Yesterday, 9 April, on the Bright Week, the Orthodox Church celebrated the feast of the Healing Spring. His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church was at Techirghiol, county of Constanta, on the occasion, where he explained in the sermon delivered at the end of the Divine Liturgy that this feast refers to the thanksgiving of emperor Leon the Great who had a church dedicated to the Healing Spring built after a blind man got his sight again while the voice of the Mother of God told emperor Leon the Great to go and wash himself with the water from a spring close to Constantinople.

This church is, at present, just in Constantinople and is called Valucli Monastery. It is here, near the church, that the patriarchs of Constantinople are buried. This healing spring dating as far back as the time of Leon is kept under the church.

His Beatitude explained all those present that the healing power of Jesus Christ, our Lord, is often shown through the Mother of God who heals our diseases, troubles and suffering through the healing power of her son. “This healing power is seen in the Sacrament of the Extreme Unction, in the mystery of Repentance, of the Holy Communion. The Church herself is a spiritual hospital, and the entire Church is a place of healing. The Church is a hospital, not a court of justice; it is a hospital because it is the place where we heal the diseases of our soul, as well as the diseases of our body.

Explanation of the feast’s icon

The icon of this feast shoes the Mother of God Oranta-Praying, with her hands raised as for prayer, and Jesus Christ, our Saviour, blesses with His both hands as an answer to the prayers of the Mother of God. Both Jesus Christ, and the Mother of God are in a basin looking very much like the font in which we have been baptized. In this font, or basin of water, the water is coming down, and the people are healed when they receive this healing water. Just above the Mother of God the angels are standing on her both sides. The Primate of our Church underlined that “this icon concentrates in it all the spiritual meaning of today’s feast. Just in the middle of the icon it is Jesus Christ, our Saviour, Risen from the dead, who healed us of the disobedience sin, through the complete obedience in the Passions Friday, and now, during the Bright Week, He shows us that while healing us of the disobedience disease, of the disease of our alienation from God in the Week of the Holy Passions, now, on the Friday of the Bright Week, He heals our diseases, and this is why the water is consecrated. The Healing Spring is Jesus Christ, who healed us of the disobedience, as well as of death and, while He was raised from the grave, He delivered us of degradation. After his resurrection, Christ does not return to the earthly life, but passes to the heavenly life”. (Article written by Ioan Nusaga and published in „Ziarul Lumina”, dated 10 April 2010).