The Spirituality of the Christian East — 20160110

Posted on by

Ladder of Divine AccentHopefully you, my readers, are finding these thoughts of St. John as helpful as I am. I believe that his thoughts can be very beneficial to spiritual growth. I have begun sharing the three basic causes for Talkativeness which, as you have seen if you have been following this article, needs to be curbed if we wish to spiritually grow. The first way dealt with our lifestyle.

The second cause is Vainglory. St. John defines vainglory as that which prompts us to boast and to speak with the intention of impressing others. It is what prompts us to lie through our teeth about what we know or what we have done or experienced. From the average Joe in the pub bragging about how much he drank last night or the last fight he got into, to the devout Christian pretending the information he has gleaned from conversations with fellow Christians is the result of real scholarly knowledge – we are all guilty of lying or exaggerating in order to make ourselves look better than we really are.

The solution is as simple as it is difficult: humility. For wanting to be seen as greater than we are in the eyes of others is nothing less than vanity, a sign that we have forgotten God, who cannot be fooled by pretense.

We must realize that when we engage in vainglory, we are acting out something from our childhood. If we were diminished in any way during our childhood – people may have said that we were not intelligent – we will try, in adulthood, to change this feeling by aggrandizing things, making ourselves seem to be more intelligent. It is not a matter of judging this to be a fault as to recognizing that it might be influencing how we live and act as adults. Stop blaming and judging! Just get an honest picture of yourself.

Reflections on the Scriptural Readings for This Weekend — 20160103

Posted on by

I send my messenger before you to prepare your way;
a herald’s voice in the desert, crying,
‘Make ready the way of the Lord, clear him a straight path!

st-john-the-baptist-iconThus begins the Gospel of St. Mark. The story of our redemption is closely connected to two men who happened   to be cousins, Jesus and John the Baptizer. John followed in a long line of prophets who God sent repeatedly to the Chosen People to help them understand the meaning and purpose of life. God, according to Jewish historians, was always there for them. He led them out of captivity and bondage and even led them to a new land. They repeatedly seemed to forget all that He did for them and reverted to the old ways of looking at life. All He wanted from them was that they would be honest in their relationship with Him.

As we reflect on the history of Israel we quickly realize that their history is the history of humankind. It seems that we humans find it much easier to just live   in accord with our natural tendencies instead of realizing that we have been given this earthly existence in order to develop ourselves as spiritual beings.

We recall that the preaching of John the Baptizer, which was then continued by Jesus after John’s death, was Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. John, and then Jesus, attempted to help people come to an understanding of life and live in such a manner that they would be able to spiritually grow. Both John and Jesus attempted to point out to the leaders of their religion that any worship of God must be authentic. The only way that our religion is truly authentic is if it changes the way that we deal with other people. It is not by mere chance that the majority of all the stories that are in the New Testament about people who have truly understood the teaching of Jesus involve people who were considered as outcasts by the majority of the “religious” people of Israel. It is always a Samaritan that seems to understand the message of Jesus. Probably one of the most profound of all the parables of Jesus is that of the Good Samaritan.

As we prepare to celebrate the Baptism of Jesus by John in the Jordan we must remember the message of John and Jesus. They called us to a way of living that says: How you treat others is how you actually treat God! We are here on earth to learn how to open our hearts and minds to what God intended when He created life and not what we may think is the purpose of life.

Understanding Our Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church — 20160103

Posted on by

theophanyThe first three great feasts in our Church were: Resurrection, Pentecost and Theophany (i.e., the Baptism of Jesus by John in the Jordan). We will be celebrating this third feast this coming week (January 6th) and next weekend. Our celebration of this feast is marked by the inclusion of the Great Blessing of Water. It was not celebrated, however, until the end of the second or at the start of the third     century. It should be noted that it was     originally regarded as a collective feast since it embraced     other events in the life of Jesus which bore witness to his divinity (i.e., Nativity, the Coming of the Wise Men, Baptism, Miracle at Cana and the multiplication of the loaves). Theophany must be understood in the plural sense for it means a feast of holy Theophanies or Manifestations of God.

This feast had three periods of development. The first was throughout the third century and included all of the events which were considered as true manifestations of Jesus’ divinity. The second was during the fourth century during which the Nativity held first place. During the third period, toward the end of the fourth century, the Birth of Jesus and the Visit of the Wise Men were separated from His Baptism. It was at that time that January 6th became the feast of Theophany as we know it. It is one of the twelve major feasts of our Church.

The feast of Theophany places before our eyes one of the greatest and most profound truths of our holy faith: the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity. This is the true focus of the feast. It is believed, based on the New Testament Gospel accounts, that the Baptism of Christ is the event that truly revealed to us the true nature of our God, namely that He is Triune, that is He is Three Persons in One Godhead.

In the service of the Great Blessing of

Water we see this truth of our faith visually proclaimed. Water, which is one of the primary     substances of creation, symbolically represents that which we call life. This includes all forms of life – everything that we see as living. The ritual that blesses this symbolic representation of life, represents the Trinity – all blessings are done three times and include fire and breath. The next two blessings, that is the priest’s hand and the cross, visually connect water to humanity. The great Blessing of Water is truly a profound profession of our faith and belief in God as Triune – Three in One. As we celebrate this feast, let us renew again our belief that Our God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit now and forever.

The Divine Liturgy and Our Worship of God — 20160103

Posted on by

Over the past several weeks I have been sharing ideas about anamnesis. Closely connected with this idea is the idea of the assembly of the Church as the image of the body of Christ. If this is true, then the image of the head of the body is the priest. He presides over, he heads the gathering and his standing at their head is precisely what makes a group of Christians the gathering of the Church in the fullness of her gifts. He symbolically represents, although he is unworthy to do so, the true head of the Church, Christ. The priest, by the laying on of hands by a bishop, manifests the power of the priesthood of Christ, who is the one priest of the New Testament. Just as the holiness of the assembly is not that of the people who constitute it but Christ’s, so the priesthood of the priest is not his but Christ’s, bestowed on the Church because she is Christ’s body. Christ is not outside the Church and neither his power nor his authority is delegated to anyone. He himself abides in the Church and, through the Holy Spirit, he fulfills her entire life. The priest is neither a representative nor a deputy of Christ: in the sacrament he is Christ himself, just as the assembly is Christ’s body. Standing at the head of the body, he manifests in himself the unity of the Church, the oneness of the unity of all her members with himself. Thus, in this unity of the celebrant and the assembled is manifested the divine-human unity of the Church – in Christ and with Christ.

vestmentsEven the vestments of the priest is linked with the assembly. The first garment the priest wears, which is an undergarment or stikharion, represents the baptismal robe that each received when initiated into the Church. It is the garment of all the baptized and in wearing it the priest manifests the oneness of the assembly, uniting all of us with himself.

The epitrakhilion or stole is the image of the Savior’s taking on of our nature for its salvation and theosis, a sign of the priesthood of Christ himself. Why? Because this vestment, on which there are seven crosses, represents the power of the Mysteries or Sacraments that join us to Christ as we experience the particular mysteries of life. This vestment represents the power given to the priest to make present in a real way, using the rituals of the Church, God in the Trinity of His Persons.

 

Gaining a Deeper Understanding of the New Testament — 20160103

Posted on by

st-timothy1In the last issue of this article I finished commentary on First Timothy. Second Timothy is like and unlike the first. Both begin as letters from Paul to Timothy. Both emphasize “sound teaching,” guarding “the good treasure entrusted to you” and “sound doctrine.” Both are almost certainly by the same author.

But 2 Timothy is much more personal. Paul is in prison, expecting to die soon. The letter reads like a “farewell letter” that also commissions Timothy to continue what Paul has begun. There is nothing about qualifications for leadership or directives about who is a real widow. Rather, it is like a last testament from Paul to Timothy.

It begins with memories, naming Timothy’s mother and grandmother, Eunice and Lois. Then the author refers to Paul’s imprisonment and sense of abandonment. It continues with a commendation to Timothy to be “a good soldier of Christ Jesus” and a worker approved by God. It warns of what will happen “in the last days.”

This is not Paul. But it is not far from Paul. Most of the rest of the letter, beginning with 3:10, is a “charge” to Timothy commissioning him to be Paul’s successor and legatee.

This section of the letter contains what is probably its best-known verse. It affirms that “all scripture is inspired by God”. It is one of the foundations of Christian controversy about the authority of the Bible. Especially in the last hundred years, many Protestants have thought, been taught, or have taken for granted that “inspired by God” means that the Bible has a divine guarantee to be true. It commonly leads to the claim that the Bible is inerrant and infallible. Some would make a subtle distinction between those two terms, but in ordinary usage today they are synonymous. This understanding of this verse and thus of the Bible as the inerrant Word of God is the basic foundation of fundamentalist and most of conservative-evangelical Protestantism. For these Protestants, the Bible as the inspired and therefore inerrant and infallible Word of God defines who they are. You should read 2 Timothy 3:14-17. You will find that although the verse does say “all scripture is inspired by God,” it does not say that “inspired” means inerrant and infallible. Rather, because it is inspired, it is useful for teaching, correction,   reproof and training in righteousness (better understood as justice). There is nothing controversial in that claim. Is scripture useful for teaching and so forth? Of course.

Again this seems to prove that all scripture can be read in a way that is dependent upon the predisposition of the reader.

Learning Our Faith From the Greek Fathers of the Church — 20160103

Posted on by

transfigurationFrom Byzantine liturgical hymnology we clearly see that the Holy Spirit is the glory of Christ, which not only transfigures the body of the historical Jesus, as was the case at the Transfiguration, but glorifies as well His wider “Body,” that is all those who believe in Him. In fact, a comparison of the Byzantine liturgical texts of Pentecost with those appointed for the feast of the Transfiguration – and it is always important to remember that, for the Byzantines, the liturgy was the highest expression of their faith and Christian experience – shows that the miracle of Pentecost was considered as an expended form of the mystery of Tabor. On Mount Tabor the divine light was shown to a restricted circle of disciples, but at Pentecost Christ “by sending the Spirit, has shone forth as the light of the world,” because the Spirit “enlightens the disciples and has initiated them into the heavenly mysteries.”

Examples can be easily multiplied, which show that the Byzantine theological tradition is constantly aware that in the “economy” of creation and salvation the Son and the Spirit are accomplishing one single divine act – without, however, being subordinated to one another in their hypostatic or personal existence. The “head” of the new, redeemed humanity is, of course, Christ, but the Spirit is not only Christ’s agent; He is, in the words of John of Damascus, “Spirit of God, direct, ruling; the fountain of wisdom, life and holiness; God existing and addressed along with the Father and Son; uncreated, full, creative, all-ruling, all-effecting, all-powerful, of infinite power, Lord of all creation and not subject to any; deifying, not deified; filling, not filled; shared in, not sharing in; sanctifying, not sanctified.” Truly this personal independence of the Spirit is connected with the whole mystery of redemption, which is both a unification of mankind in the one divine-human hypostasis of Christ, the new Adam, and a mysterious personal encounter between each man and God. Truly the unification of human nature is a free, divine gift, but the personal encounter depends upon human freedom: “Christ becomes the sole image appropriate to the common nature of humanity. The Holy Spirit grants to each person created in the image of God the real possibility of fulfilling the likeness in the common nature. The one lends His hypostasis to the nature, the other gives His divinity to the persons.

What is your understanding of the role of the Holy Spirit?

The Spirituality of the Christian East — 20160103

Posted on by

Ladder of Divine AccentIn the last issue I was sharing thoughts about the eleventh step on the Ladder, namely Talkativeness and Silence. When we are spiritually lazy, we often try to fill the vacuum with pointless chattering. The Ladder pinpoints three fundamental causes of talkativeness. The first is A Bad or Relaxed Lifestyle.

Words are easy, whereas prayer, hard work, fasting, study and restraint require recollection, contemplation, thoughtfulness, and action. When these things are lacking, we spend far too much time sitting around talking. And let us not make the mistake of thinking that constantly speaking of spiritual or theological matters always justifies this passion of talkativeness. For speaking incessantly of such matters while not acting upon them is of little benefit to us. As St. Maximus the Confessor aptly wrote, “Theology without works is the theology of demons.”

But let us also be careful not to go to extremes. For a good word can bring hope, peace, comfort, enlightenment and joy. Sometimes our own words can even remind us that we should be trying harder to reach our own ideals, to heed our own advice, to practice the very thing we are preaching. This is why I always tell everyone that I tend to preach to myself and just hope that   others listen. All things must be         exercised in moderation. There is “a time to keep silent and a time to speak.” One of the many great Mothers of the Church, St. Cassiani, a rather outspoken woman for her day, once said, “I hate silence when it is time to speak.”

There is always a delicate balance. When a person is talking too much they are not really listening to others, don’t really want to hear what others say, or are trying to convince themselves of what they are saying is true.

Use this to assess yourself?

CALLED TO HOLINESS — 20160103

Posted on by

theotokosAs I finished this article last time I shared this thought: Jesus asks us to tell Him the thoughts of our minds and to let them go into His hands, thereby cleansing our inner selves and making us whole and wholesome. This would seem to be a simple procedure except for one other   hurdle: our desire to enjoy the evil our minds concoct. Sometimes we neither want to repress our evil thoughts nor to give them up; we want to concentrate on them and enjoy them. Consequently, one person can enjoy plotting how he will bring vengeance on his enemy, and another person may enjoy her lustful thoughts, and another person may enjoy another’s bad fortune.

Therefore, after we are ready to admit honestly our evil before Jesus, one thing more is required – to desire to be rid of it. Even this desire, however, is a gift. Just as we cannot heal ourselves or change ourselves in any permanent way, neither can we desire to do so on our own. This desire comes from God. “It is God, for his own loving purpose, who puts the will and the action into you” (Philippians 2:13).

All we can do on our own, then, is to desire the desire. The rest is God’s work. What a comfort to know how little really relies on our own capabilities! Though small, however, this is still a great challenge; it is about as much as human beings can handle. But we can handle it; it is not outside our grasp. It is good to know that God does not ask the impossible or the unusually difficult; He asks of us only what we can do, and He promises to do the rest in the process of our spiritual growth.

I realize that this probably confuses some of my readers since we always want to be in control and to feel that we are the ones accomplishing any growth. What is important for us to remember is that we must first desire to have the desire to spiritually grow. If we don’t, God can’t really do anything about our growth.

A Prayer for the New Year 2016

Posted on by

Almighty God, as we begin this New Year, we offer You our thanks for granting us another year in which we can come to know, trust and love You. We thank You for all the blessings You bestowed on us last year and for helping us meet the challenges life presented us.

As we begin this new year, we ask Your blessings upon all our deceased relatives and friends and humbly ask that You grant them rest in a place of light where there is no pain, sorrow or mourning. We ask You to help us remember them. |

As we begin this new year, we further beg Your blessings upon all of our living relatives and friends. May they have the strength and courage to peacefully face all of life’s challenges. Help them, we pray, to embrace each single moment of life as a precious gift. Help them to truly know that You are with them. We ask You to help them learn the lessons that life presents to them so that they may grow in their union with You. Help them, O God, to know that You are with us.
We also ask You, O God, to bless our parish family. Bless all of our members, especially those struggling with health challenges. Help us to ever grow closer to You and one another.

Finally, Almighty God, we humbly ask that You increase our awareness of Your presence in our life so that we might grow in our ability to hold precious each and every opportunity that life presents, believing that each opportunity provides us with an occasion to place our hope and trust in You.

We ask these blessings for the New Year and render glory to You, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, now and ever and forever. Amen.

Reflections on the Scriptural Readings for This Weekend — 20151227

Posted on by
Flight Into Egypt

Flight Into Egypt

This weekend our Gospel continues the story of the events surrounding the Lord’s birth (i.e., God’s Incarnation) as presented by the Evangelist Matthew. Matthew adds two events which are unique to his gospel, namely the Flight into Egypt and Herod’s Slaughter of the Innocents. Matthew presents Jesus as   re-enacting in His own life the career of Israel, for indeed Jesus is the new Israel.

We must remember that the name Israel, while it was latter applied to the Jewish nation, is actually the name given to Jacob during his encounter with the Angel of God at the river Jabbok. This comes from the Hebrewיִשְׂרָאֵל (Yisra’el) meaning God contended. Perhaps the most important event in the history of the Jewish nation was the Exodus out of Egypt. It was the event that transformed the Jewish people into the Chosen People of God. Matthew, because He believed that Jesus was the awaited for Messiah, had to, in some manner, have Jesus relive the Exodus experience. So Matthew has the Holy Family flee to Egypt so that they might later make an Exodus from Egypt.

It is interesting to note that the children of Israel did not leave Egypt destitute. In addition to their own possessions, the terrified Egyptians had bestowed upon them gifts of gold and silver, and clothing, in an effort to hasten their departure. Thus God made His promise to Abraham, that his descendants would leave their exile with great riches, come true in every detail. This reminds us that the Holy Family would have taken the gifts of the Magi into exile.

There was in Egypt a large colony of Jews, especially at Alexandria and Heliopolis (tradition says that there is a tree there under which Mary sat and which local residents always point out to travelers). The journey on foot would take about a week from Bethlehem. But the   kernel of the incident is the typology of Jesus as the new Moses or the new Israel.

The flight into Egypt was in response to the dream that Joseph had about Herod’s desire to kill the Child Jesus because Jesus, if He was a new King of the Jews, might pose a threat to Herod’s power. The theme of the wicked king who tries to eliminate at birth possible rivals is common to folk-lore.

As one can tell, the Evangelist Matthew, as well as the early Church, firmly believed that Jesus was truly the awaited for Messiah. We believe He was that and much, much more.