The principle commemorations for October 1st are of Ananias, apostle of the seventy and first bishop of Damascus, and Romanos, the melodist and hymnographer, as we receive this tradition from of old. Also, the Holy Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church keeps the memory of the protecting veil of the Theotokos, a lesser remembrance of the Mother of God.  Some are confused as to why this commemoration of the Mother of God is not everywhere celebrated or that it is celebrated on different days. For example, in the Russian Orthodox Church and the other Slavonic-language churches, it is a great solemnity, with Great Vespers and Gospel reading at Orthros. However, in Greece and in the Middle East it receives little or no attention on this day. Why is this?

The commemoration itself stems from a wonderful event which took place in Constantinople of old, in the Church of the Blachernae, which is one of the two principle temples in the City dedicated to the Theotokos.  During an all-night vigil, the Mother of God was seen by St Andrew, fool-for-Christ, extending her protection over all of the faithful. This vision was given to the faithful during the time when Slavic invasions were threatening the City. This vision is what we commemorate; however, the service for this commemoration was only written much later, in the 12th century. At that time, St Andrew Bogoliubov, Grand Prince of Vladimir, expressed his gratitude to the Mother of God for her protection during the time of Tatar invasions by composing the akolouthia for the feast of Pokrov. This explains why it is so solemnly kept by the Slavic churches.  As one of our priests has observed, there is irony here, in that the Slavic churches now solemnize this memorial above the other local churches of Orthodoxy; they who were the invaders now take their place among the faithful!

The commemoration does, in fact, take place in the Greek Orthodox Church and the sister-churches who follow the “Byzantine” calendar of commemorations. But the Church of Greece has transferred the commemoration to October 28th in order to underscore the protection of the Theotokos during a most serious threat to the country of Greece. In the pre-dawn hours of October 28th, 1940, the ambassador of Italy, representing the fascist dictator, Mussolini, presented the government of Greece with an ultimatum. Mussolini intended to bully Greece into submission and to take control of the country in an act of naked aggression, under the pretext of requesting that Greece allow the Axis troops to enter the country and simply to occupy certain “strategic locations.” General Ioannis Metaxas, the military dictator of Greece (who encouraged a kind of benevolent, non-racist fascism) answered the ultimatum with one word, “okhi!” (pronounce: OH-hee, with a heavy “h”), which means simply, “NO!”  This marks the point of Greece’s entry into the Second World War and was the harbinger of all of the dreadful suffering which that war brought upon them. The Italian troops invaded along the Albanian front as a result. Later, the Nazi Germans invaded the country and wrought many great horrors during their occupation. Beginning in 1942, Greece has kept an annual remembrance of this rejection of “European” bullying with “Okhi Day,” a civic observance with great meaning to the Greek people.  As a result, ten years later, the Church of Greece transferred the commemoration of the Protection from its place on October 1st to Okhi Day, October 28th, so that the Church might solemnly share in the national day of remembrance with the recognition of the Panagia’s protection of the Greek Orthodox people during their time of national suffering.

For those who question the legitimacy of commemorations being moved around, some assurance may be in order. The Holy Orthodox Church has always had both universal and local calendars. As the memory of a saint spreads in a local area, that local church begins to keep a memorial of that saint. Then, as the fame of the holy one spreads, it may be that the whole Church solemnizes and coordinates the festal commemoration. But pastoral needs arise in local churches which at times require an adjustment to the calendar of fixed memorials. For example, the memory of the great martyr Catherine (aka, Ekaterina) of Alexandria and protector of the monastery dedicated to her on Mount Sinai was transferred a day to meet the needs of the festal commemoration of the monastery along with the leave-taking of the Feast of the Entry of the Theotokos. Thus, to this day, the “Greek” calendar observes Catherine on November 25th, while the “Slavonic” calendar, November 24th. There are many other such examples.

In short, we should honor the saints as given in the tradition, on the day(s) appointed, using the so-called “Byzantine” calendar, as it is published by our Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America.  We do not have Okhi Day here in America, nor in the Middle East. That is a local custom of the Greek nation, and the transfer of the commemoration of the Protection took place there based upon their national experience and pastoral need. I suspect that we here in America will find the pastoral need for such adjustments as the American Orthodox Church matures in our soil and incarnates our American way of being human with Christ, the New Man. When those pastoral needs arise, our God-loving hierarchs will find a way to express our faith in the face of whatever crisis faces us. This will be reflected in our local ecclesiastical calendar.

A practical and liturgical guideline for Antiochian Orthodox Christian parishes of our diocese then is in order. In our American Orthodox situation, we keep the traditional commemorations of October 1st: the holy apostle, Ananias, one of the seventy, first bishop of Damascus, and our righteous father, Romanos the Melodist, composer of kontakia. Those churches in our diocese (whose church-name is not the Protection of the Theotokos) should skip the service for the Holy Protection (October Menaion, published by Holy Transfiguration Monastery, pages 5-12) and refer to that of Ss Ananias and Romanos, pages 13-20. This direction is based on the fact that our Byzantine tradition does not keep the memory of the Holy Protection as a 3rd class, or “polyeleos” rank, but rather as a simple commemoration, subordinate to Ss Ananias and Romanos.

By The Reverend Patrick O'Grady
(Posted on September 30, 2006)