Sergei Fudel, on sorrow and joy at Pascha

Now I am celebrating Pascha another way, on my own like a great sinner..., and in this fashion I rediscover the Paschal service. Till now it was the Divine service of Paradise, but in it I now see the possibility of repentance and remorse. My childhood and youth and also the first years of my priesthood were spent with our dear departed Father, and it was through him that I first learned to understand Pascha. ... Even as a child I was impressed by the way he sang the Paschal Ikos. ... He sang this Ikos in such a way that its meaning was revealed, and the sense of one or other of the expressions underlined. Then, amidst the delight and rejoicing of this night, he would suddenly retreat into himself, so to speak, and as he came to the words, 'O Master, arise, that those who have fallen may rise again,' I could sense that he was inwardly weeping and sobbing. Who was he grieving for? For our Saviour? No, now I know, it was for himself, the fallen. /.../ The triumphal climax of the yearly calendar ... merges into the climax of repentance..., so that the light of repentance pours down from Zion over the whole of the remainder of the Church calendar. A cry of repentance breaks into the Paschal hymns, a cry which penetrates into the depths of the penitent heart so that paradise is revealed. ... Tears, tears of repentance overwhelm me, but in my soul I can feel that joy is growing, joy that He has risen, and not only He but I also, I the fallen. (Cry of the Spirit, pp. 69-73)