"Hospody Pomylui": Lord, Have Mercy

One of the great myths of Orthodoxy in America is that we cannot fulfill our evangelical mandate if we use Greek, or Slavonic, or Arabic, or Serbian. While I there is much to be said for using English as the base language of our liturgical life, we ought not to underestimate the importance of using Greek, or Slavonic, or Arabic, or Serbian as a way of reaching American inquirers to the Orthodox Church.

In light of this I offer the following video of the "Soul Children of Chicago" for consideration:



What the children are singing is "Hospody Pomylui!" or "Lord, Have Mercy!" in what I Ukrainian (the audio quality is not what I would hope--so it is a bit hard to make out).

A cute story from back in the day: I had a family of lapsed Evangelical Christians who were investigating the Orthodox Church. The parish I was serving at the time used a small amount of Greek in the Divine Liturgy. The youngest son in the family, then 7 or 8, was quite taken with the Greek phrase "Kyrie Eleison" or "Lord, have mercy!"

Well, on afternoon his mother told me that her son had been sing "Kyrie Eleison" all afternoon. She asked him what he was sing and he told her, "Mom, I'm sing 'Lord have mercy' in Greek" When asked how long he was going to keep singing this (he'd gone on for several hours by this point), he answered "Until it happens."

While the exclusive use of Greek, or Slavonic, or Arabic, or Serbian or any other traditional Orthodox liturgical language is rarely a good idea, we cannot limit ourselves exclusively to English (or in coming years, Spanish). The question of language is pastorally complex and we would do well to not artificially limit ourselves to only some parts of the Church's tradition.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

Moving From A "Closed Source" An "Open Source" Model of Pastoral Ministry

After Liturgy this morning I had a conversation with one of the men in the parish about different approaches or models of pastoral ministry. For many ministry in the parish, whether by the clergy or the laity, is very much a "closed source" reality.

"Closed source," you ask, "what is that?" I'll tell you.

Without getting lost in the technical details "closed source" refers to a computer software in which the end user or consumer is does not have access to the source code or the actual program that makes the software work. In many cases this isn't really a problem. Most of us, myself included, are not particularly interested in the source code of say, Microsoft Word. We don't care how it works, only that it works. The technical details of the program, much like the technical details of automobiles, or electricity, or cell phones, don't matter to us.

Except of course when the program, or automobile, or electricity, or cell phone, doesn't work. Then we ask, pointlessly in my own case, "What's wrong, why isn't this stupid thing working?" The reality of course is I don't really care why my cell phone isn't working, at least not in any technical detail. I only care that I'm not able to make a phone call when I want to.

The typically parish I think largely runs on a closed source model. As with our computers, or our automobiles, or electricity or our cell phones, we don't care how the parish works, only that it is there and working when we want something. While it is not all together true, the work of parish is kind of like making sausage or law, most people think it is better if they don't really goes in to them.

But again, this is only the case while things are working. When things go wrong, or probably somewhat more cynically, if not inaccurately, we get upset and we want answers. Unfortunately, as with our computers or our automobiles, most of us really don't have the knowledge basis to understand what went wrong. So again what most of us look for is not for an accurate appraisal of is wrong (and right) in our community, but an answer (and it is almost always a singular explanation we are searching for) we can understand and that makes sense (justifies really) our discomfort, disappointment, or anger.

While this is certainly understandable, and I am as prone to this as anyone, it is not reasonable to expect to have a satisfying answer to a complex question without putting in the necessary time beforehand. Without a sufficient knowledge base, any explanation I can understand is likely to distort the situation. Worse it is likely to play to and re-enforce my ignorance or bias or active prejudice.

My brother priests will often tell me that because I'm a psychologist I'm less biased in evaluating parishes. I'm not, I am simply differently biased then they are. The fact that my different bias, my different perspective on a parish, the people in the parish and their relationship with one another, is useful doesn't mean that it is "objective" with any mathematical purity. Like everyone else I see what I see from my own vantage point in terms of my own life experiences and with my own very real blind spots.

So since none of us have time to master all the information necessary to run a parish, much less to diagnosis its illness, what are we to do? This is where the "open source" model of computer programing might come in handy. If Microsoft is closed source, open source software give the user access to the code that makes the program work. Why? Because in the open source model the conviction is that the best programs are developed incrementally, step-by-step, in an active and intentional collaborative process. In this process, those who design the software and those who use it are seen as partners in the development of the final product.

In the social realm blogs are very much an application of the open source model to the writing process. As the author of the blog, I invite you not only to read what I write, but to comment on it. These comments are especially valuable to me since they help focus my own thoughts, tell me where my thought is not being communicated effective, and are a source for me of new themes of inquiry and reflection.

So what might an open source approach to parish ministry look like?

I don't know--that's why I've written this post. Let me ask those of you who read this: What would an open source model parish look like? Have I even given you enough information to answer, or even understand, the question? As a suggestion, think of the times when your own parish has not been functioning properly, what (and not "who") need to be different do you think to avoid, or at least minimize, the dysfunction? Looking back, what might have been done differently to strengthen the parish? And what does strengthen mean anyway?

Just some grist for the mill:

There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore He says:

" When He ascended on high,
He led captivity captive,
And gave gifts to men."

(Now this, "He ascended"—what does it mean but that He also first[c] descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.)

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, or the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love (Eph 4:4-16).

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

Thoughts on Parish Life

When I write my next book (this of course is assuming the publisher ever gets back to me about my first book!), I think I will need to mentioned the good people at Holy Assumption Orthodox Church (OCA), Canton, OH where I've been helping out the last several weeks. We've been discussing an part of an article by Fr Alexander Schmemann. You can find that article here: "The Canonical Problem." In our conversation today after Liturgy, people helped me put words to something I've been struggling with for quite a while.

In a parish where the Gospel is being preached with conviction, and people are at least somewhat committed to Christ and sensitive to the prompting of the Holy Spirit, then at any given time at some members of the community will be in crisis. Not crisis necessarily as the world understand the term to be sure.

Rather this crisis is the internal struggle that which proceeds real spiritual growth and transformation in Christ. In a word, metanoia.

It wasn't until this morning that the reality of that really struck me. At any given moment in a parish's life some people are experience a call to repentance. There are men, women and children who, having come to know themselves as sinners, are now struggle to know themselves as loved by Christ and to see themselves in light of the Resurrection. My question is this: What are the implications of this for how we structure the life of the parish?

Of course this has implication for the people who are undergoing repentance. But since we rarely (okay, never) have a sign around our necks reading "Caution! Significant Spiritual Work in Progress!" it also places a particular obligation on the rest of us in the parish. Basically it seems to me that we need to structure parish life around, well, around how we'd like to be treated when we were in those moments of crisis that are at the heart of repentance.

Especially in recent years, it has become fashionable to speak of the Church as a hospital for sinners. That's all well and good and I agree with the idea. The challenge though is figuring out what this means in practical terms.

For a while I thought that this meant calling people to repentance. This isn't wrong exactly, but I think now I was a bit off the beam. Calling people to repentance is too often confused with making people sick--getting them to feel bad about themselves and their relationship (or lack of relationship) with Christ and His Church.

Now I'm wondering if rather than calling folks to repentance, especially in sermons, if I ought not to guide people through the process of repentance. Might it not be better to outline what repentance looks like and help people see how they can walk through repentance rather than, even unintentionally, risk castigating them for being unrepentant?

The challenge of the sermon is that I must speak to everyone and so I need to not only limit myself to those themes that address what is universal applicable and useful. I must also avoid those themes that, while true, might cause harm to those who in all innocence cannot yet hear them. Or for the biblically minded among us: offer people milk not meat, that is describe the way of repentance, but not demand it from people.

God, and the ebb and flow of everyday life, seems to do a good job in reminding us that we aren't God. Looking back over my ministry as a priest I can help wonder if taking it on myself to call people to repentance hasn't done more harm then good.

What I mean is this: Those who are in the midst of repentance probably don't need me heaping coals on the fire. These folks are already in as much pain as they can handle. And since repentance also seem to come with a fair degree of self-criticism and even loathing, I don't think a strong sermon or adult ed class on why we must repent does anything but make the person feel worse about him or herself.

Much like when I'm talking with someone whose been the victim of a violent crime, I think it is better to avoid language or ideas that simply cause more pain (and yes, that's part of what we aim at when we call people to repentance--psychic or spiritual pain). If someone's heart is already sore, why add to the pain? God is already at work there, my job is to cooperate with His work, not usurp His role.

And so, by outlining the process of repentance, I can serve as a guide to those who are in crisis. This approach I think is not only more helpful generally, it also will encourage people to speak with me privately. After all, if I'm in pain already, who would I most likely want to speak to, someone who offers me a helping hand or a harsh word?

"Okay," you say, "but what about those people who haven't repented yet?"

Well, what about them? If they aren't listening to God, why do I think they'll listen to me?

Again looking back at my own ministry, I think this is where I have gone wrong: Preaching to the unrepentant. As with programs centered around the complacent Christian in our midst, structuring my ministry around the unrepentant is a waste of time. Not because there isn't a need to call them to repentance, but because that call is probably better given through the example God transforming lives of the people around them in the parish.

While in a one-on-one situation, I might be able to call someone to repentance, in a public forum I think I need to be mindful of the effect of that call on those who are already undergoing repentance. For the person who is undergoing the trials of repentance my sermon to the unrepentant is not going to encourage or sustain them as they walk through their own experience of inner darkness.

How much damage, I wonder, have I done to those bruised by repentance in my zeal to call the unrepentant to "New Life"? How easy it has been to justify giving voice to my own frustrations and anger at the obstinate and the unrepentant by an appealing to the Gospel. More frightening, how easy it is to overlook the damage I've done to the "little ones" of faith in my zeal to call the unrepentant to turn from their sins.

Thinking about my conversation this morning, I think I would, and in fact all of us would do well, to take to heart the description of the Messiah in Isaiah:

"Behold! My Servant whom I uphold,
My Elect One in whom My soul delights!
I have put My Spirit upon Him;
He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles.
He will not cry out, nor raise His voice,
Nor cause His voice to be heard in the street.
A bruised reed He will not break,
And smoking flax He will not quench;
He will bring forth justice for truth.
He will not fail nor be discouraged,
Till He has established justice in the earth;
And the coastlands shall wait for His law."
Thus says God the LORD,
Who created the heavens and stretched them out,
Who spread forth the earth and that which comes from it,
Who gives breath to the people on it,
And spirit to those who walk on it:
" I, the LORD, have called You in righteousness,
And will hold Your hand;
I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people,
As a light to the Gentiles,
To open blind eyes,
To bring out prisoners from the prison,
Those who sit in darkness from the prison house.
I am the LORD, that is My name;
And My glory I will not give to another,
Nor My praise to carved images.
Behold, the former things have come to pass,
And new things I declare;
Before they spring forth I tell you of them." (42:1-9)

I wonder what it would look like to structure a parish around the needs of not the "powerful and wealthy", not around the "pillars of the community," or the "fervent," or even the objectively unrepentant, but rather around the needs of the "smoldering wicks" and the "bruised reeds" who need above all a guide through repentance?

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

We Need to Serve the Spiritual Seeker in Our Midst

This morning I served at St Nicholas Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Pittsburgh.

Attendance was probably twice what it was the week before. This was due to the fact that the church school program started this morning as well as a memorial service and breakfast after Liturgy for a member of the Cathedral parish who died last month.

After Liturgy I spoke with a couple who have left the Orthodox Church for an evangelical church. While I disagree with their decision, I do understand it. The sad fact of the matter is that Orthodox parish, especially those with a strong or dominate ethnic identity, tend not to preach the need for repentance and a vibrant spiritual life. Or if they preach this they are usually ineffectual in actual guiding people in the process. The reason this is so is that we naively assume that formation simply happens apart from any decision on the part of the individual Christian or the community.

This lack of effective spiritual guidance means that people tend to be rather mediocre in their commitment to Christ and His Church. The sad irony in all of this is that while priests and bishops and seminary faculty have all complained to me about the results of our lack of any intentional spiritual formation of the laity (and this includes our neglect of spiritual formation for seminarians), no one seems willing to actually take up the task of preaching repentance and implementing a program of spiritual formation.

We are often very anxious not to offend, or drive people away. While I understand this concern, the question needs to be asked how attached are the people really to Christ and His Church who we are afraid of driving away?

Absent repentance and spiritual formation how deep is the person connection to Christ and the Church?

And, absent our willingness to preach repentance and offer intentional spiritual formation, what does this say about us that people leave the Orthodox Church for other Christian traditions (typically Evangelical Christian communities)?

Who exactly are we afraid of offending or driving away? The lukewarm or those who desire for a deep relationship with Christ? This desire is so strong, their need for a relationship with a community of faith, with at least some sort of church, that they vote with their feet and walk across the road to the local megachurch.

So the question is really this: Why is it that we are willing to keep the lukewarm Christian at the expense of the baptized spiritual seeker in our midst?

The couple I spoke with after Liturgy had a list of reasons why they have joined a Bible church. I had to agree with their negative reasons--the reasons why they left Orthodoxy are simply true--or at least true enough for government work as my grandparents used to say.

But even their positive reasons attending a Bible church--to learn the Word of God, to develop a relationship with Christ, and to grow spiritually I also agreed with, even if I doubt they'll find what they want in a Bible church. In any event, what they are looking for, and didn't find in the Orthodox Church, all reflect rather poorly on their experiences as Orthodox Christians (and it is worth noting that they were both baptized and raised in the Orthodox Church, but in different ethnic traditions. The problem that they brought to my attention is not limited to one ethnic tradition or another.)

Thinking about their experiences, I wonder if it isn't the case that the Orthodox Church planted in them a spiritual hunger that we then never feed? In effect, we pointed them down a road, but then said, that they (we, and more to the point, I) didn't need to actually travel down.

In conversation after conversation, in sermon after sermon, in Greek, Russian, Serbian, Antiochian, Ukrainian and Carpatho-Russian parishes, from cradle Orthodox and converts, I have gotten a positive, even zealous, response to the possibility of new Life that comes to us through repentance and the sacraments.

But somehow, and again and again this has been my experience, at just the last moment, people falter. They see the prize, reach for it and then lose their desire and turn away.

And I've seen this as well not only with lay people, but also clergy and bishops. We know what we need to do, but we are afraid. And mostly what we are afraid of losing our relationship with those who will not follow Christ with us.

The time has come for God to renew the Orthodox Church. We've made little steps forward here and there, but these are not sufficient. We are still too attached to our wealth, our glorious history (as if any of us had anything to do with Byzantium or the "Third Rome"), our different ethnic customs, and above all our "True Churchiness."

Ain't none of this going to give us the "good defense before the fearsome Judgment Seat of Christ" that we pray for at every Liturgy. In fact, if we do not repent, if we do not value a deeper life in Christ more than our relationship with lukewarm Christian in our midsts, then all of these things--these real blessings from God that we have come to value more than God Hmself--will stand in judgment of us at the end of our life.

There are in every Orthodox parish lukewarm Christians who are dead set to remain lukewarm (It is odd if you think about it. The only way to stay lukewarm is to decide to be lukewarm. This is the only way I can imagine standing in the Divine Liturgy and NOT responding to Christ's call to repentance.) Our willingness to cater, and yes it is a catering, to the lukewarm is costing us presence and the gifts of the baptized spiritual seeker in our midst.

We must as a Church turn our attention to these people. It will in the short run cost us members, money and even some of the "grace proof" comfort we have come to enjoy. But if we do not change our ways we will lose our salvation--our inaction we leave us with no acceptable answers before the judgment seat of Christ.

And that my friends is scary biscuits indeed as one of my spiritual children would put it.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

Enduring the Cross: Reflects on Preaching

This morning I served Orthros and Liturgy at Kimisis Tis Theotokou (Dormition of the Theotokos) Greek Orthodox Church in Aliquippa, PA in the absence of the vacationing pastor Fr Christopher Bender. While I often prepare the basic themes of my sermon earlier in the week, I am often struck--as I was this morning--of the importance of the congregation and their response in the final content of the sermon.

Much Orthodox preaching makes use of a very formal rhetorical style that seems to be modeled on 19th century translations of patristic works. While there are any number of problems with this style of preaching, I think a central problem is that it is a way of preaching that obscures the person of the preacher.

Whether the sermon is long or brief, it is usually the only opportunity that most of the congregation has to get any insight not only into the Gospel as a living reality, but also the character of their pastor. Sometimes I will listen to a sermon and be struck by how anyone could have preached the same sermon. The sermon is so formal or abstract that I have no sense that the preacher is preaching to me.

In these cases the sermon, no matter how rhetorically polished or theological sound, remains a dead word; there is no sense that the sermon is an act of living speech between preacher and congregation. What makes the sermon alive is that it is, or should be anyway, uttered under the inspiration and authority of the Holy Spirit. The sermon is not simply a lecture, but a prophetic utterance and preachers needs to take seriously their prophetic office in the life of the congregation.

But a prophetic word must rise above the purely formal. To do this it will necessarily reveal not only something of God but also the preacher and the congregation. The preacher's own spiritual life and struggles are the material out of which the sermon is crafted. And the preacher's desire to change the hearts of his listeners--to draw then closer to Christ or to turn from sin--is also necessarily a personal work.

As I preach, I pray attention to the faces and reactions of my listeners. Are they understanding? Are the thinking about the sermon? Is there any connection between us as speaker and listener?

This style of preaching makes great demands not only of the preacher but also the congregation. A purely formal sermon that does not engage reveal the heart of the preacher, or seek to engage the heart of the listeners, is certainly easier and safer. But this kind of preaching will never change the heart of either the listener or the preacher.

None of this is to suggest that the sermon is about the preacher--far from it. But if the preacher does not communicate to his listeners that he knows from his own experience, his own struggles, his own failures and successes, that what he is saying is true, he commits a fraud against the congregation.

Henri Nouwen puts the matter this way:

In order to bring any kind of message to people there has to be a willingness to accept the message. This willingness means some desire to listen, some question that asks for an answer, or some general feeling of uncertainty needs clarification or understanding. But whenever an answer is given when there is no question, support is offered when there is no need, or an idea is given when there is no desire to know, the only possible effect can be irritation or plain indifference (Creative Ministry, p.25)

To avoid preaching the results in irritation, or worse indifference, Nouwen says that the preacher must "be willing to lay himself down and make his own suffering and his own hope available to others so that they too can find their own, often difficult way" (p. 40) But, he warns us,

Nobody can ever claim to be a real preacher in this sense. Only Christ could, since only He entered into full dialogue with those He loved by laying down His life in total availability. But out of all those who witnessed His death and saw blood and water come His pierced side, only a few were willing to cast off their indifference and irritation and come to the liberating insight" "In truth this was the Son of God." (Mt 27.54)

A purely formal style of preaching--whether or the part of the preacher or his listeners--will never bring us to saving faith. And in fact, this purely formal sermon contradicts the reality that "every time real preaching occurs the crucifixion is realized again" in the life of both the preacher and his listeners. For this reason, the preacher who hopes to bring his listeners closer to faith, cannot hope to do so except himself "having entered the darkness of the Cross." For this reason, Nouwen says, "let us hope that there always will be men to endure the hardship of preaching and lead their people through their own darkness to the Light of God."

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

The Dormition of our Most Holy Lady the Theotokos and Ever Virgin Mary

Apolytikion in the First Tone

In birth, you preserved your virginity; in death, you did not abandon the world, O Theotokos. As mother of life, you departed to the source of life, delivering our souls from death by your intercessions.

Kontakion in the Second Tone

Neither the grave nor death could contain the Theotokos, the unshakable hope, ever vigilant in intercession and protection. As Mother of life, He who dwelt in the ever-virginal womb transposed her to life.

Reading:

Concerning the Dormition of the Theotokos, this is what the Church has received from ancient times from the tradition of the Fathers. When the time drew nigh that our Savior was well-pleased to take His Mother to Himself, He declared unto her through an Angel that three days hence, He would translate her from this temporal life to eternity and bliss. On hearing this, she went up with haste to the Mount of Olives, where she prayed continuously. Giving thanks to God, she returned to her house and prepared whatever was necessary for her burial. While these things were taking place, clouds caught up the Apostles from the ends of the earth, where each one happened to be preaching, and brought them at once to the house of the Mother of God, who informed them of the cause of their sudden gathering. As a mother, she consoled them in their affliction as was meet, and then raised her hands to Heaven and prayed for the peace of the world. She blessed the Apostles, and, reclining upon her bed with seemliness, gave up her all-holy spirit into the hands of her Son and God.

With reverence and many lights, and chanting burial hymns, the Apostles took up that God-receiving body and brought it to the sepulchre, while the Angels from Heaven chanted with them, and sent forth her who is higher than the Cherubim. But one Jew, moved by malice, audaciously stretched forth his hand upon the bed and immediately received from divine judgment the wages of his audacity. Those daring hands were severed by an invisible blow. But when he repented and asked forgiveness, his hands were restored. When they had reached the place called Gethsemane, they buried there with honor the all-immaculate body of the Theotokos, which was the source of Life. But on the third day after the burial, when they were eating together, and raised up the artos (bread) in Jesus' Name, as was their custom, the Theotokos appeared in the air, saying "Rejoice" to them. From this they learned concerning the bodily translation of the Theotokos into the Heavens.

These things has the Church received from the traditions of the Fathers, who have composed many hymns out of reverence, to the glory of the Mother of our God (see Oct. 3 and 4).

Reading courtesy of Holy Transfiguration Monastery
Apolytikion courtesy of Narthex Press
Kontakion courtesy of Narthex Press
Icon courtesy of Theologic Systems

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Who Will Be Saved?

In the Gospel for August 19th, the Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost (Mt 19.16-26), we hear about the encounter between Jesus and the rich young man. After being told that perfection requires that he sell all he have, give the proceeds to the poor, and become himself a disciple of Jesus, the young man "went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions" (v. 22). As the young man turns and leaves, Jesus says "to His disciples, 'Assuredly, I say to you that it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God'" (vv. 23-24). In response to this teaching of Jesus the disciples " were greatly astonished, saying, 'Who then can be saved?'" (v. 25).

This question of the disciples is key to our understanding of the Gospel: Who can be saved?

Certainly not the rich young man, at least not at the moment in his life when we meet him. When he is offered salvation he simply walks away. St John Chrysostom in his homily (Homily 63) on this passage cautions us that while the young man is "avaricious and greedy since Christ showed him up as such" we ought not to think him "a dissembler," who was simply trying to trick Jesus. We know that the young man was sincere in his question to Jesus for two reason.

First, Chrysostom tells us, we have the testimony of the Apostle Mark. In Mark's Gospel (1o.17, 21) the man is shown running up to Jesus "and kneeling before him" asks what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus, for his part according to Mark, looks at the young man with love. So both the young man's own behavior in asking the question as well as Jesus' gentle, even affection, response suggests that whatever his other faults he wasn't trying to trick Jesus.

But Chrysostom offers us a second reason for not doubt the sincerity of the young man. St John tells us that the young man "seems ready to do what he would be told." The young man was well disposed toward obedience. Had his heart been otherwise, had his intent been "to put Jesus to the test, the Evangelist would have give some indication of this as he does in other cases." And so

If the young man had come to test him, he would not have retreated downcast at what he heard. This never happened to any of the Pharisees. When refuted they were all the more angry. This man was not angry. He went away in sorrow, which is no little signal that he did not come t0him with evil intent.

Well, if the young man did not come with evil intent, what was the problem, why didn't he follow Jesus? Chrysostom says though he did not come withe evil intent, the young man "did come with too weak a will." St John continues:

Truly he did desire life but was held in the grip of a serious moral infirmity. When therefore Christ said, "If you would enter life, keep the commandments," he said "Which?" not putting him to the test--far from it--but because he thought that there were some other ones beside those in the law which could bring him life. So he seems quite earnest.

Though he is sincere, the young man is weak willed. St Jerome in his Commentary on Matthew points of that divine grace is never lacking and so for this reason it "is in our power whether we wish to be perfect." But perfection demands not simply that we "sell . . . in part, . . . but sell . . . all." And even this is insufficient Jerome says

unless after despising riches [we follow] the Savior, that is, abandon evil and [do] good. For easily is a little purse despised than one's will. Many abandon their wealth but do not follow the Savior. To follow the Savior is to be an imitator if him and walk in his steps, Anyone who says that he believes in Christ must himself also walk in the steps he walked in.

It is this last thing that the young man lacked. It was less that he was unwilling to follow Jesus and more that he was unwilling to imitate him. But again, we ought not to judge him harshly for this since. Yes, "he put great trust in wealth" but because he "was a young man." He was, in St Hilary of Poiters' phrase trapped in "an arrested adolescence."

Here I think developmental psychology can help us. The difference between and adolescent and an adult is not that one loves and the other doesn't. Rather it is that the adult is willing to love sacrificially and do so for the good of others. The young man was willing to keep the law for his own sake--but unwilling to go beyond the law for the sake of others. He would not use his wealth for the salvation of others.

St Cyril of Alexandria tells us that while the law isn't perfect, it "is a kind of introduction to the eternal life, briefly acquainting trainees to the things above." How can the law do this? Because it "is the starting point for social justice." He continues, "For the beginning of good is to act justly, . . . [and just] action . . . is shown by the law, . . . [even as] goodness is shown by Christ." The young man in refusing to imitate Christ showed himself unwilling to become perfect. Like adolescents everywhere, he preferred the lesser good of justice, but refused to go beyond justice and commit himself to the greater good of sacrificial love which in the end brings the only lasting justice since love reconciles us not only to God, but to one another and to ourselves.

So, who then can be saved?

St John Chrysostom says that Christ promises "a significant reward for the wealthy who can practice self-denial." But this ascetical exertion isn't meant to be an end in itself, but rather is in the service of the salvation of others. Think about the disciples at the very end of the Gospel reading. When they heard how hard salvation is they were clearly upset. "But why were they upset," Chrysostom asks, "since they were poor, very poor in fact?"

They were upset for others' salvation and because they possessed great love towards them all. Already they were taking on the tenderness of teachers. At least they were in such trembling and fear for the whole world from Jesus declaration as to need much comfort.

So what about us? What are we to do in response to the teaching the Gospel reading puts in front of us? Again, from Chrysostom's homily:

If you want also to learn the way and how the impossible becomes possible, listen. He did not make this statement that what is impossible for man is possible for God merely so you could relax and do nothing and leave it all to God. No, he said this so you could understand the importance of calling upon God to give you help in this rigorous contest and that you might ready approach his grace.

Like the disciples in the Gospel, all of us who are in Christ have been called to be witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are each of us called personally by Christ to evangelize the world around. We are each of us called to put the salvation of others at the center of our lives and to prefer nothing else to obedience to our great calling.

So who will be saved?

Only those who make the salvation of others their concern. For most of us our spiritual lives never seem to ever quite get started, or if we start we quickly run out of energy, we stall out. I would suggest that, like the rich young man in the Gospel, this happens because we fail to imitate Christ, we fail to be concerned for the salvation of others. But when we work to advance the Gospel, to bring others not simply to Church, but to Christ in and through the things His Church offers (prayer, fasting, Scripture, the Fathers and above all the sacraments), growth in the spiritual life, peace, love and joy really do become ours even if the circumstances of our lives are not what we would hope.

At the end of Matthew's Gospel (28.19-20), Jesus tells us

Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." Amen.

St John Chrysostom says in his homily (Homily 90) that Jesus "does not scold Peter for his denial or anyone of the others for their flight." Rather, after putting "into their hands a summary of Christian teaching, which is expressed in the form of baptism, he commands them to go out into the whole world."

If we would be saved then, like the disciples and unlike the rich young man, we must be faithful to this final command of Christ.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

Humility and the Worship of God

I served Liturgy this morning with Fr John Steffaro, the pastor of St John the Baptist Russian Orthodox Church in Campbell, OH (about a 20 minute drive from our apartment in Poland, OH). St John's is beautiful church and the congregation both last night after Vespers and this morning after Liturgy was very warm and welcoming.

Before Liturgy this morning I was thinking about how the right worship of God requires humility. As Chesterton points out in the contemporary understanding of humility, humility “has moved from the organ of ambition. . . [and] settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be.” Rather humility is,

largely meant as a restraint upon the arrogance and infinity of the appetite of man. He was always outstripping his mercies with his own newly invented needs. His very power of enjoyment destroyed half his joys. By asking for pleasure, he lost the chief pleasure; for the chief pleasure is surprise. Hence it became evident that if a man would make his world large, he must be always making himself small. Even the haughty visions, the tall cities, and the toppling pinnacles are the creations of humility. Giants that tread down forests like grass are the creations of humility. Towers that vanish upwards above the loneliest star are the creations of humility. For towers are not tall unless we look up at them; and giants are not giants unless they are larger than we. All this gigantesque imagination, which is, perhaps, the mightiest of the pleasures of man, is at bottom entirely humble. It is impossible without humility to enjoy anything -- even pride.

To really worship God, to really have a sense of the enormity and significance of the Christian vocation to send and offer worship to God requires just this willingness to make ourselves small, but in a very particular way. Again Chesterton:

The old humility was a spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working altogether.

The fact is that no matter how hard I try, my worship of God will always fall short of the honor that is His due. This should, or at least isn't meant to, undermine my trying to worship Him, but spur me to try harder, to do more. The poverty of my efforts is meant to be like the experience of thirst or hunger—the poverty of my attempts should increase my desire to worship God like hunger makes me desire food and thirst makes me desire, move towards, water.

For this to happen though, we need to foster in our lives a sense of gratitude not just for the opportunity to worship God, or for our salvation, or our spiritual life, but for life and all the things and people in our lives. Again, Chesterton:

When we were children we were grateful to those who filled our stockings at Christmas time. Why are we not grateful to God for filling our stockings with legs?

Gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.

You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.

In this, Chesterton is simply repeating the advice of St Paul, “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor 10.31). Real humility, a real sense of my inadequacies, doesn't cause me to turn inward on myself—but outward toward God and toward my neighbor.

We get a taste of this wholesome taste of humility in the Akathist Hymn, “Glory to God for All Things” when we sing in the first ikos:

I was born a weak, defenseless child, but Your angel spread his wings
over my cradle to defend me. From birth until now, Your love has
illumined my path, and has wondrously guided me towards the light of
eternity. From birth until now the generous gifts of Your Providence
have been marvelously showered upon me. I give You thanks, with all
who have come to know You, who call upon Your Name:
Glory to You for calling me into being.
Glory to You, showing me the beauty of the universe.
Glory to You, spreading out before me heaven and earth,
like the pages in a book of eternal wisdom.
Glory to You for Your eternity in this fleeting world.
Glory to You for Your mercies, seen and unseen.
Glory to You, through every sigh of my sorrow.
Glory to You for every step of my life's journey,
for every moment of glory.
Glory to You, O God, from age to age.

Humility and the right worship of God are all facets of the experiencing our own contingency, our own absolute dependence on God and our relative dependence on our neighbor, as fundamentally a good thing. In effect, humility and the right worship of God grow out of, and foster, a sense of gratitude, wonder at the gift of our humanity.

The man who cannot embrace with gratitude and wonder his own humanity, his own status as a creature whose life comes to him as a free gift from God, will always lack humility and for this reason never quite rightly worship God.

Because I'm tired, but mostly because he said it better than I could (and he ALWAYS says it better than I could), I'll give Chesterton the last word:

The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful. For example, Mr. Blatchford attacks Christianity because he is mad on one Christian virtue: the merely mystical and almost irrational virtue of charity. He has a strange idea that he will make it easier to forgive sins by saying that there are no sins to forgive. Mr. Blatchford is not only an early Christian, he is the only early Christian who ought really to have been eaten by lions. For in his case the pagan accusation is really true: his mercy would mean mere anarchy. He really is the enemy of the human race—because he is so human. As the other extreme, we may take the acrid realist, who has deliberately killed in himself all human pleasure in happy tales or in the healing of the heart. Torquemada tortured people physically for the sake of moral truth. Zola tortured people morally for the sake of physical truth. But in Torquemada's time there was at least a system that could to some extent make righteousness and peace kiss each other. Now they do not even bow. But a much stronger case than these two of truth and pity can be found in the remarkable case of the dislocation of humility.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory