Our weapon and our armour in the Spiritual Life

OIKOS, October 17
"Taking up the cross as a weapon and clothed with faith as a breastplate, O all glorious Andrew, thou wentest forth to wrestle with visible and invisible enemies, a self-called Martyr, and thou didst cast down their arrays by the might of the Spirit. Since thou art abundantly filled therewith, O righteous Father, grant even unto me a small portion of grace, that it may enlighten my mind to praise thy  courageous struggles worthily, O light of the orthodox Faith."

I. Our weapon in the spiritual life is the cross.  What does this mean in practical terms? It means that we need to embrace mortification as an essential part of our life.  Our share in the cross is twofold.  First, we participate in the cross passively, by accepting all of the mortifications that come to us through the Providence of God.  We keep in mind that everything that happens to us is either positively or permissively willed by God, and that, in either case, He has only one motive for all the things that He wills-- His compassion for all His creatures.  Whatever suffering we have to endure, if we embrace it in the spirit in which it is given, as a share in the sufferings of Christ to encourage our growth, then we are in a position to profit from it. It is only when we resist it through anger, sadness, etc., that we miss our opportunity to grow closer to God and destroy our passions.  Further, we also participate in the mystery of the cross as our weapon actively by seeking mortification that we can embrace intentionally and voluntarily.  We might, for example, commit ourselves to special prayers, or fasting, or some other penance for the same reasons as a means to greater communion with God and the destruction of our passions.  We need to go out to battle both with our weapon (the cross) and our armour, the breastplate that is the faith. We need to have an abundance of faith, because we cannot make sense of the mortifications that God sends us without faith.  It is only with the eyes of faith that we can understand, even in the limited way that we human beings are capable of, the workings of God in our lives. Whatever we choose to do for ourselves, the penances that God sends to us through His loving Providence are by far more important. We should praise God and thank Him for the opportunity He gives us to use the cross as a weapon for these two purposes.  We should resolve to practice some special mortification, and to always and seamlessly whatever God sends us in the way of suffering.

II. We should remember that our battle is against both visible and invisible enemies.  Our visible enemies are whats rather than who's.  Our visible enemies are the material circumstances that are ancillary to temptation, things like advertising, television programmes, music and specific aspects of the behaviour of others.  All of these things are visible, but they are not the temptations themselves.  They are ancillary to the temptations.  A number of theologians have argued persuasively that the beat itself of popular music aids in arousing certain passions-- a fact that in Christian thinking is always problematic, since Christian anthropology regards the passions as demon-controlled. Added to the visible enemies, we also have invisible enemies: the temptations themselves and the demons who inspire them. Our battle is against both of them.  It is against them that we wear our armour and use our weapon. God is our strength and defense against visible and invisible enemies, and we should concretely resolve to firmly commit our will to resist both temptations to sin and the material circumstances that help them.

III. The arrays of our enemies are cast down by the Spirit.  Well, wait. I thought we said that the cross (that is mortification in communion with Christ) and faith (trust in God that He knows what He is doing in sending us particular mortifications) are the way that we defeat our temptations both visible and invisible.  No, the cross and faith are the ways that we fight against them.  We are required to fight against them, but the way that we fight against them is not the way that they are defeated.  They are defeated by the Spirit.  Our efforts are required as a sign of our bona fides, but they do not, in themselves, accomplish the victory.  The victory comes through the Spirit, Who, in filling us, becomes our Spirit too.  We receive a share of the Spirit in proportion to our ability to receive Him, and it is His portion that accomplishes victory over sin in us through the enlightenment of our minds.  We can thank God and praise Him abundantly, reaching out to Him in renewed love, for finding us worthy of a portion, and an ever-increasing portion, of His Spirit.  We should make a firm resolution to renew and expand our particular devotion to God's Holy Spirit.  Think of specific ways that an increasing portion of the Holy Spirit can assist you in the circumstances of the interior life.

The Tree is Known by its Fruit, and a House by its Foundation

"A healthy tree does not bear bad fruit, nor does a poor tree bear good fruit.  Every tree is known by the fruit it bears; you do not pick figs from thorn bushes or gather grapes from bramble bushes.  A good person brings good out of the treasure of good things in his heart; a bad person brings bad out of his treasure of bad things.  For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

Why do you call me, "Lord, Lord," and yet don't do what I tell you? Anyone who comes to me and listens to my words and obeys them-- I will show what he is like. He is like a man who, in building his house, dug deep and laid the foundation on rock.  the river flooded over and hit that house but could not shake it, because it was well built.  But anyone who hears my words and does not obey them is like a man who built his house without laying a foundation; when the flood hit that house it fell at once--and what a terrible crash that was!"(Luke 6: 43-9)

I. The Lord Jesus' reference in the Gospel of St. Luke concerning the image of the tree, reminds us at once of all the many other times that the Lord uses this same image throughout the wholeness of salvation history.  It is one of God's favourite images.  We think, for example, first of the Garden, and the trees that are in the Garden, which are good for food and delightful to the eyes, and especially of the Tree of Life in the middle of the Garden.  Yet, even after the human race lost access through sin to the Tree of Life, human beings were still expected to be like life-giving trees, living to the greatest extent possible in communion with God. In the first psalm, for example, we read: "Blessed is the man, who has not walked in the counsel of the wicked... He shall be like a tree planted by flowing waters, which will give its fruit in due season.  Its leaf shall not wither, and in everything he does, he prospers."  Similarly, in Psalm 92, we read that "the just man shall flourish like the palm tree, and he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God." In the forgoing verse, communion with the Lord is highlighted by the reference to the "courts of our God." If we were to read the passage from St. Luke without this background in the rest of the Scriptures, we would perhaps think that, according to the Lord's saying, the good and the bad are unchanging quantities, and that the bad are irreformable.  It certainly sounds that way.  But understanding the passage as a fulfillment of what is said in the Psalms and in the rest of the Tradition, guides us to see that being good or bad rests in a decision, and then, in a habit of decisions.  Communion with God begins with the decision to turn to God, but that communion is deepened by habitual decisions to draw closer to God through grace.  The passage speaks about "the treasure of the heart," and that this treasure can be either good or bad.  A treasure is not heaped up in a day.  Of course, God can give us a treasure all at once, and instantly, for God can do anything.  Yet, is such a thing really consistent with God's designs.  How is our growth really humanly possible without repeated synergistic decisions to draw ever closer to God.  OK, so what does "synergistic decisions" mean? Well, it means that our cooperation with grace is a synergy.  It is like electricity.  If the electrical current did not flow out from the wall to the lamp, the lamp would not be lit.  At the same time, however, if the electrical current did not flow from the lamp back to the wall, the lamp would not be lit.  When the circuit is complete, where does the current begin, and where does it end? Where is the important part of the current? Is it that that comes from the wall, or is it that that goes back from the lamp to the wall? Christianity, in the past, has allowed itself to become embroiled in chicken and egg controversies regarding this very question, but these controversies have obscured the truth more than they have revealed it.  We receive God's energy (grace), but we have to cooperate with that energy by means of a corresponding synergy.  Is our synergy, in fact, the energy of God simply returned to Him? Of course.  What could be more obvious? We heap up a treasure of good in our heart through repeated decisions to deepen our communion with God.  It is a great motive for us to love God, and love Him deeply, in that He has equipped us to participate in this kind of ever-deepening relationship with Him.  We should make concrete resolutions concerning our own circumstances, how we are able to deepen our relationship through prayer, sacrifice and work.

II. This leads us to the second consideration.  The Lord tells us that if we really hear His words and put them into practice, we will have to dig deep.  This is, of course, another way of saying what He was saying above. It is not enough to simply hear His words when the Gospel readings are read in Church, even if we were to go to the church for every service, everyday.  No, we cannot simply hear in this fashion.  We have to dig deep.  Digging deep means following the example of the Mother of God, which is given to us twice in the same Gospel.  We have to ponder the Lord's ways in our hearts.  We have to meditate on them.  The very concept of meditation was inspired by watching ruminating animals.  Ruminating animals have more than one stomach.  They will, in the course of digestion, vomit the contents of their first stomach back up into their mouth, so that they can chew it again.  Gross! Yes, but it is a useful image of what we are supposed to do with the Lord's words and His ways in our lives.  We are supposed to meditate on them, that is to chew them over and over again.  In them is life, just as life is in our food, but it takes some effort on our part to extract that life, just as a ruminating animal cannot simply swallow its food once and be done with it.  If we have approached the spiritual life in that way in the past, we need to correct that.  We can no longer read the Gospel and say, "OK, now I understand that. I'll move on to something else." Deepening communion with God results from continued meditation.  We have to dig deep, and there, in communion with God, lay our foundation. We should certainly praise and thank God for the very invitation to "dig deep." After all, we realize that God did not have to reveal Himself at all.  There is no necessity in any particular manifestation of His goodness.  We can resolve in a concrete way to make "digging deep" a greater part of daily life.

III. So what can we expect if we don't dig deep.  The Lord answers this by giving us the image of the person, who does not build on rock.  What is the rock? His words? No, the rock is communion with God, that is, sharing the identity of God, becoming God by grace, since that which shares the same life is entitled to share the same name.  If we hear His words and assume, "OK, I understand that. I can move on to something else," then we have not really heard Him.  We may think that we are faithful, even daily communicants, but our whole life in religion is vitiated by the lack of mental prayer.  Mental prayer, that is meditation, is that "digging deep" that we need in order to draw ever closer to God.  If we are not drawing ever closer to God, we are getting further away from Him.  There is no standing still in the spiritual life.  We should stand in absolute awe of the goodness of a God, Who invites us so freely to communion with Him, Who wants us to share His life so fully.  A resolution to expand the place that mental prayer holds in our life would be appropriate.

St. Lucian of Antioch-- Building a Temple to the Lord from Virtues

Ode 3 of the Canon of St. Lucian of Antioch

With the splendour of the virtues thou madest thy soul a house for God, O Martyr Lucian; and by thy prayers thou didst raze the idols' temples to the ground.

Holy Martyr, Lucian, pray to God for us!

Compassed by trials and oppressed by painful tortures, O Martyr, thou dost praise as thy Benefactor Him that deemed thee worthy of such good things.

Holy Martyr Lucian, pray to God for us!

Thou didst surrender thy body unto tortures, O Martyr, but thou keptest thy soul in safety offering thyself unto the Master as an unblemished and most precious sacrifice. (October Menaion, 15)

This ode of the canon of the saint shows us an illustration of our contribution to our salvation.  It is true that we are saved by faith in Christ, but we are also saved through the works done in faith, which "fill up what is wanting in the sufferings of Christ on behalf of His Body, the Church."  We contribute to the great work of our salvation through works that are done in Christ.  According to the image that is provided in the canon, we are building our soul into a beautiful temple for the Lord, by using the virtues as our raw material.  We have to be expert carpenters and masons as we fit together the beautiful virtues into a dwelling that is holy in the Lord.  This tropar of the canon makes us think explicitly of the Book of Proverbs (9:1): "Wisdom has built her house and made seven columns for it." Traditionally, the Fathers of the Church have interpreted this verse to refer to the seven virtues that are the support and basis of the Christian life (the three theological virtues: faith, hope and charity; and the four cardinal virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance). The Christian life is made up of virtue.  On the one hand, we love virtue as we see it in the Lord and in others around us, but on the other hand, we pray for the grace to build the corresponding virtues in ourselves.  At the same time that we are building, we are also tearing down the diabolical temples that we raise up within ourselves as a result of our attachments.  We make created things into gods through our attachments to created things.  Through the destruction of the passions, we tear those idolatrous temples down, as we build the virtuous temple to the Lord.

The second tropar is far more explicit about the particulars of this process.  We accept the mortifications that are sent to us by God.  We view as our benefactor the one who gives us trials and sufferings, because we know by the eyes of faith that He gives us these things in order to perfect us in the image and likeness of God.  Praising God as our Benefactor means accepting what the Will of God gives to us in every circumstance.  Despite the terrible sufferings that we may endure, we accept the direction of God's Will as holy, that is, separated from all earthly concerns, and impartial in its application, though, at the same time, completely motivated by unconditional compassion for each creature as if it were the only creature.  We accept that that which befalls us is the best that could happen to us, not given our limited knowledge of the ways of universe, but according to the infinite knowledge and power of the Maker of the universe, who understands all its ways, and directs all its ways according to His own boundless love. It is a leap of faith, but not without reason, for it is eminently reasonable that God loves what He has made and what He continuously sustains in being.

The third tropar tells us that St. Lucian willed to become a unblemished sacrifice to God by giving his body over to torture.  It goes on to say that it is precisely in giving his body over to torments that he keeps his soul safe for everlasting life.  In the same way, we recognize that by willing embracing the mortifications and sufferings that God sends to us, we keep our souls safe through cooperation with God's Will. All of this leads us to a greater love for our God, Who has designed everything to work together for the good of those who love Him.  

The Love of Benevolence as the Likeness of God

"If you love only the people who love you, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners love those who love them! And if you do good only to those who do good to you, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners do that! And if you lend only to those from whom you hope to get it back, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount! No! Love your enemies and do good to them; lend and expect nothing back. You will then have a great reward, and you will be children of the Most High God.  For he is good to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful just as your Father is merciful." (Luke 6:32-36)

First we are invited by the the words of the Gospel to consider the general love of benevolence.  We should have the love of benevolence for every creature.  The love of benevolence is the continuous intellectual decision to will the good for the other.  This is the perfect love that we are commanded to have for God and neighbour.  The love of benevolence mirrors God's love.  It is God's love returned to Him in a synergy.  St. Isaac the Syrian tells us:

Once an elder was asked, "What is a merciful heart?" He replied, "It is the heart's burning for the sake of the entire creation, for men, for birds, for animals, for demons, and for every created thing; and at the recollection and sight of them, the eyes of a merciful man pour forth abundant tears. From the strong and vehement mercy that grips his heart and from his great compassion, his heart is humbled and he cannot bear to hear or to see any injury or slight sorrow in creation.  For this reason he offers up prayers with tears continually even for irrational beasts, for the enemies of the truth, and for those who harm him, that they be protected and receive mercy.  And in like manner he even prays for the family of the reptiles, because the great compassion that burns without measure in his heart is the likeness of God."(Homily 71)

The love of benevolence is the general orientation towards all things that makes us Godlike.  For God is not a God who rules OVER all things like a taskmaster.  He is not the sinister and intimidating Allah of Islam, who delights in the destruction of the things he has made.  He is the compassionate Ruler of all Creation in the sense that He is the basis and foundation of everything that exists.  He does not rule OVER  all things, but supports all things, seeking the lowest place, so as to be and become the ground of all things.

Though the love of benevolence is the beginning and the sine qua non of becoming like God, the Lord Jesus goes on to say that we must do good in order to be like God.  We must do concrete works.  It is not enough to bear universal benevolence in our hearts. We must do deeds that manifest the benevolence of God.  They needn't be enormous things of great moment.  They merely need to be works of love done specifically for those who are normally outside of our circle of benevolence.  Reaching beyond our circle of benevolence is essential to understanding the Lord's words.  It also plays an essential part in his next remark.

He next tells us that we must "lend," but that we must not lend according to the world's way of lending.  It does not take very long to come to the conclusion that when He says "lend," He is actually inviting us to give in a sacrificial way.  This is the only possible way to interpret his instructions to lend, expecting nothing in return.  Lending, but expecting nothing in return, is not technically lending.  It is giving, donating in a sacrificial way.  It is selflessly sacrificing that which we have a right to.

The Lord directs us in this passage to form within us the love of benevolence for every creature, to do specific works of kindness to those who are normally outside our circle of benevolence, and to do those acts in a selfless and sacrificial way.  We can form specific resolutions now to make these three aims a part of our daily life.  First, we can resolve to pray with a greater awareness of the love of benevolence.  Second, we can make a specific resolution to deliberately reach, in a personal way, beyond our usual circle of benevolence to embrace someone in need, whom we know slightly, do not know, or is one of our enemies. Further, we can resolve to do these things in a truly sacrificial way, so that our entire beings are involved in the love that makes us like God.  

11th Sunday After Pentecost-- Seek the Lord, while He may be found

Brothers and sisters in Christ—

                Today, the Gospel reminds us about the need to forgive those who offend us.  This, together with the obligation to fulfill the commandments of Christ is the central theme of the Christian religion.  Next Sunday, we will hear the Gospel reading, which tells us about the fulfillment of the commandments, but today, we focus on forgiveness.  Forgiveness is very important for us, because it is through it that we become like God. Despite our serious sins above number, God is always ready to forgive us, if we turn to Him in repentance.  Our contemporary problem is that we often no longer consider certain things to be serious sins that are, nevertheless, very offensive to God.  For example, in the Mystery of Holy Confession, we must have the intention to change our life.  Only in this way do we fulfill the obligation of the sacrament and truly receive absolution of our sins.  It is not possible for us to confess our sins and still have the intention to return to our old way of life in sin. If we do this, we do not receive forgiveness and absolution, but we commit an even more serious sin.  In a similar way, we cannot receive forgiveness and absolution, if we have the intention to conceal some of our sins.

                We ought to memorize this passage from the Prophecy of Isaiah and meditate on it, so that we understand our relationship with God in repentance: “Seek the Lord while He may be found! Call to Him while He is still near! Let the wicked man forsake his way, and the sinner his thoughts! Let him turn to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him,-- to our God, for He is bountiful in forgiveness.” “Seek the Lord while He may be found” means that the time will come, when He will not be found.  We must repent now and at once, because later repentance will be impossible.  If there is an obstacle between us and Christ, we must now and at once strain with all our might to remove it.  For example, married people need to be in Christ, that is “crowned,” married in the Church, sanctified by the Church’s service.  According to Christ and His Church, those, who are not crowned, are not married. Their association is sinful, rather than holy.  They are not able to receive Holy Communion in Church, and they ought only to confess their sins, if they have the intention to change their life.  Such people should act quickly to be reconciled with Christ and the Church, for the Church has the means to help them, namely, the annulment of a previous marriage, or the absolution of the Mystery of Holy Confession.  “Seek the Lord while He may be found” means to begin this work now, since certainly the decision no longer to delay is pleasing to God.  Those who have been married outside the Church, without the presence of Christ, have committed a serious sin, and those, who were participants, through aid and support, have also committed serious sin. It is shocking that not a single person had the courage to say, “This is not right.” Nevertheless, the Lord is always ready to forgive us, if we only turn to Him in repentance.

                All of us human beings have sinful habits, which we must change, because these things are obstacles between us and Christ.  We know that we have to destroy our passions and practice self-denial, in order to follow the Crucified Christ.  For this same reason, we must forgive one another.  No one ought to cry out: “Lord, forgive me,” if he does not forgive others.  Just as we seek a harmony in our relationships with others, so we also need to seek a similar harmony with God.  He calls us to take part in the one only peace, which is both horizontal and vertical, because it unites with God and with others.  This peace is both horizontal and vertical, because it is the peace of the Life-Giving Cross.  We must not think that we can share in the Mystery of the precious Cross without suffering, without the pain, which comes from the death of our passions.  It is painful, because we very greatly cherish our passions, even though they are evil.  We learn to wallow in their corruption, just like pigs in the mud.  The passions are our habitat, not by nature, but by long practice, and the pain, which we experience when we free ourselves from them is indescribable.

                This community has committed a very serious sin.  We have spurned the blessing of the Lord, showing contempt for His commandments.  Our spiritual house is desolate. Donations to our building fund, for example, have been rendered vain and nonsensical, since “If the Lord does not build the house, in vain do the builders labour.” Once, the Lord desired to live among us, but now there is only the stench of death on us.  We only need to turn to the Lord, to repent and do penance. Do not think that there will be any success or blessing at all until the Lord finds here a sincere love and respect for His commandments. Seek the Lord while He may be found.

The graces of true vocation

The words of today’s Gospel emphasize the theme of vocation.  Vocation is an essential element of the Christian life, and each Christian person has a special vocation, which God gives to him for his salvation and the salvation of the whole world.  An example of vocation, which the Gospel gives to us, is the vocation of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and James and John.  The Lord Jesus Christ says to them: “Come follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Being a fisher of men means to value the salvation of souls before all other things, and to work for this goal with great zeal and devotion.  The fisherman knows that his life depends on the life of the fish.  The fisher of men knows that his everlasting salvation depends on the preaching of the Gospel, which the fisherman is called to preach.

                This story is similar to several stories that come to us from the Old Testament, which demonstrate for us the true meaning of vocation.  First of all, there is the vocation of the Patriarch Abraham.  God called Abraham to leave his land, his family and people, and to go to the land, which God would show him.  By means of this vocation, we know that true vocation has to separate us from our dependence on worldly things.  In true vocation, we choose God, and therefore we abandon all other things.

                Similar to this is the vocation of the Prophet Moses.  The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a fiery burning bush.  The Lord told him to return to Egypt and to lead the people of Israel to deliverance and freedom.  When he doubted his ability to fulfill this task, God promised to help him with divine grace.  When God calls us to work for the salvation of souls, He also promises to help us.  We labour with the power of God.

                The vocation of the Prophet Eliseus is also an important example for us.  The First Book of Kings says to us: “Elias left that place and found Eliseus, the son of Shaphat, who was plowing with twelve teams of oxen; he himself was following the twelfth team.  Elias came up beside him and covered him with his cloak.  Eliseus, leaving the team of oxen, ran after Elias and said: “Allow me to kiss my father and mother, then I will come and follow you.” Elias replied to him: Go, turn back, what have I done to you? Eliseus left him, took the team of oxen and butchered it, and building a fire, he cooked the oxen and distributed the food to the people, so that they could eat.  Then, he rose up to follow Elias and serve him.” This shows us another aspect of true vocation.  When God calls us, we must give everything that we have.  The vocation from the Lord requires total commitment.

                Each of us has a special vocation.  Let us pray that He will give to us all these signs of true vocation; that he will separate us from dependence on worldly things; that he will help us with His power; that He will give us the grace for perfect sacrifice.  Let us pray to God that He will give us the spirit of sacrifice, for the salvation of souls is highest priority. 

                This spirit of sacrifice was the constant attribute of St. John the Baptist, whose nativity we celebrate today.  From the time that he was an infant, he was an example of the ascetic life.  The New Testament tells us about his customs of fasting and poor clothing, as well as his life in the desert.  Saint John chose to follow the Lord God, and therefore he abandoned all other things.  In a similar way, we need to choose to follow the Lord, and thus to abandon care concerning all other things. 

The disciple will inherit a hundredfold-- and persecution besides

Today, Our Lord Jesus Christ tells us about the wonderful destiny, which He has prepared for all, who love Him and follow Him according to the commandments.  That which He promises us is the Kingdom of God, which He describes here as: “You that would follow me: when the new world is inaugurated, when the Son of Man sits on His throne of glory, you will sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Everyone, who has left home, brothers, sisters, father, mother, wife, children, or land for my name’s sake, will receive a hundred times more, and, as their inheritance, everlasting life.” The Gospel of St. Luke is clearer, for that Gospel says: “There is no one, who has left home or wife, brothers or children for the sake of the Kingdom of God, who will not receive much more in this time, and in the age to come, eternal life.” Saint Luke speaks here about the beginning of the Kingdom of Heaven already in this world, for our inheritance begins already in this world.  In the mysteries of Christ, we share in the Life of God, and we already begin to become God by grace.  In the Most Holy Eucharist, for example, we receive the true essence of the Risen Lord Jesus Christ.  Through this personal experience with the Risen Christ, we begin to rise from the consequences of death, just as the Gospel of St. Matthew says to us: “The Lord spoke to them another parable: “the Kingdom of Heaven is like yeast, which a woman took and kneaded into three measures of flour, until the whole mass begins to rise.” When the mysteries of Christ are kneaded into us, we begin to rise to our resurrection and union with God.

                In the Gospel of Saint Mark, we see another valuable idea, since we should note the important difference between this Gospel and the other two versions.  This Gospel says: “there is no one, who has left his home or brothers, or sisters, or mother or father, or children, or land, for my sake and the Gospel’s, who will not receive a hundredfold now, in this time, and persecution besides… and in the age to come, eternal life.” Here Saint Mark emphasizes the fact of our journey in this world.  Truly, through the mysteries of Christ, we already live in the Kingdom of God, but we still live in this world as well.  We must transform this world, little by little, into the Kingdom of Heaven through prayer and good works, by the grace of God.  If we decide to live that life, which tries to transform the world, then we will receive persecution, because the world will try to destroy us.  For us, this doesn’t matter.  When the world tries to destroy us, then we remember that we live in the Kingdom, since this world is not able to harm us, just as the Lord says to us in the Gospel of St. John: “In the world you will have tribulation.  Be of good cheer! I have overcome the world.”

                Our challenge is to live more and more in the Kingdom, instead of in this world.  In order to do this, we must consecrate the present moment through prayer and sacrifice in the name of the Lord.  We return to this theme over and over again, because this is the essence of the Christian life—the imitation of Christ according to our circumstances.  We have no obligation to consecrate and sanctify any other life or any other moment than this life and this moment.  Why do we continue to do evil things, which have no place in the Kingdom of God? Why are we not steadfast against the evils of the world? We must reject the evil agenda of this society, since this society and this state, seeking to control every aspect of the life of its citizens, continuously commits evil and calls it good.  There can be no compromise with tyrants, who desire to coerce and force people to act against their consciences.  We need to recognize that we have a share in the Kingdom of God, but this share comes together with persecution.  If we reject persecution, then we also reject the Kingdom. “Everyone, therefore, who acknowledges Me before men, I will acknowledge before my Heavenly Father.  Whoever denies me before men, I will deny before my heavenly Father.”

The Life-Giving River of Prayer and Sacrifice

Today, Pentecost Sunday, in the Gospel, we heard that the Lord called out in a loud voice: “Let anyone who is thirsty come to Me and drink! He who believes in Me, as the Scripture says, will have rivers of living water flow from within him.” This passage is always a conundrum for readers of Holy Scripture, because the Lord Jesus seems to cite a specific passage, but this passage cannot be found anywhere in the whole Bible.  No, instead of citing a specific passage, He interprets a passage according to the custom of the rabbis.  Here, the Lord interprets the forty-seventh chapter of the Book of the Holy Prophet Ezekiel—a fascinating story about a vision of the prophet, in which the prophet sees a river that flows from the façade of the Lord’s Temple.  This river grew greater and greater, and fruit-bearing trees grew up along its banks.  In the end, the river flowed into the Dead Sea, and the sea became fresh.  In the Gospel of St. John, the Lord Jesus says again and again that His body is the True Temple of the Lord, which the Jews would destroy, but that He would raise again on the third day.  From the body of the Lord, a life-giving river will flow, which will give salvation and everlasting life to all, who believe in Him.  St. John says about the death of the Lord: “one of the soldiers pierced His side, and immediately there flowed out blood and water.  He who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true.  He knows that he speaks the truth, so that you might believe.” This “river,” which flowed from the side of the Saviour is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, which creates the mysteries of Christ, and engenders life-giving power in them.  For example, when the Lord, the Holy Spirit descends on the bread and wine during the Divine Liturgy, they become the body and blood of our Lord.

                What the Lord says to us in today’s Gospel is wonderful above all wonders, since we are not surprised when we see that the Body of Christ is a fountain of grace for all people through the life-giving river flowing from His side, but we are amazed concerning the revelation of our own very great dignity.  Here the Lord says that the same river, which flows from His side to engender the Holy Mysteries, will flow within us.  In other words, He is the Temple of the Lord, but in Him each of us becomes the Lord’s Temple, sanctified by the presence of the only God.  Just like Him, we become a fountain of grace for others.

                What sort of river is it that flows from us—the Lord’s Temple? What sort of river is it that gives life to the whole world? This is a river of that, which flows from a temple.  This is a river of prayer and sacrifice.  Prayer and sacrifice sanctify the world, because through them we take part in the identity of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Word, the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity.  We are the true Temple of the Lord when, full of prayer and sacrifice, a river of grace flows from us do our parched environment.

                We offer to God all our prayers, joys and sufferings. This is our daily sacrifice, which is pleasing to God, just like the sacrifices offered in the Temple of the Lord under the Old Law and even the sacrifice of the Holy Eucharist.  Often during our normal day, we do not clearly discern our sufferings and joys, and thus we do not think to ourselves: “I should offer this to God the Father.” We should correct this problem by offering everything, each aspect of our experience.  In this way, we attain nearly continuous prayer, since we remain in conversation with Him during all of our tasks.  This method gives us greater concentration and attention to our goal and eternal destiny.  

God has promised us a universal and everlasting Kingdom

Brothers and sisters in Christ—

The subject of today’s Gospel reading is the high-priestly prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ.  In this prayer, the Lord Jesus proclaims that the Father gave to Him authority over all flesh.  Actually, the universal authority of the Messiah was foretold during the time of the prophets.  For example, King David proclaimed in the second psalm: “The Lord said to me, ‘You are my son. Today, I have begotten you.  Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for an inheritance, and your authority to the ends of the earth.  You will shepherd them with an iron rod, and you will shatter them like a potter’s vessel.’” Here we have a description of the universal authority of the Son of God.  The Father gave authority to the Son even to destroy the whole of Creation, just as the psalm says, but the Son did not choose to destroy the Creation, but to save it and redeem it.  Therefore, the authority of the Son of God did not come about in order to herd and then shatter the peoples of the world, but, instead, this authority appeared in order to give enormous gifts to the human race.  The authority to destroy became the authority to give and to bless, since the Son of God gave up His claim to justice in order to show mercy to evildoers.  We should have a very great admiration and a great love for our God, because He willed to lay aside justice in order to act mercifully in our regard.  Instead of the authority to destroy, the Lord Jesus uses His authority to give us everlasting life.  It is just as we said all during the paschal season: “He has given us life everlasting.  We bow down to His holy Resurrection on the third day.” We should decide to become like Him in our generosity—to be merciful to one another, using our authority to give life and joy.

                The Lord Jesus also spoke concerning a task, which the Father sent Him to accomplish.  “But I glorified You on earth, accomplishing the task, which You had given Me to accomplish.” What was this task? The Lord Jesus accomplished many works during the period of His earthly life.  But here the Lord spoke concerning the redemption of mankind, the inauguration of the Kingdom of God and the gift of everlasting life.  In other words, the Lord Jesus received authority from the Father to accomplish a task, and He accomplished it.  Naturally, He has plenipotentiary authority, since He is God the Creator and the Almighty, but He speaks concerning a specific authority to fulfill a specific task.  This is the authority of a servant, not the authority of God.  He gave up His royal authority in order to receive the authority of a servant and agent.  Here we have a special motive for gratitude, since our Almighty God came among us in order to serve the Father and us.  According to His example, we ought to look upon all our tasks (even the most mundane) as very important things.  After all, God has sent us in order to accomplish them.  Our salvation depends upon us doing them well.

                The Lord continues His prayer, so that He can speak about glory. He says, “Now glorify Me, Father, in Yourself, with the glory I had in You before the world began.” What sort of glory is it, for which he asks? Of course, it is a share in the only true glory—the Life of God.  But, He already shares in this glory, since He is God—One of the Holy Trinity.  But, He asks for this glory for the sake of human nature, so that in Him human nature might be deified and receive everlasting life.  Our hearts ought to be full of gratitude and love for God, because our God Jesus Christ asks the Father for our sake, so that we can receive as an inheritance the greatest benefits and goods.  On account of God’s very great compassion for us, we should pray to the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ for others to receive God’s benefits and to be glorified through the Lord’s works in their lives.

                In Christ, we have authority to accomplish a task, which will lead us to glory—the salvation of our souls and the souls of others around us.  

Some reflections on the Gospel of the Man Born Blind

Brothers and sisters in Christ—

Today in the Gospel, we find the theme of spiritual blindness.  We know that often sight is a metaphor for knowledge, and blindness is a metaphor for ignorance.  Here the Son of God proclaims to the man born blind that He came from Heaven so that those who cannot see may see, and those who see may become blind.  This is the judgment of the Son of God on this world, and the sight of which He speaks, is knowledge of the True God, the Holy Trinity.  The blindness of which He speaks is not the blindness of the eyes, but the darkness of the will.  The Lord Jesus describes the condition of people, who freely choose not to see; people, who know the light, but choose to sit in the darkness of evil.  They deny the existence of sin, and yet they are continuously surrounded by the devastation due to sin.

     St. Paul explains in his epistle to the Romans that the Lord God gave us a Law, because he wished to reveal the disobedient spirit in the human race.  Before the Law, there was no sin, because it is impossible to transgress without the Law.  By the Law of Moses, the Lord God revealed His criterion of justice, and sin became clear.  Human beings, oppressed by the spirit of disobedience were not able to choose the good, but were slaves to evil.  Therefore, Our Lord Jesus Christ came from Heaven to show manifest perfect obedience to God’s criterion of justice.  After that, He gave us the only true medicine for sin: The New Law, and the New Justice, which we fulfill through faith.  In the letter to the Romans, St. Paul gives a summary of the thinking regarding the New Law, when he says: “Everything that is not of faith is sin.” By means of the New Law, we are able to fulfill God’s criterion of justice in Christ Jesus by doing three simple things.  First, we must ask for the mercy of God.  God’s mercy is available to us, but we must seek it and ask for it.  As the Lord says to us through His servant, the Holy Prophet Isaiah: “Seek the Lord while He may be found.  Call to Him while He is still near.”

     Second, we must be merciful, for the Lord warns us that we have to forgive the sins of others if we desire that our sins be forgiven, just as we pray in the Our Father: Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” We have to fill our lives with works of mercy, according to the example of God Himself, who is generous in His gifts and benefits to all people, even the wicked.

     Third, we have to completely trust God to fulfill His promises.  “Everything that is not of faith is sin,” means that our trust in God has to be simple and complete, according to the example of the Holy Apostle Paul, who wrote: “We know that all things work together unto good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.” We need to trust that everything works together for our good.

     The New Law of Christ gives to us the ability to escape from the spiritual blindness, which hold us imprisoned in sin, but we must ask for the mercy of God, we must do merciful and loving things for others. Finally, we must completely trust God in all the circumstances of our life. If our goal is to fill our lives with works of mercy, and if we pray we trust, then we will see everlasting life in Christ’s Kingdom. 

Reflecting On Thought: Part II

The human mind is ineffable.  As I was saying in the forgoing post, there is nothing that can be said about it, nor is there anything that can be known about it.  In this way, it is a true image of God, Who is likewise ineffable.  No, the only thing we can judge and analyze is the product of the mind, that is, thought, and all of this judgment and analysis is done by means of thought.  Modern psychology has no access to the mind itself.  All it can do is analyze thoughts and draw inferences from thoughts concerning the health of the mind.  It goes without saying, however, that all that has been accomplished in this case is to infer concerning the health of the thoughts and thought patterns (families of thoughts, we might say).  The mind remains unknowable.  Psychology claims to have access to the "subconscious" through a study of thought, but this, ultimately is a matter of faith.  There is no evidence that this claim is actually true.  For the most part, therapy is shown to help patients by means of exerting control over patterns of thought.  Recovering memories, and uncovering the roots of unconscious motivation reveals nothing about the mind, in the same way that revealing the contents of a very deep hole, and bringing those contents out into the full light of day, reveals nothing about the hole.  What relation do the contents of the hole have to the hole? Are the contents of the hole products of the hole? Did the hole produce them?

When we say the "mind" we mean, of course, the soul of man.  This is not to suggest that the mind is all that there is to the soul.  Actually, far from it. According to traditional Scholastic philosophy, for example, the mind (intellect) is numbered among the three high faculties of the soul along with Will and Memory.  This is also not to suggest that if one "loses one's mind" then one has lost one's soul.  The expression "to lose one's mind" really has nothing at all to do with the mind.  It means that one has lost the ability to think rationally.  Again, it is an assessment of thought and the powers of thought, not of the mind.

For all of the aforementioned reasons, some branches of Eastern philosophy, most notably Buddhism, rejects the reality of the self altogether.  This does not mean that followers of this way of thinking reject identity or the reality of the individual, but only that they realize that there is nothing essentially that they can point to, which is constitutive of the self.  According to their way of thinking, the self is not so a thing, but a process, like a river.  We call South America's largest river the Amazon.  We give it an identity, even though that which constitutes it is constantly changing, never the same.  In the same way, the self is constantly changing and never the same, as can be observed by the "river of thought" of flows through it.

Christianity, though embracing realism as a philosophical basis for practical purposes, recognizes that contingent beings are not real in the sense that Being (God) is real.  This is the very reason why St. Dionysius the Areopagite makes the rather shocking statement that it is just as true to say that God is not as it is to say that God is.  It is not that the God Being is simply many, many degrees greater than ours.  No, it is "Being" in an entirely different sense.  The only way that we understand being in this world is through the mechanism of cause and effect.  Every being is a cause, and every being is an effect.  We cannot conceive of being aside from these relationships, so we use language that suggests these relationships even in reference to God.

The Sunday of the Samaritan Woman: The Human Being is Made to Be a Deep Well and a Life-Giving Spring

In today’s Gospel, the Lord Jesus Christ tells His disciples: “My food is to do the Will of Him Who sent Me, and to accomplish His work.” In this place, Our Lord uses a Greek word “vroma,” which means food that is either permitted or forbidden by the Law, along with another similar word “vrosis,” which He uses to describe the Eucharist in another context.  “Vroma” and “Vrosis” are the translation of the Hebrew word “ma’akal,” which is a very ancient word, only found in the Books of Moses. 

     We have been baptized into Christ, and therefore we have hidden resources of strength and virtue, which transform us into “other Christs.” The Christian is a person who has been clothed in Christ, and thus becomes another Christ by the grace of God.

     In Christ, we have hidden resources of strength and virtue.  We have well in us, which becomes a fountain springing up to everlasting life.  The Greek Gospel uses two words to describe this well: “piyi” and “phrear.” “Piyi” is a spring, which flows of its own accord, but “phrear” is a deep well.  To draw water from such a well, one needs a rope and a bucket.

     Our hidden strengths are a fountain of living water, and a special, spiritual food. In the first place, we have the fountain of living water: the Mystery of Baptism.  When we consider this Mystery, we remember two images, given to us by the Holy Scriptures, which help us to understand the great gift of this Sacrament.  The first images is water, as in the Prophecy of Isaiah: “As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there, but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”

     Nevertheless, there is a great contrast between the rain and the snow, and the Lord’s Word, for the rain and the snow leave heaven and do not return there, but the Lord’s Word not only returns to Heaven, but also lives there continuously, even though it works on earth.  The imagery of the Mystery of Baptism is a water, which life to the earth, for Baptism becomes in us a fountain of the kind of water, which springs up to life everlasting, and not only for us, but for the whole world.  We see an illustration of this fact in the behaviour of the Samaritan woman. She brought all of the villagers to the Lord Jesus.  In the same way, we should bring all of our neighbours to Christ through our life of virtue.  Therefore, the water of Baptism becomes in us a rain or a snow, which comes forth from us as from heaven in order to give life to our world.

     The second element in the imagery of Baptism is light.  Often we call this Mystery Illumination when it is celebrated together with the Sacraments of Chrismation and the Eucharist.  The Mystery of Illumination—Baptism, Chrismation and the Eucharist—make us share in the identity of Christ.  St. Simeon prophesied that Christ would become “light of revelation to the Gentiles.” But, in Christ we also become a light of revelation to the nations.

     We also have a hidden strength, which come to us from our spiritual food—the Eucharist.  The Eucharist—the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ—strengthens the identity of Christ in us.  It gives us the virtues of Christ to accept the Will of God and to lead others to freedom from sin.  In the Eucharist, we have the strengthen to imitate Christ, that is, to imitate the Eucharist, and become offerings together with Christ for the salvation of the world, just as it says in the psalm: “Have they no knowledge, those evildoers, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and do not call upon God?”

     In Christ, we have hidden resources of strength and virtue.  It is necessary for us to use these resources for our salvation and the salvation of all people.  It is necessary to water our world with the life-giving water, which, on account of our baptism, springs up in us unto life everlasting.  It is necessary to become a light of revelation for the nations, and to follow the example of the Samaritan Woman, bringing all people to our Holy Catholic Church.  It is necessary to receive strength from the Eucharist, in order to imitate the Eucharist, and become offerings for the salvation of the world and the glory of God. 

Reflecting on Thought: Part I

In the past I have spent some time reflecting on the problem that thought presents in the spiritual life. It is a common problem presented in all the spiritual writers and Fathers of the Church from the Cappadocians to the ascetical fathers of Sinai. Thought is such a problem because, according to the beliefs of the fathers, of it propensity to be demon-controlled. It is an even more common perception among the spiritual traditions across religious lines that it is difficult for us human beings to distinguish between thought and what should be the background of thought—the mind. We have all experienced it, the mind is never empty but jumps from thought to thought without pause. One thought leads to another thought, in a seamless way, so that often we wonder how we got to a particular thought that we, eventually, advert to. These end to end seamless series of thoughts are, more often than not, not apparent to us. The background noise of the mind is the "normal" that we are used to.

As we have seen before, St. John Climacus and the other ascetical fathers of Sinai advocated a type of concentration/awareness that allowed them to discern the difference between individual thoughts, watch them come and go, and be detached from them so as to effectively accept or reject them. Climacus called this discipline "going up into the tower." The image is of the owner of a vineyard, who is aware that the vineyard is under attack, so he withdraws into the tower in order to observe his enemies approaching. This concentration/awareness of thought in Climacus is not yet prayer, but in Climacus and in the Sinaite school in general, it is closely associated with the practice of the Jesus Prayer (the Prayer of the Heart), and may have been practiced simultaneously, or successively.

Across spiritual traditions, there is a concern about thought being automatic and uncontrolled. In contemporary life, we often hear in common speech the results of this type of automation. We hear the expression, for example, "He made me so angry." The implication is that thought is an irresistible force, like a locomotive on train tracks, which inevitably reaches its goal once it starts long its path. In this example, the subject was not capable of discerning the difference between the thoughts (and their attached passion: anger) and the mind, which is supposed to be the observer and arbiter of thought. Rather than observing the presence of anger, and then simply letting it go, the mind allows itself to be carried along by the runaway locomotive.

We are using here the name "mind" as the background, the observer and arbiter of thought. Buddhism, of course, promotes a belief that is referred to as "the theory of No-Mind." In Buddhism, the mind is said not to exist, not because Buddhism believes that thought has no arbiter/observer, but because nothing can be said or known about this arbiter/observer. This is, of course, true. There is nothing at all that can be known or said about the arbiter and observer of thought (the mind) in itself. It is completely ineffable on account of the fact that any knowledge or statement concerning it would have to proceed by means of thought. This very ineffability has very deep implications, and it is that that I will take up next.

The Nature of Silence

    The Lord stands before Pilate. The Lord stands before His accusers in the Sanhedrin. The Lord stands before Herod. He is silent. "Like a lamb before his shearers, he was silent and opened not his mouth." Yes, indeed, the closest thing to this silence that we experience in this world is the silence of nature. It is a silence without hostility, nor sorrow. It is a silence full of love. Or, for that very silence, is not "peace" a better word. The forest is alive with the sounds of singing birds, along with the sound of the wind as it moves through the thick canopy. Yet none of those songs or gusts breaks the silence. No, rather, they are part of the silence, this special silence that attests to the truth of being. I count it as one of the greatest gifts that I learned to love this silence. From an early age, I can recall feeling at one with it. My own sounds too were part of it—treading a hiking path through a pine forest, with the sound of the cones crunching beneath my feet. Man is not alien to the silence of nature (the truth of being). No, he can even be part of it, if God wills. Sound does not break the silence. It is part of it. The only thing that would shatter the silence is the presence of untruth. Falsehood would shatter the silence. God has given me the privilege of being a part of the truth of being. I am also the only one who can dash it in pieces and tread it underfoot like the pine cones. It is my awesome, and fatal, choice.

    The silence of nature is the mother of prayer. What could be more natural than union with God? Yes, it is supernatural, but nature was made for super-nature. Our great teacher is experience, in this matter, as in so many others. When we remove from our hearts everything that breaks the silence, all those things that shatter the truth of being, then we are open to God. We recognize the beauty of nature, this truth of being, and at the same time we recognize the defect of our own nature. Being in silence, without hostility and sorrow, reveals to us clearly the damage within us. In my distant memories, I recall that silence was a punishment. It was banishment—being set apart for having been bad. It was an agony and an eternity, even five minutes of such exile. Yet, these little childish banishments taught me nothing of silence. They taught me to be quiet. Only if we are quiet can we hear the silence.

    This is all so much nonsense, then! These words mean nothing. What can "silence" mean if it includes sound? No, no, it is simple. Silence is what is natural. It is truth.

Silence of Several Kinds

When the Lord stands before Pilate, He is silent. But what kind of a silence is this. Silence, we know from experience, differs according to kind.

There is the silence of bitter hostility--the silence of adversaries, who hold their peace lest, if they were to speak, they would come to blows. When this kind of silence envelopes a household, love can no longer live there, for there is no room. No, the silence fills every corner, every crack in the flooring, and every angle of every eave. Love needs room, and this silence gives it none. It is not silence by nature, but din. It may be silent, but it will eventually burst into sound. It is pressure longing for release. Given time, it will explode.

I have some experience with this silence. As a child, it was not much present in my house—save but from time to time, but I knew households of friends upon which it had settled like a wet blanket. They were kingdoms of blame, where expectations were never met, and needs were daily disregarded.

This was not the silence of the Lord Jesus before Pilate. No, that silence is "the still, small voice." You know the one—manifest not in fire, nor wind, nor the shaking of the earth.

It is not the silence of sorrow. That is a silence that would speak, but, somehow, can never find the words. It is not a silence, like that hostile silence, which is waiting to break into sound. No, it retreats further and further away from expression, until it sinks to the lowest point of despair. Despair no longer wants to speak. It is grievance that no longer wants to be heard. It wants only to sit alone, neglected and disregarded.

So, what is this silence before Pilate? What is this still, small voice? It is the silence of God. The closest thing we have to it in our experience is the silence of nature, for nature has learned it from her Master. Anyone who has walked in the forest has heard it. Anyone who has lain in the warm sunshine on a beach has experienced it. It is the presence of truth. It is a silence that is full of love. It is also full of meaning. No one can doubt its meaning, because no one can escape its peace.

Christ's Compassion Visits Us in our Far Country

When we consider the parable of the Prodigal Son, we are invited to remember the prodigality, which the Lord shows in His love for us.  We are used to considering the example of the Prodigal Son as a paradigm of human sinfulness, but naturally we can see in this figure as well a shadow of the One “Who became sin for our sake.” Just as we see the Prodigal Son go into the sinful land of the “far country,” so too does the Only-Begotten Son of God descend to us in the “far country” of our sinful nature. He, by means of an infinite condescension becomes man for us, and walks among us as one of us. He lives an earthly life among us, both before and after His resurrection from the dead, in which He travels from place to place and teaches us precepts of salvation. He Who cannot experience death in His Divine Nature willingly enters into suffering and death in His human nature, so that He can destroy Death from within and reveal the resurrection.

     Last Sunday, in connection with the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, we considered the symbolism of the iconostas, the fundamental division of Creation itself into the material and spiritual worlds.  We noted at the time the constant communication between these two worlds, which, though different, nevertheless constitute one single Creation. The iconostas has doors through which there is frequent movement from one side of the barrier to the other.

     Today, in the parable of the Prodigal Son, we see the greatest example of that communication and union between the material and spiritual worlds, for the Son of God descends into our far country, our fallen world, in order to prodigally spend all of His grace (that is His Life) on us sinners.  This Divine Visitation, which is our salvation, was long expected by the Patriarchs and the Prophets, who prayed ceaselessly that the time of that Visitation be hastened.  The Prophet Isaiah, for example, cries out: “Let the heavens open, and let the clouds rain down the Just One, may the earth be engendered, and may she bud forth a Saviour (45:8).” Nevertheless, for millennia, the heavens remained closed, the life-giving rain was not sent forth, as God awaited the proper time to fulfill His promises. 

     In just the same way, according to the ustav, when we begin the Divine Liturgy, the doors of the iconostas remain closed, and our responses to the litany (Lord, have mercy) represent the prayers and supplications offered by the Patriarchs and Prophets who awaited their salvation with great longing and expectation. We are able to join our prayers to theirs, because, in the same way, we long for our individual experience of salvation to be manifest to us.

     We proclaim His birth and His coming among us in the hymn “Only-Begotten Son,” but His presence remains hidden from our eyes, just as the Christ remained hidden even to His own people Israel for the space of three decades. Finally, at the beginning of the Third Antiphon of the Divine Liturgy, the doors of the iconostas are opened for the Little Entrance.  It is then that we behold in a mystical fashion the Son of God coming to our “far country” to teach us the way of salvation contained in the Divine Gospel.  The Gospel tells us that He went all around Galilee preaching and teaching in the synagogues, curing diseases and casting out demons. At the beginning of the Little Entrance, after opening the Royal Doors, the priest makes three bows before the Gospel Book, as a reminder of the threefold great degradation into which human beings had fallen: death, pain and disease (both spiritual and physical), and slavery to the demons. The Little Entrance of the Divine Liturgy is the sign of that great mystery that Christ came among us in order to spend His grace upon us, to free us and to lift us up.  

     In the procession of the Little Entrance, the Gospel Book is led by the light of a candle or oil lamp, recalling the prophetic ministry of St. John the Forerunner and Baptist.  The Lord Jesus Himself says of St. John the Baptist in the Gospel According to St. John: “He was a bright and shining lamp, and you rejoiced for a while to live in his light.” The same Gospel, however, also says of John: “He himself was not the Light, but he was sent to bear witness to the Light.”

     The Little Entrance of the Divine Liturgy, the sign of that journey of mercy, which the Son of God took in order to visit us in our “far country” is a challenge for us.  We live in an age in which the great majority of people have ceased to ask or be interested in the great questions of human life: “What is the meaning of this life and of this Creation?” Our world has abandoned the love of Wisdom, and has left us only with a concern for feathering our own nests in a quest for “quality of life.” How far we have traveled in our “far country” from the God Who comes to us in our sinful world to “seek and to save what was lost.” That is, after all, the way that He Himself defines His mission: “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost.” If we are seriously and deeply committed to following Christ, then that ought to be our mission too. We need to seek and recover the love of Wisdom, which we lost when we decided to go into our “far country.” “Feathering our nests” is an impossibility for us, because Christ did not live for Himself. Neither, then, can we. 

True Repentance: A Simple Message for us on the Sunday of the Pharisee and the Publican

Today we see the Pharisee standing in the court of the Temple, praying “O God, I thank you that you have not made me as other men.” The Pharisee perhaps believed that the words of the Scriptures concerning the righteous man applied to himself.  For example, he may well have thought of the words of the First Psalm: “Blessed is the man, who has not walked in the counsel of the wicked.” When the Pharisee read these words, he believed that the psalm was referring to him. 

     Every week, at the first service of the observance of the Lord’s Day, the office of Vespers on Saturday evening, we recite the words of this same psalm, but we know in the light of the Gospel, that those words do not refer to us. No, there is only one to whom that description applies.  The Prophet David wrote those words in a spirit of prophecy foretelling Christ. “Blessed is the Man, who has not walked in the counsel of the wicked.” We ourselves, apart from Christ, can not lay claim to that blessing, on account of the fact that many times and in many ways, again and again, and even daily, we have walked in the counsel of the wicked. We have followed the counsels of the Evil One. We have surrendered to his temptations, and thus we have made resentment a part of our lives, have disdained communion and friendship with God, and have abandoned the path of peace and inner stillness. 

     Yet, we long for that blessing, which we see in Christ (Blessed is the Man). Our path as Christians is often presented as a path of emulation or imitation.  There are spiritual books, which teach us to imitate Christ in the ways of His earthly life.  But our path to communion with God is actually a matter of participation.  There is only one way for us to inherit the blessing of God uttered in the 1^st Psalm: to become one with Christ.  But how may we accomplish this? The Church’s services teach us how.

     We must remember that our path to Christ will not be easy, but the services gives us mystical knowledge of that path, and reveal our passage to God to be the great adventure of our lives.  So often in the Byzantine Rite, we, and especially the clergy, hear comments from people, who have attended our churches to the effect that there is too much ritual; the tradition is like a weight too heavy to bear. But the people who respond in this way to the rites of the Church seldom understand the meaning of the signs contained in the services; seldom do they understand the purpose of the symbols to elevate our minds from simple things that are seen to the unseen and imperishable realities, which they represent. These realities, these mysteries, can not be represented in words, for all the forests in the world could not produce enough paper upon which to write a summation of even one of them, for the things of God are far superior to human thought.  They can only be conveyed by means of symbolic representation, because by means of this language of signs, our hearts can be lifted up into heaven to be taught by God Himself.  Ten centuries ago, St. Volodymyr sent emissaries to capital of the Roman Empire, Constantinople, in order to inquire about the Romans culture, civilization, and especially religion.  Later, these emissaries told St. Volodymyr, “the Greeks took us to their temple where they worship their God… and we did not know whether we were in Heaven or on Earth, but of this we are sure, that there God dwells among men.” In just the same way, we come Sunday after Sunday, and feast day after feast day, in order to be elevated up to Heaven, to enter into the Kingdom of God, and to be ennobled by God’s gracious plan for us.  Our ascent to the heavenly places here in God’s holy temple can be accomplished only if we have “laid aside all anxious cares of life,” or “laid aside all earthly cares” as another translation has it.  Then the meaning of the things of God will become clear to us. 

     First of all, we believe that the world in which we live is divided into two different “worlds.” There is the material world, which is accessible to us by means of our minds and our reason. Then, there is the spiritual world, whose vastness far surpasses the material world.  This world is accessible only to our hearts, the deepest reality of our souls. The spiritual world is the Holy of Holies, the place where God resides, and although it is different from this material creation in which we find ourselves, nevertheless there is constant communication across its subtle membrane from one side to the other. This fundamental division in all of creation is the meaning of the iconostas. 

     What the words of the psalm reveal to us is that there are two kinds of men: there are the men, who are rooted in this material world, held down by the chains of covetousness, pride and resentment, and then there is the Man Who has not walked in the counsel of the wicked, in other words, the Man who has His heart, the whole attention of His whole Being focused on the Holy of Holies, the spiritual world. We are invited in the Liturgy to share His Life, just as the priest says: “Let us lift up our hearts.” When we respond, “We lift them up to the Lord,” we affirm that we desire to conform ourselves to Him, that we want to be Christ, the Man who has not walked in the counsel of the wicked. The only way is to have our hearts where His is, for the Lord tells us: Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” True repentance is precisely this desire, to conform our hearts to Christ. 

Reflections on this society's perception of the Catholic clergy as pedophiles and sexual deviants-- What have we to do with the world?

Reading the comments on virtually any news site, as long as the story has to do with the Pope of Rome's resignation, or church governance, or religion in general, is sufficient to convince anyone that the world views the Catholic clergy as something altogether odious.  To Protestants, secularists and even many Catholic laymen the Catholic clergy are pedophiles (more colloquially "baby-rapers"), criminals and/or sexual deviants on account of their celibate life-style.  There is no doubt that this is what they truly think of us.  At the same time, however, the question is, "Should we care?"

The answer to that question has to be "no," and not for any reasons of bitterness or hatred, but because caring about what the world thinks is going to make the problem worse, not better.  The Prophet David was certainly right when he calls out: "Let the nations rage-- those who boast of their worthless gods." Secularists want something completely different out of life and existence than we do.  Their desires appear to us as vanity.  We have warned them that their values are vacuous, but they regard us as discredited and ridiculous.  We have warned them, but they have not heard us.  It is time to let them go their way, and follow the example of the Lord Jesus. "When He was insulted, He returned no insult.  When He was made to suffer, He did not counter with threats, but gave Himself up to the one who judged Him unjustly."  This is a fascinating verse, since in some versions it ends with "He gave Himself up to the One Who judged Him justly." The latter reading is referring to the Father, while the former is referring to the Sanhedrin, the High Priest Caiaphas and Pontius Pilate.  Whatever version you like, the truth remains the same.  In order to give yourself up the One Who will judge you justly (God), you have to give yourself up to the one who judges you unjustly (the Pilates of your life).  So, let them think what they like.  It is, after all, they who hate.  We hate no one.

But here is a further nagging question: How can we be effective witnesses to truth, if we are perceived as sexual deviants, discredited, and evil? The only possible answer to that question is: We can't.  We can't effectively witness to truth.  The best thing to do is to admit it, accept it and get on with the task at hand. If we try to continue to preach the truth to the secular society, we will only bring ridicule on the truth itself.  I remember well the touching story of the Clown of God, an Italian folktale that was retold and illustrated by Tomie da Paola some years ago.  The clown grows to great fame on account of his ability to juggle, eventually building an act in which he juggles many different things, drawing large crowds all over the country.  But he grows old and people become tired of his displays, and, eventually, he even begins to drop things.  In the end, he is ridiculed, hated and even forcibly driven from town after town.  In his old age, he is penniless.  In the end, he is attracted to a church where the feast of the Nativity of the Lord is being celebrated.  He enters the church and witnesses the glory of the festive celebration.  After the service is ended, he conceives a great desire in his heart to offer something to the newborn Lord.  He wishes he had something to give.  He decides to juggle one last time before the altar.  He gives his whole heart to the performance for the Lord, and during the high point of the act, he suddenly dies, collapsing before the altar.  Some Franciscan friars find him there, and, to their astonishment, they find the statue of the Lord Jesus over the altar holding the golden ball that was centerpiece of the clown's act.  Faced with the ultimate failure of his life, the clown found success in prayer.  In the same way, we have to change our priorities, put all our energy into interiority, and become people of prayer.  Similarly in the time of Noah, the world heard Noah's warnings and denunciations, but at a certain point, Noah had to enter the ark and seal it.

When we really think about it, this is not a big change.  We are no longer going to be esteemed in this society.  Quite the opposite, we are going to be despised as sexual deviants.  But our ancestors were thought by secular society to be sexual deviants, too.  The early Christian community was widely labeled as miscreants because of their supposed practice of incest and cannibalism.  Many centuries later, the Catholic clergy here in the United States were despised again for similar reasons, when falsehoods were printed and widely disseminated in such publications as The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk in the Hotel-Dieu de Montreal and its sequels.  Ultimately, the libelous books were proven to be lies, but a generation of non-Catholics believed them. We are no longer going to be esteemed in this society, but that gives us an opportunity to be further conformed to Christ: "Who would believe what we have heard? To whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? He grew up like a sapling before him, like a shoot from the parched earth; there was in him no stately bearing to make us look at him, no appearance that would attract us to him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity, one of those from whom men turn away, and we held him in no esteem."

We have to become intent on prayer.  Our Christianity by necessity must be less preachy and more prayerful.  Our Year of Faith, which was proclaimed by Benedict XVI, the Pope of Rome, is a perfect opportunity for us to do accomplish this.

Your Faith Has Saved You: Some thoughts about reading the Scriptures in a personal manner

Brothers and sisters in Christ—

    We had this same Gospel reading a few weeks ago, but today we find more than enough that is new in the reading to meditate on. The last line of the reading is particularly interesting. The Lord tells the leper, who had been healed, "Go, your faith has saved you." It is more accurate to translate, "Go, the faith that is yours has saved you," but this is awkward, so we do not translate it this way typically. However, we should be cognizant of the difference. It is not merely by some abstract faith that we are saved. It is not sufficient that we simply profess faith in Christ, as if, as long as we do that, we can sit at home, without the Church, without the sacraments, without prayer, without the comprehensive practice of religion. No, on the contrary, the faith (the Catholic Faith) has saved us, and is saving us. When the Lord tells the man in the Gospel that his faith had saved him, He did not mean that the man never had to think about his salvation ever again. He did not mean that it was impossible for the man to contract the disease of leprosy again. No, He meant that the faith (faith in Christ) had saved the man right then, at that moment.

    Salvation is a story, a history, not a one-time event. If we were to believe that salvation was an event, once for all, we would be incapable of understanding the Holy Scriptures. The Scriptures are a continuous series of falls into sin, and redemptions from sin through God's love. Again and again, God's people fall away from God. God then punishes His people to correct them, and bring them back to the right way. The people turn to God. God heals them and receives them back into His friendship. Progressively, in the course of all these episodes, the people's knowledge of the ways of God deepens, so that the next fall is of a different nature, or in a matter less grave.

    The experience of being saved by our faith is learning to live the history of salvation as our personal history. It is learning to read the Scriptures as if they are about God's dealings with us. The infidelities that are denounced there are our infidelities. The punishments that are described there are our chastisements, which are intended by God to gently bring us back to our relationship with God. When we read the Scriptures, God wants us to understand that we are His chosen one. Each and every one of us is His beloved, whom He desires to bring to Himself.

    The fathers have told us that ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ. But ignorance of the Scriptures is also ignorance of our relationship to God. We should try to read the Scriptures in this kind of personal way, which will lead us to pray about the text. We are used to reading for information. We should not read the Bible primarily for information. We should read as an entry to prayer, using the Scriptures to begin that dialogue with God that prayer should be. Let the words give birth within us to thoughts and resolutions that relate to our circumstances, so that, through the text, God can reveal to us the sins we must destroy and the virtues we must cultivate with His help. Then, at every moment, God can say to us in our prayer, "Your faith has saved you."

My Maimonides: Notes in the Margin of the Guide for the Perplexed

By any measure, Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed is one of the great philosophical books, particularly in its interpretation of the biblical text according to traditional Aristotelianism.  Maimonides begins the book with the classic distinction between Physics (Ma'aseh Bereshit-- Description of the Creation) and Metaphysics (Ma'aseh Mercabah-- Description of the Chariot).  These same categories he had already expounded in the his earlier magnum opus Mishneh Torah. Metaphysics is apparently referred to as the Description of the Chariot, because of the vision of the chariot in the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel.

Maimonides is very insistent that it is the tradition in Judaism that Metaphysics is superior to Physics, and that metaphysical issues and questions hold pride of place over those that are concerned with the origin and construction of the physical world.  At the same time, however, the rabbis are equally insistent that the Description of the Chariot should not be taught to any student, who has not mastered the Description of the Creation.  Further, the student must have distinguished himself by certain intellectual qualities before being initiated into the mysteries of metaphysics.  Both are necessary, but Physics is the only door of Metaphysics, while the purpose of Physics is the discovery (in the original sense of the word) of Metaphysics. 

What makes this perspective so important is the fact that this culture has effectively excluded Metaphysics as an area of possible knowledge.  In today's world, learning about the world (particularly in the modern sciences) leads nowhere but further into the physical world.  Pure science is knowledge for knowledge's sake about the physical world that emphatically does not lead to something greater, something deeper, but constitutes an end in itself.  Gone is the spirit of Aristotle himself, a spirit that, seeing the world of change described by physical science, longed to ascend above the realm of physical science to that that did not change.  Maimonides would certainly look upon modern science as a truncated knowledge.  He would see it as a form of physical science that was obsessed with itself

In the modern world, our culture has become satisfied with the official separation of Physics and Metaphysics.  Much like the "separation of church and state" it has become a dogma as unbending as any geometric law.  Physics and Metaphysics are discreet areas, which are explored by different people.  Increasingly, those whose purview is the physical sciences refuse to even so much as acknowledge the possibility of the existence of anything beyond their field, claiming that the only things that are real are those that can be known empirically through sense perception.

Yet, at the same time that Metaphysics has been discarded, another interesting and counterintuitive thing is happening on the level of culture.  One would think that with this emphasis on empirical knowledge and evidence there would be a growth in the use of reason and in rational argument as a means to arrive at the truth.  Actually, however, the opposite is the case.  As the physical sciences gain complete sway over everything else as the exclusive arbiters of meaning, there is a steady diminution of the ability of our contemporaries to use logic in order to frame rational arguments.  More often than not, they will afford themselves of sentimentalism, arguments based on emotions, and, if these fail to be convincing to their interlocuters, they will resort to ad hominems.  This can be clearly seen in political discourse, where the Left and the Right revile one another with invective and insult, but rational argument is nowhere to be found. 

The disappearance of rational argument in modern discourse might easily be considered related to the disappearance of Metaphysics.  The physical sciences are deemed an end in themselves, and not as a stepping stone to the greater realities that lie beyond the physical universe.  Reason itself, beyond the laboratory quantifications associated with the scientific method, is not considered terribly useful,  After all, "nature is red in tooth and claw." If the physical universe is all that exists, then there is no truth beyond what can be ascertained by physical science.  There are the truths of mathematics.  There is quantity, weight, duration, etc.  There is no virtue, no good.  Further, while there is in the physical sciences an intricate description of forces, there is no concept of Being, and no truth of Being.

An Unexpected Book Recommendation: Scripture Commentary is a Philosophic Feast

Just recently, I decided to try reading the commentary series that is put out by Intervarsity Press under the title of Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture.  I must admit that I did not expect to like it, because I feared an overbearing influence of Protestantism on account of the makeup of the editorial board.  Nevertheless, I have found, with few exceptions, that the Fathers have been allowed to speak for themselves.

The commentary that they sent me to start with is the volume on St. Paul's Letter to the Romans.  I confess, there is a great deal of editorial comment concerning "justification by faith alone," which we know for certain is not a component of Christian Faith known to the Fathers of the Church.  On the contrary, the Fathers understood the Faith the same way that historical Christians understand it now; that is, that our salvation is achieved through the sacramental system instituted by Christ. Christ is not Buddha (He did not come to be an ethical teacher.  He came to institute life-giving mysteries.)Besides this, however, the insights that are provided by the various selected Fathers (saints of the Early Church) more than make up for having to wade through the occasional anachronistic Lutheran-based diatribe in defense of sola fides. It will be interesting to see what the volume on the Gospel of St. John will do with the passages regarding the Eucharist, since, it is undeniable, that all of the Fathers believed in sacramental realism as far as the Eucharist is concerned. 

The coordinators of the ACCS project state that what they want to do is assemble a "Christian Talmud," which will proceed through the various Scriptural books verse by verse giving explanatory commentary. The same coordinators also state that they are desiring to produce a book that can and will be used by Christians of all sorts (Protestants, Catholics and Orthodox).

I think that this is a very important project for Christian lay-people, especially, since it opens to them, really for the first time, the riches of the Patristic Age.  Christianity in the Patristic Age is really philosophy in its most undiluted form, since the Fathers of the Church were, for the most part, highly trained in the Greco-Roman philosophy of their day, but, over and above that, they were deeply in love with the Divine Wisdom Himself, Who had become incarnate for our sake. 

Nobody has a greater appreciation for Who Christ Is than the Fathers.  They understood in a very real sense that He is the Logos (the pattern, the model, the principle of comprehensibility for everything in Creation and for the whole of Being).  Each of them had a personal love for Jesus Christ, but that love was cosmic in that they recognized that the Logos is what stands behind the logoi of everything that exists.  To learn about the Logos, study the logoi, they would say, for the Logos Himself engenders the logoi.  Each of the logoi participates in the Logos.  The challenge that presented itself to each of the Fathers as they got out of bed every morning was how to live their lives kata Logon (according to the Logos), which is the same as to say "according to Wisdom," or "according to Reason."

This commentary series is definitely worth a read.  I think it has the potential to bring a lot of people, of various Christian backgrounds, to an appreciate of true philosophy.