Easter with the Orthodox is strangely exhilarating. The service begins shortly before Saturday midnight but you arrive half an hour before to avoid the Russian crush. Inside, the church is almost completely dark, although a thousand people are standing there, each with an unlit candle. People mill around, greeting one another; whole families are whispering stories and gossip, but there is an expectant atmosphere. This is the best night of the year. The night not to miss. The night of the resurrection.
Metropolitan Anthony, the Bishop, appears at the front. He tells us that the service will be broadcast live by radio across the whole of Russia. He explains that during the Cold War, millions of Russians illegally tuned their radios to this, the only Easter Liturgy they could hear. And now, he tells us, for the sake of people living in remotest Russia, where the churches have yet to be converted back from being builders' yards, the whole service will be said in the familiar words of Old Church Slavonic.
This is not good news. We all know that about two hours of liturgy stretch ahead of us. That we will stand for the whole of this time, our vertebrae tested to the limit. And we now know that most of it will be conducted in a language that none of us speak. But somehow the Bishop conveys this news with such simplicity that we feel willing – happy, even – to make this small Christian sacrifice for the radio worshippers of the Russian steppes.
It is now after midnight. The choir, followed by a procession of priests, deacons and the Bishop exits through a side door. A sort of electric thrill runs through a thousand bodies in the tomb-like darkness of the church. Waiting in dead silence, we see lights outside moving against the windows. We hear the choir singing. And then we hear the voice of the Bishop himself at the doors. This voice, fierce despite its years, passionate even through the walls of the church, sings out: 'Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and to those in the tomb he has given life!'
Inside the church, no sound, but a thousand faces slowly turn towards the main doors. Suddenly, those doors swing back, and the Bishop appears. As he walks up the aisle, his black eyes are shining, his white robes blaze like an icon, and the light he holds feeds flame to our eagerly outstretched candles. First in Slavonic, and then in Greek and English, he proclaims the news, not once, but over and over: 'Khristos voskrese!' 'Christos anesti!' 'Christ is risen!' We respond with a shout: 'Voistinu voskrese!' 'Alithos anesti!' 'He is risen indeed!'
The church fills up with a dancing sea of candles, the golden icons glimmer on the walls, the choir sings out in deep Russian tones, the joyful clouds of incense fill every nostril. This is a place where all the senses wake up for the resurrection. You can understand Tolstoy's story about a boy and girl whose passion catches fire as they exchange glances at an Easter service such as this. For this is not English Easter with a sedate rendition of 'Thine be the Glory'. Nor is it the foot-tapping, finger-clicking Easter of the charismatics. This is Easter with Byzantine severity and Russian passion. It has ceremony and formality, but also something wild and dangerous. This is Easter with attitude.
You can see it in the priests, each of them stepping up to the front to swing the incense and bless the people with the Easter greeting. They come out one by one, like musicians in a jazz band standing up to do their solo. The congregation wait for their favourite priest to do his turn. And these are priests who know how to priest: bowing deeply before the icons, throwing the censer about with panache, smoke and holiness billowing round their shoulders. As each of them turns back to the altar, they give the censer a final spin so that it whirls right over their heads in a fragrant loop the loop.
'Khristos voskrese!' 'Christos anesti!' 'Christ is risen!'
The Bishop reads out the Easter homily, and then gives a sermon of his own. The Russian Orthodox have recently fallen out with the Greek Orthodox over which of them has rights in Estonia. It's a textbook Church squabble, complete with mutual excommunications, and the bishop addresses some home truths to his own side about it. What he says must be setting Russian ears tingling all along the Volga.
If you stay till 5 o'clock, you qualify for breakfast in the church hall. But like most people, I leave at 2.30am, at the end of Easter Matins, but before the Easter Liturgy. My back is stiff, my feet are aching, my mouth is dry, but my eyes, ears and bones are full of Easter: 'Khristos voskrese!'
Simon Jenkins is a freelance writer, editor and designer. He is a Reader in the Church of England and lives in London. This piece was first published in the magazine Leading Light.
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