The Exaltation of the Holy Cross

By tradition, St. Helena, mother of the Emperor Constantine, journeyed to Jerusalem around the year 326 in search of the site of Christ's death and the Cross itself. The tradition tells that the Cross was found near Golgotha, and that when it was recovered the crowds pressed so eagerly to see it that the Patriarch, Macarius, mounted a high place and "lifted it up" — exalted it — turning it to the four directions while the people cried out, "Lord, have mercy." That lifting up gives the feast its name.

The feast is bound up with the dedication of the Church of the Resurrection (the Holy Sepulchre) in Jerusalem, kept the day before. In the seventh century it also came to commemorate the recovery of the Cross from Persia by the Emperor Heraclius. The Church distinguishes what is certain — that the Cross was venerated in Jerusalem from early times — from the pious details of the finding, which she hands on as tradition rather than documented fact.

Alone among the great feasts, the Exaltation is a strict fast day. Even amid the festal joy, the faithful abstain — in the strictest reckoning, from meat, dairy, fish, wine, and oil — because the day sets us at the foot of the Cross, where fasting, not feasting, is the fitting response. (As always, the exact rule varies by jurisdiction and pastoral discretion; see why Orthodox Christians fast.)

Yet the Cross the Church exalts is not merely an instrument of death but the weapon of victory. Orthodox worship never separates the Cross from the empty tomb: it is "through the Cross" that "joy has come into all the world." The feast proclaims what the whole tradition holds — that on the Cross Christ trampled down death and disarmed the powers of hell (the Cross and atonement; Christus Victor).

The icon of the feast shows the Patriarch standing on a raised ambo within the church, holding the Cross aloft with both hands, deacons supporting him; Constantine and Helena stand to the sides, and a great crowd of the faithful bows below. On this day the Cross, adorned with fragrant basil, is brought out and set before the people to be venerated with prostrations, and clergy vest in the deep red of the Passion.

The troparion prays, "O Lord, save Your people, and bless Your inheritance," asking that by "the virtue of Your Cross" God preserve His people and grant them victory. Sung first for the Christian empire, it is now understood above all as a plea for victory over sin, death, and the evil one — the true adversaries the Cross overcomes. To make the sign of the Cross is to take that victory upon oneself.