Altar Consecration in Santa Maria
September 7th, 2024 – Orthodox Church of the Annunciation – Santa Maria, CA
LORD, I have loved the habitation of Your house, And the place where Your glory dwells. (Ps.26:8)
On the day of September 7, 2024, our community was blessed to participate in the Divine Rite of the Consecration of an Orthodox Church. At this service, and through prayers, blessings and several anointments, our God consecrated our new altar and the whole of our Temple. The event took place 14 years after the founding of our new temple (in 2010,) and just under 45 years after the Orthodox Church of the Annunciation was founded, in December of 1979.
Several of you have asked me and other parish council members what it means to consecrate a church. To consecrate means to set apart a person or a thing for a sacred or holy purpose: to mark a God-given boundary, to dedicate something or someone to God. It is God Who commands that the person or thing be set apart for His specific purpose: “As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them. (Acts 13:2). This “separation” is not just a separation from someone or something but is a separation to God, to the sacred.
The foreshadowing of the New Testament Rite of the Consecration of an Orthodox Christian Temple stretches back to the Old Testament consecration of the Tabernacle of God. The Prophet Moses was instructed to bless a specially confected oil that was to be used to anoint all things and persons associated with ministrations in The Tabernacle and, later, persons specially consecrated to specific offices through which God ministered to his people: prophets, priests and kings.
Exodus, chapter 30, contains the instructions for mixing the ingredients for the making of this holy oil and its consecratory usage:
Take the following fine spices: 500 shekels of liquid myrrh, half as much (that is, 250 shekels) of fragrant cinnamon, 250 shekels of fragrant calamus, 500 shekels of cassia—all according to the sanctuary shekel—and a hin of olive oil. Make these into a sacred anointing oil, a fragrant blend… use it to anoint the tent of meeting, the ark of the covenant law, the table and all its articles, the lampstand and its accessories, the altar of incense, the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils, and the basin with its stand. You shall consecrate them so they will be most holy, and whatever touches them will be holy…Anoint Aaron and his sons and consecrate them so they may serve me as priests (Ex. 30:22ff.).
This Holy Oil was an Old Testament precursor to the Holy Chrism of the New Testament—also made by mixing oil and various fine spices and blessed by the Patriarchs or Metropolitans of local Orthodox churches. Anointing with this Holy Chrism imparts the gift of the Holy Spirit to all Orthodox Christians at their Chrismation, and it is also appointed to consecrate the temple of God and the Altar on which is offered the perfect sacrifice of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of everything ordered in the Old Testament. He is the one who brings about a New Covenant through a New Priesthood, perfect and eternal (Heb.7:17). He is the “King of Kings,” Whose Kingdom shall “have no end” (Lu. 1:33). And He is the Incarnate Word of God, the ‘other’ Prophet Whom Moses saw from a distance (Duet. 18:15). In Christ we share the offices of priest, prophet and king: we are a “royal priesthood” (1Pet.2:9).
The Orthodox Rite of Consecration is called the Rite of Renewal. Why renewal? What is being re-made, new? Ultimately? Everything! As Jesus says in the final book of the Bible, The Revelation: “Behold, I make all things new” (Rev. 21:5). One writer confirms: “…the Metropolitan reads the prayer of Consecration. This prayer emphasizes renewal, referring to the power of God that causes nature to renew itself and helps man through the working of the Holy Spirit to renew himself.” (GOARCH website: The Consecration of a Church).
At the very center of the Rite of Renewal is the consecration of the Altar Table. Our parish has now received the beautiful new Altar we ordered 10 months ago—properly designed so as to be properly consecrated through the Holy Spirit-bearing Holy Chrism and by the placing of the Holy Relics of the saints in a specially made wooden box under the inner altar: “…and I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God” (Rev. 6:9). It is on this Holy Altar that a renewal of all Creation, the whole of the Cosmos—refashioned in Christ—takes place: through the celebration of the Mystery of the Eucharist.
It is such a joy for me to contemplate this crowning event in the long line of work and sacrifices made by people affiliated with our parish—old and new, living and departed—over the course of the 50-year history of The Orthodox Church of the Annunciation. Others joined us—friends and family, donors and benefactors—who over the course of the years have been in one way or another our partners in this glorious work. God bless you and them and thank you!
With paternal affection and Love,
Fr. Lawrence Russell
Rector, Orthodox Church of the Annunciation, Santa Maria, California
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