GREETINGS TO THE ARMENIAN DELEGATION ON THEIR VISIT TO THE JERUSALEM PATRIARCHATE TO DELIVER EASTER GREETINGS FOR PASCHA

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The Jerusalem Patriarchate – May 2016

Your Beatitude,
Your Eminences,
Your Graces,
Beloved Members of our respective Brotherhoods,
Dear Fathers,

Christ is risen!

We greet you, Your Beatitude, and your delegation, with these joyful words from the Easter liturgy:
You descended into the tomb, Ο Immortal One,
you destroyed the power of death.
You arose in triumph, Ο Christ our God, proclaiming,
“Rejoice” to the myrrh-bearing women,
granting peace to your apostles
and giving resurrection to the fallen.

As we celebrate the Feast of Feasts, we do so in the wake of our recent agreement for the restoration of the Sacred Edicule of the Holy Tomb. From this Tomb has come the very peace and resurrection in which we rejoice together.

We wish to acknowledge the significance of this agreement, and the hope that lies in this united task. We have been entrusted by Divine Providence with the guardianship and the diakonia of the Holy Places, and our common spiritual mission in ensuring that the Holy Places remain open and accessible to all without distinction is a great witness to the world.
It is our prayer that the peace of the incarnate Logos, the Son of Cod, that God gives to us and to the world may deepen among us, so that the hope of the new life of the Resurrection that has been given to the fallen may be evident in our life. Our world, and especially our region, face the gravest difficulties, and men, women, and even children everywhere look to Jerusalem and the Holy Land in great hope. We say this, because we are aware that we are not here for ourselves alone. We are here, rather, precisely for this reason, to give our own living martyria, our own faithful witness, to the Light of the Resurrection to a world where there is deep confusion, uncertainty, and fear.

We thank you for coming to our Patriarchate to greet us in this joyful season, and may God bless you, Your Beatitude, in your primatial ministry, your Brotherhood, and all the members of the Armenian community in our beloved Holy Land.
Christ is risen!

His Beatitude
THEOPHILOS III
Patriarch of Jerusalem

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