Coffee with Sister Vassa -- WHY ARE THE RISEN LORD’S WOUNDS FAITH-AFFIRMING?

This week, throughout which the hymns of Thomas Sunday continue to be chanted in church-services, let’s think about why it is specifically the woundsof the risen Lord that convince Thomas that his Lord and his God is. Thomas had been traumatized, as had been the other Apostles, by the triumph of injustice over Jesus, Who was publicly humiliated, crucified, dead and buried. Jesus, Who was innocent of the charges brought against Him, Who had only done good for others, was executed like a criminal, and those who had committed this crime got away with it. How could God, if He is God, if He is at all, have let this happen?

This question, I mean, the question arising from the senseless, entirely-unjust violence suffered by innocent people, is the one that most often makes it hard to believe in God. Hence the disbelief of Thomas. But here’s why the wounds of the risen Lord renew the Apostle’s faith: The Lord, even after His resurrection, continues to carry the wounds inflicted on Him, on His risen Body. The Body of Christ carries the evidenceof the crimes committed. The evidence, my friends, is not erased, not forgotten by God, not swept under the rug, no. The wounds of all those who suffer at the hands of unjust and mindless violence are carried henceforth on the Body of Christ, no longer harmed by the wounds, but testifying to all the injustice that will, in the end, in God’s time, be judged by Him.

Of course, these wounds are an open invitation to repent, for those who have been inflicting such wounds on the Body of Christ; on human beings in this world that God so loved, that He sent His only-begotten Son into it and into all its madness. These wounds are also enabling us, in communion with Him, to be partakers of the risen-yet-wounded, new Life in Him. We are empowered to carry also the wounds, without being harmed or deadened by them. As we continue to witness, in our unjust world, a lot of injustice that seems to hold power, that seems to be triumphing, at times, we are also given to know and to trust that God’s only-begotten Son holds on to the evidence of the crimes, carrying the wounds on His precious Body. Lord, help us co-carry the wounds, by Your grace, in faith and patience and wisdom and love. Our Lord and our God, glory be to You.

Coffee With Sister Vassa -- I AM THE DOOR

 

“I am the door; if any one enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hireling and not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hireling and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd; I know my own and my own know me, as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep, that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd.” (Jn 10: 9-16)

We all need to “belong.” Why? Because we were made that way, to share in, and be part of, God’s Oneness and God’s “abundant” Life. It is both spiritually and psychologically tormenting for us, to feel shut out from Life, like puzzle-pieces that just don’t fit anywhere. Many people go through life feeling that way, or have felt that way, at some time or another.

Christ, the One Shepherd, is the “door” through Whom we, who were once outsiders and misfits, “enter” true Life, and become proper citizens of God’s world. Other, merely-human community-builders might offer us some sense of belonging, – like the high priests of the Internet, or our political party, or clan, or some social circle, etc. But none of these “hirelings” can “save” us, that is to say, make us “whole” within ourselves and with God’s world. Outside communion with Christ, we will find ourselves “scattered,” at the end of the day. Thank You, Lord, for laying Your life down for us, and claiming us as Your own, and nobody else’s. This Tuesday I hear Your voice, and take Your door, embracing the positive change with which you challenge me in this Lenten season, when you say: “ Repent! (Metanoeite! – in Greek, meaning “ Change your mind/your focus!“) For the kingdom of heaven is at hand.“ (Mt 4: 17)

Lenten Meditation -- St. Mary of Egypt

Source: uocofusa.org

In describing His coming Passion, Christ uses words which allude to the basis of our life in the Church right now: the cup which He is to drink and the baptism with which He is to be baptized.

Jesus promises that His disciples will also drink of His cup and be baptized with His baptism, showing us the full significance of accepting baptism and participating in communion. These are not merely things we do when we come to Church. They should be the basic fabric of our lives, making our whole life a continual martyria—a witness to Christ in the service of others.

As an example of this, we have before us today St. Mary of Egypt, who, through her encounter with the Cross, totally changed her way of life by living in total repentance and penitence, until she also partook of the cup of salvation.

Let us pray that we also have the strength to respond to Christ, not to try and avoid His Cross, aspiring after whatever we hold to be glorious, but rather recognize it as the source of our life in Him.

—Archpriest John Behr, excerpt from sermon for the Sunday of St. Mary of Egypt in The Cross Stands While the World Turns

Coffee With Sister Vassa -- JOY-CREATING SORROW

 

“For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.” (2 Cor 7:10)

Yesterday evening in Rome, on the eve of this Saturday of the Deceased, I was sitting in the courtyard of the basilica of St. Agnes, a 13-year-old martyred for her faith in the 4th century, whose relics are in this basilica. And I observed a steady stream of women, one by one, coming into the courtyard to pray and/or light a candle in front of the statue of the Mother of God, at the place you see in this photo. There was a kind of sorrow in the air, which wasn’t a morbid kind of sorrow, but the kind of lamentation that’s in the air during Lent; the kind that women might bring to a place where the relics of St. Agnes rest, who was executed after being dragged naked through the streets to a brothel (where she was probably raped), and where a statue of the long-suffering (in her own lifetime) Mother of God looks over the courtyard.

On my way home, I was thinking about the above-quoted words of St. Paul. What would the not-godly sorrow be, the “sorrow of the world” that “produces death”? It’s the sorrow human beings feel for losing what we are meant to lose, in order that we may gain eternal life. It’s the sorrow over our ageing process, which is a sign that we’re closer to parting from this world, which is what our soul desires, but our body resists. It’s the sorrow over losing the friend or friends we used to have, because either they or we have moved on, as God willed it to be, either because they died, or some other circumstances beyond our control. It’s the sorrow over the world not bringing us what we expected, but what God brought us instead, by His loving providence.

Thank You, Lord, for last evening in this holy city. What is usually known as “Adam’s lament,” I saw as “Eve’s lament,” because it happened only to be women, who passed by this place where I was sitting; and there was St. Agnes and the Theotokos, looking over us, as women who had already experienced the godly sorrow that led to salvation, after many trials. By their prayers, dear God, help us, save us, and keep us by Your grace, throughout the joy-creating sorrow of our Lenten journey.

Midweek Morning Meditation -- Have I Ever Really 'Heard' the Parable of the Prodigal Son?

 

Source: uncutmountainsupply.com

As we move forward in the pre-lenten Sundays and the upcoming week of the Last Judgment (MATT. 25:31-46), perhaps we can "meditate" throughout this week on the Parable of the Prodigal Son from yesterday's Liturgy. When thought over deeply, we begin to understand how inexhaustible it really is!

This parable is chosen at this particular time in order to draw us toward repentance (Gk. metanoia); to remind us that Great Lent is the “school of repentance;” and that without repentance, our other “lenten efforts” become rather meaningless – if not spiritually dangerous. What will it take to convince us that we, too, need that “change of mind” and return to our heavenly Father that is the truest expression of living according to the Gospel?

As I ponder that question, I ask myself further: Have I ever really heard this parable in the way that Christ refers to “hearing?” And that would mean being shaken at the very core of my being. Am I only paying “lip service” to this greatest of the parables, as I listen to it as a wonderful short story that is exciting to analyze and discuss; but not quite capable of moving me any closer to genuine repentance? Again, these are the questions that come to my mind as I have heard this parable in the Liturgy for over forty four years now as a priest.

Yet, if we have spent some time in analyzing the richness of this parable, then we realize that it is not only about the prodigal son, with the two other characters – the father and the older brother – acting in a clearly subordinate manner or for the sake of rounding out the story. They are both integral to the parable and hold equal weight as we try and grasp the parable as a whole. Without the father and the older son, the parable would suffer from a certain one-sidedness or incompleteness.

This is absolutely true when it comes to the very core meaning of the parable - which is repentance. We are deeply moved by the movement of the prodigal son toward his return to his father’s home. We first read of his journey to a “faraway country” and rapid and total decline wherein he wastes his inheritance in “loose living.” An all too-familiar tale. This is followed by a spiraling descent that has him longing for the pods that serve as food for the pigs he has been hired to tend. His re-ascent begins with his “coming to himself” after what must have been a painfully honest self-assessment of his stricken condition of estrangement from even basic human fellowship. This culminates in the thought of returning to his father and begging for mercy and the actual movement of “arising” and doing it.

None of this would have born any fruit, however, without the compassion and love of the prodigal son’s father who embodies the forgiveness that completes his repentance. If the father had been stern, or absorbed with his own sense of being offended; if he had chastised his son with the predictable and perhaps satisfying retort, “I told you so;” then the parable would collapse with an all too-human reaction that would be plausible but unworthy of the Gospel that Jesus came to proclaim. For the father of the parable is a figure of our heavenly Father’s compassion, love and forgiveness that Christ came to offer to all and every sinner. The father remains unforgettable as a “character” precisely because he confounds our expectations in his boundless love fully revealed by running out to his son, falling on his neck and kissing him. This is how the Father “Who is without beginning” acts toward his wayward creatures who have spent their inheritance – the “image and likeness” of God – in the faraway country of self-autonomy and the “swinish” fulfillment of the most base desires. Our repentance results in a cosmic joy that God shares with the angels and the preparation of the “banquet of immortality.”

The older son represents precisely that all too-human response referred to above of hurt feeling and an offended sensibility that leaves him insensitive to his repentant brother’s return and salvation. No matter how justified such a response would seem from our human perspective, it remains outside of the Gospel’s “transvaluation of values.” If our "common sense" approach would align us with the older brother, then the image of God presented by Jesus would only prove to be scandalous, as it would challenge us to leave the false security of defending our wounded pride and ego. 

This is our “invitation” to Great Lent offered to us by the Lord Jesus Christ: “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand” (MATT. 4:17). To help us understand the beauty of that movement of repentance, the Lord delivers what just may be his “parable of parables,” the one we usually name after the prodigal son. So before we get out our lenten cookbooks, we must first really “hear” this parable and pray to God that He will direct and guide us toward true repentance. 

The lenten cookbook will not save us – but repentance and acceptance of the grace of God will.

Monday Morning Meditation -- Re-centering Until Our Last Breath

Source: novoscriptorium.com

"God requires of us to go on repenting until our last breath."  (St. Isaias the Solitary)

"Repentance is not negative but positive. It means not self-pity or remorse, but conversion, the re-centering of our whole life upon the Trinity. It is to not look back with regret but forward with hope - not downwards at our own shortcomings but upward at God's love It is to see, not what we have failed to be, but what by divine grace we can now become; and it is to act upon what we see."(Archbishop Kallistos Ware)

I believe that we should think of the Sunday of the Prodigal Son extending itself throughout the week, thus giving us the Week of the Prodigal Son and the possibility of meditating upon this extraordinary parable carefully and thoughtfully. This parable is perhaps "the parable of parables," and thus deserving of a great deal of attention on our part. Sundays come and go, perhaps too rapidly, and we find ourselves back in our "routines," and living in a world far different than the one we are given a glimpse into through the Liturgy. That fleeting glimpse, which is actually a vision of life that is Christ-centered and Spirit-guided, may thus appear to be "ideal," but not "real." However, it may actually be the vision of the one underlying Reality of all that exists and which makes everything else not only tolerable or endurable, but meaningful and embraceable. If our liturgical and eucharistic experience is forgotten the moment it is over, as we move on to Sunday's entertainment (the "Super Bowl?"), and then prepare to endure Monday morning's responsibilities; perhaps then we are "cheating" ourselves of "the one thing needful." And in the process we lose sight of the riches of the Gospel if we only absentmindedly await next Sunday's. That certainly applies to the Parable of the Prodigal Son!

Yet, before briefly looking into some of the riches of this well-known parable, perhaps we should place it within the wider context of its setting in the Gospel According to St. Luke. For the evangelist Luke places the Parable of the Prodigal Son as the climax of a series of three parables in chapter 15 that reveal the "joy in heaven" when sinners are "found" following an implied or clearly stated repentance. In fact, these parables are told to a group of "tax collectors and sinners" who "were drawing near to hear him." (LK. 15:1) The first of these is the Parable of the Lost Sheep:

What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one which is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost.' Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.(15:3-7)

The Parable of the Lost Coin follows immediately:

Or what woman, having ten silver coins, is she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin which I had lost.' Just so, I tell you , there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.(15:8-10)

These are wonderful parables that serve as images of our heavenly Father rejoicing when He "finds" a sinner who has returned to Him through repentance. This "rejoicing" links together these two shorter parables with the masterpiece to come that closes out this trilogy of repentance-oriented parables. For the father of the parable will command his household to "make merry" with the return of his wayward son. (15:24, 32) Repentance is not simply a time of hand-wringing, regret and guilt. It is the beginning of a new life and an open-ended future that is a radical change in direction from the "no exit" of sin and alienation from God. The somber and stultifying atmosphere of sin is driven away by the "breath" of the Spirit, which "blows where it wills." Of course, repentance is hard work - for old habits die hard - but sustained by the grace of God and the promise of salvation, the entire process to this day is most perfectly described by St. John Klimakos as "joy-creating sorrow." Remorse for the past devoid of forgiveness will only produce sorrow - if not despair. 

The acceptance of divine forgiveness produces joy - both for God and the sinner. A profound awareness of God's gift of salvation as the only meaningful release from the sorrow of sin leads to the "gift of tears" according to the experience of the saints. Their weeping was the expression of an inner joy that was overwhelming.

If (or As?) we squander our "inheritance" from our heavenly Father, we will unfailingly resemble that representative figure of the prodigal son. We too, then, "journey into a far country" there to waste our wealth in "loose living." (15:13) Unlike the prodigal son, though, we can do this without moving a step away from our homes. We need only retreat into the seemingly limitless space of our imaginations where fantasies entice us with unrealizable visions of "self-realization" or "pleasure." Then, there are the murky recesses of our hearts; uncharted territory that if not filled with the grace of God will "fill up" with "inner demons" that will eventually frighten us by the sheer audacity of temptations we never thought ourselves capable of entertaining. Or, perhaps a bit less dramatically, there are "the pods that the swine ate" (15:16), symbolic of philosophies and worldviews totally foreign to the Christ-centered life of the Church. 

The end result will be an emptiness and desolation that will exhaust our own inner resources. Our humbled minds and bodies will begin to search elsewhere for more satisfying nourishment. Anyone in such a predicament will only hope to be blessed - as was true of the prodigal son - with that mysterious process that leads to repentance, described simply as, "he came to himself." (15:17) Then, in words that have an urgency far greater than in an entire book of theology, we too may cry out, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired servants." (15:18-19)

We all know what follows: the compassionate father who runs to embrace his son in love; the clothing of the son in festal garments; the orders and preparations for a sumptuous banquet of joy; and the solemn words: "for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found." (15:24) As this parable repeats itself endlessly until the end of time, with its finely-etched descriptions of sin, repentance and redemption; we continue to witness some of the "mini-resurrections" that make up the meaningful dramas of everyday life.

The Civil New Year - Resolutions or Repentance?

 

Source: goodfreephotos.com

According to the civil calendar, we begin the year of our Lord (Anno Domini) 2026, on January 1. The year of 2026 is based upon the calculations of a medieval monk who, in attempting to ascertain the exact date of the birth of Christ, missed the year 0 by only a few years. According to contemporary scholars, Jesus was actually born between what we consider to be 6 – 4 B. C. These were the last years of Herod the Great, for according to the Gospel of St. Matthew, Jesus was born toward the very end of Herod’s long reign (37 – 4 B.C.). Christians therefore divide the linear stretch of historical time between the era before the Incarnation; and the era after the Incarnation and the advent of the Son of God into our space-time world. 

In other words, the years before the Incarnation are treated as something of a “countdown” to the time-altering event of the Incarnation; and the years since are counted forward as we move toward the end of history and the coming Kingdom of God. By entering the world, Christ has transformed the meaning and goal of historical time.

Recently, there has been a scholarly shift away from this openly Christian approach to history, as the more traditional designations of B.C. and A.D. have been replaced by the more neutral and “ecumenically sensitive” designations of B.C.E. (Before the Common Era), and C.E. (Common Era). Understanding and interpreting history from a decidedly Christian perspective, I would still argue in favor of the more traditional B.C. and A.D.

Although an issue of more than passing interest, that discussion may appear somewhat academic in comparison to the pressing issues of our daily lives as they continue to unfold now in 2026. We will exchange our conventional greetings of “Happy New Year” probably more than once in the next few days. Under closer inspection, there remains something vague about that expression, and perhaps that is for the better. Do we wish for the other person – as well as for ourselves – that nothing will go (terribly) wrong in the unknown future of the new year? More positively, do we wish that all of our desires and wishes for our lives will be fulfilled in this new year? Or, are we wishing a successful year of the perpetual pursuit of “happiness” (whatever that means) for ourselves and for our friends? How did that all work out in 2025? This last year seemed particularly jarring for the world as a whole! At some point we just may be reaching beyond the restrictive boundaries of reality with our wishes. As Tevye the Dairyman once said: “The more man plans, the harder God laughs.” 

Perhaps the more realistic approach would be to give and receive our “Happy New Year” greetings as neighborly acknowledgement that we are “all in this together,” and that we need to mutually encourage and support one another. When has that been more imperative than precisely in the harrowing year that we have just completed?

We also approach the New Year as a time to commit ourselves to those annual “resolutions” that we realize will make our lives more wholesome, safe, sound, or even sane - if only we can sustain them. A resolution is to dig deep inside and find the resolve necessary to break through those (bad) habits or patterns of living that undermine either our effectiveness in daily life; jeopardize our relationships with our loved ones, our friends and our neighbors; or seriously threaten to make us less human than we can and should be.

We know that we should eat less, swear less, lust less, get angry less, surf the computer less, play on our iPhones less, watch TV less and so on. We further know that we need more patience, more self-discipline, more graceful language, more attention to the needs of others, more “quality time” with our families and friends, more forgiving, more loving and so on. We know, therefore, that we need to change, and we intuitively realize how difficult this is. Bad habits are hard to break. Therefore, we need this annual opportunity of a new beginning and our New Year resolutions to give us a “fighting chance” to actually change. 

We may joke about how quickly we break our resolutions, but beneath the surface of that joking (which covers up our disappointments and rationalizations) we are acknowledging, once again, the struggle of moving beyond and replacing our vices with virtues. May God grant everyone the resolve to maintain these resolutions with care and consistency!

And yet I believe that we can profoundly deepen our experience of the above. For, as a “holiday” is a more-or-less secular and watered-down version of a “holy day;” so a resolution is a more-or-less secular and watered-down version of personal repentance. To repent (Gk. metanoia) is to have a “change of mind,” together with a corresponding change in the manner of our living and a re-direction of our lives toward God. The New Year’s resolution of our secularized culture may be a persistent reminder — or the remainder of — a lost Christian worldview that realized the importance of repentance.

“There is something rotten in Denmark,” and an entire industry of self-help and self-reliance therapies — totally divorced from a theistic context — is an open acknowledgement of that reality regardless of how distant it may now be from its religious expression. As members of the Body of Christ living within the grace-filled atmosphere of the Church, we can, in turn, incorporate our resolutions within the ongoing process of repentance, which is nothing less than our vocation as human beings: “God requires us to go on repenting until our last breath” (St. Isaias of Sketis). Or, as St. Isaac of Syria teaches: “This life has been given you for repentance. Do not waste it on other things.”

Summarizing and synthesizing the Church’s traditional teaching about repentance, Archbishop Kallistos Ware has formulated a wonderfully open-ended expression of repentance that is both helpful and hopeful:

"Correctly understood, repentance is not negative but positive. It means not self-pity or remorse but conversion, the re-centering of our whole life upon the Trinity. It is to look not backward with regret but forward with hope – not downwards at our own shortcomings but upward at God’s love. It is to see, not what we have failed to be, but what by divine grace we can now become; and it is to act upon what we see. In this sense, repentance is not just a single act, an initial step, but a continuing state, an attitude of heart and will that needs to be ceaselessly renewed up to the end of life." (The Orthodox Way, p. 113-114)

Hard not to be inspired by such an expressive passage! In the Service of Prayer for the (Civil) New Year, we incorporate into the litanies of the service some of the following special petitions . Thus, in the language of the Church, these petitions served as an ecclesial form of the resolutions we make to break through some of our dehumanizing behavior; as well as a plea to God to strengthen our better inclinations:

That He will drive away from us all soul-corrupting passions and corrupting habits, and that He will plant in our hearts His divine fear, unto the fulfillment of His statutes, let us pray to the Lord.

That He will renew a right spirit within us, and strengthen us in the Orthodox Faith, and cause us to make haste in the performance of good deeds and the Fulfillment of all His statutes, let us pray to the Lord.

That He will bless the beginning and continuance of this year with the grace of His of His love for mankind, and will grant unto us peaceful times, favorable weather and a sinless life in health and abundance, let us pray to the Lord.

If you resolve to seek and to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind … and your neighbor as yourself” (MATT. 22:37-38), then I believe that this new year may not be perpetually “happy,” but that it will truly be hopeful, meaningful and blessed!

*** A good beginning to the (Civil) New Year would be participating in the Divine Liturgy on Thursday morning at 9:30 a.m.

Meditation for the Apostles Fast - June 27, 2025

Source: uncutmountainsupply.com

 In one day, my brother, you can gain all eternity. And in one day you can lose it. You are given thousands of days on earth to determine for yourself whether to pursue eternal salvation or damnation. 

But blessed a hundredfold be that day on which you repent of all your unclean works, your unclean words and thoughts, and turn to God with a cry for mercy! That day is worth more to you than a thousand other days.

—Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic, Prolog

Hearing the Parable of the Prodigal Son

Source: uncutmountainsupply.com

 

Have I Ever Really 'Heard' the Parable of the Prodigal Son?

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

As we move forward in the pre-lenten Sundays and the upcoming week of the Last Judgment (MATT. 25:31-46), perhaps we can "meditate" throughout this week on the Parable of the Prodigal Son from yesterday's Liturgy. When thought over deeply, we begin to understand how inexhaustible it really is!

This parable is chosen at this particular time in order to draw us toward repentance (Gk. metanoia); to remind us that Great Lent is the “school of repentance;” and that without repentance, our other “lenten efforts” become rather meaningless – if not spiritually dangerous. What will it take to convince us that we, too, need that “change of mind” and return to our heavenly Father that is the truest expression of living according to the Gospel?

As I ponder that question, I ask myself further: Have I ever really heard this parable in the way that Christ refers to “hearing?” And that would mean being shaken at the very core of my being. Am I only paying “lip service” to this greatest of the parables, as I listen to it as a wonderful short story that is exciting to analyze and discuss; but not quite capable of moving me any closer to genuine repentance? Again, these are the questions that come to my mind as I have heard this parable in the Liturgy for over forty years now as a priest.

Yet, if we have spent some time in analyzing the richness of this parable, then we realize that it is not only about the prodigal son, with the two other characters – the father and the older brother – acting in a clearly subordinate manner or for the sake of rounding out the story. They are both integral to the parable and hold equal weight as we try and grasp the parable as a whole. Without the father and the older son, the parable would suffer from a certain one-sidedness or incompleteness.

This is absolutely true when it comes to the very core meaning of the parable - which is repentance. We are deeply moved by the movement of the prodigal son toward his return to his father’s home. We first read of his journey to a “faraway country” and rapid and total decline wherein he wastes his inheritance in “loose living.” An all too-familiar tale. This is followed by a spiraling descent that has him longing for the pods that serve as food for the pigs he has been hired to tend. His re-ascent begins with his “coming to himself” after what must have been a painfully honest self-assessment of his stricken condition of estrangement from even basic human fellowship. This culminates in the thought of returning to his father and begging for mercy and the actual movement of “arising” and doing it.

None of this would have born any fruit, however, without the compassion and love of the prodigal son’s father who embodies the forgiveness that completes his repentance. If the father had been stern, or absorbed with his own sense of being offended; if he had chastised his son with the predictable and perhaps satisfying retort, “I told you so;” then the parable would collapse with an all too-human reaction that would be plausible but unworthy of the Gospel that Jesus came to proclaim. For the father of the parable is a figure of our heavenly Father’s compassion, love and forgiveness that Christ came to offer to all and every sinner. The father remains unforgettable as a “character” precisely because he confounds our expectations in his boundless love fully revealed by running out to his son, falling on his neck and kissing him. This is how the Father “Who is without beginning” acts toward his wayward creatures who have spent their inheritance – the “image and likeness” of God – in the faraway country of self-autonomy and the “swinish” fulfillment of the most base desires. Our repentance results in a cosmic joy that God shares with the angels and the preparation of the “banquet of immortality.”

The older son represents precisely that all too-human response referred to above of hurt feeling and an offended sensibility that leaves him insensitive to his repentant brother’s return and salvation. No matter how justified such a response would seem from our human perspective, it remains outside of the Gospel’s “transvaluation of values.”

This is our “invitation” to Great Lent offered to us by the Lord Jesus Christ: “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand” (MATT. 4:17). To help us understand the beauty of that movement of repentance, the Lord delivers what just may be his “parable of parables,” the one we usually name after the prodigal son. So before we get out our lenten cookbooks, we must first really “hear” this parable and pray to God that He will direct and guide us toward true repentance. 

The lenten cookbook will not save us – but repentance will.

Monday Morning Meditation

Source: uncutmountainsupply.com

 Dear Parish Faithful,

At the Liturgy on Sunday, we heard what must be the shorter epistle reading on our lectionary - I Tim. 1:15-17. Here is that text:

"The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. And I am the foremost of sinners; but I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ may display his perfect patience for an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life. To the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever and ever. Amen."

We know part of this text very well, of course, as we recite it together as a kind of communal pre-Communion pray as we prepare to receive the Eucharist at the Divine Liturgy. The question is then raised: How can each and every one of us be "the foremost of sinners?" I would like to again share a key passage in Peter Bouteneff's book How To Be a Sinner, as an insightful and deeply challenging response to that very natural question:

"I am the foremost of sinners." How can I make sense of this statement as I strive to make it my own? ...

For one, to the best of my knowledge, it is actually true. I can't fully know the misdeeds, circumstances, external strictures, inner struggles, or repentance of other people. It is not mine to analyze other people's shortcomings or their motivations. Doing so will not benefit me. Plus, their failings are fully known only to God. I have access to and control over only myself. I can bring only myself before God's judgment. And I will tell you that the picture is not very pretty. Given the circumstances in which I was raised, my education and life in the Church, what I have seen and what I know, for me to harbor the kind of thoughts that I have, to speak the words that I say, and do the deeds I do is utterly inexcusable. As for the state of my repentance? The quality of my prayer? Forget it. I can't say how it goes for anyone else. I honestly have no idea. But there's a real good chance they are doing this all better than I do, thanks be to God. (p. 56-57)

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Very honest and, in my estimation, very true for each and every one of us.

Coffee With Sister Vassa: 'Man-Made' & Not 'Man-Made' Disasters

 

‘MAN-MADE’ & NOT ‘MAN-MADE’ DISASTERS

“There were present at that season some who told Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answered and said to them, ‘Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, do you think that they were worse sinners than all other men who dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.” (Lk 13:1-5)

I’m thinking of this Gospel-passage today, which deals with one man-made (or man-intended) and another, not man-made or man-intended disaster, which brought sudden death onto the victims. The first was Pilate’s massacre of people on the temple mount, and the second was the collapse of a tower in Siloam, which killed 18 people. It reminds me of two current disasters, also bringing sudden death to their victims, – the man-made and man-intended war against Ukraine and the wildfires in Los Angeles County. The latter are perhaps partly man-made, but certainly not man-intended. Just like the tower in Siloam was man-made, but certainly not with the intention of it collapsing and killing people. 

Our Lord makes two points here. First, He warns against assuming that the victims of these sudden and senseless tragedies had been judged for their sins. We are all sinners, and to assume that victims of such tragedies are somehow worse than the rest of us and hence deserved to die, is wrong. His second point is that all of us need to repent, meaning, change our focus, because we don’t know exactly when or how we will die. If we are not mindful of this fact and not attentive to our own “repentance,” preferring to judge others instead (as do those who thought that the victims of Pilate or of the collapse of the tower), we will “likewise perish,” says the Lord, – in the sense that our death will catch us unprepared for it. But if we are always in repentance-mode; always focusing and re-focusing on our path of salvation and our journey to new life in God’s kingdom, death will not find us unprepared, however or whenever it happens. 

It is natural, when tragedy strikes, to ask why. And when it is both man-made and man-intended, when it is a crime, it is important to bring to justice the criminal(s) responsible. But it is not our place or our right to blame the victims, or to usurp God’s judgment over them, because He alone is the Judge of our sins. So, let me read the headlines about sudden deaths as a warning to repent, as a call to self-examination, rather than as an occasion to judge the victims. All our lives are essentially a house of cards, which can collapse at any moment, for man-made or not man-made reasons. Help us, save us, have mercy on us, and keep us, O God, by Your grace.

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One of themes raised yesterday in the homily was precisely that of repentance: "Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand." (Matt. 4:17) The need for repentance pervades the Gospels within a seemingly endless amount of situations. As Christians, we are called to endlessly seek that "change of mind" that brings us closer to Christ and the Kingdom of Heaven. I just the passage that Sister Vassa brings to our attention the other day. I believe that her distinction between "man made" disasters and not "man made" disasters is very helpful.

Can't Get No Satisfaction... Thank God!

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

Relatively speaking, the meditation being presented here was written some time ago - Fall 2007. I am quite sure that anyone who read it then has long forgotten it! But for those who are new to the parish, and for those who are willing to give it another read, I thought that it would have a certain resonance since it was only yesterday evening when we chanted the Akathist Hymn "Glory to God For All Things" as we acknowledged the Church New Year beginning on September 1. I say that because there are certain thoughts expressed in the Hymn that led me to write this particular meditation.

* * *

Can't Get No Satisfaction... Thank God!

"My soul thirsts for God, for the living God." —Psalm 42:2

"I can't get no satisfaction" —The Rolling Stones

"I (Can't Get No) Satisfaction" by the Rolling Stones must be considered one of the great all-time "classics" of the pop/rock music world. 

I remember it well from the Summer of 1965. With its driving guitar riff and raspy-voiced lyrics giving a kind of pop-articulation to the disaffection of the lonely and alienated urbanite who, try as he might, just cannot succeed at "satisfying" the material and romantic/sexual goals droned into his mind on the radio and TV; this song - regardless of its actual intentions - managed to say something enduring about the "human condition." (I wonder if the various members of the Rolling Stones ever experience any genuine satisfaction after many years of fame and fortune). 
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Be that as it may, a rather odd connection came to me between this song and a verse from "The Akathist of Thanksgiving" that we sang and chanted yesterday evening for the Church New Year beginning today, September 1. In Ikos Six of the akathist, one of the verses in the refrain reads as follows:

Glory to You, Who have inspired in us dissatisfaction with earthly things.

Both the Stones' song and the Orthodox hymn speak of "no satisfaction" or "dissatisfaction." However by "earthly things," the author of this remarkable hymn does not mean the natural world in which God has placed us. The refrain of Ikos Three makes that abundantly clear:

Glory to You, Who brought out of the earth's darkness diversity of color, taste and fragrance, 
Glory to You, for the warmth and caress of all nature, 
Glory to You, for surrounding us with thousands of Your creatures, 
Glory to You, for the depth of Your wisdom reflected in the whole world ...

To the purified eyes of faith, the world around us can be a "festival of life" ... foreshadowing eternal life" (Ikos Two). The "earthly" can lead us to the "heavenly."

"Earthly things" in the context of the Akathist Hymn and the Orthodox worldview expressed in the Hymn, would certainly refer to the very things the Rolling Stones song laments about being absent - material and sexual satisfaction seen as ends in themselves. But whereas the song expresses both frustration and resentment as part of the psychic pain caused by such deprivation, the Akathist Hymn glorifies God for such a blessing! In the light of the insight of the Akathist Hymn, we can thus speak of a "blessed dissatisfaction." The Apostle Paul spoke of a closely-related "godly grief." (On this point, I would imagine that the Apostle Paul and Rolling Stones part company).

This just may prove to be quite a challenge to our way of approaching something like dissatisfaction.

Our usual instinct is to flee from dissatisfaction "as from the plague." Such a condition implies unhappiness, a sense of a lack of success, of "losing" in the harsh game of life as time continues to run out on us; and the deprivation and frustration mentioned above. 

Why should we tolerate the condition of dissatisfaction when limitless means of achieving "satisfaction" are at our disposal? To escape from a gnawing sense of dissatisfaction, don't people resort to alcohol, drugs and sex as desperate forms of relief? Or unrestrained and massive consumer spending? And we should not eliminate "religion" as one of those means of escape. 

If those means fail, then there is always therapy and medication as more aggressive means to relieve us of this unendurable feeling. 

Sadly, many learn "the hard way," that every ill-conceived attempt to eliminate dissatisfaction through "earthly things" only leads to a further and deeper level of this unsatiable affliction. Sadder still, there are many who would "forfeit their soul/life" just to avoid the bitter taste of dissatisfaction!

If the living God exists as we believe that He does, then how could we not feel dissatisfaction at His absence from our lives? What could possibly fill the enormous space in the depth of our hearts that yearns for God "as a hart longs for flowing streams." (Ps. 42:1) 

It is as if when people "hear" the voice of God calling them - in their hearts, their conscience, through another person, a personal tragedy - they reach over and turn up the volume so as to drown out that call. 

If we were made for God, then each person has an "instinct for the transcendent" (I recall this term from Fr. Alexander Schmemann), that can only be suppressed at an incalculable cost to our very humanity. To put that another way from the Akathist: "Where You are not is only emptiness."

In His infinite mercy, the Lord "blesses" us with a feeling of dissatisfaction so that we do not foolishly lose our souls in the infinitesimal pseudo-satisfactions that come our way. Therefore, we thank God for the gift of "blessed dissatisfaction!"

When we realize that we "can't get no satisfaction," then we have approached the threshold of making a meaningful decision about the direction of our lives. The way "down" can lead to that kind of benign despair that characterizes the lives of many today. The way "up" to the One Who is "enthroned above the heavens" and the Source of true satisfaction. 

The Rolling Stones uncovered the truth of an enduring condition that we all must face and must "deal with." I am not so sure about the solution they would ultimately offer ... but in their initial intuition they proved to be very "Orthodox!"

May the Church New Year fill us with "blessed dissatisfaction" so that we desire to seek and love God all the more!

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXIV — Dangerous Prayer

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

If the Lord comes to us, we should receive him with great joy and humility. But let us be careful not to seek mystical experience when we should be seeking repentance and conversion. That is the beginning of our cry to God. “Lord, make me what I should be, change me whatever the cost.” And when we have said these dangerous words, we should be prepared for God to hear them. And these words of God are dangerous because God’s love is remorseless. God wants our salvation with the determination due its importance. And God, as the Shepherd of Hermas says, “does not leave us till he has broken our heart and bones.”

—Metropolitan Anthony Bloom & George LeFebvre, Courage to Pray

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XVIII — Anger and Remembrance of Wrongs

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

Anger is the result of people’s failure to do or say what we wish, or of things that do not go the way we prefer. Rather than adapt to circumstances by way of the practice of patience, we often succumb to the sin of anger. Paramount in the equation of anger is the “remembrance of wrongs.” …

...The pervasiveness of this sin warrants special mention. We live in an age where, though we have less and less direct contact with others, we seem so easily tempted by thoughts, feelings, fantasies, and injuries believed caused by our neighbor.

Whenever we become obsessed by some past event in which we perceive that we have been wronged, we give the devil ample opportunity to lead us toward greater temptation. We forget that our warfare is not with each other! We are to engage in spiritual warfare against the Enemy of our salvation and his willing hosts, the demons. When we remember wrongs, we fall prey to the Father of Lies and engage in combat against our fellow brothers and sisters.

—Fr Joseph David Huneycutt, Defeating Sin

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As far back as the fourth c. Evagrius of Pontus (+399), the great "desert psychologist," came up with a list of the "passionate thoughts" (logismoi) that can tempt and trouble the human mind and heart. One of those "thoughts" was anger. Later, St. Gregory the Great (+604) devised the more familiar list of the "seven deadly sins," and his list also included anger. To this day, we continue to analyze the effects of anger on the human mind. Fr. Joseph above offers some good insights into this "passionate thought," that are worthy of our reflection.

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XIII

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

We must care for ourselves, think about ourselves, reflect on ourselves. But keep it light. A good sense of humor about yourself helps immensely. Don’t overdramatize either your sins or your virtues, because frankly, chances are that neither are all that spectacular.

Peter Bouteneff, author of How To Be a Sinner

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A helpful piece of short "spiritual advice" that I would think speaks to all of us. There is a thin line between high drama and soap-opera, as there is between pathos and bathos. And perhaps we straddle both of those lines more than we think. I recall that the great religious philosopher, Vladimir Solovyov (+1900) once reflected that among all of created beings, that  it is only the human being who has the capacity for laughter.

 

The Parable of the Prodigal Son - Ending Unresolved?

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful, 

Of the many intriguing points about the Parable of the Prodigal Son, one of them is the fact of just how "open" it is in the end. After reading of these three wonderfully etched characters of the compassionate father, and of the two sons - one prodigal and the other unforgiving - we find ourselves facing a real dose of uncertainty when the parable is completed. 

Sequentially, we heard of the remarkable "resurrection" (anastas in the text) of the prodigal son once he "comes to himself," and literally throws himself before the father whom he callously abandoned to pursuit his fortune and his misguided understanding of both independence and pleasure. Then, we heard of the compassionate father who responds with an outpouring of forgiveness and love, as he refuses to react with a predictable offense at his son's misadventures when he returns seeking mercy. And finally, we hear of the even more predictable response of the other son who, almost choking with resentment at the mercy shown his unacknowledged brother (a relationship that he does not admit to), as he bitterly lashes out at his father's seemingly blissful indifference to his life of toil in pursuit of fair recognition of his filial piety. The poor father has two very difficult sons to deal with, and he does so with an amazing patience and loving admonition. The image of our heavenly Father as revealed by Jesus finds its truest expression in the father of the parable.

But a parable is not a fairy tale, and though the final sentence is undoubtedly positive and even echoes the very core of the Gospel: "Your brother was lost, and is now found," that is not the same as hearing: "And they lived happily ever after." It is not even equivalent to hearing: "All's well that ends well." Hence, the "openness" of the parable's ending is that we cannot assume with any certainty that the unforgiving brother experienced a "change of mind" (the meaning of the Gk. word for repentance - metanoia). The possibility remains that his resentment may have continued to smolder even if he went into the party and partook of the fatted calf and appeared to "make merry." There is no real indication of his final response. 

And the prodigal son? We left him humbled and on his knees before his father; perhaps filled with jubilation at his "reversal of fortune" as he now rejoices in a sumptuous feast prepared for him shortly after his desperate willingness to even eat the pods thrown to the pigs. But was his repentance permanent or ephemeral? Did he suffer another bout of restlessness and instability? Did he "hit the road" yet again?

Christ gives us a remarkable glimpse of the gift of salvation and of a "fresh start" in this parable. Of this there is no doubt, as many see this as the "parable of all parables;" the one that comes readily to mind when the heart of the Gospel is reflected upon: the salvation of sinners by a merciful God. And yet we can also say that Christ was a "realist," and that he leads us into the deepest recesses of the Gospel, while simultaneously acknowledging the barriers presented to a sinful humanity to actually repent: habit, hard-heartedness, indifference and resentment, to mention a few of the more obvious sins. 

We know how we want the parable to end, as our better intuition seeks reconciliation and deep communion between human beings made in God's image and likeness. But the "openness" in the end, without an assurance of that longed for "happy ending" reveals the contingency of all life within the theater of history and its demands for constant choices. Repentance must be sustained once embraced - an ever-deepening process of "turning around" and "changing one's mind" so that we seek first the Kingdom of God and all righteousness, leading to the human transformation that that implies.

Again, Christ offers us an unforgettable image of repentance, compassion, and even the "no exit" of cold indifference. This openness is perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the Lord's incomparable parables.

Please feel free to share any comments or further insights into this "parable of parables."