In the Epistle reading that we heard today, the Holy Apostle Paul insists upon the truth of the Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, because it is the central, essential Christian teaching. The Apostle rightly insists that if Christ is not raised from the dead then our Faith is worthless and we are still in our sins.
This reading gives us a good opportunity to reflect upon the fact that faith in Christ is salvific. We are saved through faith, but we are not saved through just any faith. We can only be saved if we hold the right faith. For this reason, from the very earliest times, the leaders of the Church, the bishops, often gathered in councils to settle points that were in dispute concerning the content of the Church's faith.
The Church is always first and foremost a unity of faith. We together make up one Church, because we have the same faith, we all believe the same things, the same teachings, which the Councils and Fathers of the Church handed down to us. In the celebration of the feast of the Holy Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council (the First Council of Nicaea) which we observe every year on the Sunday after the feast of the Ascension, the Faith of the Church is compared to a robe that is woven from "theology." The right theology weaves the robe, but the wrong theology, based in error, tears the robe. The Alexandrian priest Arius, against whose ideas the First Ecumenical Council was called, was trying to tear the robe of the Church's Faith. The Fathers of the Nicene Council restored it and handed it on to us through composing the Symbol of Faith, which we still use to this day.
Sadly, our Church has fallen into considerable decay in this time period in which we live. The decay is due to the fact that we are failing to hand on the Faith to those who are rising after us. As a result, many who consider themselves members of the Church do not believe the Church's teachings. Recent studies show that seven in ten do not believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. In nearly the same proportions, members of the Catholic Church also give way on fundamental moral issues, believing, against the constant Tradition of the Church, that homosexuality and homosexual marriage are acceptable and not seriously sinful.
In order to be saved, we must have the right faith, but the orthodox faith is not being handed on due to societal decay in the Church and in the world. If we look for the source of this decay, we find it in our own hearts, the deepest reality of ourselves before God. So powerful is the human heart that if the heart is changed, the world is changed. If the heart is transfigured by the grace of the Holy Spirit, then the world too is transformed by communion with God.
The practice of the Rosary in the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church is often referred to as the Rule of the Mother of God, Pravylo Bohorodytsi, because it is the revival of a prayer rule that came originally from monks in Egypt in the ninth century. Unfortunately, it is often looked upon as a Latin-inspired addition, even an innovation. This is partially true, because Pravylo Bohorodytsi fell out of use in the Christian East for so long. Nevertheless, I would suggest that it is an important devotion for us for three reasons: first, it forces us to meditate on the major events of the Gospels; second, it forces us to consider the Church's doctrines that spring from those Gospel events; and third, it brings us to meditate on the virtues that those New Testament episodes show us and on the moral consequences that those virtues have in our own lives.
Whether we use the prayer Rule of the Mother of God, Pravylo Bohorodytsi, or not, it is extremely important that we do all three of these things. We need to reflect on the Gospel. We need to understand the Gospel the way the Church understands it, and we need to consider the moral application of the truths of the Gospel to our everyday lives. It is the consistent practice of these three things that renovate our hearts, correct the decay of false doctrine that enters into them and builds us up in unity of faith.
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