Homily for the First Sunday of Great Lent (Sunday of Orthodoxy) in the Orthodox Church

 

Hebrews 11:24-26, 32-40; John 1:43-51

 

On this first Sunday of Great Lent, we commemorate the restoration of icons centuries ago in the Byzantine Empire.  They were banned due to a misguided fear of idolatry but restored as a proclamation of how the entire creation, including every dimension of our personhood, may shine brightly with the gracious divine energies of our Lord.  The icons convey the incarnation of the God-Man, Who is fully human with a real body, which was necessary for him to be born, live in this world, die, rise from the grave, and ascend into heaven.  Were any aspect of His embodied  humanity an illusion, we could not become “partakers of the divine nature” through Him.  Icons of the Theotokos and the Saints display our calling to become radiant with holiness by uniting ourselves to Christ as whole persons, which requires healing the passions that lead us to abuse food, drink, money, sex, natural resources, and our neighbors. https://www.antiochian.org/regulararticle/616

Today’s commemoration shows that our Lenten journey is not about escaping from life in our bodies or in our world.  Quite the opposite, the icons call us to find healing for every dimension of our personal and collective brokenness in the brilliant light of the Lord. The God-Man shares His salvation of the human person with us so that even our deepest struggles may become points of entrance into the blessedness of His Kingdom.  During this season of Lent, we must pray, fast, give, forgive, and confess and repent of the ways in which we have refused to embrace our calling to become ever more beautiful living icons of Christ, which is necessary for us to gain the spiritual clarity to see that every human person bears the divine image as much as we do.  If we are approaching this season with integrity, the ways in which we have fallen short of our high calling will quickly become apparent.  The more we struggle against our slavery to self-centered desires, the more apparent their hold upon us will become.  If you have been surprised during the first week of the Great Fast how your passions have reared their ugly heads, you are certainly not alone.  If you have picked yourself up whenever you have fallen, gotten back on the path when you have strayed from it, and grown in your awareness of your need for the mercy of the Lord, then your Lenten journey is off to a good start.    

Above all, we must not despair in the face of our weakness because the goal is not merely to change our diets and become more religious.  It is, instead, as the Savior said to Nathanael, nothing less than to “see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.”  As those who bear the divine image and likeness, our calling is to share fully in the eternal life of the God-Man by grace. As we read in our epistle lesson, the Old Testament saints “did not receive the promise, since God had foreseen something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.”  In Jesus Christ we have received the fulfillment of the ancient promise to Abraham as “partakers of the divine nature” who are called to be “perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  (Matt. 5:48) That is truly an eternal goal, but we participate already in a foretaste of such blessedness when we open our hearts to His healing through repentance.  As Christ taught, “The Kingdom of God is within you.”  (Lk. 17:21)

Even as the icons proclaim the truth of our Lord’s incarnation using materials like paint and wood, they call us to manifest His holiness in our own bodies.  They remind us to make our daily physical actions tangible signs of Christ’s salvation.  In fasting, we limit our self-indulgence in food in order to gain strength to purify and redirect our desires toward God and away from gratifying bodily pleasures.  In almsgiving, we limit our trust in possessions in order to grow in love for our neighbors, in whom we encounter the Lord.  In prayer, we limit our focus on our usual distractions to become more fully present to God as we open our hearts to Him.  As experience teaches, even the smallest efforts to practice disciplines that open our hearts to receive Christ’s healing mercy reveal that there is so much within us that would rather remain in the darkness of corruption.

Nonetheless, our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and empowered to become radiant with the glory of our Lord’s resurrection.  Literally no aspect of our humanity is excluded from the vocation to shine with God’s gracious divine energies.   No matter how difficult the struggle with our passions may be, we must not become practical iconoclasts by refusing to become more beautiful living icons of Christ in any aspect of our existence.  Instead, we must open even the darkest and most distorted dimensions of our lives to the healing light of Christ as we call out for His mercy from the depths of our hearts.

The Savior entered fully into death through His Cross in order to overcome the corruption of the first Adam.  He rose and ascended in glory in order to make us radiant with His holiness.  As we celebrate the historical restoration of icons today, let us continue the Lenten journey in ways that will enable us to be more fully restored as the beautiful living icons of God, for that is what it means to become truly human in the divine image and likeness.  The disciplines of this season are not ends in themselves but simply present opportunities for us to become by His grace those who will “see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/hopko/the_triumph_of_orthodoxy/

 

 

 

 

 

Homily for the Sunday of Forgiveness in the Orthodox Church

 Romans 13:11-14:4; Matthew 6:14-21

 

            On this last day of preparation before we begin our Lenten journey, we must focus on doing what we presently have the strength to do in following Christ to His Cross and glorious resurrection. Whether today or during the coming weeks, we must not be distracted or discouraged about what our weaknesses or life circumstances may keep us from doing.  Instead, we must keep our eyes on the prize of taking the steps that we can take on our journey home from self-imposed exile to Paradise, which the Savior has opened to us through His Passion.

           

A few weeks ago, we read that Zacchaeus was restored as a son of Abraham when he did what he could do by giving more than justice required from his ill-gotten gains to the poor and those whom he had defrauded.  The publican returned to his spiritual home by praying from his heart as best he could, calling only for the Lord’s mercy.  The prodigal son had done his best to destroy his relationship with his father, but he was still able to take the long and difficult journey home after coming to his senses. Last Sunday we heard that the ultimate standard of judgment for returning to our true home is whether we have become living icons of the Savior’s merciful lovingkindness, which is shown by whether we do what we can to care for “the least of these” in whom we counter Him each day.  Today’s gospel reading reminds us to do what we have the strength to do in forgiving, fasting, and showing mercy in ways that direct us back to the Paradise from which Adam and Eve were cast out when they stripped themselves naked of the divine glory and entered an existence so tragically enslaved to the fear of death that their son Cain murdered his brother Abel.  We have all followed in their path of corruption, especially in our refusal to forgive those who have wronged us.     

 

As the Lord offered up Himself on the Cross, He said to the penitent thief, “Truly I tell you, you will be with me today in Paradise.” (Lk. 23:43) Hades and the grave could not contain the Savior Who entered fully into death, for He is not merely human but also God.  Our first parents refused to fulfill their calling to become like God in holiness and instead distorted themselves and the entire creation.  The Savior’s restoration of the human person in the divine image and likeness reveals that our calling is nothing less than to become perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect. Even the strictest Lent observance will not enable us to achieve that goal, for God’s holiness is infinite.  So much of the corruption of the old Adam remains within us, for we typically prefer to live according to our passions in ways that keep us in the misery of exile.

 

            That is why we must all approach Lent with a deep awareness of how we far we are from sharing fully in the New Adam’s fulfillment of our vocation to become like God in holiness.  The only way to escape our self-imposed exile is to do what we can as we take intentional steps to share more fully in the life of the One Who calls us to Paradise.  As St. Paul taught, we must “put on the armor of light” and “make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.”  That means mindfully investing our energy, time, and attention in ways that will strengthen us spiritually.  It means refusing to invest our energy, time, and attention in whatever keeps us from sharing more fully in the life of Christ.  Lent calls us to give ourselves so fully to prayer, fasting, generosity, forgiveness, and other spiritual disciplines that we will have nothing left to fuel “the works of darkness” that bring only weakness and despair.

 

            A holy Lent is not about going through the motions to gain the praise of others or even of ourselves; such vain hypocrisy will never help us acquire the spiritual strength necessary to love and forgive our enemies. The same Lord Who said from the Cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do,” tells us that we must forgive others their offenses against us if we want the Father to forgive our sins.  (Lk. 23:34) Refusing even to begin the journey of forgiveness is a sign that we have become far too comfortable living in exile.  If the Savior’s merciful love is not becoming characteristic of us, then we are not on the path toward Paradise.  Forgiveness is often a difficult struggle that shows us how strong our inclinations are to remain separated from God and neighbor.  If we refuse even to take the first small step of wanting to gain the strength to forgive those who have wronged us, we will choose slavery to our passions over the hope of eternal joy.   

 

            Because it is so hard to forgive as we hope to be forgiven, we need spiritual disciplines like fasting, prayer, and almsgiving to strengthen us in pursuing the path that leads to Paradise.  Our first parents’ self-centered refusal to restrain their desire for food enslaved them to death and corruption.  Struggling to abstain from satisfying ourselves with rich food during Lent will help us see more clearly how addicted we are to gratifying our self-centered desires.  Doing so helps us grow in patience and humility, which fuel forgiveness.  Slavery to pride, however, makes forgiveness impossible because it blinds us to the truth about our souls. In Forgiveness Vespers, we ask for and extend forgiveness to one another personally. Since we are members together of the Body of Christ, we weaken each other whenever we refuse to do what we can to embrace the Lord’s healing. 

 

            Even as we stand on the threshold of the Lenten journey, we must be prepared for our passions to fight back mightily when we deny them.  Pursuing spiritual disciplines brings our weaknesses to the surface, often leading to anger as a way of distracting us from reckoning with our own sins.  As St. John Chrysostom asked, “What good is it if we abstain from birds and fishes, but bite and devour our brothers and sisters?”  We must mindfully struggle to keep our mouths shut when we are tempted to criticize or condemn each other this Lent.  Whenever we fall prey to our passions, we must ask forgiveness of those we have offended and then get back on the path to Paradise with renewed commitment.  No matter how many times we wander from the narrow way, we must return to it. We all have the strength to do that, no matter how many times we fall.

 

            Lent calls us to “put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.”  When we set out to pray, fast, give, and forgive with integrity, we will learn quickly how much we still share in the corruption of the old Adam.  That should help us see how ridiculous it is not to extend to others the same mercy that we ask for ourselves.  In preparation for the struggles of the coming weeks, let us humble ourselves and forgive one another so that we may acquire the spiritual strength to “cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.”  Let us begin our Lenten journey with the joyful recognition that “now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.  The night is far spent, the day is at hand.”  It is time to wake up and focus on doing what we have the strength to do even as we refuse to judge what others are doing. The coming weeks are not about trying to impress God, our neighbors, or ourselves.  They are about taking the steps we can take at this point in our lives in the journey of repentance that alone can lead us out of exile and into our true home, the Paradise that our Lord has opened to us through His glorious resurrection on the third day.   

 

Homily for the Sunday of the Last Judgement in the Orthodox Church

 

1 Corinthians 8:8-9:2; Matthew 25:31-46

 

            On this Sunday of the Last Judgment, the Church reminds us that true repentance is not about obedience to religious rules as an end in itself.  Our vocation in Lent is, instead, to open our souls to receive the healing mercy of the Lord so that we may enter more fully into His victory over sin and death at Pascha.  The ultimate test of whether we will do so is not how strictly we fast, how many services we attend, or how much money we give to the poor.  It is, instead, whether we will become so receptive to Christ that His love permeates every dimension of our character to the point that we treat our neighbors as He treats us.  That is what repentance is all about. As today’s gospel lesson reveals, every encounter with those who bear God’s image is an encounter with Christ that anticipates our ultimate judgment, which will reveal whether we have become living icons of His healing and restoration of the human person.  

            As we begin the last week before Great Lent, the Savior teaches us that how we relate to our neighbors, especially those who are weak, suffering, and in need, is the great test of our souls.    How we treat the hungry and thirsty, the stranger and the naked, the sick and the prisoner, manifests whether we are finding the healing of our souls in Him.  How we relate to them is how we relate to Christ.  We must not distort the way of the Lord into a culturally accommodated faith that calls for concern only for the wellbeing of our family, friends, and others with whom we identify for some reason.  That would violate the requirement of the Old Testament law that “if a stranger dwells with you in your land, you shall not mistreat him.  The stranger who dwells among you shall be to you as one born among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” (Lev. 19: 33-34) As Gentile Christians, we were aliens to the heritage of Israel who have become heirs to the fulfillment of the promises to Abraham through faith in the Savior.  When we refuse to share the undeserved lovingkindness that we have received with the strangers and foreigners of our day, we reject Christ and show that we want no part of His Kingdom.   If we abuse or neglect anyone for any reason, if we celebrate cruelty and hatred toward any child of God, we will demonstrate that our true allegiance is to some false god of this world, not to the Savior Who identified Himself with “the least of these.” 

            Especially in Lent, we must reject the temptation of trying to impress God by doing good deeds of any kind.  Instead of obsessively trying to justify ourselves through religious legalism, our calling is to take the small and imperfect steps that we currently have the strength to take in conveying His selfless love to other people.  The point is not to measure ourselves according to an impersonal standard of legal perfection, but to grow in conforming our character to His as we serve those who need our help.  Doing so is an essential dimension of being able to say truthfully, “I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” (Gal. 2:20)

            On this last day for consuming meat until Pascha, we must resist the temptation to obsess about whether we will be able to follow all the Church’s canons about fasting in Lent.  The canons are guidelines that we embrace for the healing of our souls with the guidance of a spiritual father.  They are not objective impersonal laws from a book that everyone must obey in the same way.  St. Paul taught that the key issue in the question of whether to eat meat that had been sacrificed in pagan temples in first-century Corinth was how doing so impacted others, for “food will not commend us to God. We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do. Only take care, lest this liberty of yours somehow become a stumbling block to the weak.”  To cause another to fall back into paganism would be to “sin against Christ.”  His words show that what is truly at stake in fasting is not a mere change in diet or the fulfillment of a law but learning to relate to food in ways that help us to grow in loving and serving our neighbors.  By abstaining from the richest and most satisfying dishes to the best of our ability, we gain strength to reorient our desires from self-gratification toward blessing others.  Eating a humble diet frees up resources to give to the needy in whom we encounter Christ.  Lenten foods should be simple and keep well for future meals, thus freeing up time and energy for prayer, spiritual reading, and serving our neighbors.  Even the smallest steps in fasting can help us gain a measure of freedom from slavery to our passions as we learn that we really can live without satisfying every desire for pleasure.   Especially for those who are new to fasting, it is best to begin with small steps that we can take in a spiritually healthy way. Trying to do more than we can do at this point in our journey is invariably counterproductive and discouraging.  As people with responsibilities in our families, at work, at school, and in relation to our needy neighbors, we must not deprive ourselves of nourishment to the point that we lack the energy necessary to be good stewards of our talents every day.   

The spiritual discipline of fasting is a tool for shifting the focus away from ourselves and toward the Lord and our brothers and sisters in whom we encounter Him each day.  If we distort fasting into a private religious accomplishment to prove how holy we are, we would do better not to fast at all.  That would simply be a way of serving ourselves instead of God and those who bear His image and likeness.  In Lent, our focus must be set squarely on Christ and His living icons, not on us.  The fundamental calling of the Christian life is to become like our Lord, Who offered Himself up for the salvation of the world purely out of love.  If we are truly in communion with Him, then we too must offer up ourselves for our neighbors. And as He taught in the parable of the Good Samaritan, there are no limits on what it means to be a neighbor to anyone who is in need, regardless of nationality, culture, or anything else.  Those who limit their concern for people according to such standards place serving the kingdoms of this world before fidelity to the Kingdom of God.

Discerning how to live faithfully is not a matter of cold-blooded rational calculation or meeting objective standards, but of being so conformed to Christ that we become a “living sacrifice” (Rom. 12:1) such that the Savior’s healing of fallen humanity becomes present, active, and effective in us.  We must grow as persons in communion with Christ and all those who bear His image and likeness, refusing to define ourselves or anyone else according to the divisions and circumstances of our fallen world.   

            Whenever we encounter the Lord in a suffering person who needs our care, there is inevitably a kind of judgment that reveals who we are. That is the case when we see His living icons suffering today as the victims of natural disasters, wars, persecution, and injustice. It is the case when those who bear His image are sick, lonely, hungry, imprisoned, living in fear, or in any other circumstance in which they need our friendship, care, and support.  Since we do not yet respond generously to everyone without a second thought, we must mindfully struggle against our self-centeredness and indifference to the sufferings of others, especially those whom the world tells us to ignore.  We must not shut the eyes of our souls to the brilliant light of Christ when the darkness within us becomes apparent.  We must respond to what every judgment of our souls reveals by taking the steps we can to open our hearts to Christ more fully.   

            Fasting helps us acquire the humility necessary to do so, for it is such a hard struggle for most of us to disappoint our stomachs and tastebuds even in small ways. Serving our suffering neighbors is also a teacher of humility, for most of us are experts in coming up with excuses for disregarding them.  When these disciplines reveal our weakness, we must simply call on the mercy of the Lord from the depths of our hearts and then take the next small steps that we have the strength to take on the blessed path to the Kingdom.   If we will do so throughout the remaining time of our life and persist in returning to the path whenever we stray from it, then we will have good hope of being among those surprised to hear at the Last Judgment, “’Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.’”  Like the people on His right hand in the parable, that will not be because we have calculated rationally how to earn a prize or met some legal standard.  Instead, it will be because the self-emptying love and gracious mercy of Christ have permeated our souls and become constitutive of our character.  Every day of Lent, and every day of our lives, let us live accordingly, for “‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’”  

 

 

 

 

 

Homily for the Sunday of the Prodigal Son in the Orthodox Church

1 Corinthians 6:12-20; Luke 15:11-32

 

As we continue preparing for our Lenten journey, the Parable of the Prodigal Son reminds us that true repentance is a matter of returning home from self-imposed exile.  It shows us who God is and how we have all chosen to turn away from a loving relationship with Him due to our insistence on serving our own self-centered and foolish desires, no matter how miserable and weak they have made us.  The parable calls us never to fall into despair, no matter how depraved we have become, because we remain the beloved sons and daughters of a Father Who wants nothing more than for us to return from exile and to our true relationship with Him.

 

The younger son had done his best to reject his father, for he had treated him simply as a source of money for funding a decadent way of life that gratified his passions.  He did not relate to his father as a beloved person to be honored and cherished, but only as the source of his inheritance. His request was the same as wishing that his father were dead; it was the worst kind of insult.  The prodigal rejected his identity as a beloved son so that he could live as an isolated individual who was free to indulge his passions in any way that he saw fit with no responsibilities toward anyone.  Once he burned through the cash, however, he faced the harsh realities of being a stranger in a strange land during a famine.  He sunk so low that he envied the food of the pigs he tended.  The Jews considered pigs unclean and this scene shows that he had repudiated not only his father, but his identity as an heir to the ancient promises to Abraham.     

 

In the midst of his misery, the young man finally came to himself and realized that he would be better off as a servant in his father’s house, where there was bread to spare, than in some Gentile’s pig pen starving to death.  He recognized how he had broken his relationship with his father and no longer had any claim to be his son.  Reality had slapped him in the face and he gained a new level of spiritual clarity, for he finally understood the grave consequences of his actions.  Then he began the long journey home in humility.  

 

That is when the young man got the greatest shock of his life. Contrary to all the customs and sensibilities of that culture, the father ran out to hug and kiss the son who had repudiated him.  The old man must have scanned the horizon every day in hope of his son’s return. Despite the son’s despicable behavior, the father did not give him what he deserved.  He did not even consider receiving him as a servant, but said, “‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet; and bring the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and make merry; for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’” The party began, but the older son was offended by the injustice of the celebration, as he claimed to have always obeyed his father and was never given a party.  This fellow missed the point of the father’s joy, for “It was fitting to make merry and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.”  He had returned from exile to the Promised Land and been restored as a descendant of Abraham.  It was obvious to the father that this was a time to celebrate and not to obsess about past wrongs.

 

The parable reminds us that our return from exile to the joy of our Lord’s Kingdom is not a reward for good behavior.  We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. (Rom. 3:23) Each of us is the prodigal son, for like him we have chosen to repudiate our identity as the children of God in order to live as isolated individuals according to our own desires.  It does not matter what has led us away from our true home, for if we have put love for anything before Him then we have rejected our vocation to become persons who share in the holiness of the Lord. The passing pleasures the prodigal son sought were base and brought him into obvious misery, even as our first parents’ unrestrained desire for the forbidden fruit resulted in their expulsion from Paradise into our world of corruption.  His behavior was obviously shameful, but many of our habitual sins are equally dangerous, if not more so, due to their subtlety in turning us away from our calling to share more fully in the life of Christ.  That is especially the case if we distort the spiritual disciplines of Lent into opportunities to become more like the older brother in slavery to vainglory and self-righteous judgment by wanting a reward for our apparent virtues and condemning our neighbors for their failings.  He refused to enter into the celebration of the return from exile of a beloved child of God.  He referred to the prodigal as “this son of yours,” for he had become blind to his relationship to his brother as a person whom he was to love. We can easily do the same thing to our neighbors, thus shutting ourselves out of the joy of the Kingdom where, thanks be to God, none of us hopes to get what we deserve. 

 

The father restored the prodigal son by clothing him in a fine robe, shoes, and a ring.    The young man had surely been half-naked in stinking, filthy rags during his journey home.  Adam and Eve had stripped themselves naked of the divine glory when they put gratifying their own desires before obedience to God.  In baptism, we receive the robe of light they rejected as we put on Christ like a garment, but still we refuse to live each day as those who have been restored to such great dignity as the beloved children of God.  The father had the fatted calf slain for a great celebration.  Like the confused Gentile converts of Corinth whom St. Paul had to remind about the holiness of their bodies, we must remember that “Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.  Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” (1 Cor. 5: 7-8) In the banquet of the Eucharist, we already participate mystically in the Wedding Feast of the Lamb, being nourished by His own Body and Blood.  Yet we all fall short of our calling to live each day as persons in communion with Christ,  as members of His own Body, the Church.  Like the prodigal son, we so often think, speak, and act as isolated, anonymous individuals enslaved to the self-centered desires that have taken our hearts captive.  No matter how appealing or noble we find the objects of our desires to be, we mar the distinctive beauty of our souls when we act more like bundles of inflamed passion than as beloved children of our Father and as brothers and sisters to one another.    

 

As we prepare to follow our Lord back to Paradise through His Cross and empty tomb, we must see ourselves in the prodigal son, for we also must begin the long journey home after self-imposed exile.  Like him, we must not allow the fear of rejection to deter us.  Like the father in the parable, God is not a vengeful tyrant set on retribution.  “God is love” (1 Jn. 4:8) and constantly reaches out to us, calling us to accept restoration as His beloved sons and daughters. All He asks is that we reorient the course of our lives toward the blessedness of His Heavenly Kingdom.  With King David, we must pray, “Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions; according to Your mercy remember me, for Your goodness’ sake, O Lord.” (Ps. 24) “A contrite and humble heart, O God, You will not despise.” (Ps. 50) We must mindfully refuse to allow the hurt pride called shame to keep us from coming to ourselves and returning to our true home. Now is the time to end our self-imposed exile and return to the Lord as His distinctive sons and daughters, irreplaceable persons who bear the divine image and likeness. Now is the time to leave behind the filth and misery of the pig pen and to enter by grace into the joy of a heavenly banquet that none of us deserves.   That is the calling of us all in the coming season of Lent.