The Orthodox Church celebrates four major feasts of the Theotokos throughout the year: her Nativity (September 8), her Entrance into the Temple (November 21), the Annunciation (March 25), and her Dormition (August 15). These aren’t minor commemorations. They’re Great Feasts, meaning they rank among the highest celebrations in our liturgical calendar after Pascha itself.
Each feast gets the full treatment, Great Vespers the night before, special hymns, particular Scripture readings, and icons that appear in the center of the church for veneration. If you’ve been to St. Michael’s for any of these, you’ve seen the whole parish gather around the icon stand, kissing the image and receiving anointing. That’s not just tradition for tradition’s sake. We’re marking moments in salvation history when God was preparing the world for the Incarnation.
The Four Great Feasts
The Nativity of the Theotokos on September 8 celebrates Mary’s birth to Joachim and Anna. You won’t find this story in Scripture. It comes from Holy Tradition, and it matters because God was preparing the one who would say yes to Gabriel. Without her birth, there’s no Incarnation. The hymns for this feast are full of joy, the barren couple finally has a child, and that child will become the Mother of God.
Three months later, on November 21, we celebrate the Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple. Mary’s parents brought her to the Jerusalem Temple as a young child and dedicated her to God’s service. Again, this isn’t in the Bible. But the Church has always understood that Mary’s whole life was a preparation, a consecration. She wasn’t just chosen randomly. She was being formed from childhood for her unique role.
The Annunciation on March 25 is the hinge. Gabriel appears to Mary and tells her she’ll conceive by the Holy Spirit and bear the Son of God. And she says yes. That moment, her free consent, her “let it be to me according to your word”, is when the Incarnation begins. God doesn’t force himself on humanity. He waits for a human being to cooperate, and Mary does. This feast often falls during Lent, and even in the strictest fasting periods, we allow fish and wine because the joy is too great to suppress.
The Dormition on August 15 commemorates Mary’s death. We don’t say “death” much in the hymns, though. We say she “fell asleep” and was taken up to be with her Son. The Church has always believed that the Theotokos didn’t just die and decay like the rest of us. Her body was assumed into heaven. We don’t have the same dogmatic formulation as the Catholics do with their Assumption doctrine, but we celebrate the same reality. And we prepare for it with a two-week fast from August 1 to 14, which can be rough in Southeast Texas when it’s 98 degrees and you’re trying to avoid meat and dairy.
Why These Feasts Matter
If you’re coming from a Baptist or non-denominational background, this might feel like a lot of attention to Mary. It is. But here’s the thing: we’re not worshipping her. We’re honoring the one human being who cooperated most fully with God’s plan. She’s the first Christian, the first to say yes to Christ. And because she’s alive in Christ, death doesn’t separate us from the Church, we ask her prayers just like you’d ask your grandmother to pray for you.
These feasts also shape our understanding of salvation. God didn’t just drop Jesus into the world out of nowhere. He prepared a people, a family, a specific woman. The Incarnation has a history. It required human cooperation. That’s how God works, through us, with us, not around us.
You’ll notice these feasts are spread throughout the year. September, November, March, August. The Church year isn’t just about Christmas and Easter. It’s a whole cycle of remembering how God entered human history, and the Theotokos is woven through that story from beginning to end.
If you want to understand Orthodox Christianity, come to one of these feasts. Come to the Dormition this August when we sing the burial hymns for the Mother of God, or come to the Annunciation in March when we hear Gabriel’s greeting. Fr. Michael Keiser’s book “The Seasons of a Lifetime” has a good chapter on the Theotokos feasts if you want to read more, but honestly, you learn this stuff by showing up. The services teach you in ways an article can’t.
