On Sunday, October 25, the Armenian Church will observe
the Feast of the Discovery of the Holy Cross. The feast day marks the
fourth-century “discovery” of the actual cross of the Crucifixion by Queen
Helena, mother of the Roman emperor Constantine. At the advanced age of 80, this pious Christian woman
made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to identify places where Christ had walked
some 300 years earlier.
“The Finding of the True Cross” by the 14th-century Italian painter Agnolo Gaddi.
There, after years of prayer and good works, Helena was
witness to a miracle: at the foot of Golgotha—the hill where Christ was
crucified—workers under her sponsorship unearthed three wooden crosses.
But which one was the true Cross of Christ? In an
ingenious solution, the workers brought the body of a recently-deceased man to
the site. Placing him on the first two crosses produced no result. But when he
was placed on the third, the body stirred to life. This, Helena concluded, must
be the True Cross—still surging with the miraculous, life-giving power of
Christ’s Resurrection.
The cross is a source of great pride for Armenians as a
khachagir—or "cross-bearing"—nation. Over the centuries, Armenians
have borne Christ's cross with faith, hope, and love. What was once an
instrument of torture and death would become for Christians the symbol of
salvation, and victory over death.
Click here to read more about the significance of the
cross. http://www.armenianchurch-ed.net/feasts/the-holy-cross/about-the-exaltation-of-the-cross/
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