Category: Mercy

Triodion Reflections – Tuesday in the Second Week

In thine idleness my soul, why art though become a slave of sin? And in thy sickness, why dost thou not run to the Physician? Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the true day of salvation. Rise up and wash thy face with tears of repentance, and make thy lamp burn brightly with the oil of good deeds, so that Christ our God may grant thee cleansing and great mercy.

Matins Aposticha Tuesday in Second Week

O Christ, Thou hast stretched out Thy sinless hands upon the Cross, gathering together the ends of the earth. Therefore I cry unto Thee: Gather together my scattered mind, taken captive by the passions; cleanse me in every part through abstinence, and make me a sharer in Thy sufferings.

The season of the Fast is one of gladness. In shining purity and unfeigned love, filled with the light of prayer and every virtue, with rejoicing let us cry aloud: Most Holy Cross of Christ, that has brought us life and joy, count us all worthy to venerate thee with pure hearts, and grant us forgiveness and great mercy.

Vespers Lord I have Cried Stichera Tuesday of Second Week

When Thou was crucified in the flesh, O Lord, Thou has crucified our fallen nature with Thyself; when Thy side was pierced by the spear, Thou has pierced the serpent that destroyed mankind. Nail my flesh with the fear of Thee and wound my soul with Thy love, that, gazing on Thy Passion, in abstinence I may pass through the appointed time of the Fast, governing not my stomach only, but all the other entrances of sin. Repenting over my past sins, may I offer Thee in sacrifice a humble spirit and a contrite heart. O deliver me from my offenses in Thy love for mankind.

Vespers Aposticha

Get Real for Lent – Father Stephen Freeman

According to St. Basil, God is the “only truly Existing.” Our own existence is a gift from God who is our Creator. None of us has “self-existing” life. We exist because God sustains us in existence – in Him we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28).

Sin is the rejection of this gift of God – a movement away from true existence.

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Much of our attention in the modern world is engaged seemingly with things that have no “true existence.” We engage with illusions, with digital constructs. Our economy allows us to escape the normal necessities such as seasonal scarcity or other mundane concerns. We are increasingly removed from the very environment in which we naturally live.

It is said that astronauts, after spending a prolonged time in space, have lingering effects of zero-gravity. Our bodies are made for gravity and require its constant pull for everything from muscle tone to bone density. But we now live in situations in which many forms of natural “gravity” have been reduced or removed. What effect does the long-term ability to have almost any food at any time of year have on the human body? As someone who has spent the better part of my life at a desk, I can attest to the effect of a sedentary existence. My lower back, my range of motion, the flexibility of my joints are all consistent with the modern white-collar worker.

What effect do such things have on the soul? For the soul requires “gravity” as well. Plato stated in his Republic, that all children should learn to play a musical instrument because music was required for the right development of the soul. We give far too little thought to such things, assuming that no matter what environment we live in, our inherent freedom of choice remains unscathed and we can always decide to do something different, or be something different.

I could decide to run a marathon tomorrow, but I know that the first quarter-mile would leave me gasping for breath and exhausted. You cannot go from 40 years at a desk to the demands of a marathon – just because you choose to do so.

And so we come to Great Lent.

Some see this season of the year as a spiritual marathon. They rise from their sedentary spiritual lives, set off in a sprint and fail before the first week is out. The failure comes in anger, self-recrimination, even despondency.

The first year that I “chose” to fast in the Orthodox manner (it was 4 years before I was received into the Church), the priest I discussed the fast with said, “You can’t keep the fast.” I argued with him until I realized his wisdom.

“Do something easier,” he told me. “Just give up red meat.”

“What about chicken?” I asked.

“Nope. Eat chicken. Eat everything except beef and pork. And pray a little more.”

And so I returned to my Anglican life, a little disappointed that my zeal had made such a poor impression. But my family accepted the proposal and we ate no red meat for Lent. It was, in hindsight, the best Lent my family had ever had. No longer were we musing over “what to give up for Lent,” and instead accepted a discipline that was given to us.

In subsequent years that same priest (who is now my godfather) increased the discipline. And we were ready for it. It is interesting to me, however, that my first experience of an Orthodox fast was being told not to be so strict. The “strict” part was learning to do what I was told. That is sometimes the most difficult fast of all.

Lent is a time to “get real.” Not eating some things is actually normal. In our modern world we have to embrace a natural “gravity” that we could easily leave behind – at least, we have to do this if we want to avoid an atrophy of the soul.

In 2000, the average American ate 180 pounds of meat a year (and 15 pounds of fish and shellfish). That was roughly a third more than in 1959. Scarcity is not an issue in our diet. Our abundance is simply “not real,” and the environment frequently shows the marks of the artificial nature of our food supply. But we have no way of studying what is going on with our souls. What I know to be true is that – as goes the body – so goes the soul. Those who engage the world as consumer are being consumed by the world to an equal measure.

And so we get real.

Getting real means accepting limits and boundaries. Our culture is a bubble of make-believe. It rests on an economy of over-consumption. The crash of 2008 came close to a much greater disaster and could have easily gone into free-fall. Many fail to understand just how fragile our lives truly are. In the season of Lent (and on all the fasting days of the year) we embrace the fragility of our lives. We allow the world to say “no” and take on extra burdens and duties. It is worth keeping in mind that such things do not make us spiritual heroes, first they have to make us human.

Become a Living Icon: Homily for Sunday of Orthodoxy

By Father Phillip LeMaster

At the end of Liturgy today, we will parade around the church carrying our icons in celebration of the Sunday of Orthodoxy, which commemorates the restoration of icons to the church after the period of iconoclasm many centuries ago.  We do so because Icons are not mere works of decorative art to us; they are windows to heaven which remind us that the Son of God really has become one of us, with a visible human body, and that we are called to become like the saints whose images are portrayed in them.   For we are all icons of God, created in His image and likeness.  Jesus Christ is the new Adam  Who has restored and healed every dimension of our fallen humanity, and brought us into the very life of the Holy Trinity.  It may help us to think of Lent as a time to make ourselves better icons of the Lord.

 When we recall the great saints of the Old Testament mentioned in today’s reading from the Epistle to the Hebrews, we are humbled by their faithfulness, obedience, and humility.  But even they “did not receive the promise, God provided something better for us that they should not be made perfect apart from us.”  As hard as it is to believe, we have been blessed beyond them, for God’s promises in Jesus Christ were not fulfilled in their lifetimes; they hoped for what they did not receive, but their lives were still icons of faithful anticipation of the Messiah.  

We live many generations after the New Testament saints Peter, Andrew, and Nathanael encountered Jesus Christ.  And the Lord’s promise to Nathanael, “you shall see the heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man,” is the fulfillment of all the hopes and dreams of the Old Testament.  In Jesus Christ, humanity and God are united; no longer shut out of paradise, we are raised to the life of the Heavenly Kingdom by our Lord.  Our destiny is not for the dust and decay of the tomb, but for life everlasting because of His glorious third-day resurrection.

In Lent, we take small, humble, imperfect steps to open ourselves to this new life in Christ, to become better living icons—living images—of what it means for human beings to share in God’s salvation.  The point of Lent is not to punish ourselves or simply to make us feel guilty, miserable, or deprived.  Instead, the purpose of our spiritual exercises is to help us share more fully in the promise fulfilled in Jesus Christ.  We want His holiness, love, mercy, and blessing to reshape every dimension of our lives, to be evident in how we go through the day, in how we treat others, in what we say, think, and feel.  

And the more we grow in His image and likeness, the more we will become our true selves.  Icons portray particular human beings whose lives have shown brightly with the holiness of God.  The unbelievable truth is that, in Christ Jesus, we may do the same.  No matter our age, health, occupation, family circumstances, personality quirks, or anything else, we too may become living, breathing manifestations of our Lord’s salvation when we open ourselves to His healing mercy through prayer, fasting, forgiveness, generosity to the needy, and all the various forms of spiritual nourishment given through the life of the Church.  

There could be no greater optimism about us than what we proclaim on the Sunday of Orthodoxy.  We not only carry icons, we are icons.  We not only venerate icons, we are called to become living proof of what happens to a human being who enters into the eternal blessedness of God, even as we walk around our parish.  Let this sink in:  What the Old Testament saints hoped for, we possess.  This Lent, let’s take Jesus Christ as His word, and prepare—with humility, persistence, and mindfulness- to “see the heaven open and angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”  For that is the good news of our salvation.       

Come To The Great Canon And Wake Up

Olivier Clément’s book ’The Song of Tears’ begins with this short, powerful chapter that compellingly illustrates how the Great Canon (like the Orthodox Funeral Service) helps awaken us to the reality of our lives. We so often suppress this reality in the busyness of our daily distractions. Awakening to ‘see the reality of our lives in God’ can help us identify these distortions. We are encouraged to embrace the ’mother of virtues’, humility in the Light of this reality. This chapter is full of references to the Great Canon that are italicized and referenced with a parenthesis noting which ode and the specific troparia/verse within that ode. So, the first reference (4:32) is the 4th ode verse 32 of the full version of the Great Canon done in the 5th week of Lent.

Awakening and the Fear of God – Chapter 1 ’The Song of Tears’ by Olivier Clément

Spiritual death, expressed as biological death, secretly eats away at our existence. Yet, by the very intensity of the anguish it provokes, it can set us on the path of awakening. The fickleness of time and the precariousness of an existence in which everything eludes us is something that is repeatedly emphasized by St Andrew of Crete in his Great Canon: The time of my life is short, filled with trouble and evil (4.32); The end draws near, my soul, the end draws near for the days of our life pass swiftly, as a dream, as a flower (4.11); My life is dead, it is petering out and my mind is wounded, my body has grown feeble, my spirit is sick, my speech has lost its power (9.10).

Thus we become aware of a fundamental emptiness and a sense of failure. St Andrew alludes several times to this background of anguish. Feelings of revulsion and yet a melancholic nostalgia take hold of us when we come to realize the hollowness of our preoccupations, the emptiness of the hustle and bustle and the many concerns and preoccupations in which we seek refuge so as to forget our finiteness. My days have vanished as the dream of one awaking (7.20); I speak boastfully, with boldness of heart, yet all to no purpose and in vain (4.33). That is to say, out of a laughable self-importance or, even more tritely, out of the dreary despondency that is so characteristic of our thoroughly nihilistic age. This is argia, the “sloth” or “idleness” spoken of in the prayer that is recited so frequently in Lent, the Prayer of St Ephraim: “O Lord and Master of my life, give me not a spirit of sloth . . .” Argia, say the ascetics of old, begets forgetfulness, one of the “giants” of sin: forgetfulness of God and thus of oneself and of the other in his mystery; forgetfulness of the truth about beings and things—a sort of sleepwalking filled with fantasies in which the soul, as it were, splinters, breaks up, splits into two. It is precisely this dipsychia, this double-mindedness that the Epistle of St James (1.8) describes as the major sin. In fragmenting, the soul falls prey to the demon whose name is Legion (Mk 5.9). The same night that falls perceptibly with the approach of death had long since begun to enshroud our life, rising from the cracks and the chaos: In night have I passed all my life; for the night of sin has covered me with darkness and thick mist (5.1). A layer of filth encrusts the soul, hardening the heart and rendering it heavy and insensitive: I have defiled my body, I have stained my spirit (392). We have a sense of foreboding that maleficent powers are on the look-out, and that in the shadows the Enemy lurks with his perverted intelligence. The Enemy—that deceiver, that beguiler, that separator: 1 Let me not become the possession and food of the enemy, we pray four times in Ode Four (4.32, 34, 35, 36).

Then, a first blessing is given: the “remembrance of death.” St John Climacus advises us — to make the constant thought of death our “spouse.” 2 In the sobering light of this “remembrance,” our conscience begins to awaken, regardless of our conditioning or our instinct for self-preservation. Solzhenitsyn3 has shown how the experience of the camps—where the remembrance of death was inescapable—can indeed awaken the conscience. I am convicted by the verdict of my own conscience, which is more compelling than all else in the world (4.14). For several of the Fathers—Dorotheus of Gaza, for example4—the conscience is like a divine spark. Thus man is judged from within, and with no possibility of appeal, by his own conscience. He then becomes aware not only that he “sits in darkness and the shadow of death” (Lk 1.79), but that in a certain sense he is in hell; for hell, as Origen said, is precisely the burning sensation caused by one’s own conscience. 5

There remains a certain persistent hunger. I am barren of the virtues of holiness; in my hunger I cry out (1.21). There remains a certain desire, though it has been disappointed for so long by the fantasies we have projected onto the wall of our finiteness. And so, the understanding and the heart begin to undergo change. This is the real meaning of metanoia, which is too often translated as “repentance” but which in fact signifies the transformation of our entire grasp of reality. We begin to shake off our torpor, our self-sufficiency, and that habit of perpetually justifying ourselves by condemning others. It is a return to one’s true self, which becomes a return to God and which manifests itself in confession: With boldness tell Christ of thy deeds and thoughts (4.12); Turn back, repent, uncover all that thou hast hidden. Say unto God, to whom all things are known: Thou alone knowest my secrets, O Savior; “have mercy on me,” as David sings, “according to thy mercy” (7.19).

As this awakening becomes more clearly defined, it brings with it a second blessing: the “fear of God.” This is an attitude that has become alien to many Christians today, probably because it happens to have been linked to a terrorist conception of God. Yet it is important to rediscover its deeper meaning, otherwise we risk remaining insensitive to the fundamental tone of the Great Canon. “The holy fathers place fear of God after faith in the order of virtue,” write Kallistos and Ignatius Xanthopoulos. 6 It is not fear that incites faith, as a terrorist approach to the mystery might well imply. Rather, it is faith that elicits fear—fear in the sense of a feeling of metaphysical dread or awe that wrests us from this world. One might mention here Heidegger’s analysis of angst in Being and Time. Angst, he argues, is caused by the awareness of our absorption into this world of futility, banality, and death. A world of “vanity,” says St Paul (Rom 8.20), in a sense that might be described not as ontological but as “non-ontological”: I have wasted the substance of my soul in riotous living (1.21). Angst causes man to distance himself from this world, sensing that “la vraie vie est ailleurs,” as Rimbaud puts it. 7 Yet such anxiety, when provoked simply by an intuition of nothingness, is insupportable; so man attempts to rid himself of it by exchanging it for various cares and fears. Always, adds Heidegger, a fear of something in the world, whereas angst proper is nothing other than our very awareness of being-in-the-world. It is noteworthy, he continues, that once such a feeling has passed, we are only too ready to say, “It was nothing”; for it was precisely this nothing that was causing us anxiety in the first place.

The “fear of God” takes up again this theme of fundamental angst, but now from within the perspective of our spiritual destiny. Thus the fear of identifying ourselves with the mortal way of the world, with the thirst for security whilst all escapes us, with the thirst for happiness whilst death stalks us—this fear now calls into question our spiritual responsibility. It is no longer a matter of simply discovering our closed finiteness, but an awareness of our sin as being a voluntary separation from God and neighbor, as a spiritual torpor, as entailing the risk that we might miss out on our eternal destiny: I have killed my conscience . . . making war upon the soul by my wicked actions (1.7).

It is a fear that implies the existence of a spiritual authority that transcends this world and before which man will be accountable for his destiny, or rather in the light of which his destiny will be judged and which can, from this point on, begin to judge itself. If men were orphans, alone in the world, if they did not have to render an account to anyone for their absorption into the world, their angst would be inexplicable. This outpouring of anguish—Give ear to the groaning of my soul (2.28)—only has meaning if said to Someone. It has no meaning unless it becomes “fear of God.” And whereas a fear of the world debilitates us and causes us to lose our footing more and more, the “fear of God,” born of a spiritual awakening and of faith, fortifies us, enables us to tear ourselves away from being captivated by “idols,” whether they be fears, passions, or cares. We begin to understand that letting ourselves be absorbed into the world results in our overlooking God. We begin to realize that we have stoned [our] body to death with [our] evil deeds, and killed [our] mind with [our] disordered longings (2.31) and that to care only for the outward adornment is to neglect that which is within—the tabernacle fashioned by God (2.19). Thus, between ourselves and the world, a certain distance is introduced. We can no longer bury ourselves in it because we now make sense of our destiny in a light that is not of this world. We understand that our being absorbed by the world risks compromising our eternal destiny, turning us away from God for ever. This fundamental angst that worries us points to a risk with everlasting consequences—the absence of God, hell. That the incarnate God has nevertheless come to seek us out, even in hell—that is something we shall discover later. We must first of all have a sense of what we have been saved from; or simply of the fact that we need to be saved!

I lie as an outcast before thy gate, O Savior. In my old age cast me not down empty into hell (1.13).

I have found myself stripped naked of God, of the eternal Kingdom and its joy, because of my sins (1.3).

Fear of God is the acceptance here and now of that krisis, that judgment by which, says St Symeon the New Theologian, we anticipate the Last Judgment and which enables us to pass beyond it: “In this present life when, through repentance, we enter freely into . . . the divine light, we find ourselves accused and under judgement; but, owing to the divine love and compassion the accusation and judgement is made in secret, in the depths of our soul, to purify us, that we may receive the pardon of our sins. . . . Those who in this life undergo such a judgement will have nothing to fear from another tribunal.” 8

In this way, say the Fathers—and the Great Canon as a whole progresses in this same direction—man passes little by little from impure fear to a fear that is pure. Impure fear is vanquished by humility, trust, and openness to the vastness of divine love. More exactly, it becomes this openness. On the other hand, as St Maximos the Confessor writes, “Fear that is pure . . . is always present even without remembrance of offences committed. Such fear will never cease to exist, because it is somehow rooted by God in creation and makes clear to everyone his awe-inspiring nature, which transcends all kingship and power.” 9

Notes

1Clément is alluding here to the etymology of the New Testament Greek term for the devil: dia-bolos.

2St John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent 3.15. Translation: Ladder of Divine Ascent, C. Luibheid and N. Russell, trans. (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1982), 87. (Section numbers within the steps appear in the English translation published by Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Brookline, MA; these are found in many Greek and Russian texts, and are provided to allow readers to navigate other versions of the work more easily.—Ed.)

3See Olivier Clément’s 1974 book on Solzhenitsyn: The Spirit of Solzhenitsyn, S. Fawcett and P. Burns, trans. (London & New York: Search Press/ Barnes & Noble, 1976).

4See Dorotheos of Gaza, Discourses and Sayings, E. Wheeler, trans., Cistercian Studies 33 (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2008).

5See Origen, On First Principles 2.10.4.

6Callistus and Ignatius of Xanthopoulos, Directions to Hesychasts 1

7. Translation in Writings from the Philokalia on the Prayer of the Heart, E. Kadloubovsky and G. E. H. Palmer, trans. (London: Faber & Faber, 1951), 190. 7Though Clément must have been aware that what Rimbaud actually wrote in Une saison en enfer (1873) was “La vraie vie est absente,” the misquotation is so well known and so often used that he naturally preferred not to amend it. Moreover, it is admirably suited to the present context.

8Quoted in Vladimir Lossky, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1997), 233–34.

9St Maximos the Confessor, Quaestiones ad Thalassium 10.5. Translation in On Difficulties in Sacred Scripture: The Responses to Thalassios, Maximos Constas, trans. (Washington DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2018), 118.

How Is The Humility of the Wise Thief and Harlot highlighted in the Great Canon

Olivier Clement has written a wonderful book entitled ’The Song of Tears’ entirely on the Great Canon. In Chapter 6 , he explores how the Great Canon promotes humility that he describes as ’the basis and crown of all virtues’. In the extract below from this chapter , you will find references to the Great Canon denoted with a parenthesis. The first number will indicate the ode or canticle that is involved and the second the specific troparia verse. This book is another reminder of the depth and majesty of this great work.

By Olivier Clement extracted from Chapter 6 Trust & Humility in ‘The Song of Tears’

It is with the good thief and the harlot that those Orthodox preparing to receive communion identify themselves, as the Prayers before Communion emphasize.

By becoming wholly a being of faith, existing only by his relationship with Christ, man frees himself from his various masks and his pride. He learns humility, which is the basis and crown of all virtue: I have passed my life in arrogance: make me humble and save me (4.4). The soul that is humble lives only by God’s mercy. The ladder of virtues is in fact a descent—a descent into humility, but then “he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Lk 18.14). A saint is simply a sinner who has become fully conscious of the fact, and who is thereby open to God’s grace. In the heroic days of desert asceticism, even the monks with the most abrupt of manners ended by recognizing that all that was needed was humility—in a way that heralds the “little way” of St Thérèse or St Silouan. Do not demand from me worthy fruits of repentance, for my strength has failed within me. Give me an ever-contrite heart and poverty of spirit, that I may offer these to thee as an acceptable sacrifice, O only Savior (9.33). In Step 5 of St John Climacus’ Ladder of Divine Ascent, there is the harrowing description of his visit to the separate monastery of serious penitents called “The Prison”—a voluntary gulag, as it were, for God. Yet it is noteworthy and significant that much later in his book (Step 25), he writes as follows: “In Scripture are the words, ‘I humbled myself, and the Lord hastened to rescue me’ (Ps 114.6); and these words are there instead of ‘I have fasted,’ ‘I have kept vigil,’ ‘I lay down on the bare earth.’”

The fact is that humility assimilates us to that of God himself, to his voluntary humiliation, his great kenosis of love: “Learn from me, for I am meek and lowly in heart” (Mt 11.29). The revelation of God’s own humility touches the proud heart of man, breaks it, and transforms it into a “heart of flesh” (Ezek 36.26). “Let us eagerly follow the ways of Jesus the Savior and his humility, if we desire to attain the everlasting tabernacle of joy and to dwell in the land of the living.” For trust and humility help us become poor in spirit, and it is those who possess nothing whom God can pervade with his joy. Take pity on me, as David sings, and restore to me thy joy (7.18).

The Great Canon’s Call For Us To Return To Our True Home

By Father Lawrence Farley

Every year during Lent we invite into our churches a great pastor, St. Andrew of Crete, and listen while he leads us in a meditation on sin and repentance. That is, we listen while his Great Canon is chanted, and in response we reply over and over again, “Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me!” Some things in this long poetic work might strike some moderns as a bit jarring, if not downright pathological—all this self-flagellation over our sins, this torrent of anguish and self-abhorrence. Is all this really necessary? Is it even healthy?

A quick and superficial perusal of the text might leave us wondering. “There has never been a sin or act or vice in life that I have not committed, O Saviour. I have sinned in mind, word, and choice, in purpose, will and action, as no one else has ever done.” “I have sinned, O Lord, I have sinned against You. Be merciful to me. For there is no one who has sinned among men whom I have not surpassed by my sins.” “From my youth, O Christ I have rejected Your commandments. I have passed my whole life without caring or thinking, a slave of my passions. Therefore, O Saviour, I cry to You: at least in the end save me!” Isn’t all this self-condemnation a bit much? And how accurate is it? Are all those people standing about in church for hours on end in Lent really as bad as all that?

Such questions miss the point of the Great Canon. The long meditation from the pen of St. Andrew is not offered as an individual’s personal confession of sin. It is not intended to be the sort of thing one shares with a psychiatrist while lying on his couch, or with one’s confessor while standing before the Cross. It is not intended as autobiography, but as medicine. Like some medicines, it might seem a little severe, and even taste bitter. But it is exactly the medicine that we need, however it might taste.

The disease the medicine is intended to cure is the one now afflicting large segments of our modern secular population—that of careless and serene self-righteousness. We far too easily fall into the assumption that we are pretty sensational spiritually, and that we have racked up an impressive score. We soon enough become blind to our true spiritual state. We can see others’ sins clearly enough, especially when they sin against us, but our own failings often seem to elude us.

I remember this kind of delusional approach being expressed on the radio one afternoon. A lady was being interviewed about her life and her life choices, and she said that she really couldn’t bring herself to regret anything she had ever done, because all her actions combined to make her the person she was today. Quite the confession! Really—she couldn’t bring herself to regret anything? Ever in all her life? Speaking personally, I can find plenty of things I regret doing, saying, and thinking in the last twenty-four hours, never mind all my life. The interviewed lady seems to reflect a culture in the last stages of the “I’m Okay; You’re Okay” disease. We are just fine spiritually, and we can’t bring ourselves to regret anything we have done.

Into this den of insanity and illness comes St. Andrew of Crete, bearing just the right medicine. We need to hear him, to listen to our conscience afresh, and to submissively receive its inner rebuke. Something inside of us is indeed broken and dark, diseased and dying. By confessing the brokenness, by admitting to the darkness, we can begin to separate ourselves from them, and to find healing and soundness of mind and peace. The World with its lies shouts at us every day, all day long, without ceasing. We need a rival voice, the voice of sanity, a voice calling us home. We need St. Andrew and his Great Canon. Maybe that is why he is so welcome in our churches every Lent.

Full Article

Can reflecting on an individual ode (of the Great Canon) be useful?

Last night we had our first encounter of Lent with the Great Canon of St. Andrew. Let’s examine just one of the nine odes we heard in more depth. Specifically, let’s add the Biblical verses (both Old and New Testament) that support the troparia written by St. Andrew. We’ll just examine and reflect on the 2nd ode.

My hope is that this may strengthen the connection between what we’ve heard and its scriptural support in a way that deepens our acceptance and response to his continual call for repentance while also reminding us of God’s acceptance of us … when we approach Him with the truth of how dependent we are upon His mercy and Grace.

Clean Monday Night 2nd Canon – Great Canon of St. Andrew

He is my Helper and Protector, and has become my salvation. This is my God and I will glorify Him. My father’s God and I will exalt Him. For gloriously has He been glorified. (Exodus 15:2,1; Psalm 117:14)

The Lord is my strength and song, and he is become my salvation: he is my God, and I will prepare him an habitation; my father’s God, and I will exalt him

Exodus 15:2 , 1

The Lord is my strength and my song , and He is become my salvation

Psalm 117:14

Attend, O heaven, and I will speak; O earth, give ear to a voice repenting to God and singing praises to Him.


Attend to me, O God my Savior, with Thy merciful eye, and accept my fervent confession. (Proverbs 15:3; Psalm 33:15)

The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good.

Proverbs 15:3

The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and His ears are opened unto their supplication.

Psalm 33:15


I have sinned above all men, I alone have sinned against Thee. But as God have compassion, O Savior, on Thy creature. (1 Tim. 1:15)

This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.

1 Timothy 1:15


Having formed by my pleasure-loving desires the deformity of my passions, I have marred the beauty of my mind.


A storm of passions besets me, O compassionate Lord. But stretch out Thy hand to me too, as to Peter. (Matthew 14:31)

And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?

Matthew 14:31


I have stained the coat of my flesh, and soiled what is in Thy image and likeness, O Savior.


I have darkened the beauty of my soul with passionate pleasures, and my whole mind I have reduced wholly to mud.


I have torn my first garment which the Creator wove for me in the beginning, and therefore I am lying naked. (Genesis 3:21)

Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LordGod make coats of skins, and clothed them

Genesis 3:21

I have put on a torn coat, which the serpent wove for me by argument, and I am ashamed. (Genesis 3:4-5)

And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

Genesis 3:4 – 5


The tears of the harlot, O merciful Lord, I too offer to Thee. Be merciful to me, O Savior, in Thy compassion. (Luke 7:38; 18:13)

She stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment.

And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.

Luke 7:38 and Luke 18:13


I looked at the beauty of the tree, and my mind was seduced; and now I lie naked, and I am ashamed. (Genesis 3:7)

And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.

Genesis 3:7


All the demon-chiefs of the passions have plowed on my back, and long has their tyranny over me lasted. (Psalm 128:3)

The sinners wrought upon my back, they lengthened out their iniquity

Psalm 128:3


Beginning of Great Lent 2022

Archpastoral Message of
His Beatitude Metropolitan Tikhon

March 7, 2022

To the Clergy, Monastics, and Faithful of the Orthodox Church in America,

Dear Beloved Children in the Lord,

As we stand at this moment, the threshold of Great Lent, with all turmoil and violence unfolding in the world, the Lenten fast comes like a spring breeze to refresh our souls. It is a time during which we take stock of our hearts, discard the unnecessary things of this world, refocus our spiritual vision, and bring our pains and griefs before God’s healing presence.

Even in the midst of everything we endure; a pandemic, social unrest, economic uncertainty, and now war in Ukraine, we must remember to always attend to doing good and becoming ever-brighter beacons of Christ’s light in this darkening world.

We hear this through the Prophet Isaiah, where the Lord tells us what distinguishes our true fast: 

“Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the cords of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?” (Is 58:6)

In this turbulent moment, the Fast is a call to freedom as children of God through our spiritual discipline. In our time, there are many “bonds of wickedness” and “cords of the yoke” which Lent urges us to loose—but above all, the sins which bind our souls.

We also remember that Lent calls us to control not just our stomachs but our eyes, hands, feet, and mind. We avoid gluttony of food, but likewise we ought to avoid gluttony of all sorts: in recreation, media, or conversation with others. As the Scriptures tell us, “Every athlete exercises self-control in all things” (1 Cor 9:25).

This Lent, be especially on guard with social media, which too easily inflames our passions, devours our time, and devolves into the “foolish controversies” which Saint Paul warns us to avoid, “for they are unprofitable and futile” and only disturb our brothers and sisters in Christ (cf. Titus 3:9). 

We are assured in the Letter to the Galatians that “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand fast therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Gal 5:1). With these words we fast with cheerful hearts, because it is in our self-denial that we find freedom in the Resurrection.

So as we take up the spiritual disciplines given to us by our Lord, I pray that it is with a spirit of renewed commitment and not with a spirit of gloominess. Nor should we, as Christ warns, “look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by men” (Mt 6:16). Great Lent is our much needed time of refreshment of the heart and cleansing of the soul, so that we may more clearly perceive the light of Christ on Great and Holy Pascha.

When we each ask God to “open to me the gates of repentance” this Lent, remember that we do not fast to earn God’s love or to impress others around us. Over the next forty days we break the chains of sin and evil by controlling the things which control us—and so become free people. Let us run towards this freedom in the coming weeks.

Beloved children in the Lord, I conclude by directing you to keep in prayer those suffering in the calamity of war: the wounded, the grieving, and the displaced. Please also be of service to them in your charity and almsgiving this Lent. Remember also those who have been killed in this war. May God keep their memory eternal.

I humbly ask your forgiveness. May you have all the blessings of our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ in your Lenten journey.

I remain sincerely yours in Christ,

+TIKHON
Archbishop of Washington
Metropolitan of All America and Canada

The Death of Christ & the Life of Man

By Father Stephen Freeman

Extracted from this full article:

https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/glory2godforallthings/2016/04/15/death-christ-life-man/

What is wrong with humanity, and creation, such that we are in need of anything from God? What is sin?

At its most fundamental level – sin is death. For the wages of sin is death(Romans 6:23). The fact that we die is not a punishment sent to us from God but the result of our having broken fellowship (communion) with God. God is Life and the only source of life. Created things (humanity included) do not have life in themselves, it is not something we have as our possession and power. Rather, life is the gift of God. It is not just our life that is the gift of God – but our very existence and the existence of all that is. God is our Creator. The Scriptures say, “In Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28).

Genesis offers us the story of Adam and Eve in which we hear described their disobedience from God. He had warned them: “Do not eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

Many early commentators on Scripture were careful to note that God did not say, “In the day you eat of it I will kill you,” but “in the day you eat of it you shall die.” Rather we are told: “God did not create death, nor does he delight in the death of the living” (Wisdom 1:13).

St. Athanasius explains that when humanity chose to break its relationship with God (through disobedience) we cut ourselves off from the source of life. However God did not take life from us (He does not take back the gifts He gives) but we removed ourselves from it. And so we die. We not only die physically, but we have a process of death at work in us. St. Paul speaks of this process as “corruption.” This movement away from life and towards death and destruction reveals itself in the many broken things in our lives. We hurt and kill each other. We hurt and destroy creation. We are weak and easily enslaved to powerful things such as drugs and alcohol. We are dominated by greed, envy, lust, anger, etc. We cannot help ourselves in this matter because we do not have life within ourselves. Only God can give us the true life that alone can make us well.

The Answer

Above all else we should remember that “God is a good God and He loves mankind” (from the Orthodox dismissal). This we hear clearly in Scripture: “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

We hear this echoed in the words of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom:

You [God] brought us into being out of nothing, and when we fell, You raised us up again. You did not cease doing everything until You led us to heaven and granted us Your kingdom to come.

This good God who loves mankind is not an angry God. He is not a vengeful God. He does not will us harm or punish us for our destruction. Though the Scriptures use these images, the Fathers of the Church have been consistent in understanding that this language is figurative and should not be understood literally. For instance, St. Anthony says:

God is good and is not controlled by passions. He does not change. Now someone who thinks it reasonable and true to affirm that God does not change, may well ask how, in that case, it is possible to speak of God as rejoicing over those who are good and showing mercy to those who honor Him, and as turning away from the wicked and being angry with sinners. To this it must be answered that God neither rejoices nor grows angry, for to rejoice and to be offended are passions; nor is He won over by the gifts of those who honor Him, for that would mean He is swayed by pleasure. It is not right that the Divinity feel pleasure or displeasure from human conditions. He is good, and He only bestows blessings and never does harm, remaining always the same. We men, on the other hand, if we remain good through resembling God, are united to Him, but if we become evil through not resembling God, we are separated from Him. By living in holiness we cleave to God; but by becoming wicked we make Him our enemy. It is not that He grows angry with us in an arbitrary way, but it is our own sins that prevent God from shining within us and expose us to demons who torture us. And if through prayer and acts of compassion we gain release from our sins, this does not mean that we have won God over and made Him to change, but that through our actions and our turning to the Divinity, we have cured our wickedness and so once more have enjoyment of God’s goodness. Thus to say that God turns away from the wicked is like saying that the sun hides itself from the blind.

There are many Christians who would handle Scriptures in a different manner – but I think they do not listen to the fathers of the Church and interpret Scripture according to their own opinions. In this, I think they are in error and should not be listened to.

This good God, the only Lord and giver of Life, had compassion on us when we fell away and became subject to death and corruption. In His compassion He sent His only Son who became one of us – taking our human nature upon Himself. Uniting us to Himself, He lived a life without sin (for He is Life), and taught us by word and deed the goodness and kindness of God and to become like God by loving even our enemies.

His love was so great, that He extended that love beyond the grave. He accepted death on the Cross, suffering the hatred and evil doings of those around Him.

And here, as we approach Christ’s death on the Cross, it is appropriate to ask, “Why death?”

There are many meditations on the death of Christ. Meditations that see Him as the Paschal Lamb sacrificed for us, as the “Serpent lifted in the wilderness,” and others. Here, temptation sets in and Christians seek to explain Christ’s death by comparing it to their own faulty understandings of lesser things. For it is not the shadow of things to come (Old Testament) that interprets the things to come – but rather the reality (New Testament) that interprets the shadow. It is Christ’s death that gives meaning to every type and foreshadowing and image of that death to be found in the Old Testament.

Thus it is more accurate to say that the Paschal Lamb in the time of Moses is like Christ’s sacrifice, rather than to say His sacrifice is like that which came before. As Christ said of Moses and the Prophets, “These are they which testify of me” (John 5:30).

One of the most common and helpful images in Scripture and the fathers of the Church is the image of Christ’s union with humanity. Christ became incarnate, taking to Himself our human nature. He became what we were, yet without sin. This union should be understood in more than a metaphorical manner. For Christ literally and truly became man. His humanity was not a new creation, but he took flesh “of the Virgin Mary.” He became a partaker of our humanity.

In becoming a partaker of our humanity, Christ opened the way for us to become partakers in His divinity. “For as He is, so are we in this world” (1 John 4:17). St. Paul uses this language as well in his explanation of Baptism:

Do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall also be raised together in the likeness of His resurrection. Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that we should no longer be the slaves of sin (Romans 6:3-6).

This imagery is common in St. Paul:

I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. And the life that I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me (Galatians 2:20).

If you are risen with Christ, seek those things that are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then you shall also appear with Him in glory (Colossians 3:1-4).

These things only make sense because Christ has united Himself to us, and us to Him. We are united to His death and resurrection in our faith and in our Baptism. We become one flesh with Christ. We truly become a part of the Body of Christ.

And this goes to the heart of the answer to the question posed: why did Christ die? Christ died because we were dead. We were trapped in the lifeless death that is sin (which yields corruption and physical death as well). Christ is God who has come to rescue us from our prison of sin and death. He became what we are that we might have a share in what He is. We were created in the image and likeness of God – but our sin had marred us.

We did not inherit guilt and a legal penalty from Adam and Eve. We inherited a world dominated by death. In such a world we behaved as the slaves of sin and sought to live our lives apart from God Who alone is Life. God alone could rescue us from the place where we had confined ourselves. Christ enters death. Christ enters Hades and makes a way for us to follow Him into true life.

In our present life, this true lifeis made present within us in many ways. First, it is made present in our knowledge of God. “This is eternal life, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ Whom Thou hast sent” (John 17:3). We know God and have a true relationship and communion with Him. We also have within us the power to overcome sin. This is sometimes manifest as obedience to Christ’s commandments, and, as God pleases, it is sometimes manifest as physical healing in our bodies (and miracles in creation – Romans 8:21).

If the same Spirit which raised Christ from the dead dwell in you, He will make alive your mortal bodies (Romans 8:11).

The true life of humanity is a common life. It is common in the modern world to think of ourselves only in terms of discreet individuals. But the Scriptures and teaching of the Church bear witness to a common life in which we all partake. Thus, what happens to one of us effects all of us. This commonality is also an important part of our spiritual life and our salvation. The Church in particular is the place where Christians live their common life.

This common life is also the place where we come to understand the references to “Christ’s blood” (since this was part of the question posed). His blood carries a number of meanings. It is His death, His “life poured out for us.” It is also His life given to us in the sacrament of His Body and Blood. His blood cleanses us – just as Baptism cleanses us – for His death destroys death and makes the whole creation new. There are many links between the image of blood in the Old Testament and Christ’s blood in the New. However, it is easy to become overly detailed about his connection and miss the larger point of Christ’s death – by which He destroyed death and gave us eternal life.

There are many voices across the Christian world. Taken together – they are a madhouse of confusion. Confusion and contradiction is the only result of those who listen first to one teacher and then to another. No one will arrive at the truth by such a route.

Instead, I counsel anyone to take up the life of the Church. Be Baptized (or otherwise received into the Church) and stay put. Listen to a godly pastor who lives the Scriptures and respects the fathers of the Church. Those who have built private empires and practice ministries that are in submission to “no one except God” are frauds and live in delusion. They are scandals waiting to happen.

No Church, including the Orthodox Church, ever exists without scandal. But that scandal can be disciplined. True teaching can be found and life in union with the resurrected Lord can be lived.

Adam’s Expulsion From Paradise & Forgiveness Sunday Adult Education Class

This week we face the challenge in the mirror of who Adam is for us and to us. The homilies and reflections I’ve chosen are ones that remind us of a theme we’ve been exploring before … that the judgments of ourselves, our neighbors and God get in the way of His mercy. And is there anything needed more today than His mercy?

Adam’s sin was certainly disobedience but these reflections suggest that his response to his disobedience … his dishonesty in not accepting the reality of his disobedience, his fear that he would be punished and his encounter with shame, his judgement that he should blame Eve and even blame God for giving him Eve , his decision to hide from God instead of to seek God out … that his response to protect what was false and hide from what was true is the ’condition of heart’ that lead Adam away from God. And so it is with us … with the prodigal in us, with the elder son in us, with the Pharisee in us … all real and undeniable in us … truly a mirror of who we are. Our Lenten preparation hopefully now leaves us in the place of humility that Father Thomas Hopko so beautifully describes as ’seeing reality as it is in God’ and with this humility as the ’mother of virtues’ we need as we begin our journey in Lent.

However, this Sunday also moves us from this mirror of our exile to a communal and very tangible expression of reconciliation and forgiveness. Father Alexander Schmemann once again provides us some very useful and practical guidance for why forgiveness is so essential to what we are about to begin in Lent on this Forgiveness Sunday.

This week , I’d also like us to discuss the Lenten ’Prayer of St. Ephraim’ and the wisdom of Archbishop’s Kailistos’s Ware guidance on fasting.

So our class readings this Sunday will include:

  1. How can the lesson of Adam help me accept my sinfulness before God; not justify it?
  2. What is the meaning of Forgiveness Sunday?
  3. Why is the ’Prayer of St. Ephraim’ our Lenten Prayer?
  4. Why do we fast? (Excerpted from Triodion)

Although we won’t have time to go further than these readings, this week a lot of supplemental information was shared that may be useful and relevant to where we find ourselves. These additional articles include: