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8 THE SHEPHERD • MARCH 2021 • SAINT SPYRIDON GREEK ORTHODOX CHURCH OF SAN DIEGO Daylight Savings Time begins SUNDAY MARCH 14 at 2 AM (clocks ahead 1 hour) spring forward! don’t forget to ... The Sunday of Orthodoxy is the first Sunday of Great Lent. The dominant theme of this Sunday since 843 has been that of the vic- tory of the icons. In that year the iconoclas- tic controversy, which had raged on and off since 726, was finally laid to rest, and icons and their veneration were restored on the first Sunday in Lent. Ever since, this Sunday has been commemorated as the "Triumph of Orthodoxy." The Seventh Ecumenical Council dealt pre- dominantly with the controversy regarding icons and their place in Orthodox worship. It was convened in Nicaea in 787 by Empress Irene at the request of Tarasios, Patriarch of Constantinople. The Council was attended by 367 bishops. Almost a century before this, the iconoclas- tic controversy had once more shaken the foundations of both Church and State in the Byzantine empire. Excessive religious respect and the ascribed miracles to icons by some members of society, approached the point of worship (due only to God) and idolatry. This instigated excesses at the other extreme by which icons were completely taken out of the liturgical life of the Church by the Icon- oclasts. The Iconophiles, on the other-hand, believed that icons served to preserve the doctrinal teachings of the Church; they con- sidered icons to be man's dynamic way of expressing the divine through art and beauty. The Council decided on a doctrine by which icons should be venerated but not wor- shipped. In answering the Empress' invita- tion to the Council, Pope Hadrian replied with a letter in which he also held the posi- tion of extending veneration to icons but not worship, the last befitting only God. The decree of the Council for restoring icons to churches added an important clause which still stands at the foundation of the rationale for using and venerating icons in the Ortho- dox Church to this very day: "We define that the holy icons, whether in colour, mosaic, or some other material, should be exhibited in the holy churches of God, on the sacred vessels and liturgical vestments, on the walls, furnishings, and in houses and along the roads, namely the icons of our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ, that of our Lady the Theotokos, those of the venerable angels and those of all saintly people. Whenever these representations are contemplated, they will cause those who look at them to commem- orate and love their prototype. We define also that they should be kissed and that they are an object of veneration and honour (ti- mitiki proskynisis), but not of real worship (latreia), which is reserved for Him Who is the subject of our faith and is proper for the divine nature. The veneration accorded to an icon is in effect transmitted to the prototype; he who venerates the icon, venerated in it the reality for which it stands". An Endemousa (Regional) Synod was called in Constantinople in 843. Under Empress Theodora. The veneration of icons was sol- emnly proclaimed at the Hagia Sophia Ca- thedral. The Empress, her son Michael III, Patriarch Methodios, and monks and clergy came in procession and restored the icons in their rightful place. The day was called "Tri- umph of Orthodoxy." Since that time, this event is commemorated yearly with a special service on the first Sunday of Lent, the "Sun- day of Orthodoxy". For the entire article and refereces, see https://www.goarch.org/sunday-of-orthodoxy SUNDAY ORTHODOXY of