1 Corinthians 12:27-13:8; Luke
16:19-31
Today we commemorate Saints Cosmas
and Damian of Asia, the holy Unmercenary Healers. They were
physicians who healed both people and animals and refused payment for their services.
St. Paul’s famous words about love in today’s
epistle reading were lived out by these great saints. We remember them
precisely because of their Christlike love, for they selflessly eased the pain
of others, lightened their burdens, healed their bodies, and restored them to
health. They followed the example of the
Savior in doing so. They obeyed His
charge to the disciples, “Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead,
cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.” (Matt. 10:8) These saints did not take credit
for their work or think that they healed by their own power. To the
contrary, their lives were transformed by the gracious divine energies to the
point that they became channels of God’s mercy which flowed through them to
bless and restore their suffering neighbors.
This is why Saints Cosmas and Damian were completely different from the rich
man in today’s gospel reading who disregarded poor Lazarus. Despite the
benefit of the great spiritual heritage of Abraham, Moses, and the prophets, he
had become such a slave to gratifying his desire for indulgence in pleasure
that he was completely blind to his responsibility to show mercy to Lazarus, a
miserable beggar who wanted only crumbs and whose only comfort was when dogs
licked his open sores. The rich man’s
life revolved around wearing the most expensive clothes and enjoying the finest
food and drink. He surely stepped over or around Lazarus at the entrance to his
home on a regular basis and never did anything at all to relieve his
suffering.
After their
deaths, the two men’s situations were reversed.
The rich man had spent his life rejecting the teachings of Moses and the
prophets about the necessity of showing mercy to the poor. He had blinded himself spiritually to the
point that he could not recognize Lazarus as a neighbor who bore the image of
God. He remained blind to the love of
God after his death and could perceive the divine majesty as only a burning
flame of torment. When the rich man
asked Father Abraham to send Lazarus to his brothers to warn them of the
consequences of living such a depraved life, the great patriarch responded,
“‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if
someone should rise from the dead.’”
This statement
applies to the corrupt religious leaders who called for Christ’s crucifixion
and denied His resurrection because they wanted a warrior king who would serve
their self-centered desire for earthly power and glory. We must not fail to see, however, that the
Lord’s statement speaks powerfully to us as those who have received the
fullness of the mystery of salvation. We
must bear witness to the Savior’s victory over sin and death in our own
lives. Our responsibility is far greater
than that of the Jews of old, for as members of Christ’s Body, the Church, the Holy
Spirit strengthens us in learning to love our neighbors as the Lord has loved
us. Therefore, we must conform our character to Christ’s to the point that we embody
the words of the Apostle: “Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or
boastful; it is not arrogant or rude.
Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;
it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends.”
The great test
of whether we are sharing in the life of Christ is how we treat those with whom
the Lord identified Himself: those who
are hungry, thirsty, strangers, naked, sick, and imprisoned. (Matt. 25) The wretched
state of the rich man’s soul was revealed by his refusal to love Lazarus, one
of “the least of these,” as he loved himself.
Since he did not love his brother, it was impossible for him to love God.
(1 Jn. 4:20) It is no surprise, then, that the rich man experienced the torment
of bitter regret after his death, for he was in the eternal presence of the
Lord Whom he had rejected throughout his life.
The eye of his soul was darkened to the point that he could perceive the
divine glory as only a burning flame. As
St. Basil the Great proclaimed to the rich who refused to share with the poor, “You showed no
mercy; it will not be shown to you. You
opened not your house; you will be expelled from the Kingdom. You gave not your bread; you will not receive
eternal life.”[1]
In the midst of
our materialistic and consumeristic culture, it is easy to overlook St. Paul’s
warning that “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a
trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into
ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of
evil.” (1 Tim. 6: 9-10) The problem is not with money or
material possessions in and of themselves but with our tendency to make them
false gods due to our pride, self-centeredness, and addiction to pleasure. Instead
of cultivating the Christlike love that Sts. Cosmas and Damian embodied, those
enslaved to the love of money manifest anger, resentment, and cruelty toward
anyone who threatens to frustrate the gratification of their desires. And they
simply ignore the needs of people like Lazarus, even though they could easily
help them.
Regardless of
our financial situation, we must not become obsessed with gratifying our self-centered
desires to the point that we lose the ability to convey the Lord’s merciful
love to those who need our friendship, attention, and care. We must not become so enslaved by the passion
of love of self that we refuse to offer our time, talents, and resources for
the benefit of neighbors who need our companionship or practical assistance of
whatever kind. If we want to grow in Christlike
love, we must make practicing generosity a settled habit of our lives. We must serve others as Christ has served us if
we want to gain the purity of heart necessary to see God. If instead we focus only on serving ourselves,
like the rich man, we will risk excluding ourselves from the joy of the
Kingdom. Remember the words of the Lord:
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of
heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.” (Matt. 7:21)
It is never the case that we find
the healing of our souls simply by force of willpower in doing good deeds of
any kind. It is always the case that cooperating
with the Lord’s grace requires offering ourselves to Him in love. Love for God and love for neighbor are intrinsically
connected. Acts of piety are not ends in
themselves but ways of opening ourselves to share more fully in the eternal
life of the God-Man. The sign that we
are doing so is not how religious we appear to others or to ourselves but how
we treat the living icons of God we encounter daily, especially those who are weak
and vulnerable. As St. Maria (Skobtsova) of Paris taught, “At the Last Judgment
I shall not be asked whether I was successful in my ascetic exercises, nor how
many bows and prostrations I made. Instead I shall be asked did I feed the
hungry, clothe the naked, visit the sick and the prisoners. That is all I shall
be asked.”[2] Her words show that the ultimate measure of
our lives is whether we are being healed by the gracious divine energies to the
point that we radiate God’s mercy to all who bear His image and likeness,
especially those with the greatest needs and the least prestige in the eyes of
the world. In other words, the question
will be whether we have become like Sts. Cosmas and Damian, who fulfilled the
Lord’s command: “Freely you have received, freely give.” That is what it means to share personally in
the life and love of Jesus Christ.
