Category Archives: Homily/Sermon

Homily/Sermon

On the Dormition of the Mother of God

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In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Dear brothers and sisters – How blessed we are, that in His infinite mercy, love and compassion, our Lord, and God, and Saviour, should grant us not only the wonderful and radiant feast of His own Life-Giving Resurrection, but also this triumphant and joyful feast of the Dormition: the falling asleep, resurrection and heavenly Assumption of His All-Pure Mother.

This glorious, second Pascha shows that the mystery of His third-day rising, and glorious Ascension into heaven was not simply for Him by right, as the Victor over Death and Giver of Life, but also the intended gift and calling of all of the children of Adam and Eve, whose flesh He assumed in the salvific mystery of the Incarnation. 

For those baptised into the mystery of His death and Resurrection, the heavenward translation of the Mother of God, is the very meaning of His Incarnation, and the Dormition is the foretaste of what the Saviour mercifully wills and desires for each and everyone of us. 

Speaking of the theosis to which we are called as heirs of the Kingdom, St Athanasius famously declared that, “God became man, so that man may become God”, through adoption and grace (not of course, according to nature). The Dormition is the preeminent passage of humanity – in the exulted person of the Theotokos – into the heavenly life; into the theoria –  the vision of Divine Glory; and into the inheritance, which the Lord has prepared for us.

At the salutation of the Archangel, by the Divine planting of the seed of the Incarnation within the womb of the Most Holy Mother of God, the Only-Begotten Son and Pre-Eternal Word assumed human flesh to open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers, and to call the children of both the Old Israel of the Abrahamic Covenant and the New Israel of the Church to the glory of the Kingdom of Heaven.

But, we may anticipate this salvific moment, and say that the Lord was already affecting His saving Incarnation even before the message of the Archangel was heard, and before the Mother of God rendered humble acceptance to God’s Economy of Salvation.

Was the Lord not already calling us to the same glory of the resurrection and ascension of the Mother of God, when at three years of age she climbed – without any human aid – up the steps of the Temple into the Holy of Holies? 

Was not this physical ascent a sign and prophecy that in the fullness of time, the Theotokos would climb not only into the earthly dwelling place and abode of the Lord Most-High, but also the supra-heavenly sanctuary, of which the haikal of the Temple was but a image and type. 

The earthly infancy of the infant Virgin Mary, instructed by the angels and enclosed within the Temple, was not only a preparation for her calling to be the Theotokos and Mother of our Salvation, but also to stand beside the heavenly throne, far higher than the Mercy-Seat above the Ark of the Covenant, and far more exalted than the cherubim and seraphim.

Had David the King and Prophet not already prophesied, “The Queen didst stand at Thy right hand, arrayed in vesture of gold, adorned in varied colours.” (Psalm 44)

It is through her glorious translation from the sleep of death to heavenly life that the Mother of God was glorified and honoured at her Son’s right hand, like Bathsheba, enthroned at the right hand of King Solomon, as advocate and intercessor of all who would seek the favour of her Son.

But what is this golden robe, adorned with varied colours?

St Gregory Palamas teaches us that, 

“By “vesture wrought with gold” understand her divinely radiant body arrayed with divers colours of every virtue.” ”

It was through her God-centred and sacrificial life of prayer, spiritual labour, and virtue that the Theotokos wove for herself such a glorious and resplendent robe of grace, in which to stand at the right hand side of her Son and Lord. 

By this salvific example, she calls us to emulate her journey, seeing her life of grace and virtue as the sure and certain way to approach the Gates of the Kingdom of Heaven. 

But, today, on this solemn and joyous feast, this must even be the very way in which we approach the celebration of her falling asleep and translation to the heavenly life – coming not only with flowers, bearing candles and incense, but above all approaching her bier with the precious virtues which will weave for us a radiant spiritual robe – adorned with humility, patience, obedience, love, mercy, compassion, and ever jewel of spiritual virtue and grace.

On this wondrous and joyful feast, these are the offerings which will truly please the Mother of God and bring great joy, as our heavenly protectress and intercessor. 

When her tomb in Gethsemane was opened for the Holy Apostle Thomas to bid farewell to her sacred body, he discovered that even though she drank from the common cup of death, the tomb and corruption could neither hold nor contain the body of the All-Immaculate Mother of the Giver of Life.

Thus, having been translated to heavenly life – she has no need for precious perfumes, but rather desires that we draw near to her Dormition with the spiritual perfume of divine grace, anointed and fragrant with spiritual virtues.

Recognising her salvific and guiding example, with the great Palamas, we acknowledge,

“thou art a vessel containing every grace, the fulness of all things good and beautiful, the tablet and living icon of every good and all uprightness…”

…and seeking to reflect this icon of life-in-Christ, we must hasten to her Dormition with prayer, repentance, and desiring above all to live and die in holiness, dedicated to the Lord, fulfilling His will in all things, “wholly
consecrated to God, divinely pleasing unto all…” (Ode 5 of the matins canon). 

Let us not dare to draw near to the Dormition and prostrate ourselves before the plashchanitsa with malice, envy, anger, envy, judgement, hardness, or any spiritual poison in our hearts; not daring to kiss the image of the repose of the Mother of God with judgement, complaining, gossip or words of ill-will upon our lips; not thinking that we can acceptably bring her both the sweet perfume of flowers and the stench of sinfulness at the same time.

Rather, let us approach the Dormition with repentance and the desire to follow in the footsteps of the Theotokos, filled with rejoicing, fortified with hope, and seeking to live lives reflecting her singular devotion, humility and obedience.

“Let us all bow down before her, praying: O Mistress, forget not thy kinship with those who celebrate thy most holy Dormition with faith!”  (Vespers Litia)

Amen.

 

The Call of Mount Tabor

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In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Dear brothers and sisters, greetings for this most radiant feast of the Lord’s Transfiguration, which we must celebrate with all solemnity, seeking to spiritually enter into and comprehend the profound meaning and calling of the Lord’s metamorphosis upon the slopes of Mount Tabor.

We must never underestimate the significance of this feast, on which Tabor became the Mountain of Vision, as the chosen disciples glimpsed the glory and Divinity of the Saviour – hidden beneath His humanity – and we momentarily not only encounter and behold the Saviour as God, but also glimpse the glory of the age to come: the heavenly glory to which we are called as heirs according to His promise.

On this feast Mount Tabor calls us to the radiant vision and a glorious meeting: the meeting of man and God; the meeting of apostles and prophets; the meeting of time and eternity; the meeting of the living and the dead, as the Lord of Life called Elias from the heights of Heaven and Moses from the depths of Sheol; and – in the Transfigured Saviour Himself – the meeting of Divinity and Humanity in the Logos (Word) Made Flesh.

The Mountain of Vision calls each of us to look to greetings for this most radiant and the heights, in an uphill pilgrimage of Faith – to spiritual ascent in the footsteps of the Saviour and His chosen disciples.

“Come”, Tabor says, “Put aside all earthly cares; leave behind the level and easy paths and streets of worldly living. Gird yourselves with prayer and fasting, set your feet upon my slopes, and climb, with the world and its ways behind you.”

“Rise above worldliness,” she calls, “Having glimpsed upon my slopes not only the Saviour’s Divine radiance, but also the glory to which He calls you: the glory with which the face of Moses the God-seer shone after he spoke with the Lord upon the heights of Sinai; the glory into which the prophet Elias rode in the fiery chariot of his ascension; the glory briefly glimpsed by Peter, James and John until they fell down, unable to bear it.”

“Having glimpsed that glory, forget the short lived comforts of the world”, she bides us, “Setting your hopes and aspirations even beyond the glory briefly glimpsed upon my slopes. Look beyond my heights, though they were bathed with heavenly and uncreated light, to seek, rather, the changeless glory of eternity and the Kingdom of Heaven.”

“Climb”, she says, “Even though the labour may tire you, and by your upward steps, ascend to higher things; climbing from temporality and the short lived sorrows and even joys of quickly passing life, into the heights, beyond which lies the eternity glimpsed by the disciples.”

“Forget comfort and possession, treasure or reward, and all that weighs you down,” she counsels us, “To climb my slopes freely, unencumbered, and without burden.”

“And, if you stumble and fall”, she encourages us, “Struggle to your feet, bathe and bind your cuts and wounds, and continue the upward journey, even if battered and bruised, seeking the glory of the Lord.”

And, by doing these things, with the world and its traps and shackles behind us, freed from the captivity of earthly obsessions, the perishing and deceptive hold of power, wealth, fame, popularity, worldly success, and liberated from the short-lived and illusory comforts of purely fleshly and material existence, the eyes of our hearts will begin to open.

Rather than simply beholding life with the material and sensory eyes of earthly existence, we will begin to behold spiritual realities and truths, recognising that not only are we called to be spiritual beings even in our earthly lives, but that the pure in heart, labouring in prayer and repentance, struggling to acquire grace and holiness, will begin to see the true realities of the spiritual realms and spiritual life.

Even during our earthly lives, we must heed the example of the holy apostles and the saints who have made the spiritual journey beyond the limits of this visible, purely material and physical world, so that we may contemplate the things of eternity and the heavenly mysteries that are revealed to the pure in heart.

The radiant glory of the Lord’s Divinity in the uncreated light of Tabor, was not a sudden phenomenon of blinding light, but rather the eternal and abiding glory of the Pre-Eternal Word Made Flesh revealed to earthly men, and it was the opening of the spiritual eyes of the Lord’s companions that momentarily allowed them a glimpse of his Divine glory.

In his homily on the Transfiguration, Saint Gregory Palamas, the great instructor of spiritual truths reminds us that,

“…the initiates of the Mystery, (the disciples) of the Lord at this time passed beyond mere flesh into spirit through a transformation of their senses, effectualized within them by the Spirit, and in such a way that they beheld what, and to what extent, the Divine Spirit had wrought blessedness in them to behold the Ineffable Light.”

Unless we labour to pass beyond flesh and blood, and beyond the earthly and material, reaching out to the Lord and ascending to Him in prayer, struggling to purify body and soul, heart and mind – how can we attempt to follow even in the shadows of Peter, James and John?

We must fast and pray, purifying body and soul, heart and mind, consecrating and raising them to the Lord, heeding St Gregory’s counsel that,

“…what brought forth this blessed sight was prayer, and that the radiance occurred and was manifest by uniting the mind with God, and that it is granted to all who, with constant exercise in efforts of virtue and prayer, strive with their mind towards God.“

Like Peter, the impetuous, we should be stirred to say to the Lord, “It is good for us to be here…”, but we cannot even hope to contemplate the glory of the Lord and the life of Grace unless we have heeded the call to “Lay aside all earthly cares” and left those very cares and concerns behind us and below us in the valleys of the world.

In contemplating the glory of the Lord on Tabor, and seeking the Kingdom of God, it is NOT enough to believe and hope. Rather, we must listen and act, in prayer and asceticism, walking and struggling as children of the resurrection, always following Christ the True Light.

Let us heed St Gregory as he calls us to the illumined path of holiness and faith.

“Let us… strive to be illumined by this Light ourselves and encourage in ourselves love and striving towards the Unfading Glory and Beauty, purifying our spiritual eyes of worldly thoughts and refraining from perishable and quickly passing delights and beauty which darken the garb of the soul and lead to the fire of Gehenna and everlasting darkness. Let us be freed from these by the illumination and knowledge of the incorporeal and ever-existing Light of our Saviour transfigured on Tabor, in His Glory, and of His Father from all eternity, and His Life-Creating Spirit, Whom are One Radiance, One Godhead, and Glory, and Kingdom, and Power, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.”

Make haste to follow the Lord, and lay aside all earthly cares

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A homily preached by Hieromonk Mark in the London Cathedral of the Nativity of the Mother of God and the Holy Royal Martyrs on the 8th Sunday after Pentecost.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Dear brothers and sisters,

In the Gospel pericope for this eighth Sunday after Pentecost we encounter one of two miraculous feedings of the multitudes. Sadly, some antagonists mistakenly conclude that the differences in the two narratives are contradictions which somehow undermine the credibility of the Gospels, considering them to be nothing more than jumbled different versions of some figurative and symbolic storytelling, rather than miraculous, real and salvific events.

However, the Gospels are actually quite clear that these are separate miracles, and though they are loaded with layers of profound symbolism, they are not some sort of figurative myth or parable. The feeding of the five thousand recorded in all four Gospels, and the feeding of the four thousand, recorded in Matthew chapter 15, are separate, distinct, historic, miraculous events.

The fact that both centre on the common theme of the distribution of loaves and fishes, need not worry us or indicate any confusion of events, given that this was standard street food of the time, and we learn from St John’s record of this miracle that the loaves were barley loaves, cheap and rough peasant food, available on any street corner, carried as a packed lunch by ordinary people.

As we contemplate the events that unfold before us, it is often the case that we rush forward to the miracle itself. However, we can profit by spiritually contemplating the people themselves, and asking ourselves how we could and should be like them.

We should recognise that the inconvenience and the lack of preparedness and planning in this episode essentially stems from the fact that at the end of the day – quite literally – the physical hunger of the people was a consequence of their spiritual hunger in following the Lord into the wilderness to press Him to teach them, and be spiritually nourished by the Gospel, for though St Matthew speaks only of the healing miracles performed by the Lord, St Luke’s wrote that “He received them, and spake unto them of the Kingdom of God”, and St Mark is clear in recording that the Lord was teaching and instructing the multitude: feeding them spiritually, even as they began to grow weak, hungry and tired from lack of physical sustenance.

And, as the day went on and they began to hunger and grow weak, we might say that they were already fulfilling the Lord’s teaching, recorded by the Evangelist Matthew, “Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink… But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” To repeat, St Luke’s tells us before performing this great miracle, that He spoke to them of that very Kingdom.

In the lack of provisions and preparedness of those following and listening to Jesus, we might even say that they were already embracing the spirit of the Cherubic Hymn, in laying aside all earthly cares to encounter the King of All, and in doing so took no thought for bodily sustenance as they followed the Saviour into the wastes and wilds.

Even as the Lord was seeking solitude after the death of his kinsman, John the Baptist, the spiritually hungry crowds were seeking words of everlasting life, following him in great droves as news of his retreat into the desert spread rapidly by word of mouth.

They already knew the pressing news of the moment, that Herod had executed the Forerunner, and perhaps even sensed what the Church Fathers touch upon: that the Lord was escaping from Herod’s blood lust and paranoic fear, “because His hour was not yet come”.

Blessed Theophylact of Ochrid instructs us, “Jesus departed on account of Herod’s bloodthirstiness… For if Herod had seized Jesus, he would have attempted to kill Him…” and those who followed the Lord, must have been aware of this danger, knowing and understanding that Jesus was being watched and observed, suspected by the collaborationist Jewish powers, despised as a threat to the religious status quo, to the authority of the Sanhedrin and the Temple, and the authority of the Pharisees and the rabbis.

Already in the preceding chapters of Matthew’s Gospel, we have encountered the Saviour opposed by the Gerasenes after exorcising the demoniac man who lived in the tombs; accused of blasphemy for proclaiming the forgiveness of sins; attacked for healing on the sabbath; the accusation that the He cast out devils by the power of Beelzebub; and the fourth chapter of the Gospel has already set the scene, in telling us that already, “His fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto Him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatic, and those that had the palsy; and He healed them. And there followed Him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judaea, and from beyond Jordan.”

Those who hungered at the end of the day, having listened to the Saviour’s preaching, and seen their loved ones healed, were part of this tide of humanity, and they most likely knew that not simply their association, but their determination in following Him into this desert place, to hear His teachings, could easily be considered heretical and seditious, but any associated danger did not put them off or dull their determination.

As St John Chrysostom comments, “but so the multitudes do not withdraw themselves from Him, but they follow, riveted to Him, and not even John’s tragic end alarmed them. So great a thing is earnest desire, so great a thing is love; in such wise does it overcome and dispel all dangers.”

Love and spiritual desire caused these crowds to forget all thought of food, all concern about hunger, all personal need.” They were already heeding the Saviour words, “Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? …for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.” (Matthew 6:31, 33)

And, when we come to the miracle itself, the location of this wondrous act, far from settlements, markets, vendors and food would provide no occasion for accusation or doubt.

St John Chrysostom stresses that, “He leads them into the wilderness, that the miracle might be very far beyond suspicion, and that no one might think that any village lying near contributed ought to the meal.”

There is no easy answer to this hungry situation: no market sellers, no road-side food. The multitudes are totally reliant on the Lord’s intervention, through the self-same compassion which led the Him to heal those sick and possessed they brought to Him.

He was, of course, already well aware of the situation when the disciples came and said, “This is a desert place, and the time is now late; send the multitude away, that they may go into the villages, and buy themselves food.” And when He said to the disciples, “They need not depart; you give them to eat”, He was equally well aware that there was nothing more than five rough loaves, little more than bread rolls, and two small fish, possibly salted opsaria, a garnish of a few bites, little more than sprats.

What did the disciples and the crowds think as He gave instructions for the organised seating of the people, ready to be fed, in groups of hundreds and fifties, according to the Evangelist Luke?

They had already seen Him work miracles and heal the sick. Just in the preceding chapters of Matthew we have encountered the healings of the leper, of the centurion’s servant, of Peter’s mother-in-law; the calming of the storm on Lake Galilee; the restoration of two demon-possessed men; the forgiveness and healing of the paralyzed man; the raising of a sick girl; the healing of the woman with an issue of blood; and, the healing of a blind man and a mute.

All were ready for miracles, indeed, they had seen miracles that very day in the healing of their sick, but we might say that this present miracle stands out, looking both backwards and forwards, in as much as this it is one supremely manifested in sharing and fellowship, a sign of the New Covenant, even as it echoes the old.

The mention of the Passover season in St John’s account, gives us a hint of the exodus, and the Lord’s provision of heavenly manna to sustain the Israelites in the wilderness, just as the Lord feeds the multitude in this latter day wilderness, but in this shared meal with the ancient eucharistic symbols of bread and fish (the fish subsequently becoming a symbol of the Lord, Himself) the shared experience of grace points forward to the future sacred fellowship of the Church.

This miracle and all of the previous ones that had established the Lord’s reputation as a wonderworker, are signs of Him, not only as sustainer of all, but as Creator Who, “looking up to heaven, blessed, and broke, and gave the loaves to his disciples, and the disciples to the multitude.”, so that not only are people fed, but they are full, and not only are they full, but there are twelve baskets of leftovers. We should be neither uncomfortable in the face of sceptics, nor surprised, the Pre-Eternal Word, Who created heaven and earth and all that therein is, performed a great creative act in order to feed the people.

As in the history of creation, “in the beginning”, He could have performed this miracle, ex nihilo – from nothing – but the depth of the miracle’s meaning lies in the fact that the Lord performs this miraculous act using the ridiculously little that humanity had to offer in this isolated and deserted place.

When the Lord was in the wilderness, being tempted after His baptism, even the devil – in testing Who He was – suggested that He could make bread out of stones, but, here, the Lord performs the miracle using whatever little the people have to offer. As such, humanity is in its own tiny and almost ridiculous way a participator in the great wonder performed.

From an embarrassingly small offering the Lord created far more than was needed, and whilst not doubting the historicity of the miraculous event, this should encourage us to see a far broader spiritual depth and meaning in the Lord’s wondrous works, as we recognise and understand that whatever each of us has to bring the Lord in the offering of our lives may be seemingly unspectacular and lack-lustre, yet our Lord and Creator is able to make something truly wondrous and spiritual significant, if we offer ourselves and our gifts to Him in humility, in willingness, selflessness and faith. We, as poor chaff filled barley loaves, and small fry of little significance, can be transformed and created anew by the Lord, according to His plan, purpose and will.

But for this to become possible, reflecting on the Gospel of this wondrous miracle, we must be determined and fearless in our willingness to not only follow the Lord, but to pursue Him to ends of the earth and the end of our earthly days, ignoring all threats and dangers, overcoming all inconveniences and obstacles, zealous to hear His life-giving words, seeking to be made whole, to be touched by His Divine Grace, and in so doing be able to offer ourselves and all that we have into His hands as our Creator, Fashioner, and our God.

And when, every day, we pray, “give us this day our daily bread”, we must do so with total faith in the Lord’s power to give us everything we need, even to do what is seemingly impossible, never doubting His providence, mercy, and incomprehensible and immeasurable love, through which He gives far more than we could ever merit or deserve.

Amen.

O blessed doubt of Thomas!

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The same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side… But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the LORD. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son of the Holy Spirit.

Dear brothers and sisters, we have observed so many times before, how harsh a judgement Thomas often receives for his refusal to believe in the Saviour’s resurrection, and insisting that he should not only see, but also physically, and tangibly encounter the Sacred Wounds of the Risen Lord.

But whilst his reputation as “Doubting Thomas” has entered everyday speech as the epitome of doubt, the Church Fathers and the mind of the Church have been far from condemnatory regarding Thomas’s skepticism.

The great Alexandrian Church Father, St Cyril, warns us not to idealise the reaction of the other disciples, as though it was somehow solid and blameless. For St Cyril, Thomas represented the uncertainty of the whole company of the Apostles, but he was the only one with the courage to actually express their confusion and doubt:

“For though of Thomas alone is recorded the saying: Except I shall put my hands and see the prints of the nails, and put my hand into His Side, I will not believe, yet was the charge of lack of faith common to them all; and we shall find that the minds of the other disciples were not free from perplexity, though they said unto the holy Thomas: We have seen the Lord.”

To repeat, “…yet was the charge of lack of faith common to them all; and we shall find that the minds of the other disciples were not free from perplexity…”

The Church has recognised Thomas’s voice as not only the unexpressed doubt of the other disciples, but rather as a doubting and questioning voice on behalf of the whole of humanity, of which future generations in the centuries of growing skepticism and declining faith would demand the ‘scientific’ and empirical knowledge that Thomas demanded: “Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.”

At vespers, in the hymns on “Lord, I have cried…” the Church expresses the Saviour’s welcoming of Thomas’s doubt, hearing Him welcome the investigation of His life-giving wounds, saying, “because thou hast disbelieved, all have learned of My Passion and resurrection…”

At the very time of His resurrection, the All-Knowing Lord knew the doubt and denial of generations to come, and how Christian orthodoxy would give way to liberal falsehood that, even as it masquerades as Christianity, denies the reality of the empty Tomb, and the physicality of His Third-Day Rising from the dead, resulting in heretical and perverted neo-gnostic attacks on the physical reality of the incarnation and of the Saviour’s Third-Day resurrection.

The Saviour’s answer was the blessed GIFT of Thomas’s doubt, and the disciple’s courage in demanding to touch the Wounds on the Lord’s Divine-Human Body.

Thus, we are all blessed, confirmed in Faith and are beneficiaries through Thomas’s skepticism and caution, as reflected in St John of Damascus’s seventh ode of the canon of the feast, in which he wrote,

“Thomas the Twin, who alone was bold, and who by his unbelieving belief hath brought us benefactions, doth by his believing unbelief dispel gloomy ignorance from all the ends of the earth.”

(Еди́н дерзну́вый, неве́рною же ве́рою /облагоде́тельствовавый нас Фома́ Близне́ц, /реши́т у́бо мра́чное неве́дение всех конце́в,ве́рным неве́рствием…)

In the fourth ode of the same canon, St John expresses His firm belief that the Saviour rejoiced in Thomas’s doubtful exploration of the Sacred Wounds,

“Thou didst rejoice when Thou wast examined. Wherefore, O Lover of mankind, Thou didst encourage Thomas in this (Ра́дуешися испыта́емь, / те́мже,Человеколю́бче, на сие́ повелева́еши Фоме́…) and didst show Thy side unto the disbelieving one, thereby assuring the world of Thine arising on the third day, O Christ.” (Fourth Ode)

Wheras the Risen Saviour warned St Mary Magdalene, “Touch me not.” He actively invites the apostle to do so: “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.”

The Church Fathers are approving and affirmative in their assessment of Thomas’ doubt.

St. Gregory the Great says that, “Thomas’s unbelief has been more useful than the faith of the other apostles because by believing through touching the wounds, he strengthened faith and banished all doubt”, and St John Damascene represents Thomas’s unbelief as “the mother of belief for us” (ве́ры роди́тельное нам показа́л еси́… ) and touching on the question of the Faith of future generations, St Cyril of Alexandria wrote,

“I think that the disciple’s want of faith was extremely opportune and well-timed, in order that, through the satisfaction of his mind, we also who come after him might be unshaken in our faith that the very Body that hung upon the Cross and suffered death was quickened by the Father through the Son.”

What incredibly important words.

St Cyril also says, “We… are taught, through the slight want of faith shown by the blessed Thomas, that the mystery of the Resurrection is effected upon our earthly bodies, and in Christ as the Firstfruits of the race; and that He was no phantom or ghost, fashioned in human shape, and simulating the features of humanity, nor yet, as others have foolishly surmised, a spiritual body that is compounded of a subtle and ethereal substance different from the flesh.”

Thomas’s doubt is a blessing and a gift to the Church of all future generations, to say that not only was the Saviour truly God and truly Man, but that His humanity was not a temporary incarnational instrument, to suffer on the Cross, to lie in the Tomb, but then to be cast aside because redemption was completed.

Rather, His rising confirmed that Christ remains Incarnate, the Theanthropos (the God-Man), and that even though He established a New Passover – the Pascha of the Lord – in the resurrection He would not even abandon the wounds upon His Body, but on the contrary would take these supreme marks and wounds of love into the Heavenly Kingdom in His Ascension, and that in this, He would call humanity to follow Him into the Heavenly Kingdom, as the destination of the resurrection.

St Cyril teaches us that Thomas’s blessed doubt reminds us that not only was the Risen Saviour “…no phantom or ghost, fashioned in human shape, and simulating the features of humanity, nor yet, as others have foolishly surmised, a spiritual body that is compounded of a subtle and ethereal substance different from the flesh..”

St Thomas is the apostolic voice that removes ambiguity, doubt and uncertainty, and with him we can say, “I believe in the resurrection of the body”: in both the spiritual and physical resurrection of the Saviour – the God-Man – as with the apostle we look to the Risen Saviour and say, “My Lord and my God.”

Confirmed by his doubt, his questioning, his exploring hand, we have no need to look upon the wounds of the Saviour, to inspect the marks of the nails, to place our fingers in His wounds, or our hand in His wounded side.

Because of Thomas’s witness to the reality of the Risen Lord, we have no need for scientific and empirical proof, realising and understanding that spiritual knowledge is just as potent, real and powerful as scientifically quantifiable fact.

In the Beatitudes we chant, “Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God…” and the heart of the believer, as the centre of our spiritual being, is the noetic organ and means by which we attain to the spiritual knowledge that does not need to prod, poke, inspect and investigate, placing spiritual reality under the magnifying glass.

When we encounter the Lord meeting the disciples on the road to Emmaus, it will not be through speech, conversation, or even vision that they will recognise the Risen Lord, but it will be through the spiritual movement of their hearts in the breaking of bread that their bodily eyes are opened to the reality that Christ is Risen.

As we hear in Luke’s Gospel, “When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”

Through drawing near to the Risen Lord, day by day, in this Paschal season, praying to Him in the power of the resurrection, constantly chanting the Paschal Canon and Hymns, the power of the resurrection must fill our hearts with light and spiritual warmth so that we too will know – purely by faith – that Christ is risen from the dead; trampling down death by death; and bestowing life upon those in the Tombs. And, we believe not only in the Lord’s Third-Day Rising, but crucially in the future physical as well as spiritual resurrection of everyone who has come into this world, throughout every century and generation, “…they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.” (John 5:29).

And… as we look for the resurrection of the life of the age to come, let us rejoice in Thomas’s blessed doubt, joining our voices with the voice of the Church in praising God for the truth that Thomas has daringly confirmed:

“O how praiseworthy and truly awesome is Thomas’ undertaking (Canon, Ode 5.) For daringly he touched the side that doth flash forth with the lightning of the divine fire (Canon, Ode 8). The Twin doth fill the world with wisdom and knowledge (Canon, Ode 4).”

 О вои́стинну похваля́емаго Фомы́ стра́шнаго начина́ния! Твое́ неудо́бное сокро́вище, утае́ное нам отве́рзе Фома́…(Canon, прему́дрости и ра́зума наполня́ет мир Близне́ц.

Christ is Risen! Христос Воскресе! Amen.

The Annunciation and the Divine Peace

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In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. 

On such a beautiful day, under blue Welsh skies, bathed in sunlight and surrounded by the new green leaves of spring, by blossom and birdsong, it is so easy to forget that in some parts of the world, our brothers and sisters are celebrating this feast of the Annunciation not to the sound of nesting birds and neighbours mowing their lawns, but rather to the sounds of sirens, gunfire and explosions. Yet, wherever there are Orthodox parishes and people, the feast will be celebrated, bringing light and hope to the suffering faithful as they celebrate the conception of the Saviour as the hope of the nations, Who brings light in the darkness, and to Whom we pray for “the peace from above.”

In the Imperial City, the Emperor and Equal to the Apostles, Saint Constantine built the temple of ‘Agia Irini, the Church of the Holy Peace, dedicated not to the Holy Martyr, but to the Divine Peace, for which we pray in every Liturgy.

This feast of the Annunciation inaugurates that Divine Peace, in the reconciliation between fallen humanity and God, and not only between heaven and earth, but even between the heavenly heights and the depths of Hades holding the righteous dead of the Old Covenant, who were held captive there. 

In his verse homily on ‘The Descent of the Angel’, the great Syrian Father, Jacob of Sarugh celebrates the Annunciation as the peace treaty made between God and humanity, and between heaven and earth.

In the conversation between God’s ambassador, the Taxiarch Gabriel and the Theotokos as the representative of the entire human race, Mar Jacob sees the restoration of “the peace from above”, that will become Incarnate in the Person of the Saviour, the God-Man, the Theanthropos, who will be the living sign of this reconciliation and the peace treaty that will be signed with His Blood, sealed by His last breath, with the words “It is done!” The earthquake and eclipse of Great Friday, and the tearing of the Veil of the Temple will be the heralds of this peace like no other, even as He descends into Hades and shatters its gates, and the chains and shackles of death, bringing light to those in darkness and raising his ancestors-according-to-the-flesh in his own resurrection.

This peace treaty begins today, as the Theotokos, after listening to the message of the Archangel, gives her consent to the plan and will of God, as she humbly says, “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.”

Hidden from the eyes of the world, the Prince of Peace came to dwell within her Ever-Virgin womb, and though the Cross, the Invincible Trophy and Weapon of Peace (Kontakion of the Cross) was far off, the new Life hidden within womb of the Mother of God was already the Bridegroom going to His voluntary Passion, as we describe Him in the services of this Holy and Great Week, and the meaning of this Passion, of the Cross, the nails, the spear and death was to establish “the peace from above, and the union of all”, for which we pray in the Litany of Peace.

This “peace from above” is not the cessation of earthly conflict, be it war in Europe, Palestine, the Middle East, or any corner of the world. It is realised in the end of the enmity caused by the rebellion of man against God, the conquest and vanquishing of hell and death, the reconciliation of creation with the Creator, of man with God, and of children with their Heavenly Father.

Though man may fight against man, regime against regime, nation against nation, the reality of this Divine Peace cannot be changed, and when the Risen Saviour appeared to the Apostles, His first words (the deeper meaning perhaps not apparent or obvious) were, “Peace, be with you!”

Even now, as we pray for earthly peace, and for those (including the relatives of our own parishioners) who suffer the losses, pains and vicissitudes of war, let us celebrate the Divine peace-treaty made this day, and contemplate the words of the divinely inspired, Jacob of Sarugh.

The Descent of the Angel

The Watcher had descended while Mary was standing in prayer;

he gave her the greeting which was sent to her from the Most High:

‘Peace to you Mary, blessed one, our Lord is with you;

Blessed are you and blessed is the fruit of your virginity.’

Then when she heard it, she was prudently reflecting

On what might be the cause of this unusual greeting.

The Watcher said: ‘Do not be afraid, O full of mercy,

The Lord has chosen you that in your virginity you might be his Mother.

‘Behold from this time you will solemnly conceive;

you will give birth to the great One whose Kingdom is without end.’

Mary said: ‘How then will what you say happen

Since man has never been known to me, how will I bring forth?’

‘You have announced a Son to me but I am not conscious of marital union;

I have heard of nativity but I see no marriage.’

That moment was full of wonder when Mary was standing,

Conversing in argument with Gabriel.

One humble daughter of poor folk and one angel

Met each other and spoke of a wonderful tale.

A pure virgin and fiery Watcher spoke with wonder:

a discourse which reconciled dwellers of earth and heaven.

One women and the prince of all the hosts

Had made an agreement for the reconciliation of the whole world.

The two had sat between heavenly beings and earthly ones;

they spoke, attended to and made peace for those who were wroth.

Maiden and Watcher met each other and conversed in argument on the matter

Until they abolished the conflict between the Lord and Adam.

That great strife which occurred amidst the trees

came up for discussion, and it all came to an end; there was peace.

An earthly being and heavenly one spoke with love;

the struggle between the two sides ceased, and they were at peace.

+

Surrounded by the violence, the madness, and the conflict of the world, may the Divine Peace make its home within our hearts and minds, as we abandon ourselves into the embrace of God’s love, Love which become a Person and was Incarnate in the womb of the Virgin-Mother on this Great Feast, as “the crown of our salvation, and the manifestation of the mystery that was before the ages.”

This mystery is the pre-eternal wonder of God’s ineffable, immeasurable, and sacrificial love: the love that came like the father of the prodigal son, to search for us when we were lost and estranged in spiritual exile, and took on human flesh when a young mother in Nazareth surrendered herself to God’s will, and said “yes” to becoming His instrument of reconciliation and the peace between heaven and earth.

Let us try to forget disagreements, arguments, conflicts, the negative memories of the past, and struggle to love and forgive, however hard that may be, so that we may aspire to “the peace from above”, however difficult our struggle may be.

We must pray continually, seeking to continually forgive, continually asking for forgiveness, confessing our weakness and insufficiency, and creating (by humility) a place within our hearts for that peace to make its sacred home.

Unless we at least try to do this, this feast and all it represents will have no meaning, resonance or spiritual significance in our lives.

Amen.

Christ is Born! Nativity Greetings.

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Dear brothers and sisters: Christ is Born!

As we celebrate the feast of the Lord’s Nativity, we contemplate the Lord’s birth in the darkness of the night, and like the shepherds and magi, as they draw near to the new-born Saviour, we are surrounded by great darkness, though it is a spiritual and moral blackness that envelops us in our lives.

As I reflected in my homily, the icon of the Nativity shows the Infant Lord and His manger before a gaping black hole, a cosmic spiritual void and mouth of hell… the entrance to the depths of spiritual darkness, devoid of God and hope.

Darkness surrounds the Nativity, and in the icon, we see both shepherds and wise men journeying through the night: the former arriving from the near locality and the latter ending a longer and more perilous journey.

For us it is not the darkness of the night sky, in which the magi watched the stars, or the physical darkness of the Judaean night in which the shepherds watched for wild animals or thieves, guarding their flock by the comforting defence of their nighttime fire, but spiritual-darkness, uncertainty and fear that surrounds us.

Not wolves and lions, but a myriad of spiritual dangers and forces wait to attack us on every side, and we face so many pressures, worries and anxieties in everyday life. But, though we may not be able to change the exterior spiritual darkness of our confused world, it is for each us to decide whether to be watchful and vigilant, to seek the Light of the World, new-born and laid in the manger, or to abandon ourselves to the danger-filled blackness of the spiritual night.

Through this darkness, the Lord calls out to us, “Fear not!” and it is the Incarnate Saviour, Himself, who has become the messenger/angelos that brings the tidings of joy and true peace, possible in the hearts of the faithful, even in the most terrifying, violent and threatening of times.

It is the Saviour Himself who has become the day-star from on high, guiding us through perils and dangers, and dispelling the fearful shadows for those who seek Him and rejoice in His birth.

Knowing that He remains Emmanuel – God-with-us – we are called to rise up and hasten to Him, to bow down and worship Him, and like the shepherds and magi, to put aside everything that previously seemed important and pressing.

The magi left behind all that was familiar, secure and comfortable, in order to seek Truth, willing to face risks and dangers to arrive at the place where they would find that Truth and offer Him their gifts as they bowed down and worshipped Him.

The shepherds willingly left the light and security of the fireside and the protection of the sheep-fold to stumble through the darkness to search for the Light of the World.

Like them both, we must struggle through the night to bring not only the gifts we have, however great and noble, or more likely poor and humble, as well as our anxieties, problems and fears, and to forget the darkness and danger that surrounds us as we behold the Saviour and long-awaited Messiah, and contemplate the wonderful fulfilment of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the LORD is risen upon thee.” Let us then heed the words of the Apostle Paul to the Ephesians and, despite the darkness of the world, “live as children of light.”

Amen.

A Homily On The Lord’s Descent Into the Jordan

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In the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Dear brothers and sisters, greetings as we celebrate the Baptism of Our Lord, and God, and Saviour, Jesus Christ!

The celebration of the Lord’s Baptism, is central not only to our Christian year, but to the very fabric of our Orthodox spirituality, and our understanding and experience of God’s immanence through His sanctification of creation and the gift of His grace.

Whilst the focus of the Christian west on the Lord’s Cross and passion constantly overlooks His baptism, we Orthodox Christians joyfully and enthusiastically celebrate the Theophany in the Jordan as a crucial act in the Saviour’s redemptive work, and which the Church Fathers saw as central to the economy of salvation.

Whilst the Lord’s Cross and passion is the altar of His sacrifice, His descent into the Jordan and baptism by John, is the mystery by which humanity is reclothed in the robe of glory, which Adam wore of old, but lost through his rebelliousness and disobedience.

Theophany is Christ’s baptismal calling to us, through which both individual Christians and their corporate totality, the Church, are betrothed to Christ the Bridegroom, Who mercifully deigned to come to find that which was lost.

St Jacob of Sarug uses Adam’s name and person to represent the whole human race, and in his surviving homily on the Lord’s baptism, He poetically places words into the Saviour’s mouth, as He speaks to John of His baptism being crucial to His descent, incarnation and redemptive mission.

“Our Lord said, “I am not lacking, but in one thing: the recovery of Adam who was lost by me is sought by me.

Allow me to descend to seek Adam, the fair image, and when I shall find him, the whole of my desire will be fulfilled…

In this recovery my desire will come to perfection,

because Adam is needed by me to enter into his inheritance.

Therefore, allow me to descend to cleanse the image that has become faded…”

We are struck with the fact that the Creator’s immovable and unfading love for humanity is such that it impels Him to search and to save.

Having created Adam and Eve as not only the apex of creation, but as the primary recipients of His absolute and all-perfect love, that love demands that humanity is cleansed, and that the divine image and likeness is restored in God’s lost sons and daughters.

How daring to suggest that even though He lacks nothing, the divine will of salvation is manifested in the Saviour’s voluntary “need” to seek the lost, to restore the inheritance of eternal life to his fallen children.

Christ’s descent into the Jordan is an integral part of this restoration of Adam (humanity), and a foreshadowing of His descent into Hades.

This is reflected in the hymns of the feast, in which water is the symbol of spiritual chaos and a place of unrestrained forces, and darkness that mirrors Hades.

In ode four, the second canon of matins speaks of this, and significantly celebrates Christ’s descent into Jordan as not only for the deliverance of humanity, but for the redemption of ALL creation.

“That He might bring His own back to the life-giving pastures of paradise, the Word of God falleth upon the lairs of the dragons, and destroying their manifold snares, he assaileth him who hath bruised all mankind, and, imprisoning him, delivereth creation.”

As He is immersed in the Jordan, in a reversal of the normal spiritual operation of baptism, Christ Himself sanctifies the waters, as they are cleansed by Him, and He establishes the Baptismal Mystery as the rebirth and regeneration of those who follow Him, in the establishment of spiritual order and harmony and the subjugation of chaos and lawlessness.

Just as Christ came down from heaven at the Annunciation, to enter the womb of the Mother of God, so by His descent, the waters of Jordan, become a womb in which humanity is born anew through baptism in the Name of the Trinity, Which is gloriously made manifest as the Only-Begotten Son ascends from the waters, the confirmatory voice of the Father is heard from heaven, and the Holy Spirit descends in the likeness of a dove.

In the verbal iconography of his metrical homily, St Jacob portrays Christ speaking of fallen humanity:

“I am making them enter into the moist womb, so that it will conceive them / and give them the new birth without birth pangs.”

Through the consecration of the Jordan through the Lord’s descent into its waters, the font becomes the spiritual womb in which new life in Him is conceived, as we the faithful are reborn as a new-creation through our joining to Him: in our descent into His death and our ascent in the power of His Resurrection.

Even before the great commission, in which the Lord charged the Apostles to preach to all nations, baptising them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, our baptism was established and sanctified by His own baptism for our sake, and for our salvation.

As St John Chrysostom reminds us, a significant difference between the baptism of John and that established by the Lord in His consecrating entry into the waters, is that the Jordan calls us not only to a baptism of repentance, but to baptism of new life in Christ.

As the third ode of the canon tells us,

“The Master draweth to Himself the divinely fashioned nature of man, which had been overcome by the tyranny of greed; and He restoreth mortal men, granting them a new birth, and accomplishing thereby a mighty work; for He is come to cleanse our nature.”

Our very human nature should be changed by the Mystery of Baptism, and our post-baptismal self should be that of a person radically changed by our mystical descent into Christ’s death, and our ascent in the power of His resurrection, which later sealed the inner meaning of this Holy Mystery, as He went to His voluntary passion.

We should each have put off the old man, to be reclothed in glory, having “put on Christ”, and this glorious Theophany should call us to reflect upon whether this is truly the spiritual reality of our lives, particularly for those who were baptised in infancy and are unable to remember life before their baptism.

As those betrothed to Christ through baptism, and as children of His resurrection, do we really seek to live as a new creation, with lives spiritually and morally set apart from the fallenness, brokenness and dysfunctionalism of the world?

If we find ourselves lacking, then enlivened, fortified and raised up by this glorious Theophany, we must rouse ourselves to action, repentance and newness of life – blessed and set aright as we share in God’s sanctifying grace, partaking of the Holy Water blessed upon this feast, mindful that at its sanctification, we have prayed…

“That these waters may be sanctified by the power, effectual operation and descent of the Holy Spirit…

That there may descend upon thse waters the cleansing operation of the super-substantional Trinity…

That He will endue them with the grace of redemption, the blessing of Jordan, the might, operation, and descent of the Holy Spirit…

That the Lord God will send down the blessing of Jordan and sanctify these waters…

That this water may be unto the bestowing of sanctification; unto the remission of sins; unto the healing of soul and body: and unto every expedient service…

That this water may be a fountain welling forth unto life eternal…

For those who shall draw of it and take of it unto the sanctification of their homes…

That it may be for the purification of the souls and bodies of all those who, with faith, shall draw and partake of it…

That He will graciously enable us to perfect sanctification by participation in these waters, through the invisible manifestation of the Holy Spirit, let us pray to the Lord.”

Take heed to the last petition!

We are not idle bystanders, but are called to be participators in this feast; to not be onlookers, but to spiritually stand on the banks of the Jordan as we enter into the cosmic spiritual renewal to which the Church calls us each and every year.

Let us be in awe, that the Creator of the land, the rivers and seas, the sun, moon and stars, of the angelic hosts and the race of men should humble Himself beneath the hands of the Forerunner for the healing, restoration and raising up of each of us.

Let us be in awe, that the worship of the Trinity should be made manifest in the glorious Theophany of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit together.

Let us fall down in humility, penitence and the fear of God, filled with awe that in this feast we have truly seen that “God is the Lord,and hath revealed Himself to us!” calling us to rush to the renewal of Jordan in our temples and parishes and partake of His Grace!

With the fear of God and Faith draw near!

Amen!

On the Feast of the Circumcision of Christ

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Troparion, Tone I: O Jesus, Who in the highest dost sit with Thine unoriginate Father and the divine Spirit upon a fiery throne, thou wast well-pleased to be born on earth of Thy Mother, a Maiden who knew not man; wherefore, thou wast circumcised as a babe eight days of age. Glory to Thine all-good counsel! Glory to Thy dispensation! Glory to Thy condescension, O Thou Who alone lovest mankind!

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

As we celebrate the eighth-day circumcision of the Infant Saviour, we see His merciful willingness to suffer for us, even as a new born child whose innocent blood is shed in His self-emptying and self-denying humility.

Thus, we behold not only the reality that the Only-Begotten Word has been made man, clothing Himself in human flesh, born in Bethlehem and laid in the manger, but we see that within the first days of His earthly life, He willed to be subjected to pain and the shedding of blood – a fore-shadowing of His Cross and Passion, even though His earthly birth was so few days ago.

He suffered even in His infancy precisely because He chose to become incarnate – showing that His flesh and blood, and human nature are not an illusion and mere semblance of humanity, but that as the New Adam, He is truly clothed in Adam’s flesh, by which – as Lamb of God – He will redeem us by that same precious blood, restoring His image in the first-parents and the subsequent generations of those who follow Him.

Moreover, as the seed of Abraham, whom He not only created, but called from Ur and promised that he would become the father of a multitude, He conforms Himself to the circumcision that He Himself, as Yahweh the Lord, demanded of Abraham and his descendants.

The God-man, subjects Himself to the Law which He, Himself has given!

The Saviour Who will be obedient to the death of the Cross, is obedient to the Covenant He Himself established with the great patriarch, of whom He would later say, “Before Abraham was, I am.”

What paradoxes we see.

He Who created Adam and Eve, lies as a helpless Child to be circumcised with the shedding of blood and the pain of fleshly suffering.

He Who visited Abraham at the Oak of Mamre and promised him a son, not only becomes his child in the flesh, but subjects Himself to the sign of His human descent from the father of the covenant.

He Who spoke to Moses from the Burning Bush, and gave him the Law upon Sinai is now speechless as a babe – the Eternal Logos without words in the silence of submission to the Law.

He Whom Ezekiel saw borne upon the heavenly chariot-throne, seated upon the four-faced cherubim, and the wheels-within-wheels, full of eyes, is now circumscribed within the body of an eight day old child, borne in the arms of Joseph, a vulnerable baby before the knife of circumcision.

Just as the Incarnation itself is a scandal to the impious and infidels of the world, so this circumcision is also a scandal to the world, but its shocking reality is a demonstrative sign of God’s condescending and limitless love, and a challenge to modern day Docetism – that heresy which denies the Incarnation, reducing the Lord to a spiritual being with the mere appearance of a human being, nothing more than spectral avatar, whose flesh is nothing more than a symbol.

No! This feast shouts loudly that Christ’s humanity is real, as He bleeds human blood, just as He would on Golgotha.

It also challenges the sickly, saccharine, Victorian “Away in a manger”sentimentalisation of the Incarnation and Nativity, by contrasting it the with the vocation of the Word made flesh, Who came to be a sacrificial Lamb and sheep for the slaughter, and with the spiritual violence of Golgotha, the conquering of hell and the victory of the Cross.

The real baby who bleeds on the eighth day, will grow up to be the Redeemer of mankind Who bleeds upon the Cross, shattering the gates of Hades and opening the gates of heaven not only to the children of Abraham, but to all of the sons and daughters of Adam and Eve, as heirs of paradise and children of the promise.

With the circumcision of the Infant Saviour, and the shedding of His blood, the journey of redemption and the Way of the Cross begins.

O Jesus, how precious is Thy blood!

Amen.

Restoring Adam’s Robe of Glory

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From St Jacob of Sarug’s poetic contemplation of the Nativity: The Archangel Gabriel speaks to the Mother of God of the restoration of Adam’s glory, as Christ comes to redeem and perfect the robe of humanity.

“I am not stripping you of your glory, as happened in the garden;

I have brought a cloak so that you can cover your forefathers who was stripped bare.

I am not weaving for you a garment of shame from leaves.

I have brought a garment of glory for Adam to be clothed in it.

My Lord is true and I am announcing the truth to you

and since you asked me, “how will it happen?” hear and understand.

The Holy Spirit will come to you in a holy manner

And the power of the Exalted One will abide upon you lovingly.

The Fashioner of babes will fashion for him a body in you and clothe himself (in it);

The Unbegotten Son shall be conceived in your virginity.

The maker of the world’s interweaves a garment in your pure womb

and prepares himself a cloak of flesh on the web of your womb.

The power of the Exalted One will abide upon you while not being belittled

and from your purity he will take a body to become a man.”

 

The Victory of the Holy Martyrs

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In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

This tenth day of the Nativity Fast is blessed by the double celebration of two Great-Martyrs – St Catherine of Alexandria and St Mercurius – who both lived during the first age of martyrs, resisting the paganism of the Roman Empire with the light and truth of Christ.

As an aristocrat and the daughter of the Roman consul of Egypt St Catherine was a product of the learning and culture of Hellenic antiquity. Educated to the highest standards of the classical world, she mentally outstripped even the greatest philosophers engaged to debate with her, when she disgraced her father’s house by not only rejecting the most learned, desirable and richest suitors – including the Emperor Maximian himself – but by publicly declaring her Faith in Christ, her only suitor and bridegroom.

Given over to the authorities by her own father, St Catherine learned the brutal truth of the Lord’s words in today’s Gospel for the martyrs, “You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death.”

Rejecting all of the temptations of marriage proposals and worldly comforts, defeating the “wisdom” of the pagan philosophers, her unshakeable, steadfast and immovable faith in Christ sealed her fate and the victory of Christ in the martyrdom following her placing her own head upon the executioners block.

St Mercurius, who lived a half century earlier, gained the reputation of being an outstanding, celebrated soldier, but this was not enough to protect him from the Roman laws against Christianity, after the emperors Decius and Valerian issued a law ordering all Roman citizens to worship the pagan gods and condemning Christians to death. 

As yet unknown as a Christian, St Mercurius proved himself a great leader in the Roman war against the Barbarians, for which he was made a military commander by the Emperor, placing him in an ever more noticeable public position in Roman society.

Mercurius refused to participate in the mandated offering of sacrifices to the pagan gods, and was summoned before the emperor. But he was neither threatened nor daunted by this, and openly declared himself a Christian, throwing down his soldier’s belt and mantle at the emperor’s feet, repudiating his military honours and his place in Roman society.

For this rebellion, the Great-Martyr was stretched over fire and lacerated with knives. So great were the cuts and lashes to his body that the blood from his wounds extinguished the flames. Yet after each bout of tortures, when his tormentors threw him back into the prison close to death, the Lord granted Saint Mercurius complete healing. 

These continued miracles showed the impious pagans not only God’s power, but also the power of the Great-Martyr’s faith in Christ.

Having been condemned to death, St Mercurius was granted a vision of the Lord, promising him a quick release from his sufferings, granted by his beheading at Cappadocian Caesarea, after which his body exuded myrrh which healed the sick.

How foolish and weak these great saints must have seemed to the Romans who mocked, tortured and martyred them… just the latest Christians consumed and seemingly destroyed by the death-machine of the pagan Roman Empire. Had the Romans kept statistics, they would have seen the sheer numbers of Christians martyrs as the evidence of the futility and uselessness of Christianity. Yet, the death of every martyr was another nail in the coffin of classical pagan civilisation, for every martyrdom was the victory of Christ over the earthly manifestation of the Kingdom of Satan.

In the same way the death of every new-martyr of the Soviet yoke brought the end of Communism and the collapse of the Iron Curtain closer. The blood of the martyrs was lethally poisonous to the Marxist system, just as that of the first martyrs was to paganism.

Every martyrdom and the passions and miracles that preceded the death of the saints not only manifested the power of Christ, but drew countless pagans into the net of His Gospel, confirming the words of the Gospel: “You will be brought before kings and rulers for My name’s sake. But it will turn out for you as an occasion for testimony.”

When St Catherine broke the torture-wheel, rather than being broken by it, the empress Augusta, the imperial courtier Porphyry and a vast number of soldiers confessed their faith in Christ, sealing their own martyric fate, and further hastening the crumbling demise of pagan Rome. The historian Lactantius declared that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church, but the self-same blood was also deathly poison to paganism.

The Faith and courage of the martyrs awoke those imprisoned in the darkness of paganism, declaring what we have heard from St Paul’s letter to the Ephesians:

“Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, And Christ will give you light.”

The courage, unshakeable faith and example of the martyrs must also call us to arise from our spiritual sleep and our worldly complacency.

Since the first age of martyrs, the Church has seen wave after wave of recrimination: from heretics, from Muslims, from Communists, from politicians. 

In the 20th century and beyond, in the new age of martyrdom and renewed persecution for the faithful of the former Soviet block, the Balkans, the Christians of the Holy Land and Islamic regimes, believers quickly shared in the experience of the faithful of the Old Israel, described by St Paul in his letter to the Hebrews:

“There were others who were tortured, refusing to be released so that they might gain an even better resurrection. Some faced jeers and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were put to death by stoning; they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated –  the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the earth.”

The twentieth century saw believers shot, drowned, burned alive, frozen to death, starved, buried alive, tortured to death, thrown from cliffs. In Gulags, prisons, concentration camps, gaols, political headquarters, and even hospitals and childrens’ homes, the KGB, Securitate, Ustashe, Stasi, Islamists, Zionists, and various terrorists have continued the assault of hell against Christianity, but all in vain, as the gates of hell cannot possibly overcome the Church.

On the back of the systematic persecution of Orthodoxy in Ukraine by the agents of western powers, we see the demonisation of Orthodoxy in the western world itself, with propaganda attacking coming from political elites in the USA, from the Czech government, and in the Baltic states.

We see the storm clouds gathering and know that persecution could be on the horizon for believers who thought this could never happen in western democracies, and never happen to them, calling us to now heed the Lord’s words, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness…”

But, all those living the Christian life are continually called to wrestle against worldy powers in living according to the Law of God.

In doing so, we must be close to the matyrs, by reading their lives, praying to them, seeking their help, and keeping heir memory alive by sharing it, so that those their steadfast examples of courage, faithfulness and strength may encourage us and others in the Faith, helping us to remain strong and resilient in defending Christian truth and being willing to face the consequences of confessing Christ and he Gospel. Perhaps, in the future, our own experiences will be held up as a testimony.

This can only be possible with dedicated Christian living, founded on prayer, spiritual life and struggle. We must head the words of St Paul to the Ephesians and “Put on the whole armour of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.”

Not all of the martyrs were military saints, as indeed St Mercurius was, but they were all spiritual warriors, and we are all called to be so, not only those who suffer for Christ, but ALL believers in simply LIVING for Christ. We are ALL called to “take up the whole armour of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand”

We are ALL ordered “gird your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace.”

We are ALL commanded “take the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And…the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

This is our call to spiritual arms in a dedicated, active Christian life, whether our future vocation will be to sufferer for Christ, or not, as we are called to be witnesses and to resist acquiescence to the world.

Because we believe; because we have hope; because we have faith and know that Christ has already gained the victory, even though it is daunting, we need not fear, but rather “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”

His might was shown in the victory of the martyrs, and by submitting our lives to Him, we can allow His might to be shown in us, who not only love the martyrs, but seek to imitate them in their righteousness and holiness.

Holy Great-Martyrs Catherine and Mercurius, pray to God for us!

Amen.