and pain,
Seriously alarmed,
Whispers: “I’m next to you!”

The gift of selfless love
The Lord gave the woman
Graceful, pure love,
Washed by drops of tears.

Myrrh-Bearing Women.
Evangelist wives
And holy women
And they are magicians in everything.

Bright day, we respect your memory very much,
We wish people happiness and a lot of joy.
Faith in your souls,
And forward to your dreams!

Today we celebrate strong women,
Today is the day of the myrrh-bearing women,
They save us in trouble
They bring us light and drive away shadows.

Let's wish you happiness
To our glorious guardians,
May the Lord give you goodness
To beautiful Orthodox wives.

Congratulations on a wonderful day
Orthodox women.
With their zeal and kindness
Life is always easier for us.

I congratulate the beautiful
Affectionate assistants.
On the Great and Holy Day
Glorious Myrrh-Bearing Women.

Joy, dear ones, to you
I wish it from the bottom of my heart.
Respectfully before you
I bow my head.

Happy Myrrh-Bearing Women's Day - women's holiday,
When all women celebrate their name days,
May your life be easy and wonderful,
Let your heart be filled with kindness and light.

Let the holiness of heaven show you the way
And the ancestors will tell you how to live righteously,
Let the true egg show you
After all, you have a bright life to live!

On the Day of the Myrrh-Bearing Women, let us congratulate you
All faithful and devoted women,
May their life path be thorny
Only he will be crowned with love,
We wish them good luck and warmth,
Let their faith not leave them,
And they will be in our world
A model and example for everyone!

On the Day of the Myrrh-Bearing Women
Congratulations to all women
You are strong in your faith,
Your foremothers went to Golgotha,
They saw off Christ.
They were the first to bring the news to the world
That Christ has risen,
That his soul was reborn,
Washed by hundreds of tears.
I idolize every woman
And I send you bows to the ground,
For faith, for life, for children
You are sacrificing yourself.

Happy Myrrh-Bearing Women Day
Congratulations to you,
Low bow
I send to women,
You followed Christ
Swallowing tears
Keeping your faith in your soul.
Let your hearts
Trouble won't touch you
May holy faith give strength,
Let it give warmth
Sunshine for your soul,
Love and hope
Let it live in your heart.

The Day of Myrrh-Bearing Women celebrates the world,
No one has forgotten their feat to this day.
They walked slowly to the tomb of Christ,
They carried a jar of myrrh with them.

An Angel was waiting on the spot and quietly said to them:
- Jesus our savior rose from the grave,
He rose again and ascended to heaven,
Showing miracles to the whole world.

We, religious holiday noting
Happy Myrrh-Bearing Women's Day,
Third Sunday after Easter
Let him give you bright colors,
And life will be decorated with positivity,
It will help you to always live happily,
We wish you comfort in your home,
Peace, goodness, may it be enveloped
Every day with love and care,
May you be lucky with any job,
And let there be prosperity
Follow you - and everywhere!

Many glorious myrrh-bearing women
There is a great and holy history,
They were ready to give up everything
To defend the truth with yourself.

We need to try today too,
It’s hard to defeat evil with untruth,
Stay good forever
Give to the world without reserve.

We will live like Mother Teresa,
Let's fill this world with warmth,
Let the good outweigh the cup,
May mercy be our idol!

On the 3rd Sunday after Easter Orthodox Church celebrates the memory of the holy myrrh-bearing women. Seven women were the first to come to the tomb of Jesus Christ and learned from the angel about the resurrection of the Savior.

Mary, who was called Magdalene, from whom came seven demons, and Joanna the wife of Chuza, Herod’s steward, and Susanna, and many others, who served Him with their substance” (Luke 8:1-3). Also known from the Holy Scriptures are the sisters of the resurrected Lazarus, Martha and Mary, Salome, the mother of the holy apostles James and John of Zebedee, and Mary Cleopas, the mother of the apostles James Alpheus and the evangelist Matthew.

“Every woman on Earth is a myrrh-bearer in life - she brings peace to the world, to her family, to her home, she gives birth to children, and is a support to her husband.”

O. John (Krestyankin).

The head of the missionary department of the Dobrin Central Church, Dmitry Adonyev, congratulated the parishioners of the St. Nicholas Church and employees on the holiday, giving roses.

The dean of the Dobrinsky Central District congratulated the mothers of the pupils and girls of the Sunday school “Svetoch”, giving roses.

The missionary department has developed information booklets and postcards about the holiday.

Volunteers and activists gave booklets and flowers (300 roses) to women they met on the streets of the village.

An integral part of Orthodox Christian culture is admiration for the woman who is the mother, the keeper of the hearth, the good helper of her husband, and the teacher of children.

On the Feast of the Holy Myrrh-Bearing Women, the Church remembers the feat of women who, having loved the Lord, followed the Savior in His earthly life and did not leave Him after death on the cross.

Remembering the Myrrh-Bearing Women on this day and glorifying the Risen Savior, the Church calls us to follow the example of these holy women, praising their love for Jesus Christ, their fidelity to the Lord and His commandments.

On this day, the Holy Church honors those who served the Savior during the two greatest sacraments: His death and Resurrection. Honors those who showed their love to Christ when all other disciples abandoned Him. The myrrh-bearers wept as they accompanied Christ to Golgotha, were present at the burial, and took care to buy aromas to anoint the body of Christ with. For this, they were the first to be honored with seeing the Risen Lord and talking with Him, and announcing the Resurrection of Christ to the apostles.

About the promotion.

Idea: Popularization of the Day of Myrrh-Bearing Women in society. Promoting the Orthodox worldview into public consciousness. Formation in the public consciousness of a proper and grateful attitude towards women and motherhood.
Goal: Formation of the tradition of celebrating Orthodox celebrations, missionary work through positive events. And just holding a bright event!

Formation of the tradition of celebrating an Orthodox holiday in society
- creating a positive image of the church
- popularization of the holiday in the church and secular environment
- attracting new supporters
- opportunity for missionary work
- consolidation of youth departments through joint activities

Participants:
1. Participants of the missionary department of the Dobrin Central Church
2. Volunteers
3. Media
4. Sponsoring partners

Benefactor Sponsors:

Alexandra Vostrikova is a private entrepreneur in the village of Dobrinka, Vitaly Brychaev is the director of the medical center in Lipetsk - “The ABC of Health”.

Head of the missionary department of the Dobrinsky church district Dmitry Adoniev.

In the third week after Easter,
We celebrate the Day of the Holy Myrrh-Bearing Women,
Prosperity, joy, happiness,
We wish all women on earth.
You look fragile, gentle, sweet,
But you are endowed with enormous power,
You can handle all the problems,
May the Lord protect your destiny.

The Holy Myrrh-Bearers are courageous women,
They were faithful disciples of Christ,
They followed Jesus all the time
And they were always assistants in preaching.
Congratulations to all the women of the world today,
Let life give you only inspiration,
Let them appreciate, love, respect you,
Always be in a great mood.

Today we celebrate Orthodox Women's Day,
The Church of the Holy Myrrh-Bearers glorifies,
After all, the myrrh-bearers were the first to see the resurrection of Christ,
We have always been brave and courageous.
We wish all women peace, happiness,
Let bad weather pass you by,
Let luck accompany you throughout life,
Let reliable friends surround you.

Today we celebrate female femininity,
We wish peace, joy, love to all women,
Goodness, good luck, happiness, inspiration,
All the best, endurance, patience.
On the day of the Holy Myrrh-Bearers, may happiness smile on you,
Let all bad weather pass by,
May faith in the Lord help you live,
Let there be many joyful events in life.

Today is the day of the Holy Myrrh-Bearers, congratulations,
We glorify courageous, brave women,
We always want to be in great shape,
Let happiness fill your life completely.
God bless all women, peace, good luck,
And a wonderful mood to boot,
Always be surrounded by care and love,
Let the family live in abundance.

The bells ring solemnly in the churches,
Today we glorify the myrrh-bearing women,
We wish you all the best, joy, family warmth,
May a good angel protect you.
Humility to you, faith, inspiration,
Let all doubts disappear from life,
Be surrounded by care and love,
All the best to you, good health.

Orthodox women's holiday,
Today we are happy to celebrate
Great happiness to all women,
We wish you good health.
Let all your plans come true,
Let all the bad things be forgotten,
Let every day turn into a holiday,
Let luck fly on its wings.

We glorify the myrrh-bearing women in prayers,
We know about their courage from history,
They carried their cross on their fragile shoulders,
And we always dreamed of happiness and love.
Congratulations on the Orthodox Women's Day,
We wish all women peace and joy,
Let your home be a full cup,
Let joy and comfort settle in it.

CHRIST IS RISEN!

Today, the Holy Church remembers the spiritual feat of the myrrh-bearing women. And this day is a real women's day of the Orthodox tradition. When we talk about women, we talk about a mother, we talk about a wife, we talk about a sister in faith.

The world says that women are the weaker sex. But when we read the life of the Great Martyr Barbara, it is difficult to imagine that she was a representative of the weaker sex. She endured physical torment, I don’t want to say: with male strength, female strength, so that not every man can endure such suffering. The feat of the myrrh-bearing women is a feat of FAITH, not intellectual, but heartfelt. And women’s religiosity is the power of God that protects our land. It is the woman who bears many, many family burdens and the burdens of social life. And the main feat and high purpose of a woman is to be a mother. A mother who carries a child in her womb for nine months is connected with him in such a way that there is no closer creature for a person than his own mother. A person is formed in the womb of his mother, and those biorhythms that flow from her heart become his biorhythms. This is an amazing not only physiological, but also spiritual connection. She is incomprehensible.

And we know that the Mother of our salvation, the Blessed Virgin Mary, in her womb accomplished the mystery of the meeting of God with man, the meeting of heaven with earth, in the true God-manhood of Christ Jesus, who, Christ Jesus, receives true humanity from the Blessed Virgin Mary. And this Virgin, a representative of the so-called weaker sex, she rose above the angel, archangel, Cherub, Seraphim. And each of us remembers his mother, each of us knows his mother and loves her, because it is natural to love our parents, because to love our parents means to love ourselves, since our life is in no way separate from their life. Our joy is their joy, the problems of children are always the problems of parents.

But a woman is also a wife. When God created man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his face the breath of life and man became a living soul, then God said: “It is bad for man to be alone.” Listen to these words - God says: “Bad.” A person deprived of the family principles of human life is not considered a person in the full sense of the word. This is an unfinished man. A whole person is a husband and wife in one flesh. That is, a single person is a married person with a wife. And, on the contrary, a man who does not have a wife is not a whole person, he is half a person, as they say: male, female, and together they are a whole.

When Adam first saw his wife, a poetic feeling awakens in him and he begins to verse. This is especially evident in the original language when he says these famous words: “This is flesh of my flesh, this is bone of my bone, for a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and they will be one.” In the original it simply rhymes, that is, the poetic feeling first appears when Adam sees Eve. Therefore, in every romantic story - the movement of a young man towards a girl, in the love between a man and a woman - there is a breath of the Garden of Eden.

What is the first commandment in the entire Bible? The first, sent down from God back in Paradise, is the commandment to fulfill marital duties. The first chapter of the Bible (book of Genesis) - God said: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” If this is the first commandment sent down by God, all the others follow it, this means that in family life man is most like his CREATOR. God created man, but God gave man the opportunity to reproduce his own kind. And when husband and wife are one flesh, a new life is born from this whole life, conceived and appears in this world.

Everyone standing in the temple is the fruit of the love of a man and a woman. And there is not a single one standing in the temple that is not the fruit of love between a man and a woman. This obvious circumstance already indicates the height family relations. Even the relationship between Christ and the Church is an icon of how the relationship between husband and wife should be. The Apostle Paul writes: “For as Christ is the head of the church, so is the husband the head of the wife.” Moreover, men are told: “Treat your wives as vessels made of thin glass.” These are truly very beautiful poetic words, especially when we read them in the original. Glass was a treasure in the first century, when the Apostle Paul wrote these words. And the thinner the walls of the glass vessel, the more expensive such a vessel was considered. Men are explicitly told that if they irritate their wives, it will hinder their prayer life and destroy their relationship with God. Thus, peace in the family is peace in the church. Peace between a man and a woman is peace in a relationship with the Creator, who Himself uttered this rule. It is bad for a man to be alone; let us create a helper according to him.

A woman is also a sister in faith. Especially we, priests, feel the support of our sisters in faith, who pray for us, instruct us, who wash us, who feed us, prepare food, clean our homes and, truly, how a woman can help any person, no one man is not capable of such painstaking care, and he is not considered a man if he does not have a woman. This is, as it were, half a man, an unfinished man. Let us praise God for our sisters in faith. Let us praise God for our mothers. Let us praise God for our wives and realize the high purpose Orthodox women the elderly, our grandmothers. How can you not remember them? It is older Christian women who are the most missionarily active part of any Christian community.

When I studied at the seminary in Soviet times, I conducted surveys of different streams of seminarians about who came to faith through whom. There were almost no seminarians who came to faith through the priests. There were almost none who believed through their father or mother. But there were a huge number of seminarians who testified about themselves that through their GRANDMOTHER, their first mentor in the faith, they acquired the priceless gift of faith in Christ.

Why is that? The fact is that grandmothers take care of children in the preschool period. This is the most decisive, most important period in a person’s life. Parents are more involved in their upbringing and raising their children during school. It is a depressive state, crippled by this education system, and the grandmother naturally puts the verbs of faith in the ears of her grandchildren, she whispers prayers so that they know them by heart. She always intuitively feels how to act in relation to her grandchildren, and these are the greatest missionaries - Orthodox elderly women, grandmothers. I myself learned the three main Christian prayers: Our Father, Theotokos and I Believe, while sitting at my grandmother’s back. And I remember how she carries me and says these prayers and I repeat these prayers after her, and more than one generation was raised by elderly Christian women. Even the baptism of Rus' was due to the fact that Prince Vladimir had a grandmother - Princess Olga. And when he made the decision to baptize Rus', he himself said: “So my grandmother, Princess Olga, the wisest of women, chose this faith.” This was the decisive determination, the main argument when Prince Vladimir decided to baptize Rus'.

Thus, we cannot underestimate the role of our wives, our sisters in faith, our mothers and our grandmothers. And on this day we want to glorify God, we men, for every woman that God sent us in this life, first of all, the mother who shaped our life in her womb. We want to glorify God for our grandmothers, who formed faith in our hearts, for our sisters in faith: these are aunts, cousins, parishioners who surround us and provide for us with more than care.

My first parish was in the Tambov diocese, the city of Kirsanov. This was in distant Soviet times, more than twenty-five years ago, much more. Until now, I receive parcels from this parish from women parishioners who sew me family panties below the knees, Russian blouses, handkerchiefs, and for me it is an amazing miracle such care, female care, which reaches me, as a priest, after a decade and decade.

Truly, the heart of every woman can accommodate hundreds of men’s hearts, in the sense that it is more loving, more open to serving before God. And on this day we rejoice over the myrrh-bearing wives and realize that every Christian woman is a myrrh-bearing wife in her own way. The myrrh-bearing wives carried the news of the Risen Christ to the apostles, and you bring the news of the Risen Christ to your husbands, as the Apostle Paul writes: “Unbelieving husbands are sanctified by their believing wives.” You carry the news of the Risen Christ to your grandchildren, your great-grandchildren. You, decorating the temples of God, everything that we see in the temple: washed beautiful robes put on us, towels, everything is washed clean, beautiful because a woman’s hand touched it, a woman’s hand showed care, and we thank God, we, men for being among us. Without you, there would be none of us, and life would be bad and terrible for the lonely Adam in Paradise, and it would be Paradise if Adam were without his wife Eve.

Happy holiday!

Archpriest Oleg Stenaev.

Source - https://azbyka.ru/propovedi/slovo-v-den-zhen-miron...protoierej-oleg-stenjaev.shtml