Tag: holiness

Homily: 17th Sunday After Pentecost

fatherbasil_0h3841Leave a comment

We are one.  We find our unity in our love; not the pseudo facsimile of love that the world can only offer, but the love of God, the love of one another, and a peace which the world cannot give. We are one in Christ: One God, One Truth, one cup, one loaf, one teaching, one faith, and one Church.  With the Love of which the Gospel speaks, and which Paul demands of us, there is nothing that can divide us, and nothing that can move us. The Church is still here. We are still here. 

United in Love

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. One God!  Amen.

The world would have you believe that truth is relative. That there is no absolute truth. The world would have you believe that truth is an individual thing: his truth, her truth, their truth.  Lacking absolute truth they seek for those things outside themselves with which they mostly identify, things outside themselves which have little to do with their personhood as found in their humanity created in the image and likeness of their creator: their gender identity, their sexual identity, their social status, their wealth, and everything that lies between.  Each broken person is a patchwork quilt of disparate and unrelated ideologies under which they try to find comfort. It is in this individuality with which they have fashioned for themselves their own image away from the image and likeness of their Creator, and it is in this false image of humanity with which they try to find or create community.  They are all individual pieces of an unknown puzzle.  The picture is a stranger to everyone, even those holding the pieces. They throw themselves together within the same puzzle box, thinking that coexistence somehow replaces that of communion and community. They somehow believe that proximity results in relationships and yet they have nothing of themselves to share with one another other than those things external to themselves instead of anything that’s actually of themselves or even  theirs to give. They are “bonded” by the shifting vagaries of the world which will change at the next oncoming social tide. This is a sad and broken existence. The world is insane; for, they continue to do the same things over and over again while expecting a different result; yet, they continue to be broken, continue to be lost, continue in a hopeless misery of life because they lack the absolute truth revealed in the fullness of God. They keep seeking for more because the world has nothing more to give.  Their houses are built on foundations of sand, and this is why with time, they nearly always collapse.  However, Truth is eternal.  Truth is unchanging.  Truth is the firm foundation on which we all stand.

We are unconfused about our humanity and who we are.  We are certain of ourselves because we are certain of God.  We know ourselves because we know Christ. Our purpose is absolute because Truth is absolute.  While we recognize the brokenness of man, we understand the frailty and futility of our human condition amidst the vagaries of an often harsh and unforgiving world. We may be broken, but our Hospital, the Church, is here to heal us.  We may be bruised, shaken down and trampled underfoot, but we are certainly not divided, and will never be destroyed.  We are one just as God is one, and we are united in the love of God.  If we are each living stones of the body of Christ, then we are bound together by God’s love as a spiritual mortar, for this love is no common love, as Saint John Chrysostom says, but that which cements us together, and makes us cleave inseparably to one another, and effects as great and as perfect a union as though it were between limb and limb. For this is that love which produces great and glorious fruits.

This is the kind of love we hear about in our Gospel reading for today: ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”  We give ourselves to God, but we also give ourselves to one another.  We give to God ourselves, our whole thoughts, our whole understanding, and our whole life, leaving no part of ourselves no part of our lives that may be justly unfilled by Him. This type of love is absent of self and pride, for we love God first, and then all others, before we even come into our own picture.  What’s more, Christ himself has said that “those who love me will keep and obey my commandments.”  So, you see, love is not about how we feel, love is not about our emotions, love is not a statement, but it is an action.  We love God, we love others, and manifest that love by that which we do in obedience to Him who gave us all things.  That being said, what do we do that requires the most time and attention?  Is it God?  Is it our neighbor?  Or is it some paltry thing, or something external to us?  Keep this in mind: We become what we love, and who or what we love shapes what we become. If we love God, we become more like God. If we love things, we become a thing. If we love nothing, then we become nothing. 

Look at those sitting next to you.  Look at those around you. You are bound together in an eternal felicity found only in the knowledge and love of Christ. You are each bonded together by the blood of Christ.  You share in your lives and salvation by the body and blood of Christ as an eternal food and remedy.  We love each other because we love Christ, and it is in Christ by which we are all united.  So we must think of this when we fail, not only Christ, not only ourselves, but all those to whom we share this eternal bond.  Love is a choice, but Sin is also a choice, and it only seeks to rend that which God has brought together.  

Sin is the antithesis to unity, and we see the results of this within the world around us. So when we face down our passions and the temptations of the flesh, when we get angry or choose to do something that would harm ourselves or another, would we do this to them, to any of these sitting around us?  Remember this, because we are so united by the Love of God, anything we do apart from that affects not only us but the Church, and all those to whom we are bound by love.  This is why confession is so important, because it not only heals our own wounds, but brings us back together with those we have willfully separated ourselves away from, even if we do not yet know it.  Confession heals not only our own wounds, but those wounds we have inflicted upon the Church, those wounds we have inflicted upon one another, to those sitting around us, by way of our own negligence

We are one.  We find our unity in our love; not the pseudo facsimile of love that the world can only offer, but the love of God, the love of one another, and a peace which the world cannot give. We are one in Christ: One God, One Truth, one cup, one loaf, one teaching, one faith, and one Church.  With the Love of which the Gospel speaks, and which Paul demands of us, there is nothing that can divide us, and nothing that can move us. The Church is still here. We are still here. 

Closing with the words of our blessed Father among the saints, Saint John Chrysostom, I leave you with this: “ Indeed, love is a strong wall, impregnable not only to men, but also to the devil. He who is surrounded by a multitude of those who love him cannot fall into danger; he has no reason to be angry, but always feels peace of heart, joy and gladness; there is no reason to be jealous; there are no occasions for vindictiveness. Look how easily he carries out both his spiritual and worldly affairs. Who can compare to him? He is like a city completely shielded by walls; and he [who has no love] is like a city without any protection.”

By the prayers of thy most pure mother, the holy and God bearing fathers, all the saints and the martyrs and the angels, have mercy on us and save us.  Amen.

Homily: Seventh Sunday after Pentecost

fatherbasil_0h3841Leave a comment

“A faith without fruit, and fruits without faith are collectively bitter things that are of no spiritual or genuine benefit to anyone baring them.  But a faith bearing fruit and those fruits born in faith are precious gems of our good stewardship and God’s love unto the world. May we all be good stewards of our faith, bearing good fruits into the world, that by them, the whole world may know Christ.”

We Must be Fruitful

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; One God!  Amen.

In today’s Gospel and Epistle readings we hear much about fruit.  We hear much about good fruit and bad fruit; of false prophets and slaves to holiness; of good trees and bad.  Yet, what does it all mean? Throughout the totality of scripture we read, see and hear various parables and metaphors about fruit-bearing, and it seems to present an idea for us of what it means to be a part of Him, a part of the vine to which we have all been grafted.  Let us recall the words of Christ in the Gospel of John:

“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. 2 Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He [a]takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit. “

As the vinedresser, God is a patient and purposeful farmer who seeks a spiritual harvest from each of us, His branches, grafted to His Son.  As such he expects us to be more than just branches, but fruit bearing branches; to do more than just hold an ethical and religious identity, but to become living icons of that identity; to do more than just consider ourselves Christians, but to actually be and become Christian, living out our faith in such a way that we not only become good fruit of the vine, but bear the good fruit of faith in our lives, bringing forth the fruit of the Holy Spirit, that our whole lives may become a harvest of holiness for our King of Kings, and Lord of Lords.

We are grafted to the vine through holy baptism and chrismation.  We are watered by a persistence of prayer, both in our own lives and corporately within the body of Christ, the Church.  We are thus fertilized by the teachings of both the Scriptures and the Fathers, the fullness of Truth found wholly within Holy Tradition.  And we are pruned and preserved through our Orthodox praxis of faith and ascesis, those spiritual exercises so important to us all- prayer, fasting, and alms giving, but also a simplicity of life, unfettered and unburdened by the superfluity of this world. It is only here, and only in this manner, that we may become fruits of the vine.

But what does Fruit mean in this context?  The underlying Greek work translated as “fruit” is Karpos (καρπός), a word used 66 times throughout the canon of the New Testament. Anyone who has studied koine Greek in at least a cursory fashion will know that context is important in the proper understanding of what is being said in all things.  In one sense the word quite literally means fruit, or harvest.  Towards that end we are all living fruits of the vine, that is Christ.  We embody truth and embolden others to partake of it, becoming that which is pleasing to the hearts and minds of all men, that they may see Christ in us and through us.  We do this in faith, but we also do this in fearful remembrance of the fig tree for which Christ cursed and condemned for bearing no fruit.  Love has no season, and Truth has no end.  Christ is unceasing, and so should we be also.

Another meaning of the word karpos is deed, activity, or “produce of a person.”  In this we are understood to be bearers of good fruit.  Just as we need the vine for life, for there is no life apart from it, the vine needs its branches so that good fruit may be born into the world.  If Christ is the head of His Church, and we are living stones a part of that body, then we are His hands and feet within the world.  The Orthodox Church wholly rejects any theology that violates the free will of men, but Christ calls each of us to Him, and it is our choice but also our duty to lead others to him by our own examples of faith, by our good fruits given to and done unto others, by the Grace of God and the Holy Spirit.  Christ calls all men, that we may be brought into the fullness of Truth, grafted to the vine, and spiritually nourished by the sacramental life therein. 

What does good fruit look like? Saint Paul tells us in his Epistle to the Galatians “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”  Notice here that fruit is singular.  These are all attributes of a single fruit. Love is first and foremost.  If we possess a Godly love, and truly love God as we should, then we will possess all the other attributes listed here.  Yet, if we have love, or simply say we have love, and lack any of these, then the love we possess is neither Godly nor the love of God.  Yet, such love can only be achieved through the acquisition of the Holy Spirit

How does one acquire the Holy Spirit?  We turn to the words of Saint Seraphim of Sarov regarding the acquisition of the Holy Spirit:

“Prayer, fasting, vigils and all the other Christian practices may be, they do not constitute the aim of our Christian life.  Although it is true that they serve as the indispensable means of reaching this end, the true aim of our Christian life consists of the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God.  As for fasts, and vigils, and prayer, and almsgiving, and every good deed done for Christ’s sake, are the only means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of God.”

Prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, the three great ascetic practices of our faith,  the exercise and growth of our spiritual lives. Yet, our spiritual life is far more than just our thoughts and feelings, and inward spiritual practices of our faith, but in fact it comprises the whole human experience, the full depth  of our humanity: thought, feeling, heart,  soul, vision, mind, and body.  Not only this, but our spiritual lives should consist of our everyday experiences – work, school, our social life, family life, home life – and not just be compartmentalized to Church on Sunday mornings.  This is what it mens to become good fruit, the fruit of the Holy Spirit, that peculiar fruit we are to bear unto the world, that by it and through it we may lead others into the fullness of Truth, the Life of Christ and life eternal.  It stands as a perfect counter image to that of Eve enticing and leading Adam into sin through her half truth, or heresy, bringing death unto the world.

Who, by your example of faith, have you brought into faith, and the fullness of Truth? Whose life have you enriched, enlivened, and elevated by being the light of Christ in their life?  Who have you helped and uplifted by meeting the other wherever they had need?  What joy have you brought into the life of another? What kind words have you spoken today? What prayers have you said for those who hate you, and for those that others would deem worthy recipients of such enmity?  Where have we sown peace, and have we been a cause for any enmity or discord anywhere within the lives of others?  Are we honest with ourselves when we look upon the contents of our own hearts?

A faith without fruit, and fruits without faith are collectively bitter things that are of no spiritual or genuine benefit to anyone baring them.  But a faith bearing fruit and those fruits born in faith are precious gems of our good stewardship and God’s love unto the world. May we all be good stewards of our faith, bearing good fruits into the world, that by them, the whole world may know Christ.

Oh Lord, Jesus Christ our God, by the prayers of thy most pure mother, the holy and God bearing fathers, and the saints, and the martyrs and the angels, have mercy on us and save us.

Amen.