Rev. Peter M Preble – Page 102 – Open-Minded, Open-Hearted Minister & Soul Friend

Canned Food

Posted on November 22, 2013 by Fr. Peter

If you have been reading these pages for any period of time you will know that my parish St. Michael Orthodox Church in Southbridge Massachusetts provides a free meal twice a month to people in the community. We do not run a soup kitchen but we offer a community meal and there is a difference.

What we are trying to do is build community and that is not an easy task. Our meals bring together people from all along the economic spectrum for a free meal, conversation, and friendship. As a parish community this is our way of living the Gospel message of loving our neighbor. We have made some great friends during the last 4 years and, although it is a lot of work, I don’ think any of us would miss the opportunity to serve this meal.

Last night we served our annual Thanksgiving Meal complete with turkeys, 9 of them, stuffing, mashed potato, veg, pies, etc. We had help serving the almost 130 people who came, by the youth of St. Ann/St. Patrick Roman Catholic Church in Sturbridge Massachusetts and we could not have done it without them!

So what of canned goods?

Well, each week I make a trip to the Worcester County Food Bank to get the food that we will be using for these meals. Part of what I pick up is a variety of canned goods that we put on a table for those who come to take. It is not much, but maybe it will supplement a meal or two and make life a little easier for some.

There used to be a sign that hung above the table that said, “if you need something, take it if you have extra, leave it.” This harkens to the Gospel message of helping out our brothers and sisters. St. Basil the Great believed that if everyone took only what they needed there would be no poverty in the world, a nice thought and perhaps a bit utopian, but it is something we should strive for non the less. That single can will feed a person, or a family, and keep them from going hungry. That simple can, that some make take for granted, will keep someone alive.

Next time you are out shopping for food, but a couple of extra cans of something and donate it to the local food pantry. You just might save a life!

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The Holy of Holies

Posted on November 21, 2013 by Fr. Peter

St. Paul’s Letter to the Hebrews 9:1-7

BRETHREN, the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly sanctuary. For a tent was prepared, the outer one, in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the Presence; it is called the Holy Place. Behind the second curtain stood a tent called the Holy of Holies, having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, which contained a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant; above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail. These preparations having thus been made, the priests go continually into the outer tent, performing their ritual duties; but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood which he offers for himself and for the errors of the people.

The passage from St. Paul’s letter to the Hebrews is read in Orthodox Church on feasts of the Virgin Mary and it illustrates the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God. Mary’s womb was prepared to be Christ’s tabernacle and become the very place where God dwells.

St. Paul describes the details of the Holy Place and draws attention to the second veil, that separates the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place, the place that contained the Ark of the Covenant and only the High Priest, and only once a year, could enter.

A separation existed between the people and God. There was a physical barrier, the veil, but there was also a spiritual barrier, Ancestral Sin. When Christ came and sanctified the womb of Mary and was born, all of that started to come to an end. When Christ was crucified for our Sins that separation ended in fact Scripture tells us that veil was torn in two! No longer are we separated from the Father, unless we choose to be by our sins.

Because Christ died for us he broke the hold that sin had one us and repaired the relationship between the Father and His creation. Each sin draws us away, but through the Church, we have the ability to be reconciled through confession.

Take time during this Holy season of the year to repair that relationship. Open that veil that separates you from God. No longer is the tabernacle hidden from the view of the people, the tabernacle is the people for we hold God inside each of us, we are the Holy of Holies.

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November 21st ~ Entry of the Theotokos into the Temple

Posted on November 21, 2013 by Fr. Peter

A Sermon by Saint Gregory Palamas, Archbishop of Thessalonica

If a tree is known by its fruit, and a good tree bears good fruit (Mt. 7:17; Lk. 6:44), then is not the Mother of Goodness Itself, She who bore the Eternal Beauty, incomparably more excellent than every good, whether in this world or the world above? Therefore, the coeternal and identical Image of goodness, Preeternal, transcending all being, He Who is the preexisting and good Word of the Father, moved by His unutterable love for mankind and compassion for us, put on our image, that He might reclaim for Himself our nature which had been dragged down to uttermost Hades, so as to renew this corrupted nature and raise it to the heights of Heaven. For this purpose, He had to assume a flesh that was both new and ours, that He might refashion us from out of ourselves. Now He finds a Handmaiden perfectly suited to these needs, the supplier of Her own unsullied nature, the Ever-Virgin now hymned by us, and Whose miraculous Entrance into the Temple, into the Holy of Holies, we now celebrate. God predestined Her before the ages for the salvation and reclaiming of our kind. She was chosen, not just from the crowd, but from the ranks of the chosen of all ages, renowned for piety and understanding, and for their God-pleasing words and deeds.

In the beginning, there was one who rose up against us: the author of evil, the serpent, who dragged us into the abyss. Many reasons impelled him to rise up against us, and there are many ways by which he enslaved our nature: envy, rivalry, hatred, injustice, treachery, slyness, etc. In addition to all this,he also has within him the power of bringing death, which he himself engendered, being the first to fall away from true life.

The author of evil was jealous of Adam, when he saw him being led from earth to Heaven, from which he was justly cast down. Filled with envy, he pounced upon Adam with a terrible ferocity, and even wished to clothe him with the garb of death.Envy is not only the begetter of hatred, but also of murder, which this truly man-hating serpent brought about in us. For he wanted to be master over the earth-born for the ruin of that which was created in the image and likeness of God. Since he was not bold enough to make a face to face attack, he resorted to cunning and deceit. This truly terrible and malicious plotter pretended to be a friend and useful adviser by assuming the physical form of a serpent, and stealthily took their position. By his God-opposing advice,he instills in man his own death-bearing power, like a venomous poison.

If Adam had been sufficiently strong to keep the divine commandment, then he would have shown himself the vanquisher of his enemy, and withstood his deathly attack. But since he voluntarily gave in to sin, he was defeated and was made a sinner. Since he is the root of our race, he has produced us as death-bearing shoots. So, it was necessary for us, if he were to fight back against his defeat and to claim victory, to rid himself of the death-bearing venomous poison in his soul and body, and to absorb life, eternal and indestructible life.

It was necessary for us to have a new root for our race, a new Adam, not just one Who would be sinless and invincible, but one Who also would be able to forgive sins and set free from punishment those subject to it. And not only would He have life in Himself, but also the capacity to restore to life, so that He could grant to those who cleave to Him and are related to Him by race both life and the forgiveness of their sins, restoring to life not only those who came after Him, but also those who already had died before Him. Therefore, St. Paul, that great trumpet of the Holy Spirit, exclaims, ““the first man Adam was made a living soul, the last Adam was made a quickening spirit”” (1 Cor. 15:45).

Except for God, there is no one who is without sin, or life-creating, or able to remit sin. Therefore, the new Adam must be not only Man, but also God. He is at the same time life, wisdom, truth, love, and mercy, and every other good thing, so that He might renew the old Adam and restore him to life through mercy, wisdom and righteousness. These are the opposites of the things which the author of evil used to bring about our aging and death.

As the slayer of mankind raised himself against us with envy and hatred, so the Source of life was lifted up [on the Cross] because of His immeasurable goodness and love for mankind. He intensely desired the salvation of His creature, i.e., that His creature would be restored by Himself. In contrast to this, the author of evil wanted to bring God’s creature to ruin, and thereby put mankind under his own power, and tyrannically to afflict us. And just as he achieved the conquest and the fall of mankind by means of injustice and cunning, by deceit and his trickery, so has the Liberator brought about the defeat of the author of evil, and the restoration of His own creature with truth, justice and wisdom.

It was a deed of perfect justice that our nature, which was voluntarily enslaved and struck down, should again enter the struggle for victory and cast off its voluntary enslavement. Therefore, God deigned to receive our nature from us, hypostatically uniting with it in a marvellous way. But it was impossible to unite that Most High Nature,Whose purity is incomprehensible for human reason, to a sinful nature before it had been purified. Therefore, for the conception and birth of the Bestower of purity, a perfectly spotless and Most Pure Virgin was required.

Today we celebrate the memory of those things that contributed, if only once, to the Incarnation. He Who is God by nature, the Co-unoriginate and Coeternal Word and Son of the Transcendent Father, becomes the Son of Man, the Son of the Ever-Virgin. ““Jesus Christ the same yesterday and today, and forever”” (Heb. 13:8), immutable in His divinity and blameless in His humanity, He alone, as the Prophet Isaiah prophesied, ““practiced no iniquity, nor deceit with His lips”” (Is. 53: 9). He alone was not brought forth in iniquity, nor was He conceived in sin, in contrast to what the Prophet David says concerning himself and every other man (Ps. 50/51: 5). Even in what He assumes, He is perfectly pure and has no need to be cleansed Himself. But for our sake, He accepted purification, suffering, death and resurrection, that He might transmit them to us.

God is born of the spotless and Holy Virgin, or better to say, of the Most Pure and All-Holy Virgin. She is above every fleshly defilement, and even above every impure thought. Her conceiving resulted not from fleshly lust, but by the overshadowing of the Most Holy Spirit. Such desire being utterly alien to Her, it is through prayer and spiritual readiness that She declared to the angel: ““Behold the handmaiden of the Lord; be it unto Me according to thy word”” (Lk. 1:38), and that She conceived and gave birth. So, in order to render the Virgin worthy of this sublime purpose, God marked this ever-virgin Daughter now praised by us, from before the ages, and from eternity, choosing Her from out of His elect.

Turn your attention then, to where this choice began. From the sons of Adam God chose the wondrous Seth, who showed himself a living heaven through his becoming behavior, and through the beauty of his virtues. That is why he was chosen, and from whom the Virgin would blossom as the divinely fitting chariot of God. She was needed to give birth and to summon the earth-born to heavenly sonship. For this reason also all the lineage of Seth were called ““sons of God,”” because from this lineage a son of man would be born the Son of God. The name Seth signifies a rising or resurrection, or more specifically, it signifies the Lord, Who promises and gives immortal life to all who believe in Him.

And how precisely exact is this parallel! Seth was born of Eve, as she herself said, in place of Abel, whom Cain killed through jealousy (Gen. 4:25); and Christ, the Son of the Virgin, was born for us in place of Adam, whom the author of evil also killed through jealousy. But Seth did not resurrect Abel, since he was only a foretype of the resurrection. But our Lord Jesus Christ resurrected Adam, since He is the very Life and the Resurrection of the earth-born, for whose sake the descendents of Seth are granted divine adoption through hope, and are called the children of God. It was because of this hope that they were called sons of God, as is evident from the one who was first called so, the successor in the choice.This was Enos, the son of Seth, who as Moses wrote, first hoped to call on the Name of the Lord (Gen. 4:26).

In this manner, the choice of the future Mother of God, beginning with the very sons of Adam and proceeding through all the generations of time, through the Providence of God, passes to the Prophet-king David and the successors of his kingdom and lineage. When the chosen time had come, then from the house and posterity of David, Joachim and Anna are chosen by God. Though they were childless, they were by their virtuous life and good disposition the finest of all those descended from the line of David.And when in prayer they besought God to deliver them from their childlessness, and promised to dedicate their child to God from its infancy. By God Himself, the Mother of God was proclaimed and given to them as a child, so that from such virtuous parents the all-virtuous child would be raised.So in this manner, chastity joined with prayer came to fruition by producing the Mother of virginity, giving birth in the flesh to Him Who was born of God the Father before the ages.

Now, when Righteous Joachim and Anna saw that they had been granted their wish, and that the divine promise to them was realized in fact, then they on their part, as true lovers of God, hastened to fulfill their vow given to God as soon as the child had been weaned from milk. They have now led this truly sanctified child of God, now the Mother of God, this Virgin into the Temple of God. And She, being filled with Divine gifts even at such a tender age, … She, rather than others, determined what was being done over Her. In Her manner She showed that She was not so much presented into the Temple, but that She Herself entered into the service of God of her own accord, as if she had wings, striving towards this sacred and divine love. She considered it desirable and fitting that she should enter into the Temple and dwell in the Holy of Holies.

Therefore, the High Priest, seeing that this child, more than anyone else, had divine grace within Her, wished to set Her within the Holy of Holies. He convinced everyone present to welcome this, since God had advanced it and approved it. Through His angel, God assisted the Virgin and sent Her mystical food, with which She was strengthened in nature, while in body She was brought to maturity and was made purer and more exalted than the angels, having the Heavenly spirits as servants. She was led into the Holy of Holies not just once, but was accepted by God to dwell there with Him during Her youth, so that through Her, the Heavenly Abodes might be opened and given for an eternal habitation to those who believe in Her miraculous birthgiving.

So it is, and this is why She, from the beginning of time, was chosen from among the chosen. She Who is manifest as the Holy of Holies, Who has a body even purer than the spirits purified by virtue, is capable of receiving … the Hypostatic Word of the Unoriginate Father.Today the Ever-Virgin Mary, like a Treasure of God, is stored in the Holy of Holies, so that in due time, (as it later came to pass) She would serve for the enrichment of, and an ornament for, all the world. Therefore, Christ God also glorifies His Mother, both before birth, and also after birth.

We who understand the salvation begun for our sake through the Most Holy Virgin, give Her thanks and praise according to our ability. And truly, if the grateful woman (of whom the Gospel tells us), after hearing the saving words of the Lord, blessed and thanked His Mother, raising her voice above the din of the crowd and saying to Christ, ““Blessed is the womb that bore Thee, and the paps Thou hast sucked”” (Lk. 11:27), then we who have the words of eternal life written out for us, and not only the words, but also the miracles and the Passion, and the raising of our nature from death, and its ascent from earth to Heaven, and the promise of immortal life and unfailing salvation, then how shall we not unceasingly hymn and bless the Mother of the Author of our Salvation and the Giver of Life, celebrating Her conception and birth, and now Her Entry into the Holy of Holies?

Now, brethren, let us remove ourselves from earthly to celestial things. Let us change our path from the flesh to the spirit. Let us change our desire from temporal things to those that endure. Let us scorn fleshly delights, which serve as allurements for the soul and soon pass away. Let us desire spiritual gifts, which remain undiminished. Let us turn our reason and our attention from earthly concerns and raise them to the inaccessible places of Heaven, to the Holy of Holies, where the Mother of God now resides.

Therefore, in such manner our songs and prayers to Her will gain entry, and thus through her mediation, we shall be heirs of the everlasting blessings to come, through the grace and love for mankind of Him Who was born of Her for our sake, our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory, honor and worship, together with His Unoriginate Father and His Coeternal and Life-Creating Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.

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And They All Cried Glory

Posted on November 20, 2013 by Fr. Peter

These words come from the Prophetic Words of Isaiah and describe the worship of all believers in the Heavenly places. This is also one of the verses that influence the development of the worship in the Orthodox Church. Orthodox believe that our worship mimics if you will, the worship that we will be engaged in when are in the presence of the Almighty.

Isaiah 6:3 “And one cried to another and said, ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory.”

This is the vision of Isaiah and the vision that all Orthodox worshippers should have during the services of the Church. When Prince Vladimir of Kiev was in search of a Church for his people, he sent our emissaries to the various centers of the word. When those who he had sent to the East returned they told stories of the worship being so beautiful that they could not determine if they were on earth or in heaven, this is the essence of Orthodox Worship.

The Church is like heaven and has an altar, a throne, smoke from incense and the believers singing Holy, Holy, Holy, the thrice holy hymn.

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Gettysburg Address

Posted on November 19, 2013 by Fr. Peter

On this date, November 19th, 150 years ago, President Abraham Lincoln gave a speech at a new cemetery in a small Pennsylvania town that saw one of the bloodiest battles of the American Civil War. A very short speech, by modern standards, he had a lot to say. I have printed the text of the speech below.

The Gettysburg Address

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom— and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

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He Who Began A Good Work In You…

Posted on November 19, 2013 by Fr. Peter

I think it goes without saying that St. Paul is one of the greatest missionary figures of the New Testament. In fact, most of the Epistle writings are those of St. Paul to the churches that he founded and they leave us with an enormous amount of theology, spirituality, missiology, and the like.

St. Paul was under some sort of house arrest in Rome between AD 61-63 and that is the time that most scholars believe he wrote his letter to his Church in Philippi. In the opening sentences of that letter (verse 6 to be exact) he says, “being confident of this very thing He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.”

What is St. Paul saying will be completed in the through Jesus Christ? In the previous verse he mentions the “fellowship in the Gospel” and he is pleased with that. The Philippian Church had taken up a collection and sent it to Paul who was in desperate need of those funds. They had been faithful and St. Paul is writing to thank them for their generosity. But it is more than that.

The Greek work “koinonia” is central in St. Paul’s writing in this Epistle and to the Church that had formed in Philippi. But this sense of fellowship is also central to the life of Orthodox Christianity. This word moves past friendship and implies true communion, communion not only in the sense of the Sacramental action but in the care and love that the people have for each other and those in need.

Care for each other and for those around us is fundamental to our lives as Christians, we do not have a choice to help or not, we are commanded to care for those around us. In one sense we are accountable to each other for not only what we do but what we do not do. If we see someone in need we must help them, we must give them our coat, our food, or other help they might need. But it has to go deeper than that.

Feeding and clothing people is wonderful and it is a fulfillment of the Gospel command, but we also have to feed and clothe them spiritually. We have to share our lives with them and bring them to the love and light of Jesus Christ. This is what the Church in Philippi was doing and tis is the reason St. Paul wrote to them.

Share what you have with those in need, food, clothing, money, but also share what God has given you and that is life in Christ.

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No Shopping on Thanksgiving

Posted on November 18, 2013 by Fr. Peter

Why do we desire to rush the holiday season? It seems that no sooner is Halloween over that the Christmas decorations start to appear in the stores. I noticed the other day that the Town I live in has started to put up their holiday decorations. I call them holiday decorations because there is not one that would signify the reason for season, but I digress. For the Orthodox November 15th begins the period known as St. Philip’s fast or the Nativity Fast, or even Christmas Lent. I have spoken of this before but the Christmas Season does not begin until December 24^th! It would be like running around yelling “CHRIST IS RISEN” during Lent, we just don’t do it.

Hallmark, and the other retail establishments, have brainwashed us that we have to get into debit, as a way to show how much we love each other, and we have to do it as soon as possible. This has now started to spill over into Thanksgiving. This has been coming for some time now but it seems to have arrived. Nothing is sacred any longer. The holidays are supposed to be about family and friends and the Thanksgiving Holiday is supposed to be about giving thanks for what we have not running over someone to get what we don’t need or what will be broken in 2 weeks.

It may seem like a small thing and just like Sunday, Thanksgiving has become just another day, but the madness has to stop and it needs to stop soon. If we shop on Thanksgiving, or Sunday for that matter, we require other people to have to leave their families and their table so we can indulge in our materialistic ways. The retail outlets will require their employees to work, to satisfy your craving and lust for the latest gadget, and if they do not work they will be fired. Stay home and save someone’s job!

In his weekly bulletin from St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Shrewsbury Massachusetts, Fr. Nicholas Apostola wrote this and I think it sums up my thoughts on the madness of shopping on Thanksgiving.

PREPARE FOR CHRISTMAS BY FASTING! One of the most critical ways you might what to prepare for Christmas is not only by fasting from food, but also from shopping, — or at least choosing when to shop. We are losing one of the VERY last shared holidays. Most large retailers have decided to open on Thanksgiving Day! Goodbye to family gatherings. Goodbye to simple conversation around the turkey table. Goodbye to high school football rivalries. We are now given one focus: shopping, shopping, shopping. You have a say in this. Don’t shop on Thanksgiving. Talk to your family and friends and have them stop as well. This is a moment for us to act and keep our society sane.

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Vanity

Posted on November 17, 2013 by Fr. Peter

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I am participating in the 40 Days of Pastoral Blogging established by my friend and fellow priest Fr. John Peck. Each day Fr. John provides a word or a topic for us to write on and the hope is that we will continue to blog after the 40 days are completed. Today’s word is Vanity.

My quick go to source for information Wikipedia has this to say about Vanity, in conventional parlance, vanity is the excessive belief in one’s own abilities or attractiveness to others. I made to word excessive bold in the previous sentence for a reason. I believe that excessive is the key here.

I do not see anything wrong with believing in ourselves or in our abilities. God has given each of us talents and we are supposed to use those talents, not for our won glory, but for the building up of the kingdom. Maybe our talents are not so obvious and perhaps we need to consult our Spiritual Father for help in discovering what our abilities are, but we do need to figure this out and we need to get to work!

We do not use our God Given Talents for our own glory, and by that I mean we do not use our talents as a means to an end. There has to be a purpose to what we do and that purpose cannot simply be to draw attention to one’s self. Take this exercise in blogging that I am involved in. Am I doing this to attract visitors to my site so they can see my picture and say what an awesome guy? Or am I engaged in this exercise in the hopes that what I right maybe of use to someone, perhaps that someone will only be me.

As with anything, what is our motive behind what we are doing.

As we approach the National Day of Thanksgiving here in the US I will start to get calls from people who wish to come to help out at our Thanksgiving Community Meal. (If you have read these pages for any time you will know that our parish serves a free meal to the community twice a month.) Now I am not one to ever turn help away, but I have to stop and ask why now, why not in the middle of July? People need food year round not just at the holidays. So I politely tell them that if they wish to help out at Thanksgiving they need to put in some hours during the rest of the year. I have not had one person come and help after I made this suggestion.

What are our motives? Why are we doing what we are doing? Is it to draw attention to ourselves or to bring glory to God? We are the only ones who can answer that question but the answer will determine our level of vanity.

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Met. Hilarion: The Voice of the Church Must Be Prophetic

Posted on November 16, 2013 by Fr. Peter

Source: World Council of Churches

Address by Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk,
Chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate,
At the 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches

Busan, the Republic of Korea, 1 November 2013

Your Holinesses and Beatitudes, Your Eminences and Graces, dear brothers and sisters, esteemed delegates of the Assembly,

The World Council of Churches has a long and rich history. Set up after the Second World War, the Council responded to the expectations of Christians of various confessions who strove to meet, to get to know each other and to work together. Over the sixty five years since the founding of the WCC, several generations of Christians belonging to religious communities that were cut off from each other have discovered for themselves the faith and life of their brothers and sisters in Christ. Many prejudices regarding other Christian traditions have been overcome, yet at the same time that which divides Christians to the present has been acknowledged ever more clearly and deeply. The greatest achievement of the Council has been those encounters, that well intentioned and mutual respectful inter-Christian communication, which has never allowed for compromises in the field of theology and morality and which has enabled us to remain true to ourselves and to bear witness to our faith, while at the same time growing in love for each other.

The World Council of Churches today remains a unique instrument of inter-Christian cooperation that has no analogy in the world. However, the question arises as to how effective this instrument is. We must note with some regret that, in spite of all of the efforts aimed at bringing Christians of various confessions closer to each other, within Christendom not only are the divisions of the past not disappearing, but new ones are arising. Many Christian communities continue to split up, whereas the number of communities that unite with one another is extremely small.

One of the problems which the WCC is encountering today is that of finances. It is said that it is connected with the world economic crisis. I cannot agree with this opinion. The experience of other international organizations, whose work is of general benefit and therefore needed, has shown that funding can often be found for noble goals. This means that the problem is not the economic crisis, but how relevant and important is the work of the WCC for today’s international community, which is made up to a significant degree by, and at times, a majority of Christians.

The creation of the WCC was determined by the endeavour to find answers to the challenges of the post-War period. Yet in recent years the world has changed greatly, and today Christians from all over the world are facing new challenges. It is precisely upon how successfully we respond to these challenges that the need for our organization in the future depends. The contemporary situation demands from us more decisive action, greater cohesion and more dynamism. And yet it also demands a re-orientation of the basic direction of our work, a change in priorities in our discussions and deeds. While we continue to discuss our differences in the comfortable atmosphere of conferences and theological dialogues, the question resounds ever more resolutely: will Christian civilization survive at all?

In my address I would like to focus on two fundamental challenges which the Christian world today faces in varying degrees. The first is that of the militant secularism which is gathering strength in the so called developed countries, primarily in Europe and America. The second is that of radical Islamism that poses a threat to the very existence of Christianity in a number of regions of the world, mainly in the Middle East, but also in some parts of Asia and Africa.

Militant secularism in Europe has a long history going back to the period of the French revolution. But it is only in the twentieth century in the countries of the so called socialist bloc that godlessness was elevated to the level of state ideology. As regards the so called capitalist countries, they preserved to a significant degree the Christian traditions which shaped their cultural and moral identity.

Today these two worlds appear to have changed roles. In the countries of the former Soviet Union, in particular in Russia, Ukraine, Belorussia and Moldavia, an unprecedented religious revival is underway. In the Russian Orthodox Church over the past twenty five years there have been built or restored from ruins more than twenty five thousand churches. This means that a thousand churches a year have been opened, i.e. three churches a day. More than fifty theological institutes and eight hundred monasteries, each full with monks and nuns, have been opened.

In Western European countries we can observe the steady decline of the numbers of parishioners, a crisis in vocations, and monasteries and churches are being closed. The anti-Christian rhetoric of many politicians and statesmen becomes all the more open as they call for the total expulsion of religion from public life and the rejection of the basic moral norms common to all religious traditions.

The battle between the religious and secular worldview is today raging not in academic auditoriums or on the pages of newspapers. And the subject of the conflict is far from being exhausted by the question of belief or lack of belief in God. Today this clash has entered a new dimension and touches upon the fundamental aspects of the everyday life of the human person.

Militant secularism is aimed not only at religious holy sites and symbols by demanding that they be removed from the public domain. One of the main directions of its activity today is the straightforward destruction of traditional notions of marriage and the family. This is witnessed by the new phenomenon of equating homosexual unions with marriage and allowing single-sex couples to adopt children. From the point of view of biblical teaching and traditional Christian moral values, this testifies to a profound spiritual crisis. The religious understanding of sin has been conclusively eroded in societies that until recently thought of themselves as Christian.

Particularly alarming is the fact that we are dealing in this instance not only with a choice of ethics and worldview. Under the pretext of combating discrimination, a number of countries have introduced changes in family legislation. Over the past few years single-sex cohabitation has been legalized in a number of states in the USA, a number of Latin American countries and in New Zealand. This year homosexual unions have attained the legal status of ‘marriage’ in England and Wales and in France.

We have to state clearly that those countries that have recognized in law homosexual unions as one of the forms of marriage are taking a serious step towards the destruction of the very concept of marriage and the family. And this is happening in a situation where in many historically Christian countries the traditional family is enduring a serious crisis: the number of divorces is growing, the birthrate is declining catastrophically, the culture of a family upbringing is degraded, not to mention the prevalence of sexual relations outside of marriage, the increase in the number of abortions and the increase of children brought up without parents, even if those parents are still alive.

Instead of encouraging by all means possible traditional family values and supporting childbirth not only materially but also spiritually, the justification of the legitimacy of ‘single-sex families’ who bring up children has become the centre of public attention. As a result, the traditional social roles are eroded and swapped around. The notion of parents, i.e. of the father and the mother, of what is male and what is female, is radically altered. The female mother is losing her time-honoured role as guardian of the domestic hearth, while the male father is losing his role as educator of his children in being socially responsible. The family in its Christian understanding is falling apart to be replaced by such impersonal terms as ‘parent number one’ and parent number two’.

All of this cannot but have the most disastrous consequences for the upbringing of children. Children who are brought up in families with ‘two fathers’ or ‘two mothers’ will already have views on social and ethical values different from their contemporaries from traditional families.

One of the direct consequences of the radical reinterpretation of the concept of marriage is the serious demographic crisis which will only grow if these approaches are adhered to. Those politicians who are pushing the countries of the civilized world into the demographic abyss are in essence pronouncing upon their peoples a death sentence.

What is to be the response of the Christian Churches? I believe deeply this response can be none other than that which is based on Divine Revelation as handed down to us in the Bible. Scripture is the common foundation which unites all Christian confessions. We may have significant differences in the interpretation of Scripture, but we all possess the same Bible and its moral teaching is laid out quite unambiguously. Of course, we differ in the interpretation of certain biblical texts when they allow for a varied interpretation. Yet much in the Bible is stated quite unambiguously, namely that which proceeds from the mouth of God and retains its relevance for all subsequent ages. Among these divine sayings are many moral commandments, including those which concern family ethics.

In speaking out against all forms of discrimination, the Church nonetheless must vindicate the traditional Christian understanding of marriage as between a man and a woman, the most important mission of which is the birth and upbringing of children. It is precisely this understanding of marriage that we find on the pages of the Bible in the story of the first human family. This same understanding of marriage we also find in the Gospels and the apostolic epistles. The Bible does not know of any alternative forms of marriage.

Unfortunately, not all Christian Churches today find within themselves the courage and resolve to vindicate the biblical ideals by going against that which is fashionable and the prevalent secular outlook. Some Christian communities have long ago embarked on a revision of moral teaching aimed at making it more in step with modern tendencies.

It is often said that the differences in theological and ethical problems are linked to the division of Christians into conservatives and liberals. One cannot but agree with this when we see how in a number of Christian communities a headlong liberalization is occurring in religious ethics, as a rule under the influence of processes taking place in secular society. At the same time the witness of the Orthodox Churches should not be reduced to that of conservatism. The faith of the Ancient Church which we Orthodox confess is impossible to define from the standpoint of conservatism and liberalism. We confess Christ’s truth which is immutable, for ‘Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today, and for ever’ (Heb. 3:8).

We are not speaking about conservatism but of fidelity to Divine Revelation which is contained in Scripture. And if the so called liberal Christians reject the traditional Christian understanding of moral norms, then this means that we are running up against a serious problem in our common Christian witness. Are we able to bear this witness if we are so deeply divided in questions of moral teaching, which are as important for salvation as dogma?

In this regard I would like to speak about the Church’s prophetic vocation. I recall the words of Fr. Alexander Schmemann who said that a prophet is far from being someone who foretells the future. In reminding us of the profound meaning of prophecy, Schmemann wrote: ‘The essence of prophecy is in the gift of proclaiming to people God’s will, which is hidden from human sight but revealed to the spiritual vision of the prophet’ (Schmemann, The Celebration of Faith, vol.1: I Believe…, p.112).

We often speak of the prophetic voice of the Churches, yet does our voice actually differ much from the voice and rhetoric of the secular mass media and non-governmental organizations? Is not one of the most important tasks of the WCC to discern the will of God in the modern-day historical setting and proclaim it to the world? This message, of course, would be hard to swallow for the powerful of this world. However, in refusing to proclaim it, we betray our vocation and in the final run we betray Christ.

In today’s context, when in many countries and regions of the world the revival of religion is underway and yet at the same time aggressive secularism and ideological atheism is raising its head, the World Council of Churches must find its own special voice that is understandable to modern-day societies and yet which proclaims the permanent truths of the Christian faith. Today, as always, we are called upon to be messengers of the Word of God, the Word which is ‘quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword’ (Heb. 4: 12); the Word which is not bound (2 Tim. 2: 9). It is only then that we can bring to Christ new souls, in spite of the resistance of the ‘rulers of the darkness of this world’ (Eph. 6: 12).

Allow me to speak now of the second global challenge for the entire Christian world, the challenge of radicalism on religious grounds, in particular radical Islamism. I use this term fully aware that Islamism is in no way identical to Islam and in many ways is the opposite of it. Islam is a religion of peace able to coexistence with other religious traditions, as is demonstrated, for example, by the centuries-old experience of peaceful coexistence between Christians and Muslims in Russia. Radical Islamism, known as Wahhabism or Salafism, is a movement within the Islamic world that has as its goal the establishment of a worldwide Caliphate in which there is no place for Christians.

Here I shall not go into the reasons for the appearance and rapid growth of this phenomenon. I shall say only that in recent years the persecution of Christians has assumed a colossal scale. According to the information of human rights organizations, every five minutes a Christian dies for his faith in one or another part of the world, and every year more than a hundred thousand Christians die a violent death. According to published data, no less than one hundred million Christians worldwide are now subject to discrimination and persecution. Information on the oppression of Christians comes in from Iraq, Syria, Egypt, North Sudan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and a number of other countries. Our brothers and sisters are being killed, driven from their homes and separated from their families and loved ones; they are denied the right to practice their faith and educate their children according to their religious beliefs. Christians are the most persecuted religious community on the planet.

Unfortunately, manifestations of discrimination with regard to the Christian minority can no longer be treated as separate incidents: in some regions of the world they have become a well established tendency. As a result of the continuing conflict in Syria the number of murders of Christians has increased, churches and holy sites have been destroyed. The Copts, the original inhabitants of Egypt, have today become a target for attacks and riots, and many have been forced to abandon their own country.

Radicalism on religious grounds is growing not only in the countries where the population is predominantly Muslim. It is important to draw attention to the situation in the area of Asia where today’s Assembly is taking place. In this region the Christian communities for more than three hundred years, thanks to the efforts of missionaries, have grown and developed. According to data by the experts, over the past ten years the level of discrimination of Christians in the region has increased many times over. Great anxiety is caused by the position of the Christian communities of Indonesia, where over the past two years the level of aggression aimed at Christians has increased considerably. Information on the discrimination of Christians is coming in from other Asian countries too.

Today we have to be aware that one of the most important tasks facing us is the defense of our persecuted brothers and sisters in various areas of the world. This task demands urgent resolve for which we must employ all possible means and levers—diplomatic, humanitarian, economic and so on. The topic of the persecution of Christians ought to be examined in the context of inter-Christian cooperation. It is only through common energetic endeavours that we can help our suffering brothers and sisters in Christ.

Much is done in this regard today by the Roman Catholic Church. There are Christian organizations that monitor the situation and collect charitable aid for suffering Christians. Our Church also participates in this work. I believe that of much benefit would be joint conferences and the exchange of information and experience between Christian human rights organizations that are pursuing this problem.

The rights of Christians can be guaranteed only by supporting dialogue between religious communities at both the inter-state and international level. Therefore, one of the important directions of the WCC’s work is inter-religious dialogue. I believe that we ought to pay more attention to the development of a deep and interested mutual inter-action with traditional religions, especially with Islam.

The World Council of Churches is already working to draw attention to the problem of the persecution of Christians. As an example I can quote the Christian-Muslim consultation on the topic of the Christians presence and witness in the Arab world, organized by the WCC in January 2012 in Lebanon, as well as the conference held there in May of this year on the persecution of Christians, in which the General Secretary of the WCC participated. I would also like to remark upon the work carried out by the Council with the aim of reducing the level of tension in Syria, of averting an escalation of the conflict and of not allowing external military intervention.

Addressing those who confessed Christianity St Peter said: ‘But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy’ (1 Pet. 4: 13). Recalling these words, we prayerfully desire that the All-Merciful Lord shall grant comfort and joy to those afflicted and oppressed so that they, in feeling the help and compassion of those brothers and sisters who are far away geographically yet close in the faith, may find in themselves the strength, with the aid of the grace of God, to travel further down the path of steadfast faith.

In concluding my speech, I would like to thank from the bottom of my heart the Christian communities of South Korea for the hospitality that they have shown us and the excellent organization of this General Assembly. The Russian Orthodox Church sympathizes with the Korean people in its striving to find unity, and in prayer and in deeds supports the processes for the overcoming of tension in relations between the two countries of the Korean peninsula.

To all of you, the participants of the Assembly, I enjoin the aid of God in joint labours and those labours which each of us carry out in their churches and communities. May our witness become the word of truth which the world needs so much today.

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Fasting and the Spiritual Benefit

Posted on November 16, 2013 by Fr. Peter

For Orthodox Christians around the world the period of Advent, or to be more specific the Nativity Fast has begun. This is a period of the 40 days leading up to the Nativity in the Flesh of Our Lord Jesus Christ. As I have written about, and spoken about, this is not to be confused with the Christmas season, which begins on December 24^th.

Sometimes this period of the year is referred to as Christmas Lent because the Orthodox fast and abstain from certain foods, mainly animal products, but it need to much more than not eating a hamburger or drinking a glass of milk. Fasting and abstinence has a spiritual dimension to it that needs to be considered.

Now let me state from the start that I really don’t care what you eat or don’t eat, I am not the food police, but I am concerned with your spiritual life. When we fast from certain foods we are able to gain control over our appetite and our passion for food. If we follow the dietary rules of the Orthodox Church, along with other practices like prayer, frequent confession, and attendance at Liturgy, we will strengthen our resolve when it come to the attacks of the evil one.

You would not wake up one morning and decide to run a marathon regardless of the shape you are in. Sure you can run the marathon but will you finish? Our spiritual life is a marathon, not a sprint, and we need to prepare and train ourselves and our bodies, for the struggle.

But we should not only fast and abstain from food. I have often said, you can be the best faster in the world and follow the rules to a T, but if in the end you are the same miserable person you were at the start, it did not work. There needs to be a change in our lives both internal and external, as a result of the spiritual discipline of fasting.

We should fast with our mouth, and not engage in talk that is not fitting a Christian. We should fast with our ears, and not listen to things that do not edify the soul and build up the kingdom. We should fast with our eyes and abstain from images of a sexual nature as well as violence, the list is endless. The bottom line is we fast in all aspects of our lives.

As we continue this Holy period of the Church year, let us pause and think about the things that we do and the ways we are preparing for the Nativity of our Lord. Fasting and Abstinence needs to be a big part of that preparation.