Fragments for Friday - Let Us Recover the Greatness of the Feast of Pentecost

 

stmaryorthodoxchurch.org

At last Sunday's liturgy, we heard from the ACTS OF THE APOSTLES the following passage concerning the Apostle Paul: "For Paul had decided to sail past Ephesus, so that he might not have to spend time in Asia; for he was hastening to be at Jerusalem, if possible, on the day of Pentecost"(20:16). 

For the Apostle Paul, that would mean a very challenging journey by sea, which always included the threat of storms, shipwreck and/or attack by pirates. But St. Paul was determined to celebrate the great feast of Pentecost with his brothers and sisters "in Christ" in Jerusalem - the home and center of the newly-established Christian Church, now making its impact felt in the Graeco-Roman world of his day.

Pascha and Pentecost were the two major feasts of the apostolic Church.They were powerful communal commemorations and celebrations of the decisive acts that established the Church in the world once and for all: the Resurrection of Christ from the dead, and the descent of the Holy Spirit into the world. 

It would be wonderful and deeply encouraging if we could match the zeal of the Apostle Paul for eagerly anticipating this commemoration and making it as certain as possible that we will also gather together with our brothers and sisters "in Christ" for the Feast of Pentecost. Liturgically, that would mean Great Vespers on Saturday evening and the Divine Liturgy on Sunday morning. 

Pascha, of course, is huge and greatly anticipated; but Pentecost is not. It is treated as a "normal" Sunday, which means most parishioners will be in church (thank God Pentecost is on a Sunday), unless some other "pressing concern(?)" keeps them away without, perhaps, any sense of loss. But the role of Pentecost in the economy of our salvation very much needs to be recovered. Pascha does not simply dissolve into the cares and concerns of our daily lives. It does not just disappear once we no longer sing "Christ is Risen!" Rather, Pascha is completed and fulfilled in the twin Feasts of Ascension and Pentecost.

The descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles is the goal of the paschal mystery of the death, resurrection, ascent and glorification of Christ. We actualize the coming of the Holy Spirit through our liturgical commemoration on an annual basis. 

The Holy Spirit is the energy of the Church. It is the presence of the Holy Spirit in the Church that makes the Church so unique and unlike any other worldly institution. (The Orthodox Church is the "Pentecostal Church"). This is the Holy Spirit with which we were chrismated after our baptism into the Death and Resurrection of Christ. We seek the renewal of the Holy Spirit in our lives on the Day of Pentecost. Here is also the basis of "parish renewal." We pray to God for that personal and communal renewal each year in the special Kneeling Prayers of the Vespers of Pentecost that we serve immediately following the Liturgy. This is all a great blessing.

Looking forward to celebrating the great Feast of Pentecost with the parish faithful!

Coffee With Sister Vassa - SCATTERED, AND YET UNIFIED

This Thursday morning I’m thinking about how divided we are these days, scattered to our own little information-bubbles in a world that we perceive more through the screen of a mobile phone or computer than face-to-face. One might wonder, how can any church-community survive as one, in our Internet Age?

In today’s Gospel-reading our Lord consoles us, that we may have “ good cheer” and peace in Him, even while we go through this “tribulation”: “ Indeed the hour is coming, yes, has now come, that you will be scattered, each to his own,” he says, “ and will leave Me alone. And yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me. These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” (Jn 16:32-33)

Church-unity is not realized by “us,” because we are powerless over “ the world” and cannot overcome it by our own lights, try as we might. God, on the other hand, in His human-divine Son and by the grace of His Spirit, is and always will be One. He offers us one-ness in the Sacrament of Unity that is the Church, in its countless “sacraments” both within and beyond the walls of church-buildings. And by “sacraments” I mean those moments of communion or one-ness with Him, offered to us in various ways in our traditioned faith. It is in Him that we cease to be fragmented, both within ourselves and with one another. His unconditional love for us, and His hope and faith in us, even when we remain scattered, rubs off on us, so to say, when we do not hesitate to reach out to Him and nourish our love, hope, and faith in Him. We can carry His faith, hope, and love into our immediate and online “communities,” by focusing and re-focusing on His presence in our midst.

Let me not just talk or write about this today, but reach out for conscious contact with Him in a bit of healthy reading, contemplation, and prayer sprinkled throughout my day. The unity of the Church is fine, as our Lord reminds us, because He is “ not alone,” remaining the undivided Trinity always, regardless of how many times we scatter into our own little screens and its tribulation(s). “ In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

Coffee With Sister Vassa - WE ARE NOT GOD’S GATEKEEPERS

“All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day.” (Jn 6:37-39)

In the above-quoted Gospel-reading, our Lord Jesus Christ promises us that He does not come into our midst, in the flesh, in order to act as a gatekeeper at the gates of His Father’s kingdom. Christ sees “all” of us who come to Him as a gift from His Father, “given” to Him by the Father, so He will “ by no means cast out” this gift, because it is given Him by the will of His Father. As He so often reminds us in this Gospel, He has come not to do His own will, but the will of Him who sent Him.

Why does the God Man share this point with us so often, that He is doing not His own will (as if it were not sufficient), but that of His Father? I think it's because, as one of us, He is offering us an example of how we, whenever we are called to carry His message, are to perceive ourselves and allthose who might come to Him, via this message that is not from us, but from God. It is easy for us, both personally and collectively, as Orthodox Christians, to slip into carrying ourmessage according to ourwill, rather than His message according to His will. Our own baggage, - personal, ideological, and/or political, can obstruct the way to Him if we lose sight of the fact that weare not called to bring anyone to ourideas and ideologies, but to manifest Christ, Whose power and presence endures beyond all that. “ He must increase, but I must decrease,” as John the Baptist says of the Lamb of God and himself. (Jn 3:30) So let us not fear being “decreased,” as we carry His message today, the message of One who does not cast us out, as we sometimes tend to do to one another.

Monday Morning Meditation - The Fathers of the First Council and the 'Robe of Truth'

Source: uncutmountainsupply.com

 

"Let us look at the very tradition, teaching, and faith of the Catholic Church from the very beginning, which the Lord gave, the Apostles preached, and the Fathers preserved. Upon this the Church is founded." ~ St. Athanasius the Great (+373)

This last Sunday, we found ourselves in between the two great Feasts of Ascension and Pentecost. However, on that Seventh Sunday of Pascha, we also commemorated the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council, held in Nicea in 325 A.D. It is virtually impossible to over-exaggerate the importance of this Council in the life of the Church.

The Council had not only to reject the Arian heresy that claimed that the Son of God is a "creature" and thus subordinate in essence to God the Father; but the Council had to find the right terminology to demonstrate that the Faith of the Church from the beginning believed and claimed that Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of God equal in essence to God the Father (as is the Holy Spirit). Arianism and Orthodox Christianity are essentially two different faiths which is why the Church was at a crossroads in the fourth century. According to C. S. Lewis, the Christian Faith would either become just one more "synthetic/syncretistic religion" of the ancient world, or proclaim the uniqueness of Christ as the eternal Son of God and the Savior of the world. 

The dramatic story of the Council of Nicea has been told and retold throughout the centuries. Not wanting to repeat that story here, I will simply include a link to a good summary found on the OCA website.

Yet, I would like to add a few words about the manner in which we honor the great Fathers of the Church in our liturgical tradition. To do so, I would like to bring to mind the Kontakion of the Fathers that we sang on Sunday:

The apostles' preaching and the fathers' doctrines have established the one faith for the Church. Adorned with the robe of truth, woven from heavenly theology;great is the mystery of piety which it defines and glorifies.

This kontakion is very close in meaning to what we read from St. Athanasius the Great (+373) - one of the leading lights of Nicene Orthodoxy - as quoted above. There is a direct continuity between what the Apostles "preached" and what the Fathers later formulated as doctrines.

This continuity is not simply chronological - it is theological. It was the same Gospel - the same "robe of truth" - without illegitimate subtractions or additions. The Fathers did not change the content of the Faith that they were expressing through their doctrine. They were developing and expanding upon the apostolic preaching for their own times. But the content of the "one faith for the Church" remained identical with itself in this ongoing transmission of the Tradition. (Tradition means that which is "handed down" or "handed over").

The Nicene Creed does not add anything new to what the apostles preached. It rather witnesses to what they preached so as to preserve the Truth in the face of its possible distortion. To do so they had to come up with new formulations of that unchanging Truth. Thus, their bold introduction of the term homoousios to describe how the Son is "consubstantial" with the Father was not something innovative or "creative." It was a necessary development to again preserve that which was proclaimed from the beginning: God became incarnate in order to save us for only God can save. 

In one of his classic articles "The Authority of the Ancient Councils," Fr. George Florovsky brilliantly described the relationship between the apostles and fathers and their respective roles in transmitting the Tradition:

Apostles and Fathers - these two terms were generally and commonly coupled together in the argument from Tradition, as it was used in the Third and Fourth centuries. It was this double reference, both to the originand to the unfailing and continuous preservation, that warranted the authenticity of belief.

On the other hand, Scripture was formally acknowledged and recognized as the ground and foundation of faith, as the Word of God and the Writ of the Spirit. Yet, there was still the problem of right and adequate interpretation. Scripture and the Fathers were usually quoted together, that is,kerygma (proclamation) and exegesis(interpretation).

This is a "heavenly theology" because its ultimate Source is Christ Himself, Who reveals the will of the Father for the world and its salvation. And this is that "mystery of piety which it defines and glorifies," precisely as the apostles preached:

Great indeed is the mystery of our religion:
He was manifested in the flesh,
vindicated in the Spirit, seen by angels,
preached among the nations,
believed on in the world, taken up in glory. (I TIM. 3:16)

We venerate and honor the Fathers within the ongoing life of the Church. To again turn to the same article of Fr. George Florovsky, he further writes:

"Fathers" were those who transmitted and propagated the right doctrine, the teaching of the Apostles, who were guides and masters of Christian instruction and catechesis... They were spokesmen for the Church, expositors of her faith, keepers of her Tradition, witnesses of truth and faith. And in that was their "authority" grounded.

Most glorious art Thou, O Christ our God!
Thou hast established the Holy Fathers as
lights on the earth! Through them Thou hast
guided us to the true faith! O greatly
Compassionate One, glory to Thee!

(Troparion of the Holy Fathers)

Fragments for Friday - The Ascension - The Meaning and the Fullness of Christ's Resurrection

Source: legacyicons.com

 

"I ascend unto My Father, and your Father, and to my God, and Your God.” (JN. 20:17

On the fortieth day after the glorious Resurrection of Christ, we arrived at Ascension Thursday. We celebrated the Feast yesterday morning with the Divine Liturgy, and we enjoyed a  representative body of parishioners present for the Feast - including children and teens. A truly festal celebration! I hope that one and all had a joyous and blessed feast day, and beyond as the Leavetaking is not until next Friday, May 29.

 The Risen Lord is also the Ascended Lord and, therefore, in the words of Fr. Georges Florovsky: “In the Ascension resides the meaning and the fullness of Christ’s Resurrection.” I would refer everyone to the complete article by Fr. Florovsky, a brilliant reflection on the theological and spiritual meaning of the Lord’s Ascension. This article is accessed from our parish website together with a series of other articles that explore the richness of the Ascension. In addition to Fr. Florovsky’s article, I would especially recommend "The Ascension as Prophecy." With so many fine articles on the Ascension within everyone’s reach, I will not offer up yet another one, but I would like to make a few brief comments:

Though the visible presence of the Risen Lord ended forty days after His Resurrection, that did not mean that His actual presence was withdrawn. For Christ solemnly taught His disciples – and us through them – “Behold, I am with you always, to the close of the age.” (MATT. 28:20) The risen, ascended and glorified Lord is the Head of His body, the Church. The Lord remains present in the Mysteries/Sacraments of the Church. This reinforces our need to participate in the sacramental life of the Church, especially the Eucharist, through which we receive the deified flesh and blood of the Son of God, “unto life everlasting.”

Christ ascended to be seated at “the right hand of the Father” in glory, thus lifting up the humanity He assumed in the Incarnation into the very inner life of God. For all eternity, Christ is God and man. The deified humanity of the Lord is the sign of our future destiny “in Christ.” For this reason, the Apostle Paul could write: “your life is hidden with Christ in God.” (COL. 3:3) In his homily on the Ascension, St. Gregory Palamas (+1359) draws out some of the implications of this further:

In the same way as He came down, without changing place but condescending to us, so He returns once more, without moving as God, but enthroning on high our human nature which He had assumed. It was truly right that the first begotten human nature from the dead (Rev. 1:5) should be presented to God, as first fruits from the first crop offered for the whole race of men. 

On account of our sins He was led to death, and for us He rose and ascended, preparing our own resurrection and ascension for unending eternity. For all the heirs of everlasting life follow as far as possible the pattern of His saving work on earth.

Those who live according to Christ imitate what He did in the flesh. Just as He died physically, so in time everyone dies, but we shall also rise again in the flesh as He did, glorified and immortal, not now but in due course, when we shall also ascend, as Paul says, for "we shall be caught up," he says, "in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord" (I Thess. 4:17). (The Saving Work of Christ - Sermons by St. Gregory Palamas, p. 113-114)

The words of the “two men … in white robes,” (clearly angels) who stood by the disciples as they gazed at Christ being “lifted up,” and recorded by St. Luke (ACTS. 1:11), point toward something very clear and essential for us to grasp as members of the Church that exists within the historical time of the world:  “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” The disciples will remain in the world, and must fulfill their vocation as the chosen apostles who will proclaim the Word of God to the world of the crucified and risen Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. They cannot spend their time gazing into heaven awaiting the return of the Lord. That hour has not been revealed: “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority” (1:7). The “work” of the Church is the task set before them, and they must do this until their very last breath. They will carry out this work once they receive the power of the Holy Spirit – the “promise of my Father” - as Christ said to them (LK. 24:49). Whatever our vocation may be, we too witness to Christ and the work of the Church as we await the fullness of God’s Kingdom according to the times or seasons of the Father.

In our daily Prayer Rule we continue to refrain from using “O Heavenly King” until the Day of Pentecost. We no longer use the paschal troparion, “Christ is Risen from the dead …” but replace it from Ascension to Pentecost with the troparion of the Ascension:

Thou hast ascended in glory,
O Christ our God,
granting joy to Thy disciplesby the promise of the Holy Spirit;
Through the Blessing they were assured
that Thou art the Son of God,
the Redeemer of the world.