SOUTH AMERICAN DIOCESE: May 1, 2017
Paschal Epistle of His Grace Bishop John of Caracas and South America

Christ is Risen!
Dear brothers and sisters,

I greet you all with the Feast of feasts, surpassing any feast, which through its infinite and absolute significance goes beyond all understanding of a feast.

Christ’s Resurrection is the very cornerstone of the whole of our faith, of the whole of our hope, of the whole of our Christianity. As St Paul says, If Christ be not raised, our faith is in vain… we are of all men most miserable (1 Cor. 15: 17-19).
Christ’s  Resurrection is the consummation of God’s saving incarnation, and the whole point of all His activity within the course of human history.

Through Christ’s Resurrection we become partakers of heavenly life and heirs of God. In it our troubled soul finds peace and rest. In it the fleeting instant of our transient existence finds itself eternity. Through it, from the depths of our nothingness, we are propelled into the infinite and eternal, for which we were first created.

May Christ, the Pre-eternal Wisdom, Word and Power of God, the Creator of all, Who took upon Himself the form of a servant, and Who for our sake suffered crucifixion and rose from the dead, becoming the firstborn of the dead, enlighten our minds with the Light of His Resurrection, strengthen our hearts always to do His will, keep us in His Truth, and lead us into the unwaning day of His Kingdom, that we may truly partake of that, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him (1 Cor. 2:9).
Christ is Risen! Truly He is Risen!

All else loses any significance.

+John,
Bishop of Caracas and South America,
The Pascha of the Lord, 2017.