Homily for the Sunday of the Myrrh-Bearing Women, Joseph of Arimathea, and Nicodemus in the Orthodox Church

Christ is Risen!

            We have now been celebrating our Lord’s victory over death for two weeks.  We will continue to do so for a few more weeks, saying “Christ is Risen” many times.  But we can’t let our celebration of Pascha stop there. For we want to live the new life that the Lord has brought to the world; we want to participate in His victory over sin, death, and all that separates us from life eternal.  And we can learn an important lesson in how to do that from those who were at the empty tomb on Easter morning, from the first witnesses of the resurrection who were told by the angel, “He is Risen.  He is not here…Go tell His disciples—and Peter—that He is going before you to Galilee; there you will see Him, as He said to you.”

            These first witnesses to our salvation were all women who went to the tomb with oil and spices to anoint the dead body of Jesus Christ.  So we call them the myrrh-bearing women and we sing about them in Orthros virtually every Sunday.  These holy women obviously did not expect the resurrection. And they were surely heart-broken, afraid, and terribly disappointed that their Lord had been killed.  But they had the strength to offer Him one last act of love:  to anoint His body properly for burial, to pay their last respects.  And as they were doing so, these women-- Mary the Theotokos, Mary Magdalen, two other Mary’s, Johanna, Salome, Martha, Susanna and others whose names we don’t know--  were the first to receive the greatest news in the universe, the resurrection of our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ.   

            We remember along with these blessed women two men:  Sts. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, prominent Jewish leaders who were also secret followers of Jesus Christ.   Joseph risked his position and possibly his life by asking Pilate for the Savior’s body.  Nicodemus, who understood the Lord so poorly in a conversation recorded near the beginning of St. John’s gospel, came to faith and joined Joseph in wrapping the Lord in linen with spices and placing Him in a tomb.

            Like the myrrh-bearing women, these men must have been terribly sad and afraid.  Their hopes had been cruelly crushed; their world turned upside down; not only had their Lord died, He was the victim of public rejection, humiliation, and capital punishment.  Nonetheless, these women and men did what had to be done, despite the risk to themselves from the authorities and their own pain.  They served their Christ in the only way still available to them, by caring for His body.

            Before Jesus Christ’s death, He washed the feet of His disciples in order to show them what it meant to serve in humility as He did.  The myrrh-bearers weren’t present that evening, but they followed the Lord’s example of service better than anyone else.   Their selfless devotion to Christ put them in the place where they would be the first to receive the good news of the resurrection, the first to share in the joy of Pascha.  We have a lot to learn from them, as well as from Joseph and Nicodemus.  For if we want to live the new life of our Lord’s victory over death and corruption in all its forms, we must do as they did by serving in humility.

            The good news is that we have no lack of opportunities to serve Christ, in His Body, the Church, whether by giving someone without transportation a ride to church, maintaining our building and grounds, cleaning and beautifying the church temple, teaching Sunday School, chanting, hosting coffee hour, serving on the parish council or at the altar, reading the epistle in liturgy, inviting others to visit our services, or otherwise doing what needs to be done for the flourishing of our parish.  We should not be shy in answering the call to serve Christ in His Body, the Church. 

            We are also reminded of the importance of humble service in the Church by today’s passages from Acts in which the first deacons were ordained to oversee the distribution of bread to the needy widows who were supported by the Christian community.  The word deacon means “servant,” and we read that, after the deacons began their ministry, “the word of God spread, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem and a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith.”  Perhaps the passage reads that way because humble service is the very backbone of the Church, an essential part of our faithfulness and growth as Christ’s Body. 

            Of course, we don’t encounter the Lord only in the visible boundaries of the Church.  For every human being is an icon of Christ, especially the poor, needy, and miserable.  In that we care for the least of these in society, for prisoners or refugees or the lonely or mentally ill, we care for Him.  In that we neglect them, we neglect Him.  The myrrh-bearers didn’t disregard Christ’s body in the tomb, and neither should we disregard the Lord’s body hungry, sick, poorly clothed, abused, or otherwise suffering in our world.  It’s not hard to find the Lord right here in Abilene in people who need our service and attention.  We should all do that we can to serve Christ in our needy and neglected neighbors.  That’s why our parish supports Pregnancy Resources of Abilene, buys presents for a family at Christmas, and supports the “Food for Hungry People” collection during Lent.   
            And so that we don’t let ourselves off the hook too easily, we should remember that this kind of service extends to each of us in how we treat those closest to us on a daily basis. Husbands and wives are to submit to one another in Christ; the relationship between man and woman is an image of the relationship between Church and the church; husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for her.  Christian marriage is to be an icon of the kingdom of God in which husband and wife serve Christ in one another in the thousand small details of making a life together. And whether we are married or not, we have children, relatives, friends, and neighbors in whom we are to love and serve the Lord selflessly.    

            On this Sunday of the Myrrh-Bearing Women, we need to ask ourselves if we really want to grow in the new life that the Risen Christ has brought to the world.  If so, we must prayerfully discern whether we are serving the Lord as we encounter Him daily in His Body, the Church, in our neighbors, and in our families.  For if we want to be transformed by the gloriously good news of the resurrection, we must not be distracted by our fears, doubts, prejudices, self-centeredness, or just plain laziness.  Instead, we must do what needs to be done in order to show love to Christ and all those for whom He died and rose again.  No, this isn’t a glamorous or easy path; but it’s the only one that will bring us with the myrrh-bearers to the joy of the empty tomb and the true meaning of Pascha as the deep truth of our lives.   Then we will participate personally in the blessedness of the Lord’s victory over sin and death, for Christ is Risen!        

Homily for Thomas Sunday in the Orthodox Church

John 20: 19-31

Acts 5: 12-20

Christ is Risen!

          We have only begun our celebration of Pascha, of our Lord’s victory over death in His glorious resurrection on the third day.   Perhaps one of the reasons that Pascha is a season of forty days is that it takes us a good while to let the good news sink in.  For not only is Christ raised from the dead, we are too.  Now not even the tomb is not a shadowy place of separation from God, but an entry way to the Kingdom of Heaven where the departed are in the presence of the One Who has conquered death.  And the Risen Lord calls every human being to life eternal, including you and me.

          For Jesus Christ is raised with His Body as a whole, complete human being who is also God.  We share in His resurrection already through our participation in His Body, the Church.  We are nourished with His glorified, risen Body and Blood each Divine Liturgy in the Holy Eucharist.  Our mortal bodies receive the medicine of immortality when we are nourished by the One Who has conquered the grave.  We put on His Body through baptism, are filled with the Holy Spirit in Chrismation, and in all the other sacraments and ministries of the Church we share ever more fully in the new life that Pascha has brought to the world.  “Pascha” means Passover; Jesus Christ is our Passover from death to life; and our entire life in His Risen Body, the Church, is an ongoing participation in the new day of the Kingdom that He has begun, which should transform every dimension of our lives, seven days a week.

          We can certainly see something new in Christ’s followers in our reading from the Acts of the Apostles.  In the gospels, the disciples misunderstood the Lord and often lacked the power to minister effectively in His name.  They even doubted the testimony of the women who heard of the resurrection from the angel at the tomb.  But in Acts, they perform so many signs and wonders that the sick trust that they will be healed by the mere shadow of St. Peter falling on them.  Multitudes of sick and demon-possessed people sought out the apostles, and they were all healed.

          A confused, weak, and often divided group that included fishermen, a tax-collector, and a zealot; which collectively ran away in fear at the crucifixion; and the leader of which denied the Lord three times, is now a powerhouse of miraculous healings and bold preaching.  What has happened to them? 

          The answer is clear:  Christ has conquered sin and death in their lives.  He has filled them with the Holy Spirit.  He has empowered them to manifest His new life and ministry.  “Peace be to you.  As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”  The salvation which Lord came to bring now lives in them.  He lives in them.  Christ is the vine, and they are the branches.  They are members of the Body of which He is the Head.  His victory over sin, the grave, and all human corruption is now theirs.  And you can see the change in their lives.

          And even as we live and breathe and go through our routines at work, school, home, and in this parish, the same is true of us.   Christ’s victory over sin and corruption are ours, too.  We probably find that hard to believe.  We have not seen the Risen Jesus as the apostles did, but remember what Jesus said to St. Thomas, “Because you have seen Me, you have believed.  Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” 

          Just as doubting and fearful disciples became faithful, bold preachers and wonderworkers, we are also called to know the power the Lord’s resurrection in our lives.  We may want to excuse ourselves from this high calling, however.  In contrast with the brilliant light of Pascha, we may see the darkness and brokenness in our lives all too well.  Christ has conquered sin and death, but we all still bear their wounds; and sometimes we wonder if this glorious news of life eternal really applies to us with all our struggles, pains, and weaknesses.    

          But didn’t you notice that when the risen Lord appears to His disciples, His glorified body still bears His wounds?  Christ  was not raised as a ghost or a spirit, but as a whole human being with a body.  His horrible wounds were part of Who He freely chose to become as a human being for our sakes, and He arises victorious with them.  He has taken these wounds upon Himself purely out of love for us and has used them to defeat evil and death.

          Of course, we must not deny the truth about lives; we should not pretend that all is well when it is not.  Our growth in holiness is an eternal journey, and we certainly have not yet arrived.  But we must recognize that Christ rose again to bring the dead to life, to heal our wounds and transform all who are created in His image and likeness; and, yes, that includes all of us.  The good news of Pascha is that we are no longer held captive by sin and death.  Sin only has the power in our lives that we allow it to have; the same is true of the fear of death, violence, suffering, and all the other works of darkness that can so easily dominate us.      

          When the Risen Lord breathes on His apostles and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit,” we are reminded of the creation of Adam in Genesis.  The divine breath gave us life to begin with, but with our sin and corruption we have rejected that life and preferred death instead.  Now the same Lord Who created us has conquered death on our behalf.  The Second Adam breathes on humanity again, bringing life once more to the first Adam and restoring us to our original dignity.   And this time He gives us an ongoing remedy for our sins:  the ministry of forgiveness through His Body, the Church.  “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

          This apostolic ministry continues in the Church through the Sacrament of Confession.  Even though we fall away time and time again from the new life in Christ, He extends the joy of His resurrection to us by forgiving us, restoring us to the life of the Kingdom, healing our spiritual diseases, and helping us grow ever more like Him.  No, Confession is not negative, for it is the good news of the Savior’s victory over death applied to us personally, to the wounds and scars of our lives that we rarely expose to anyone else.  Through our humble confession, Christ conquers the evil in us and empowers us to life with the joy and confident hope of those who have passed over the slavery of sin to the glorious freedom of the children of God.   No, Confession is not only for Lent, and we should all make regular and conscientious use of this Sacrament—not out of legalism or excessive guilt, but as a therapy to help us enter more fully into the joy of the Lord.

          No matter how difficult our struggles are or how weak we feel before them, let us rejoice today in the resurrection of Christ.  No matter how far short we have fallen from faithfulness in any way, let us embrace the new life brought to the world by the empty tomb.  For Christ’s resurrection is good news for people just like us.  Though His Body, the Church, and His Body and Blood in Holy Communion, and the ministry of forgiveness, we are all to passover from death to life.  The light really has overcome the darkness.  Now the challenge is for each of us to live in the joy of Christ’s resurrection, to make His victory ours, and to recognize that nothing separates us from Him other than our own stubborn refusal to share in His great triumph.   So I challenge you—and myself-- to celebrate Pascha by not only saying “Christ is Risen,” but by living the new life that His empty tomb has brought to the world and to each of us.

Christ is Risen!     

IOCC Meeting with the Patriarch of Antioch

IOCC Dignitaries Meet with Patriarch John X

IOCC's Executive Director and Board Chair with Patriarch John X (Photo: George Antoun/IOCC)International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC) reports:

It was a holy and historic day in Beirut. More than 1,000 hierarchs, clergy and lay people packed the incense-filled nave of Saint Nicholas Orthodox Cathedral on February 17, 2013, including both the President and Prime Minister of Lebanon, as well as government officials from the U.S., Russia, and other countries around the world.

Joining them were International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC) Board Chairman, Michael “Mickey” Homsey, and IOCC Executive Director, Constantine Triantafilou, who had both traveled from the United States to attend at the invitation of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and All the East. All were there to witness the same milestone, the first Divine Liturgy served by His Beatitude, John X, the newly elected Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and All the East.

His predecessor, Patriarch Ignatius of Blessed Memory, spent more than three decades serving as the spiritual father of the Orthodox faithful in Syria. Patriarch Ignatius’ leadership provided a wellspring of inspiration and comfort to Orthodox Christians throughout the Middle East, especially during troubled times. Without His Beatitude’s grateful assistance, IOCC's humanitarian efforts in the region would not have been fully realized.

Both Homsey and Triantafilou had met with Patriarch Ignatius during a visit to Syria last year shortly before his repose, during which they were humbled to receive His Beatitude’s blessing for IOCC’s ongoing humanitarian work in Syria, and his praise for the organization serving as a beacon of hope for so many struggling families.

Now before them stood a new spiritual father, chosen by the grace of God and His Church peers to serve as a leader and a visionary to His Antiochian Orthodox flock. Before this momentous weekend, Homsey and Triantafilou had only known of His Beatitude’s years of illustrious service in Europe ministering to people of diverse languages and cultures. They had been less certain of Patriarch John X’s familiarity with the humanitarian work of IOCC in Syria, which began in 2002 on small projects to rehabilitate schools, hospitals and orphanages.

Later in 2007, IOCC began providing tuition assistance, school supplies, tutoring and personal care kits to thousands of Iraqi refugee schoolchildren and disadvantaged Syrian schoolchildren as well as their families. Assistance expanded to vocational and business training for Iraqi refugee men and women resettled in Syria when conflict forced them to flee their own country. Most recently, IOCC has responded to the humanitarian crisis brought on by the conflict in Syria with assistance reaching more than 425,000 Syrian children, women and men displaced in their own country or living as refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Armenia and Iraq.

Homsey and Triantafilou were honored with an invitation to meet Patriarch John X for a private audience at the Patriarchal residence at Balamand University on the Saturday before Divine Liturgy. Homsey recalled the encounter vividly. “What struck me most about our meeting was how much His Beatitude knew about the work of IOCC and our long-standing relationship with the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch," said Homsey. “We spoke at length of the tragic humanitarian situation in Syria and His sincere desire to continue supporting IOCC’s mission to assist, without discrimination, all who are in need.”

They discussed the situation in Syria, which grows grimmer and more desperate each day. More than six million Syrian people have been affected by the bitter two-year conflict, and nearly four million people are now displaced in their own country, displaced from homes, jobs, and schools destroyed by the violence. IOCC and its church partner inside Syria, the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and All the East are among the very few lifelines that the Syrian people have to the outside world.

“In spite of all this,” said Homsey, “I was moved beyond words when His Beatitude stated that no matter the difficulties, the Christians will not leave the Middle East. His resolve serves as an inspiration and comfort to all Orthodox Christians who look to Antioch, and the sacred sites of Christianity throughout Syria and the Holy Land as the fountain from which our faith flows.”

http://www.antiochian.org/iocc-dignitaries-meet-patriarch-john-x

Support for Abducted Syrian Hierarchs

Updated April 29: The Archdiocese encourages all of her members to show their continuing support for kidnapped archbishops Paul and John of Aleppo, first and foremost through heartfelt prayer. We also encourage people to sign and promote the online petition available here at the website of the White House, calling for United States government action on behalf of the abducted metropolitans. Please use the petition at this link.

Support and attention for Archbishop Paul and Archbishop John continues to grow. The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America has published their joint letter to US Secretary of State John Kerry here. The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese has published Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew's call for the release of the archbishops. The Russian Orthodox Church has published several statements, including the patriarchal message from Patriarch Kirill to Patriarch John X available here, along with the list of documents available below. Pope Francis of the Roman Catholic Church prayed for the release of the metropolitans, as announced here. The Archdiocese is grateful for these and all other ongoing efforts for the sake of Archbishop Paul and Archbishop John, and all our brothers and sisters suffering in the region.

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Letter of Patriarch Kirill to Patriarch John X	50.42 KB
Letter of Metropolitan Hilarion to Patriarch John X	58.49 KB
Letter of Patriarch Kirill to Mar Ignatius Zakka I Iwas	38.8 KB
Letter of Metropolitan Hilarion to Mar Ignatius Zakka I Iwas	48.89 KB
Letter of Patriarch Kirill to UN Secretary General Ki-moon	53.63 KB
Letter of Patriarch Kirill to US President Obama	56.15 KB
Letter of Patriarch Kirill to Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan	58.05 KB

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Homily for Palm Sunday in the Orthodox Church

Philippians 4:4-9

John 12:1-18

            Human beings are blessed with the ability to focus on what is most important. So much of what we do at work or school, for example, requires that we tune out distractions and give our minds to the task before us.

            St. Paul reminds us that we especially need to do so in the Christian life by giving our minds to what is true, noble, just, pure, lovely, virtuous, and praise worthy.  Palm Sunday is a time that we all need this reminder as we enter into the mystery of our salvation as Jesus Christ journeys to His cross, descent into Hades, and glorious resurrection.               

            Nothing about this week comes naturally or easily to us.  We understand wanting our enemies to suffer, but not freely suffering for their sake.  We understand religious people judging others with self-righteousness, but not loving sinners to the point of dying on their behalf.  We understanding wanting our side to win, but not that true victory comes by laying aside all that looks like power in this world.  We think that we understand a remote God in the heavens who does not understand how hard life is down here, not One who hangs on a cross, occupies a tomb, and descends to Hades.    

            There are times when what has been cloudy and confused becomes bright and clear, when what has been hidden is made manifest for all to see.  Today is one of those times.  For Jesus Christ, who revealed that He is the resurrection and the life by raising His friend Lazarus from the dead, now enters Jerusalem as the long-awaited Messiah to the welcoming cheers of the crowd. 

            But even before He gets to Jerusalem, the forces of darkness had decided to kill Christ because they could tell that someone who could raise the dead was a threat to their power; for He was neither a conquering general nor a Pharisee-like interpreter of the Law; and those nationalistic religious leaders had no use for a Messiah who did not serve their schemes of domination.

            On Palm Sunday, it becomes clear that the Savior Who enters Jerusalem today is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.  He is the Passover Lamb whose death and resurrection will conquer death itself. Mary, Lazarus’ sister, performed a prophetic act when she anointed Christ with the same kind of costly ointment that was used to anoint the bodies of the dead.  This Messiah, this One who is truly anointed to save His people and the whole world, will be rejected by the leaders of the Jews and crucified under the authority of the Romans.  And when He is lifted up upon the Cross, He will draw all who believe in Him-- Jew, Gentile, male, female, rich, poor, all nations, classes, and races—to the life of a Kingdom that transcends this world and our petty divisions.

            Jesus Christ will not reign as a soldier, a politician, or a rich man, but as a Suffering Servant, a slaughtered lamb, a despised victim of torture and capital punishment.   The crowds are right on Palm Sunday to welcome Him as a conquering King in Whom God’s promises will be fulfilled.  But they misunderstand what kind of King He is and how He will conquer.  For He rules from a cross and an empty tomb; instead of killing Roman soldiers, He kills death by allowing Himself to be killed; in the place of a magnificent stallion fit for a king, He rides a humble donkey that would impress no one.

            The crowd is right, “Blessed is He Who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel.”  They shout “Hosanna,” which is a plea for God’s salvation to come upon the earth.  And it does through the Lord’s death and glorious resurrection.  But that’s not what the crowds expected; it’s apparently not what the disciples or anyone else anticipated.  For it goes against all our preconceived notions of what it means to be successful, to be powerful, to rule upon the earth, and to be respectable and religious.

            And it’s still a very hard lesson for us to accept, for there is too much of the world in all of us and the demons never work harder than when we are trying to grow closer to Christ. That’s why we need to follow St. Paul’s advice to focus on what is truly holy this week, to rejoice always, and to “let your gentleness be known to all men.”  As St. Paul wrote, “The Lord is at hand” which is never more true than on this feast as He enters Jerusalem to the cheers of the crowds.   

            In Holy Week, what had been cloudy becomes clear; the truth is out in the open and we cannot ignore it any longer.  Jesus Christ is the Passover Lamb, the Lamb of God Who takes away the sins of the world.  He is our Champion, our Savior, our King, yet in His humility and love, the incarnate Son of God suffers on the cross as the lowest of the low in order to bring us to the heights of heaven and the joy of life eternal through His empty tomb.

And this week we journey with Him to that cross, becoming participants in His passion.   Like Lazarus, we sit at table with Him.  Like Mary, we anoint Him for burial.  Like those gathered in Jerusalem, we welcome Him with palms and praises.   Like the disciples, we eat the Passover with Him; like His mother Mary the Theotokos, the other faithful women, and the Apostle John, we kneel before His cross.  Like Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, we bury Him.  And like the stunned myrrh-bearers and the doubting apostles, we will marvel at the unspeakable joy of His resurrection.  For what looks like complete failure is actually total triumph, as we will see in the early hours of next Sunday.   

Holy Week is the climax of Jesus Christ’s life and of ours, too.  For He goes to the cross for us; He dies and rises for our salvation, to bring us into the unending joy of eternal life, to defeat our ancient foe.  So it’s time to lay aside our usual distractions, excuses, and obsessions, and enter into the passion of our Lord by worshiping Him in the services of the church, as well as in every thought, word, and deed this week.  If we can’t attend literally every service, can all pray at home, read the Bible passages for Holy Week, and give less attention to the world and more to God.

It’s time to embrace the great mystery of our salvation, of our Savior’s infinite love and mercy, and thus share already in the blessedness of the Kingdom of Heaven.  Holy Week is the time to enter into the Light that shines brightly even from the terror of the cross and the darkness of the tomb.  Yes, our Savior has endured all these evils for us purely out of love; and He will soon rise over them triumphantly. 

On Palm Sunday, it is clear who Jesus Christ is:  The Lamb of God Who takes away the sins of the world.  How will we respond to Him as He goes to the cross for us? Hopefully, with the fear of God and faith and love, we will draw near and not abandon or disregard Him.      

Yes, that will take intentional focus and the discipline to turn away from temptations, distractions, and unholy thoughts that become obstacles along our path.  Nonetheless, we must follow St. Paul’s guidance to “Be anxious for nothing” and allow “the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding…[to] guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”  

“Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, the king of Israel.  Hosanna in the highest!” 

There is Hope for Power-Hungry Disciples, a Prostitute, and Us: Homily for the Fifth Sunday of Great Lent in the Orthodox Church

Hebrews 9:11-14

Mark 10:32-45

           The tragic events of the last week both in Boston and in West have reminded us all of the brokenness, pain, and corruption of life in the world as we know it.  God did not create humanity for terrorist bombings, industrial explosions, fear, mourning, and suffering, but to participate in the peace, joy, and holiness of the heavenly Kingdom even as we live in the world He created.  As we near the end of Lent this year, we should have no illusions about how far human beings have fallen short of fulfilling the Lord’s purposes for us.

            His reign has nothing to do with the pursuit of worldly glory and power of the sort that James and John sought by asking Christ for positions of honor.   Our Savior told them that they did not know what they were asking, for to follow Him into the Kingdom will require that they drink the cup and undergo the baptism of suffering and death.  The Lord reminded them that “even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”  The world still looks down upon humble self-less service that puts others first, but that is the way of Christ’s salvation and of all true discipleship.  

            On this fifth Sunday of Great Lent, we remember St. Mary of Egypt, someone who also had to abandon the ways of the world in order to follow Christ.  She had been a prostitute and a slave to her own perverse sexual passions.   Her life was an obscene scandal, but that changed when an invisible force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.  She then asked for the help of the Theotokos, entered the church to venerate the Holy Cross, and obeyed a divine command to spend the rest of her life in repentance and strict asceticism as a hermit in the desert.  When the monk Zosima stumbled upon her almost 50 years later, he was amazed at her holiness.  But like all the saints, she was aware only of her sins and her ongoing need for God’s mercy.

            Like hateful violence, sexual immorality stands as another symptom of fallen humanity’s spiritual disease.  Regardless of what is popular or easy today, the faithful and lifelong union of man and woman in marriage remains the only context for the sexual joining of two human beings that the Body of Christ has ever blessed or affirmed. Marriage is a sign of the relationship between Christ and the Church and is ultimately for our growth in holiness, for our salvation.  Passions and desires may tempt us to other kinds of behaviors and relationships, whether we are married or single. Regardless of the particulars, no kind of physical union outside of true marriage provides a way to participate more fully in Christ’s victory over sin and death.  We will only make our spiritual state worse by engaging in other activities.     

            St. Mary of Egypt presents a powerful counter-cultural example that, yes, it is possible to resist even deeply rooted temptations and to turn away from corrupt ways of living that have become all too familiar.  Do not accept the lie that life was so much easier for people long ago.  Human nature has not changed and our struggles today are surely no harder than hers.  When St. Mary of Egypt prayed before the icon of the Theotokos, she acknowledged for the first time the sad truth about her life.  She had heard in the past that Jesus Christ came to save sinners, and now she knew that she was one.  And that humble confession was the beginning of a life of such holiness that we devote a Sunday in Lent each year to her memory.

            Have you ever noticed that we do not hide repentant sinners in our Church? Instead, we put them on icons and sing about them because they are wonderful examples of the kind of people we hope to become by God’s mercy. So take heart and keep hope alive.  The same Lord who patiently corrected power-hungry disciples and who made a great saint out of an enthusiastic prostitute wants to make each of us shine with the light of holiness also.  But for that to happen, we have to follow their example of repentance by humbly setting right what has gone wrong in our lives, serving others in humility, and fighting even our deeply rooted and most appealing passions.

            Yes, in Christ Jesus there is hope for us all, no matter what we have done or who we have become.  Now, so near the end of Lent, it is time to get over our pride and embarrassment, to take the medicine of confession and repentance, and to follow our Savior to His cross and empty tomb.  For He is still the One who brings light into our darkened world and heals all our wounds.  

            

"Lord, I Believe; Help My Unbelief": Homily for the Fourth Sunday of Lent in the Orthodox Church

Hebrews 6:13-20

Mark 9:17-30

           Sometimes we stand before God with more doubt than belief, with more despair than hope.  Sometimes our worries and fears increase; the joy of life slips away and we feel rotten.  Maybe it’s our health, the problems of our loved ones, stress about a busy schedule, or other matters at home, at work, or with our friends.  We are sometimes simply at the end of our rope.

            If you feel that way today or ever have in your life, you can begin to sympathize with the father of the demon-possessed young man in today’s gospel reading.  Since childhood, his son had had life-threatening seizures and convulsions. With the broken heart of a parent who has little hope for his child’s healing, the man cries out, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.”  Christ’s disciples had lacked the spiritual strength to cast out the demon, but the Lord Himself healed him.  We can only imagine how grateful the man and his son were for this blessing.

            And imagine how embarrassed the disciples were.  The Lord had referred to them as part of a “faithless generation” and asked how long he would have to put with them.  He told them that demons like this “can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting,” spiritual exercises designed to strengthen our faith and to purify our souls.  Not only were the disciples unable to cast out the demon, they could not even understand the Savior’s prediction of His own death and resurrection.   At this point in the journey, they were not great models of faithfulness.

            In fact, the best example of faithfulness in this story is the unnamed father.  He wants help for his child, and he tells the truth about himself.  His faith was imperfect; he had doubts; his hopes for his son’s healing had been crushed many times before.  He said to Christ, “If you can do anything, have compassion on us.”  In other words, he wasn’t entirely sure if the Lord could heal his son.  All that he could do was to cry out with tears, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.” 

            And in doing so, he showed that he had the spiritual clarity that the disciples lacked, for he knew the weakness of his faith.  Still, with every ounce of his being He called to the Lord for mercy.  He received it and the young man was set free.

            If we have taken Lent seriously at all this year, we will have become at least a bit like this honest father when our struggles with spiritual disciplines have shown us our weakness.  When we pray, we often welcome distractions; and it’s so easy not to pray at all.  When we set out to fast from food or something else to which we have become too attached, we often become angry and frustrated.  When we try to forgive and be reconciled with others, memories of past wrongs and fears about the future often overcome our good intentions.    We wrestle with our passions just a bit, and they get the better of us.   We so easily do, think, and say things that aren’t holy at all.  We put so much else before loving God and our neighbors.  Lent is good at breaking down our illusions of holiness, at giving us a clearer picture of our spiritual state.  And often we don’t like what we see.   

            If that’s where you are today, take heart, for Jesus Christ came to show mercy upon people like the father in our gospel lesson.   That man knew his weakness, he did not try to hide it, and he honestly threw himself on the mercy of the Lord.  He made no excuses; he did not justify himself; he did not complain.  He did not hide his doubt and frustration before God.   He did not wallow in wounded pride, obsess about his imperfections, or worry about what someone else would think of him. Instead, he simply acknowledged the truth about his situation and called upon Christ with every ounce of his being for help with a problem that had broken his heart.

We don’t know how religious this man appeared to anyone else.   Perhaps his fasting had been his many years of selfless struggle to care for his son; perhaps his prayers had always been focused on the boy’s healing.  But we do know that this man, in humility and honesty, received the mercy of Jesus Christ when he called to Him.

With whatever level of spiritual clarity we possess, with whatever amount of faith in our souls, with whatever doubts, fears, weaknesses, and sins that beset us, let us all follow his example of opening the wounds of our hearts and lives to the Lord.  Jesus Christ heard this man’s prayer; He brought new life to his son.  And He will do the same for us, when we fall before Him in honest repentance, knowing that our only hope is in the great mercy that He has always shown to sinners like you and me whose faith leaves a lot to be desired.

If we need a reminder of the importance of taking Confession this Lent, this gospel passage should help us.    Christ did not reject a father who was brutally honest about his imperfect faith, but instead responded to his confession with abundant grace, healing, and love.  He will do the same for each of us who stand before His icon with the humble plea for forgiveness, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.”  There is no better way to prepare to follow our Savior to the agony of the cross and the joy of the empty tomb.