OrthoAnalyika Shownotes: 20 December 2009
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Homily/Lesson (28th Sunday after Pentecost)
Gospel: St. Luke (17: 12-19)
Then as He entered a certain village, there met Him ten men who were lepers, who stood afar off. And they lifted up their voices and said, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” So when He saw them, He said to them, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” And so it was that as they went, they were cleansed. And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, returned, and with a loud voice glorified God, and fell down on his face at His feet, giving Him thanks. And he was a Samaritan. So Jesus answered and said, “Were there not ten cleansed? But where are the nine? Were there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner?” And He said to him, “Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well.”
Who are we in this story? Surely we are usually more like the nine ungrateful lepers. God has healed our sin and enabled us to join the community of saints and angels, but we accept it as if it was something we deserved and as if perfect health was an entitlement we had been unfairly deprived of. Rather than being thankful, this gift reinforces our selfishness – we treat it as if God was finally making good on damages done. I am sure that the nine lepers were happy to have been healed, just as I am sure that all of us are happy when our sins are forgiven and our relationships with one another are restored through the Mysteries of Repentance and Communion. Like the nine lepers, we are happy because being healed in this way allows us to re-engage in our lives and participate more fully in the routines of normal life. But this really misses the point: Christ did not heal the lepers so that they could rejoin the normal community, and He does not offer us His Holy Mysteries so that we can better enjoy the status quo. He healed them and us so that we could join Him in transcending the status quo, so that we could create a new pattern of life that would allow us to grow towards Him in perfection.
If you think of the nine lepers, how long do you think they stayed healed? How long do you think they were able to enjoy the benefits of their cure? It could not have been for long. No one can remain healed and whole without gratitude, and no one can retain the joy of their deliverance without worship. Today’s reading does not describe exactly what happens next to these nine lepers, but we are told – albeit indirectly – that their healing was incomplete due to their ingratitude. Remember Christ’s interaction with the man who returned to thank Him: He says “Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well.” The context of this blessing suggests that the faith that made the leper truly well was exhibited NOT when he and the others supplicated the Christ at the beginning of the story saying; “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”, but rather when he returned, prostrated himself before the Lord, and thankfully glorified Him.
The others did not return. They were happy to be healed, but only because it let them live a normal life. The tenth man transcended normal because He saw the healing as something special: a sign that God was both all powerful and all-loving. No one who recognizes this can ever accept normal; and no one who recognizes this can ever cease glorifying God.
Alas, we are more like the nine … but at least once a week, we try to emulate the tenth one! Saint Paul was like the tenth one – and in today’s epistle lesson he is doing his best to get us to join him in seeing and appreciating God’s gift to us. Let’s go through this reading together.
Epistle: Colossians (1: 12-18)
Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness…
What else is there to do when given such a gift than to thank the one who gave it to us? And it is a gift – we have not earned it. The Father “qualified” us for this present. I wish that more people recognized the amazing quality of this thing: we are allowed to become “partakers of the saints in the light” – we have been “delivered from the power of darkness”. Darkness is not just physical, but spiritual. It refuses joy, replacing it with a wicked rejoicing over anger and retribution. It does not rejoice in the happiness of others, but envies it and seeks to own or destroy it. This is the inheritance of Adam, and would be our destiny were it not for God’s gift to us. I say that I wish more people opened their eyes to this because I see far too many who squander this gift (like the nine) and who try to enjoy both darkness and light, both health and bad habits. But the Gospel is clear: you have to chose one or the other. You can either live a joyful life of love for others in the light; or you can chose your own way that will lead you back to the torrents of spite and darkness.
and [He] conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,
Our Lord desires more than just our healing – although He will cleanse our leprosy every time we ask – He brings us into the Kingdom where Jesus Christ reigns. If we chose to remain there, then we enjoy the benefits of life in the heavenly kingdom – but so often we only visit this place of love. Choosing to live in our own kingdom where happiness is not eternal but dependent on the vicissitudes (variations) of the economy, the emotional states of those around us, and so on.
in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
This is the One who reigns in the kingdom that God has invited us to join. The One through who all things were created. The One who is above all. I might rationally choose my own way if the only alternative was to submit to the knuckleheads who seem to have all the power in this world. But I will submit in a second to a King with this kind of authority and this kind of love. He even loves each of us more than (the glory associated with) His own Divinity (whereas politicians would do anything to retain their position – in fact, our system relies on such selfishness to function)!
And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the pre-eminence.
And this is how we join Him (and stay): the Church. He is all good things by nature, and we can join Him there through Grace. This is the life the Christian is offered. It is a glorious life, and you can enjoy it today (and for eternity). He has forgiven you of your sins, he has healed the leprosy that kept you unclean. Will you rejoice in this gift? Will you accept it? Then join Him in His kingdom and do not visit your old home in darkness.
News:
The Falling Asleep in the Lord of His Eminence, Archbishop Job (OCA, Chicago).
The Ecumenical Patriarch on 60 Minutes.
From New Zealand: Unholy row over Mary and Joseph billboard. The article makes it sound like the church that sponsored the billboard was conservative – and in a way that makes sense. One of the main criticisms made against the ever-virginity of Mary (by Christians – most others just think the whole thing is nonsense) is the visceral sense that it would be such a punishment (or so inconceivable) for the Theotokos to live the rest of her life without sex. Perhaps they were trying to counter that by pointing out that even sex pales in comparison to the Incarnation. If so, then I give them a “B” for intent, but a D- for their action.
From the USA: More thoughts on dvoeveriye (double-faithedness) in the US. How do we square this finding – which indicates an interest in real spiritual experience – with the secularization of our parishes and our communities?
Science: interesting article on Intuition. I’ll be honest – I’m pretty ambivalent about this. On the one hand, if I’m not thinking for me, then exactly who/what am I opening myself up to? My higher self? Christ within me? Nothing at all? Or something much worse (remember the scenes from Lewis’ That Hideous Strength where Frost has lost his humanity to the evil eldila). On the other, there is no doubt that this ability is real and useful in some circumstances (note on presentation at Sobor on pre-cognition). Keep your wits (and Guardian Angel) about you – this world is a dangerous place.
Also from Science: the danger of wishful thinking and quackery. Ditto about wits and Guarding Angel.
Great quote from Matt Baglio’s The Rite. He quotes Fr. Vince as saying; “I am happy to pray with people; but if I tell them that they need to start going back to the Church and taking advantage of the sacraments, they look at me like I am crazy for actually suggesting that they practive their faith. And I know if I told them to go out and do the extreme, ‘Go stand on your lawn and swing a dead chicken around your head and you will be fine,’ they would do that. But just going to mass or confession – they think that is kind of mundane.” Also the old saws from Chesterton; “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried.” and (apocryphally or paraphrasedly) “When a Man stops believing in God he doesn’t then believe in nothing, he believes anything.”
From the Dismal Science: great article, follow-up on the structural causes of our economic malaise – and the institutions/culture that reinforces it.
Mail:
Thanks for Your Input on the Movies – I’ll do a follow-up in a future show as soon as I watch all your suggestions. It looks like we need to add at least one category for “Scary”!
Vol’ya Moment: St. Paul’s Encouragement to parishioners, priests, and seminarians.
(part of a homily Given at St. Andrew UOC in Boston, MA)
I Corinthians 4: 9 – 16
For I think that God has displayed us, the apostles, last, as men condemned to death; for we have been made a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men. We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise in Christ! We are weak, but you are strong! You are distinguished, but we are dishonored! To the present hour we both hunger and thirst, and we are poorly clothed, and beaten, and homeless. And we labor, working with our own hands. Being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we endure; being defamed, we entreat. We have been made as the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things until now. I do not write these things to shame you, but as my beloved children I warn you. For though you might have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet you do not have many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel. Therefore I urge you, imitate me..
I love this reading from St. Paul to the Corinthians because it shows us what sometimes happens to those who are dedicated to the Gospel – they are publically mocked by the “wise… strong… [and] distinguished” people they serve. The brutal clarity of his presentation should cause us to re-examine how we treat our own bishops and priests – as St. Paul says, he is not trying to shame us about our poor behavior towards our pastors, but he is trying to warn us. He knows that [as a pastor] he is sanctified by the mockery of his flock, but he also knows that their behavior – and the moral confusion that gives rise to it – [is] destroying the souls of the people he loves and serves. He loves his flock and would not see them destroyed – not by wolves, and not even by their own internal passions.
There is also a wonderful lesson for everyone who leads, and especially to those called to leadership within the Church. In two sentences, he summarizes the best advice I have ever heard, and it is advice that every seminarian should heed well: “To the present hour we both hunger and thirst, and we are poorly clothed, and beaten, and homeless. And we labor, working with our own hands. Being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we endure; being defamed, we entreat.” Christian leaders will often suffer for their vocation, they will be “reviled”, “persecuted”, and “defamed”, sometimes by the world, and sometimes (as in Corinth) even by the people he loves the dearest. But rather than reacting with either despondency or anger (which is all too often our first instinct), the Christian leader is called to respond with “blessing”, “endurance” and by continuing to witness and teach the Good News [i.e. entreaty]. It is only through this kind of witness that the world can be saved; and it is only through this kind of witness that mobs become disciples.
