I found myself for the first time in my life at the Holy Sepulchre during Easter of 2004.A need of the soul led me to the holy lands of Jerusalem amid the whirlwind of a health ordeal.
It was the place that, a few months earlier, when I was searching for where to go on vacation, I had rejected. “What am I going to do there?” I had thought. And yet, here I was now, going as a supplicant, trying to change what was written.The decision was last-minute.
I thought about it just a few days before Lazarus Saturday.With my time limited due to work and medical tests, the days I had available were very few: from Holy Thursday to Easter Monday.Unfortunately, the travel agencies I contacted no longer had spots.
However, the last one suggested a solution.“We have a group leaving on Lazarus Saturday,” they told me. “But we can arrange for you to travel on Holy Thursday; a representative from the office will pick you up when you arrive in the afternoon, take you to the hotel, and you can join the group the next day.”I accepted with relief.
They informed me, though, that the Israelis have their own security check at the airport, even though I would be flying with a Greek airline. For that reason, I needed to be at least two hours early for my scheduled flight.But on Holy Thursday, as I set out for the airport, every obstacle appeared in front of me. The car broke down, the traffic on the road was enormous, and to make a long story short, I arrived late.“I don’t think you’ll be traveling,” the agency representative told me.
“But I arrived a full hour before the flight. You said two hours, but I hit terrible traffic. What could I do?” I tried to explain.
The man shook his head understandingly. We went to the ticket counter and ended up at the Israeli security.The young woman who handled me looked at me with a mixture of pity and disbelief. After asking for my details and where I worked, she informed me that I was already far too late and my boarding was in doubt. She spoke excellent Greek, though with a heavy foreign accent.“Please,” I said, looking at her with desperate eyes. “It’s my first time, and it’s a necessity.”“Why are you going?” she asked. Something made her reconsider.
“Because I need it,” I answered boldly. “I want to go to the Holy Sepulchre; I have a vow.”The exchange lasted a little longer, but her attitude had clearly changed. She gave me my papers and nodded to the agency representative.I waited off to the side until they finished. “She thought you seemed like a good kid,” he told me. “OK, you can travel—but next time don’t be late.”I sighed with relief. Airport security followed, then boarding. About two hours later, I was at Ben Gurion Airport. The agency representative picked me up, and we set off for Jerusalem. On the way, I started asking him about the Holy Light.
“Ah, this year not many people will get in,” he said. “Only with an invitation from the Patriarchate, because the Israelis have imposed strict restrictions.”I swallowed hard, but never mind—God provides, I thought. He dropped me at the hotel, arranged my stay, and when I asked where to go for the Holy Sepulchre, he replied that entering through the gate of the Old City near the hotel and following the road would get me there in a few minutes.I left my things and set off. Crowds everywhere, me alone. I followed the flow and soon found myself in a large courtyard. Railings in the middle, people behind them, police everywhere. I passed through the railings and no one stopped me. I crossed a huge door, which at that moment they were starting to close. I stepped back out, afraid of being locked inside a place I didn’t even know. But something pushed me, and I went back in. I re-entered, and the door closed behind me. I walked on and saw a large building with a dome above, a church opposite, Orthodox monks and priests, laypeople—and I wondered if I had reached the right place. I turned back, went up some steps, saw a large cross and a monk trying to manage the crowd passing and venerating.
“Father, excuse me, it’s my first time in Jerusalem, I’m alone and don’t know where I am. What is this place?” I asked.
“The Golgotha, blessed one,” he answered amid the rush. “Down below is the Church of the Resurrection, and opposite it the Holy Sepulchre.”I went back down, circled the monument all around, tried to squeeze into the church for the service, but returned to Golgotha.I sat on a bench, squeezed among other unknown pilgrims, and exhausted as I was, I soon started nodding off.A nod that stopped abruptly when, with half-open eyes, I saw a white-robed figure pass in front of me, looking at me without touching the floor. I jumped up, blinking, but the figure vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.I returned to the hotel and fell into bed exhausted and full of questions.
Unfortunately, the next day I woke up quite a bit after the time they had told me to be at the hotel reception to join the rest of the group. So after a quick breakfast, I set off alone and began wandering the Old City.I returned to the Holy Sepulchre, joined a queue of many hours to venerate, prayed with deep emotion, and of course started asking everyone I met about tomorrow’s ceremony. “Only with an invitation from the Patriarchate” was the standard reply from all. There would be railings and police everywhere. “It will be impossible for anyone to get in.” Things looked dark, I thought, discouraged.
Since it was certain I wouldn’t be able to enter the church during the ceremony, I decided the next day to wake up without hurry, walk through the Old City, and wherever they stopped me, sit there and enter the church after the ceremony ended.
That’s what I did. But at the first barricade, I received a small shock when I saw the familiar “paparo-kades” (the rowdy ones) along with other Greek laypeople trying to break through the cordon—actually fighting (!) with Israeli police.Their attempt failed, but since I was completely alone, I decided to follow them as they withdrew from the spot.
At least I’ll be with other Greeks, I thought.Moving through the narrow streets of the Old City, the group reached the patriarchal church of Saints Constantine and Helen. I sat relatively close to them among the crowd, watching every move and every word of Elder Nektarios, who was speaking about the history of the Patriarchate and the Holy Light.
He explained that the Patriarch, to reach the Holy Sepulchre, would descend a large staircase at that spot, and then we would all follow him and find ourselves with him in front of the Holy Sepulchre. Something inside me urged me to stay right there and watch very, very carefully.A little later, I saw the Elder speaking to two of his monks. “When you get in, if you enter, call me,” I heard him say. “And we’ll come immediately.”My heart fluttered.
Suddenly my senses sharpened, and my eyes literally fixed on him. A few minutes later, I saw him pull his phone from his pocket and say joyfully, “Ah, you got in! We’re coming!”The next moment he raised his voice and called the people of his own group to follow him to leave, because they wouldn’t watch the ceremony at all but would depart completely.
His announcement was followed by disappointment and general dejection from everyone following him—except me! I went out with them and followed a bit further where he gathered them to tell them the “secret.”“We will enter the Holy Sepulchre, but not through the main entrance. We’ll go through the entrance belonging to the Ethiopians, pass through the Copts, and from there emerge into the Holy Courtyard. None of you will speak because they don’t know we’re Greeks. If they realize, they’ll throw us out,” he stressed.
Sighs of relief came from the mouths of those following him. They started moving, and I trailed behind like a faithful dog. Until at one point he saw me, looked me up and down, and said, “You don’t belong to my group—please leave.”I lowered my head, mumbled “Yes, Elder,” pretended to leave, but continued following. He saw me a second time and said the same. “Yes,” I said again, but didn’t leave.
The crowd was huge, the pushing incredible, and soon I found myself face to face with the Elder. I waited now to be scolded, but he didn’t see me! I was right in front of him, his eyes on mine, but he didn’t see me!I held my breath and stayed beside him until we reached the Ethiopians, passed through the Copts, and one by one stepped into the Holy Courtyard. An elderly, limping monk grabbed me as soon as he saw me. “Are you Greek?” he asked, and before I could properly say yes, “Into the church!” he shouted and pushed me.In cinematic speed,
I found myself inside the Church of the Resurrection—and I burst into tears. Sobbing, really. Tears of joy and thanksgiving to God. And then I saw Elder Nektarios in front of me, now seeing me and smiling as he said, “Here you are too…”Inside the church it was packed; we were one on top of the other, standing for hours on end, but who cared about fatigue or hardship? We were there, where soon we would celebrate the First Resurrection and see the Holy Light.At some point, amid the shouts of the Arab Christians celebrating, the late Irenaios with his entourage passed in front of us, reached the Holy Sepulchre. Absolute silence prevailed for a moment, and immediately afterward, bell-ringing, shouts, “Christ is Risen!”, and the Holy Light passed from candle to candle until it reached mine. I tested it on my hand, as I saw others do, and it didn’t burn.
Emboldened, I held it under my chin and still didn’t burn! Great are You, O Lord, for deeming me worthy to live these moments, I thought, while pandemonium reigned around me. People were crying, strangers embraced and kissed one another—Resurrection, Resurrection…I remained in the Church of the Resurrection (after all, I was still alone; no one was waiting for me, and I was lost from the group I was supposed to join) when a tall, sturdy man approached me, visibly shaken.“Did you see anything?” he asked in a voice mixed with anxiety and disappointment.
“Yes, I saw something,” I mumbled so as not to disappoint him more, but he didn’t hear me. “Everyone told me to go and I would see it. I came from Greece, spent so much money, and saw nothing,” he almost shouted hysterically.
“Look,” I said, trying to explain. “Someone can come forty times and see nothing, or come once and see everything. God does what He wills. Let us pray, saying, ‘Lord, let me see too, so I may glorify You.’”I hadn’t finished speaking when a woman’s voice shouted from my right with all her strength, “The icon, the icon!”We all turned toward the voice and saw the icon of Christ inside the Church of the Resurrection, at its lower part, directly opposite the Holy Sepulchre, beating against the wall on its own as if an 8-Richter earthquake were happening.
We stared in astonishment, and at the same moment we saw a round white-blue ball of light settle on one shoulder of Christ, make a semicircle, settle on the other shoulder, and finally on His head. “It’s a sign!” a girl next to me shouted. “A double sign. This is My beloved Son—and Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the Trinity,” she added.I joined the line that formed at that moment and venerated the icon with awe along with everyone else present.
In the end, God wants a humble thought, I reflected.But because I am of little faith, before leaving the church, I searched meticulously for any lasers, wires, or anything else that could have caused what my eyes had seen. Needless to say, I found nothing.As I exited the church into the Holy Courtyard, I ran into the agency man who had picked me up from the airport. “You got in? I’ve been coming here for so many years and never managed it—how did you? Really, where have you been since the day before yesterday? We were looking for you and thought something had happened to you,” he said.
The conversation continued a bit, and he said it was a good chance to introduce me to the group people I still hadn’t met. So he took me a little further to a group of monks and laypeople. “Elder Nektarios, this child is in your group!!” Yes—it was Elder Nektarios from the “paparo-kades,” the group I was supposed to have joined the previous day…
Completing my account, I must confess that after all the wondrous things I experienced, I spoke with many other people who also told me they had seen the Holy Light.Most characteristic of all was the story of the girl who was standing in front of the Beautiful Gate of the Church of the Resurrection. As soon as the Patriarch emerged from the Tomb, a ball of light bounced from his candles, raced across the space at lightning speed, crashed onto her, literally drenching her in light, while the candles she held in her hands lit by themselves at that very moment.I also saw many videos showing a white, blue luminous sphere appearing in the space, passing through walls and over the heads of the faithful.
Thus, I am truly indifferent to the way some claim the candles are lit, since I am an eyewitness and have seen with my own eyes the Holy Light inside the Church of the Resurrection, flying and settling on the icon of Christ.Yet I feel it is my duty to speak, that I owe it to do so, because if I who saw it do not speak, I feel it might become fire and burn me.My Christ, thank You for deeming me worthy, and I pray that You deem me worthy again.Happy Resurrection to you all.Servant of Christ,
Georgios
P.S.: My health problem has hardly troubled me since then…
