December 20, 2020
Beloved Faithful of Saint Barbara,
I am delighted to finally be with you for the Divine Service, and especially on this Sunday before Christmas. This is a most special day, when we read the genealogies of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Earlier in the Matins service, we read the genealogy of our Lord as found in the Gospel of Saint Luke, which contains one line of the descendants of the Lord. The other genealogy, read in the Divine Liturgy, is from the Gospel of Saint Matthew. The Fathers of the Church teach that the difference between these genealogies is a matter of subtle points of Judaic Law, but there is another difference that may be more important.