成人快手

Good morning.聽聽

Sirius is the brightest star, its name deriving from the Greek: 鈥榞lowing鈥� or 鈥榮corcher鈥�.聽 In ancient Egypt, the rising of Sirius signaled the first day of the year, when the Nile flooded and the planting season began.聽 In the modern calendar, this falls today, although with a leap year coming up, it鈥檚 tomorrow that the new year celebrations, still observed by the Egyptian Coptic Church, will take place.聽聽 I say celebrations, but the liturgy, which captivated me in Cairo this summer with its mesmeric chanting, will commemorate the Church鈥檚 martyrs, their blood symbolised by the wearing of red vestments.聽 This year, it鈥檒l take on a deeper significance, remembering the beheading of twenty-one Coptic Christians by ISIL.

For the ancients, this day was the First of the Month of Thoth [pron: 鈥楾oot鈥橾, the god depicted with the head of an ibis, whose curved beak resembles the crescent moon.聽 Thoth was the scribe of the underworld.聽 Egyptians believed that when you died, your heart was weighed on an enormous scale against a feather, representing truth and justice.聽 Thoth recorded the verdict.聽聽 A light heart showed a sinless life of good deeds, earning you a place in the afterlife.聽 But a heart heavy with the weight of wrongdoings would be devoured by a beast, a second death in which you were annihilated.

St Paul says that we鈥檒l all appear before the judgement seat of Christ.聽 But his message, read during the Coptic New Year liturgy, conveys a very different understanding: 鈥淚f anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: the old has gone, the new is here!聽 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, not counting people鈥檚 sins against them.鈥�
Lord, thank you for your saving act, a gift to all who trust you today.聽 Amen.