The Baptist, The Forerunner, The Friend of the Bridegroom

 

 Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

Yesterday, August 29, we commemorated the Beheading of St. John the Baptist. The scriptural text read at the Liturgy was MK. 6:14-29; and we also find the gruesome narrative in MT. 14:1-12. The evangelists relate the story in a way that sharply contrasts the righteousness of St. John and the utter decadence of Herod Antipas' court, beginning, of course, with his wife Herodias and her daughter Salome. St. John, the ascetic, prophet and voice "crying in the wilderness" was raised up by God to announce the coming of the Messiah, but also to denounce any unrighteousness that arrogantly ignored the Law of God. Herod Antipas was an example of that unrighteousness, unlawfully married to his brother's wife, and surrounded by a sycophantic court. Beyond that, the image of the young "dancing girl" receiving St. John's severed head on a platter and then presenting it as a "gift" to her mother, must remain one of the Bible's most brutal images of total moral depravity. Created in the "image and likeness of God," human beings, both male and female, are capable of sinking deep into the abyss of unrestrained evil. Here is a striking reminder that the gift and responsibility of human freedom can degenerate into subhuman license, wherein "everything is permitted."

Yet, perhaps it will prove to be more fruitful to turn our attention elsewhere. We call St. John "the Baptist" and "the Forerunner." These titles are meant to identify his unique and important ministry in relation to Jesus, "the Coming One." At a time when prophets and prophecy had seemed a thing of the past in Israel, God sent forth St. John to preach a baptism of repentance that would prepare the people of Israel for the advent of the Messiah, who would be Jesus of Nazareth. St. John cast his prophetic teaching in the fiery and apocalyptic language that has created an enduring image of him as the stern prophet of the impending judgement of God:

"You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits that befit repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." (LK. 3:7-9)

In addition to this, though, St. John anticipated the ethical ideals of Jesus about how we need to treat our neighbors with equity and compassion ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"):

" He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise." Tax collectors also came to be baptized, and said to him, "Teacher, what shall we do? And he said to them, "Collect no more than is appointed you." Soldiers also asked him, "And we, what shall we do?" And he said to them, "Rob no one by violence or by false accusation, and be content with your wages." (LK. 3:11-14)

Eventually, then, in fulfillment of his role as Forerunner and Baptist, St. John recognized the Lord when Jesus approached the Jordan River and "allowed" Himself to be baptized by St. John. Once he identified Jesus as "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" (JN. 1:29), St. John began to "decrease" so that the Lord may "increase." This attests to the great humility of St. John. This is his "kenotic moment." And this kenosis ("self-emptying") will culminate in his beheading; as Christ's kenosis will culminate on the Cross. We have St. John's own witness to this in the words recorded by St. John the Evangelist:

"He who has the bride is the bridegroom; the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice; therefore this joy of mine is now full. He must increase but I must decrease." (JN. 4:29-30)

Although we have given St. John the appropriate titles of "Baptist" and "Forerunner," he refers to himself as the "friend of the Bridegroom." At a wedding, all attention must fall upon the Bridegroom and the Bride. A true friend will never usurp that attention, but will carefully act in such a way as to ensure it. Only a false friend will act otherwise. Christ is the Bridegroom and Israel, the Church or the human soul is the Bride. As a "friend of the Bridegroom," St. John is loyal, trustworthy, and ever-ready to serve. As a true friend, he will accept a position of vulnerability for the sake of that friendship if need be. He rejoices simply to stand near Christ and hear His voice. In fact, as a friend his joy is "full." What a blessing it is to arrive at the fullness of life and joy in one's vocation, even in the awareness of the great "price" one must pay for that fulfillment! Indeed, St. John the Baptist and Forerunner of the Lord paid the full price for being a friend of the Bridegroom.

As "friends" of Christ - "You are my friends if you do what I command you" (JN. 15:14) - how wonderful to be able to "rejoice greatly at the bridegroom's voice" as did St. John. When we serve in a parish, as a priest, a member of the parish council, a church school teacher, or in any of the various ministries of the parish; it is essential that our role is to serve the Bridegroom as a true "friend," always perfectly willing to "decrease" so that all attention is given to the Bridegroom - Christ - so that He may "increase" in the minds and hearts of the parish faithful. There is no room for egosim and unhealthy vanity. In the presence of the Bridegroom it would be unseemly to draw attention to ourselves at the expense of His saving, healing and transforming presence. All of that is indicative of a shallowness and "self-love" that has no place in the presence of Christ. If "among those born of women, none is greater than he" (LK.. 7:28), then St. John remains the truest image of faithfulness to God, genuine humility and of that friendship that Christ offers to all of us.

St. John, Forerunner and Baptist of the Lord, pray to God for us!

Fr. Steven

 

On Joy and Worship: Two Guest Reflections

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

A couple of "guest reflections" for today...

_________ 

First, Dan Dake wrote a fine observation based on a passage from  Fr. Alexander Schmemann's Journal:

This morning I read in The Journals of Father Alexander Schmemann 1973-1983:

 

This morning during Matins I had a ‘jolt of happiness,’ of fullness of life, and at the same time the thought: I will have to die! But in such a fleeting breath of happiness, time usually ‘gathers’ itself. In an instant, not only are all such breaths of happiness remembered but they are present and alive – that Holy Saturday in Paris when I was a very young man – and many such ‘breaks.’ It seems to me that eternity might be not the stopping of time, but precisely its resurrection and gathering. The fragmentation of time, its division, is the fall of eternity. (75)

 

This theme emerges again and again in his journals. Joy! Happiness! Vibrancy of life! It can seem unrealistic or, at least, inaccessible for the more ordinary among us. But I began to question this assumption. Fr. Schmemann does not seem extraordinary in the sense that he has moments of joy, moments of happiness, moments of the kingdom breaking into what we might otherwise call ‘the mundane.’ We all have these moments from time to time. What makes him different, then, I wondered? And then it struck me. Fr. Schmemann does not merely notice these breaks of joy, he cherishes them. He puts them down in his journal, he recalls them to mind. He dwells on the particular fragrance of a purple azalea. He relishes the ruckus of his grandchildren and their vibrancy of life. He savors the pleasure these moments of joy supply. In short, he attends to whatever is lovely, good, and pure, to whatever is a manifestation of the kingdom of God.

By this complex act of attention, he creates within himself a ballast of the kingdom. He bears through whatever storms, trials, and tribulations confront him because he has stored up the treasures of the kingdom of God within himself. These weights bear him into the joy of the kingdom. They are a ballast of joy.

_________

And from Jenny Harkins, a parish "neophyte" who entered the Church just last Sunday. Jenny has taken on St. Mary of Bethany as a patron saint and Communion name. In honor of St. Mary, Jenny wrote the following fine "Prayer Poem:"

 

 

My prayer poem:

St. Mary of Bethany, holy sister of hours past, 

May the posture of my heart ever echo Your devotion at the Master's feet, My gaze as yours, fixed on His, In every face I meet.

Strong and steady, may I bear His living torch Long into the night, Pray my bent-will be broken and a fragrant offering of worship rise, Humble and contrite. 

Like your abandoned adoration in the broken Alabaster jar, Let me love our King extravagantly, no depth or Length too far,

His pouring down, mine welling up In a circle ever growing, An unbroken fountain of love ever fresh Overflowing

May our union splash and soak and save the lost,
Pray I keep the oil burning for our Bridegroom’s returning, No matter what the cost

And sweet sister, as you wept for your brother With our Lord, please pray for mine: A spiritual resurrection into Kingdom light!

 

The Dormition of the Theotokos - Celebrating a 'deathless death'

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

"What a drag it is getting old." - Rolling Stones

"All we are is dust in the wind." - Kansas

"Life's a long song, and the tune ends too soon for us all." - Jethro Tull

"Neither the tomb nor death can hold the Theotokos." Kontakion for Dormition

"A Christian ending to our lives, painless, blameless and peaceful ... let us ask of the Lord."

 

 

We are preparing to celebrate the Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos with Great Vespers on Saturday evening and the Divine Liturgy this coming Sunday morning.

In the center of the church will be placed the tomb with a beautiful icon of the Mother of God in blessed repose to be venerated by the faithful. (This icon will remain in the tomb which will be put back in its normal spot in the back of the church, where everyone can venerate the image until the leave-taking of the Feast on August 23). We will also bless flowers at the end of the Liturgy, adding beauty to the Feast as we did last week with our fruit baskets at Transfiguration.

Dormition, of course, means "falling asleep," the Christian term par excellence for how we approach the mystery of death. And here we further approach the paradox, from a Christian perspective, of death itself - the "last enemy" - that causes great anguish and grief; but yet which now serves as a passage to life everlasting, and thus a cause for festal celebration in the death of the Mother of God. For the Virgin Mary truly died, as is the fate of all human beings; and yet "neither the tomb nor death could hold the Theotokos" who has been "translated to life by the One who dwelt in her virginal womb!" Without for a moment losing sight of the reality of death (notice the weeping apostles around the body of the Theotokos on the Dormition icon), from within the Church we can actually celebrate death during this "summer pascha" because of the Resurrection of Christ.

Thus, the Feast of the Dormition clearly raises the issue of death and dying, and what we mean by a “Christian ending to our life.” For the moment, though, here is a challenging paragraph from Fr. Thomas Hopko about some of our own misconceptions – basically our fears – that often find us wandering far from an Orthodox approach to death and dying:

I believe that the issue of death and dying is in need of serious attention in contemporary Orthodoxy, especially in the West, where most members of the Church seem to be “pagan” before people die and “Platonists” afterwards. By this I mean that they beg the Church to keep people alive, healthy, and happy as long as possible, and then demand that the Church assure them after people die that their immortal souls are “in a better place, basking in heavenly bliss” no matter what they may have done in their earthly lives. — From Christian Faith and Same-Sex Attractions, p. 89, note 2.

 

To add a bit more to this, here is a passage from Bp. Ilarion Alfeyev, that reinforces the Christian understanding – and hope – that accompanies us at the moment of death:

For the non-believing person, death is a catastrophe and a tragedy, a rupture and a break. For the Christian, though, death is neither a catastrophe nor something evil. Death is a “falling asleep,” a temporary condition of separation from the body until the final unification with it. As Isaac the Syrian emphasizes, the sleep of death is short in comparison with the expectant eternity of a person. — From Orthodox Christianity, Vol. 2, p. 496.

 

St. Gregory of Nyssa states this Christian hope with clarity:

By the divine Providence death has been introduced as a dispensation into the nature of man, so that, sin having flowed away at the dissolution of the union of soul and body, man, through the resurrection, might be refashioned, sound, passionless, stainless, and removed from any touch of evil. – Great Catechetical Oration, 35.

 

This is precisely why we can call the Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos, “pascha in the summer!” The Virgin Mary and Theotokos died a “deathless death.” Now we will again have the opportunity to participate in this mystery in the celebration of this event as nothing less than a Feast. 

There is a real contrast in how the secular world and the Church approaches death and dying. It is essentially a clash of worldviews. At some point in our lives we consciously or unconsciously answer the question: "Is this all there is?" (Also the title of a truly excellent book by the German theologian, Gerhard Lohfink). Even though we are members of the Body of Christ, we often enough approach the mystery of death with the same fear and apprehension as found in non-believers. I think we need to admit that. And the COVID pandemic has further brought this out. Yet, even the apocryphal accounts of the Mother of God facing death, do not cover up her own apprehensions. But if we are in the Church for reasons that go beyond merely assuaging those fears for some kind of psychological serenity, then our faith "sees" beyond those very fears and brings us to the Risen Lord and the promise of "everlasting life."  The "deathless death" of the Mother of God is a further pledge of this enduring promise.

 

Cultivating the Image of Divine Beauty

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

We continue to celebrate the Transfiguration of Christ, with the Leavetaking of the Feast on Friday of this week. Just a few last thoughts before we get there.

 

The mysterious presence of Beauty is revealed on Mt. Tabor in an overwhelming manner when Christ is transfigured there resplendent in divine glory. This is the beauty of the first-formed human creatures, created to reflect the beauty of the divine nature, for by grace they - and we - were created in the image and likeness of God. And they were placed in a world that also reflected this divine beauty. That is why God, after completing the creation process, declared that is was all "very good."

Yet, the presence of sin marred that beauty. This lost beauty was restored to humanity when the Son of God assumed our human nature, uniting it to His divine Person and revealing the glory of God in a human being. Thus, on Mt. Tabor, Christ reveals the beauty of His divine nature and the beauty of our created human nature. This is why the Transfiguration is often referred to as a Feast of Beauty.
The Russian novelist Dostoevsky (+1881) famously and somewhat enigmatically once said:  "Beauty will save the world." Yet, Dostoevsky also realized that in a world filled with sin, beauty can evoke responses that fall short of any saving value. In fact, beauty can even degenerate toward sin and sensuality, as one of Dostoevsky's greatest creations, Dmitri Karamazov, acknowledged with great anguish. 

Therefore, for Dostoevsky beauty itself had to be "saved" and linked to Truth and Goodness. Thus, for the Russian novelist, beauty is not simply an aesthetic concept, but one that must have a moral, ethical and spiritual dimension for it to be rightly perceived and experienced. And for Dostoevsky as well as for not only great artists, but the great minds of the Church, beauty is not an abstract concept or Idea. Beauty is a Person, and this Person is Christ. In Christ, Truth, Goodness and Beauty are harmoniously united. This is why Dostoevesky also spoke of the "radiant image of Christ." In another famous passage from his pen, found in a letter of his, Dostoevsky articulated his personal "creed:"

I have constructed for myself a symbol of faith in which everything is clear and holy for me. The symbol is very clear, here it is: to believe that there is nothing more beautiful, profounder, more sympathetic, more reasonable, more courageous and more perfect than Christ and not only is there nothing , but I tell myself with jealous love that never could there be.

 

It is these qualities that make Christ such an attractive figure that a well-disposed mind and heart not unduly influenced by the marks of a fallen world will almost naturally turn to as an "ideal," but again as a concrete living Person. There is a passage from Fr. Alexander Elchaninov (+1934), taken from his personal diary after his death, that captures that same intuition as found in Dostoevsky:

It is impossible not to love Christ. If we saw Him now, we should not be able to take our eyes off Him, we should "listen to him in rapture;" we should flock round Him as did the multitudes in the Gospels. All this is required of us is not to resist. We have only to yield to Him, to the contemplation of His image - in the Gospels, in the saints, in the Church - and He will take possession of our hearts.

 

Here, again, there is an inherent moral, ethical and spiritual dimension from that beauty that flows outward from Christ. This is rendered in the form of very practical and concrete advice in the words of Vladimir Solovyov (+1900), for many the greatest Russian philosopher known to us:

Before any important decision, let us evoke in our soul the image of Christ. Let us concentrate our attention upon it and ask ourselves: Would He Himself do this action? Or, in other words: Will He approve of it or not?

To all I propose this rule: it does not deceive. In every dubious case, as soon as the possibility of a choice is offered to you, remember Christ. Picture to yourself His living Person, as it really is, and entrust Him with the burden of your doubts.

Let human beings of good will, as individuals, as social factors, as leaders of men, women and peoples, apply this criterion, and they will really be able, in the name of truth, to show to others the way toward God.

 

This concreteness is all the more interesting, for Solovyov was often a highly speculative thinker. That what he wrote just over a century ago is hardly a public ideal any longer is to our great loss. It is our role to maintain and cultivate the image of divine beauty in our lives as seen in the face of the incarnate Christ as a sacred obligation. 

 

Embracing the Tradition

 

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

The meditation below was written with the current Dormition Fast (August 1-14) in mind in addition to the incredible account of the Seven Maccabean martyrs. It is that wonderfully-placed mid-summer reminder that we are called to be practicing Orthodox Christians. The practicing Orthodox Christian combines orthodoxy ("right belief") with orthopraxis("right practice/action"). Or, as St. John Chrysostom said, "This is true piety: to combine right belief and right action." Orthopraxis combines prayer and almsgiving and fasting (MATT. 6). All of this is to prepare us to honor the most holy Theotokos.

 

On August 1, we commemorate the Seven Holy Maccabee Children, Solomone their mother, and Eleazar their teacher, all of whom were put to death in the year 168 BC. As such, they were protomartyrs before the time of Christ and the later martyrs of the Christian era. They died because they refused to reject the precepts of the Law when ordered to do so by the Syrian tyrant Antiochus Epiphanes IV. 

After conquering the Holy Land, Antiochus wanted to subvert the uniqueness of the Jews and force them to assimilate to the standards and practices of the prevailing Hellenistic culture. By attacking the precepts of the Law, Antiochus was aiming to destroy the very heart of Judaism. The Jews would then become like the “other nations,” and perhaps their smoldering resentment against their conquerors would be extinguished. This, of course, did not happen, because the Maccabean revolt, led by Judas Maccabaeus, not only resisted but expelled the Hellenized Syrian invaders and restored the Kingdom of Israel to its former glory days one last time (142 - 63 BC) before the Romans under Pompey reduced the Kingdom of Israel to a conquered province.

To return to the story of the Maccabees, we find them, under the guidance of their teacher Eleazar, resisting the decree that they eat pork, which was prohibited by the Law. Understanding that this was a threat against their entire traditional way of life, Eleazor refused and was subsequently tortured until he died. He was simply asked to “pretend” to eat the meat, so as to encourage others to do so. In reply, his dying words as recorded in the first book of Maccabees eloquently attest to his fidelity to the Law of God: 

"Send me quickly to my grave. If I went through with this pretense at my time of life, many of young might believe that at the age of ninety Eleazar had turned apostate. If I practiced deceit for the sake of a brief moment of life, I should lead them astray and bring stain and pollution on my old age. I might for the present avoid man’s punishment, but, alive or dead, I shall never escape from the hands of the Almighty. So if I now die bravely, I shall show that I have deserved my long life and leave the young a fine example to teach them how to die a good death, gladly and nobly, for our revered and holy laws."

Following the death of Eleazar, the seven Maccebee brothers and their mother Salomone were arrested. They were also tortured for refusing to eat pork, and one of them said:  “We are ready to die rather than break the laws of our fathers” (2 Maccabees 7:2).

Enraged by such pious resistance, the tyrant ordered that all seven brothers be tortured by various inhuman means. All of this was witnessed by their mother, who watched all seven of her sons perish in a single day. Acting “against nature,” she encouraged her children “in her native tongue” to bravely withstand the assaults on their tender flesh: 

"You appeared in my womb, I know not how; it was not I who gave you life and breath and set in order your bodily frames. It is the Creator of the universe who molds man at his birth and plans the origin of all things. Therefore he, in his mercy, will give you back life and breath again, since now you put his laws above all thought of self” (2 Maccabees 7:22-23).

We find in her last sentence, a clear allusion to belief in the resurrection from the dead.

Especially poignant is the death of her last and youngest son. He was promised riches and a high position if he only agreed to “abandon his ancestral customs.” Salomone his mother was urged to “persuade her son,” which she did in the following manner: 

“My son, take pity on me. I carried you nine months in the womb, suckled you three years, reared you and brought you up to the present age. I beg you, child, look at the sky and the earth; see all that is in them and realize that God made them out of nothing, and that man comes into being in the same way. Do not be afraid of this butcher; accept death and prove yourself worthy of your brothers, so that by God’s mercy I may receive you back again along with them” (2 Maccabees 7:27-29).

In verse 28, we hear the clearest declaration of the belief that God creates “ex nihilo”—from nothing—in the entire Old Testament.

The youngest of the brothers then died after both witnessing to the meaning of their martyrdom and warning the tyrant of his own inevitable fate:  

“My brothers have now fallen in loyalty to God’s covenant, after brief pain leading to eternal life; but you will pay the just penalty of your insolence by the verdict of God. I, like my brothers, surrender my body and my life for the laws of our fathers” (2 Maccabees 7:36-37).

We then simply read, in verse 39, that “after her sons, the mother died.”

It is difficult to say to what extent we can actually relate to all of this today. We may deeply respect the devotion to the Law that is exhibited in this moving story of multiple matyrdoms—and perhaps be especially moved by the beautiful words of the mother that express our own belief in the creative power of God, His providential care for us and the ultimate gift of resurrection and eternal life with God—but this is far-removed from our contemporary Christian sensibilities. In fact, such devotion today could very well strike us as being overly zealous, if not fanatical. The prospects of such martyrdoms are not exactly on our radar screens. Be that as it may, I believe that we have something greater than mere passing importance that we can learn from this ancient story.

____________ 

Yesterday, August 1, we began the Dormition Fast. We are encouraged by the Church—our “Mother” we could say—to embrace the fast with the certainty that we are being guided into a practice that is designed to strengthen our spiritual well-being. This is part of an Orthodox “way of life” that has been witnessed to for centuries by the faithful of the Church. We also could say that such practices belong to the “laws of our fathers.” By embracing such practices we continue in the Tradition that has been handed down to us, the Tradition that we have “received.” To ignore such practices is to break with that Tradition. That can lead to an erosion of our self-identity as Orthodox Christians, especially considering our “minority status” in the landscape of American religion. 

The spirit of the tyrant Antiochus Epiphanes is alive and well in the constant temptation we face to assimilate to the surrounding society and its mores, which are often reduced to finding the meaning of life in “eating, drinking and making merry.” There are no official decrees that demand that we abandon our Faith, but there is always a price to pay for comfortable conformity. We are hardly being asked to be martyrs but we are being asked to manifest some restraint and discipline in order to strengthen our inner lives as we fast bodily to some extent. If we convince ourselves that this is inconvenient, uncomfortable, or undesirable, then we place ourselves outside of the very received Tradition we claim to follow and respect. 

Older members of the community can bear in mind the words of Eleazar and realize that we are setting an example for our younger members. We are responsible for preparing the next generation. Mothers—and fathers!—can exhort their children in a way that is encouraging and not just demanding. This has nothing to do with mere “legalism,” but with a “way of life” that has been practiced for centuries by Orthodox Christians, and which is just as meaningful today as in the past. 

And, as with the Seven Maccabee Children, it is ultimately a matter of choice.