Christ the Saviour congregation celebrates Easter

May 5—JOHNSTOWN, Pa. — With a beaming playful smile, The Very Rev. Protopresbyter Robert Buczak walked Sunday through the basement of Christ the Saviour Orthodox Cathedral good-naturedly blessing parishioners very liberally with holy water.

Congregation members laughed, felt their noticeably wet clothes and wiped their faces dry.

By then, the formal part of the church's Easter, or Pascha, celebration was over. Buczak had said prayers, given a sermon, distributed the bread of love and blessed food baskets. There was even a children's Easter egg hunt held outside in the raindrops.

And he was feeling quite overjoyed by the whole experience.

"I'm still in Heaven myself in my mind," Buczak said during a conversation inside the church located in Johnstown's West End. "There's too much excitement. The joy that you experience at Pascha cannot be expressed unless you live it yourself. ... Each person celebrates the feast of the resurrection according to how much effort they put into it. The more effort you put into it, the more you celebrate, the more joyous you are."

Buczak also reflected upon the serious religious importance of the day.

"This is the feast of feasts," he said. "It's the holy of holies. It's the climax or the high point of the liturgical year when we celebrate the feast of the resurrection of our Lord. St. Paul writes that if it weren't for the resurrection our faith would be in vain. There's no reason to be Christian if you don't believe in the resurrected Lord.

"The reason that we are Christians is because we believe Christ rose from the dead. Not only that he destroyed the power of the devil over us, and so now the devil has no more power over us."

Julie Mastrine, a parishioner who lives in Ebensburg, described the Easter celebration as "really amazing."

"It's very reverent," Mastrine said. "I find it just to be so powerful the way that we celebrate. I was raised Catholic. I just find the way that Eastern Orthodox do Pascha to be honestly just very astounding. It's very powerful. You can really sense all the reverence and joy in Christ's resurrection."

Zak Timko, who grew up a member of Christ the Saviour before living elsewhere for decades, including California, reflected on Easter's connection to the springtime.

"Easter goes with the seasons," Timko said. "Unlike California, which has one season, Johnstown has so many seasons. You watch time pass. The beauty of Easter really and the resurrection of Jesus is to not only see Jesus' resurrection, but us and life all around us. The trees were nothing but branches. There was nothing there. Now, everything is blossoming, flowers are blooming. It's a beautiful celebration what Jesus did for us. And you see it all around you today when you drive around and the flowers, and the trees and the people are in celebration. It's very meaningful."

He continued: "I just wish more people in this world would take the day today to stop and actually reflect on what God did for us, and what Jesus did for us and the pain he went through."