As the Apostle continues, he notes that love “is not arrogant or rude.”  I don’t think he’s here implying that some people would actually say that love is arrogant or rude.  He is simply reminding his readers that if you have arrogance or rudeness you have not love.  To be arrogant is literally to be “puffed up,” that is, proud.  I just said [in the last post] that love must be humble, for this is the basis for all its other good qualities.  Pride is the basis for all evil qualities, so it cannot in any way be compatible with love.  Love attracts; arrogance repels. Love serves; pride dominates. Love builds up others; arrogance puffs up oneself.

To say that love is not rude is not merely to say that love requires good manners (though good manners are certainly compatible with love).  The word translated “rude” has a broad connotation, for it means simply to act unbecomingly.  To be rude can mean to be inconsiderate or to “ignore other people’s desires and feelings in headstrong pursuit of [one’s] own objectives.”  In any given situation, there are becoming ways to act as well as unbecoming ones.  When one has love, one instinctively knows what is the most fitting way to act, for if one loves one is not acting out of pride or self-interest and hence will find the way to behave that best honors and serves others.

The next element in the description of love is perhaps one at which people stumble most often: “Love does not insist on its own way.”  We tend to insist on our own way because we tend to see our own way as the best way.  If we thought someone else’s opinions or way of doing things were truer or better than ours, then we would adopt them and make them our own.  It is because we think theirs are inferior to ours that we insist on our own way.  There may be a certain logic to this approach, humanly seen, but it is not the way of love.  I don’t mean that if someone else’s way is manifestly evil we must acquiesce to it out of love; that really wouldn’t be love, since love cannot be separated from truth.  But most of the issues or situations in which we insist on our own way are not a matter of the great war between good and evil, truth and falsehood—they’re usually just one person’s opinions or idiosyncrasies against another’s.

Here is where love will make a sacrifice in deference to another.  If one refuses sacrifice or self-denial for the sake of another, one has not love.  Love and sacrifice are two sides of the same coin; they are inseparable and are part of each other’s definition.  So in matters which are not of great import or which would not compromise one’s faith or relationship with God, love will not insist on its own way.  Love will defer, give in, swallow pride, permit others to shine and to have their way.  For love makes us secure and thus we do not need to win every argument or have our opinions universally acknowledged as the best.

Love “is not irritable or resentful.”  Here’s another touchy point.  “Irritable” here means “easily provoked.”  Face it, you are irritable.  And so am I.  How often do we turn the other cheek when the first one is struck?  Life’s provocations are myriad and, living in high-stress environments as most of us do today (don’t think there’s no stress in monasteries, especially in the abbot’s chair!), we simply do not respond with equanimity or serenity to all the pin-pricks provided by circumstances and people.  There’s a relation here to patience (enduring slights or injuries serenely and without complaint) and to insisting on our own way (for if we are used to getting our own way—or at least used to wanting to get our own way—every contrary thing will irritate us).  And life is full of contrary things.  But love is not irritable, not easily provoked.  It draws on a reservoir of inner peace and strength, which come from the indwelling presence of God.  If you are always getting upset, frustrated, exasperated, annoyed or aggravated by someone’s words or behavior, for that person you have not love.

I read recently of a very short prayer that can be very helpful in dealing with the human irritants: “Lord, bless them; change me.”  The whole of one’s inner energy is thus immediately redirected.  We have to change so as to be able to love that one whom we think has to change first.  To say this prayer is to assert that all we want for them is blessing, because we want to practice love (and if God wills, his blessing will turn out to be the very thing needed to change them, too—but that’s his business).  Someone makes an irritating remark: “Bless him; change me.”  Another provokes you in some other way, pushing your buttons: “Bless her; change me.”  Try it.  It will set you on the right track of Christian love and help defuse the negative emotions.

Moving on to the other half of this pair, what is translated as love being “not resentful” is literally “love does not reckon the evil.”  Part of its meaning therefore is “love does not hold a grudge,” and here again is a rather severe test for us.  St John Climacus regards “remembrance of wrongs” as among the most odious of sins.  Therefore love and forgiveness are also inseparable.  We are simply not loving others if we resent them for their provocations or the hurts they inflict upon us.

I’ll quote a fairly long passage here from the Anchor Bible commentary, because it expresses well this dimension of love.  “It is natural enough to notice and remember every bad thing that another does and to feel judgmental and angry; [but] such an attitude…is loveless.  But Paul does not mean to ignore evil or to regard it as insignificant.  The way of love recognizes the difference between evil and good, but by a miracle of emotional transubstantiation [a remarkable expression!] love absorbs evil without charging it against the other person and deals with evil by forgiving it.  This can only be done by the power of God; that is, it is a gift.  There is no greater illustration of this act of love than the word of Jesus, ‘Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do’ (Luke 23:34).”  A certain morning offering (the author clearly was reading 1Cor. 13) reads, in part: “May I check the first risings of anger or sullenness.  If I meet with unkindness or ill-treatment, give me that charity which suffers long and bears all things.  Make me kind and gentle towards all, loving even those who love me not.”  Yes, this is the Gospel of Jesus.

The next element of love may seem to be self-evident: “it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.”  Why would anyone think that love would rejoice in what is wrong?  I have already said that love and truth are inseparable.  Perhaps we ought to rephrase it a bit in order to get a more practical perspective: “Love does not rejoice in the defeat or failure of others, but rejoices in their success and blessing.”  Ah, now we are touching a nerve!  The “wrong” in this case would be the bad things that happen to others, and the “right” would be the good things.  Jealousy and envy (which are inimical to love) are usually at work when we take secret pleasure in another’s failure, downfall, or bad luck.  Somehow the mind that is under sin’s influence thinks that it can rise to the top over the fallen bodies of others—that is, another person’s failure makes way for our success.  Or we begin to look good in contrast to the other’s looking bad.  We thus rejoice in the wrong, and so we have not love.  How often are we actually happy over someone else’s good fortune or success—especially if we ourselves are seemingly unblessed?  One of the litmus tests of our love for others is the extent to which we can rejoice in their blessings and prosperity, and not in their misfortunes.

If you’re not yet thoroughly convinced that you’ve a long way to go before you truly love, I’ll drive the final point home: “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”  Now this is a stylistic way of expression, so you shouldn’t think, for example, that “love believes all things” means the same as “love is gullible.”  I hope you don’t mind if I quote another long passage from a commentary.  Rather than try to say basically the same thing in my own tortuous fashion, I’d just as soon put you in touch with a more articulate explanation.

To “bear” all things, means literally “to put a cover over.”  The commentator translates this as “keeps all confidences,” but expands it as follows. “Paul probably means that love is capable of passing over many things in silence where it would do harm to make them public, and it charitably refuses to attribute to other people evil motives… Love trusts in the redeemable possibilities of others and in the overarching goodness of God [love believes all things], who can bring good out of evil.  Love stubbornly adheres to the conviction that life has purpose and meaning, that despite appearances God’s purpose will be accomplished [love hopes all things]… Put the other way round, the only sound basis for hope is love.  Love which has been given from God overcomes despair, fear, and hate; and this love has been revealed as a reality in the person of Jesus Christ.  The concomitant of this is steadfastness [love endures all things]: love does not cave in but retains a vital resilience, cheerfulness, and energy.  Self-centeredness will surrender to adversity in despair.  The gift of love is grounded in God’s own love.”

Finally, “love never ends.”  This is sometimes translated as “love never fails.”  The latter speaks of its infallible power and fruitfulness in this life as the way to put the commandments of the Lord into practice.  The Apostle goes on to say that all other gifts will fail or pass away, but love retains its value and efficacy forever.  It is all that is needed in the life to come in the Kingdom of Heaven.  This eternal character takes us back to “love never ends.”  This was the passage chosen for the memorial card of a friend of ours who died a couple years ago.  Bodily life may end, but love never ends. It will find its full, unhindered, and everlasting expression in the Paradise of God.  That which is of God no man can destroy, and since St John wrote “love is of God” (1Jn. 4:7), we know that love lasts into eternity.  Love is stronger than death; our souls are immortal because they are held in the undying love of God.

I think we must admit that we have a lot to learn, a lot to change, before we can honestly say that we truly love—and truly love all, not just those who are pleasing to us.  This is the Gospel; this is the meaning of life, in this age and in the age to come, as God has ordained it.  The one who loves God is the one who keeps his commandments.  “And this is his commandment, that we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another” (1Jn. 3:23).

St Paul has told us what love means in practice.  Let 13 be your lucky number, that is, First Corinthians 13.  Let love be your ticket to Paradise, your key to the fullness, beauty, and joy of life—both here and hereafter.

[I published this in our monastery newsletter a couple years ago, and it generated quite a bit of positive feedback.  I thought it might be good as a means of spiritual preparation for Christmas. If we aren’t loving in practical ways, perhaps because of the stress of these busy days, we won’t be able to fruitfully receive the love of God when we finally arrive at the manger…]

St John tells us that “God is love” (1Jn. 4:16), and Jesus commanded us to “love one another as I have loved you” (Jn. 15:12).  God’s love for us and our love for one another are of the essence of Christianity.  So it is not an exaggeration when St Paul writes: “If I have not love, I am nothing… I gain nothing” (1Cor. 13:2-3).

We might readily agree with all of the above, yet with all this talk of love, we might not be clear on precisely what we’re talking about.  I don’t have to go into all the ways that the term “love” is misused or distorted these days, for I think that’s obvious enough.  Love is not lust, it is not sentimentality, it is not about using another to make me feel good or to build my ego.  Neither is it found in an ill-conceived “compassion” that is little more than a politically-correct tolerance of sin.

Since God is love, we ought to try to understand what He means by the term, and the best way to do that is to go to the very words his Spirit has inspired, for there we will find the truth.  Scripture has much to say about love, and I can’t begin to cover it all in a single article.  So I’ll start by setting my limits.  I’m not going to say much about God’s love for us, or even about our love for God.  Probably you find God’s love for us self-evident, but if you don’t, just go back to reading the New Testament (especially the Passion narratives and texts like Romans 5 and Ephesians 1-2) and perhaps some of the sainted mystics.

I’ll say one thing, though, about our love for God.  It’s not a matter of feelings and it’s not a matter of mere words.  Jesus makes this very clear.  He never asked us to have loving feelings for Him or for God (though it certainly is fine if you do).  He never even asked us to tell God that we love Him (though this is fine, too, but like the feelings, it is inadequate). Here’s what He did say: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments… He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me… He who does not love me does not keep my words…” (Jn. 14:15-24).  You can’t get much clearer than that.  To keep his commandments is to love Him; not to keep his commandments is not to love Him.

Jesus is teaching us something very important here about the nature of love.  Love is about willing and doing.  Love is a choice, an act—or rather, a continuous series of choices and acts that express our fidelity and devotion to the One who loved us first.  Our loving words and feelings are genuine only if we in fact prove them by keeping the Lord’s commandments, that is, by doing his will.  Otherwise they are nothing but phony piety or empty sentiment.  Scripture repeatedly makes that clear: “Not every one who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father” (Mt. 7:21); “Every one who hears my words and does not put them into practice will be like a foolish man who built his house upon the sand” (Mt. 7:26); “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me” (Mk. 7:6); “Be doers of the word, and not hearers of the word only; this is self-deception” (James 1:22).  It is abundantly clear in the Bible: words are not enough to please God or to love Him.  Deeds are required if one’s faith and love are to be genuine.  Talk is cheap, and feelings are unreliable.  By our fruits we are known, said the Lord, that is, by the manifest expression of what we believe.

With this in mind, I will sharpen my focus even more and write only about the love we are called to have for one another, and I will limit myself mainly to St Paul’s magnificent and concise meditation on the subject in his First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 13.  Perhaps we find it relatively easy to love God, since we know that He already loves us, and since it has been revealed that God is the absolute and transcendent fullness of all possible goodness, beauty, joy, life, etc.  Keeping his commandments may be demanding, but the thought of who He is and what He has prepared for those who love Him lightens the burden quite a bit.  The real challenge is to love those who aren’t the fullness of beauty and goodness—and who in fact may seem to be the exact opposite—and hence will not appear as naturally lovable or attractive.  These are, for the most part, the people we live with or interact with in some way on a regular basis.  We may find that we don’t have loving feelings for them all, but we need to know that we can still love them in spite of that—because true love doesn’t require that, even though it would certainly be enhanced by it.

So if you are wondering precisely how to keep Jesus’ commandment to love other people (the very fact that we keep his commandment means that we’re also loving Him by loving others), St Paul describes the nature of Christian love in some practical terms.  This may burst the bubble of those who would prefer to keep love at an emotional level and not “get their hands dirty” in serving (or patiently enduring) others, but so be it.  That particular bubble needs to be burst.

I’ll take the Apostle’s description one or two points at a time, and try to make some practical applications.  After he describes (at the beginning of 1Cor. 13) the ultimate uselessness of spiritual gifts, knowledge, and even faith—if one has not love—he gets down to the essential elements of love-in-practice, which are indispensable if we are to please God.  By the way, when Paul writes here of love, it is agápi, not eros, so it is the self-giving, disinterested love (which doesn’t mean uninterested, but rather without self-interest) that is supposed to be the hallmark of the followers of Jesus.  (When I quote from commentaries, it will mainly be from the Navarre Bible and Anchor Bible series.)

“Love is patient and kind.”  This may at first glance seem to be little more than greeting-card sentiment.  That’s why we need much more than a first glance.  “Patience” is literally “long-suffering,” so right away we see the high cost of this first element of love.  Patience is much more than standing in line or waiting in traffic without exploding into anger or groaning in frustration.  According to one commentary, to be patient is to be “willing to receive slights, injuries, and hardships without complaint, even over a long period of time” (hence the “long” in long-suffering).  Another one says, referring to a quality that Scripture often attributes to God, that to be patient is to be “slow to anger… patience means great serenity in the face of injury.”  Far from lightweight sentiment, patience is a demanding element of love.  Think about being injured by someone, or even merely snubbed.  Are you willing to receive that treatment without complaint, and even with serenity?  This is the patience that is one way of putting love into practice.

As for kindness, that may seem even more vague and fluffy than patience originally did.  St Gregory the Great says that love is kind because it repays evil with good.  Suddenly it becomes a very serious and difficult virtue!  How often can you honestly say that you repay evil with good?  This is one of the most demanding commandments of the Lord: “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (Lk. 6:27-28).  His chief Apostle echoes this teaching: “Do not return evil for evil or reviling for reviling; but on the contrary, bless…” (1Peter 3:9).  You really are showing that you love God if you keep those commandments, for the ego gets no strokes from them.  It’s hard; but as such it is a proof of love.

More broadly seen, kindness “eases another person’s pain, soothes anxieties, fears, and hostilities, and contributes positively to the happiness of others.”  Again, not easy.  We tend to expend most of our efforts to contribute positively to our own happiness!  But the love that is kind goes out of the insulated world of the self (for it is agápi) to do good to others.  To highlight the value of patience and kindness, we should notice that they, along with love itself, are part of the nine-fold fruit of the Spirit that St Paul describes in Galatians 5:22-23.  This ought to tell us that if we are to love we need to be in the Holy Spirit.  Just as no one can genuinely proclaim the Lordship of Jesus except in the Holy Spirit (1Cor. 12:3), no one can bear the precious fruit of kind and long-suffering love except in that same Spirit.

“Love is not jealous or boastful.”  If love is to be concerned about the welfare of others (and that’s really all it is concerned about), then jealousy has to be excluded, since jealousy denotes too much concern about oneself and what one possesses.  Perhaps here “jealousy” could also be understood in the common misuse of the term to mean “envy.”  If we are jealous of what we possess (not only material things, but our own self-image, influence, reputation, ego), the other side of the coin is often that we are envious of another’s success, honor, or prosperity.  Likewise, love cannot be boastful (literally “self-vaunting”), for love must be humble if it is to be kind, patient, and all the rest.  A boastful person cannot be at the same time a loving person.  To brag or call attention to oneself can only result in the neglect of attention to others. None of this has anything to do with love—as Christianity sees it.

To be continued…

When I read the Scriptures I always try to find something that can apply to my life, that can guide my day, and in some way will turn out to be the Lord’s actual word to me.  I’m not interested only in learning more about the life and times of Jesus (though I’m somewhat interested in that), for I don’t view the Scriptures as merely a historical testimony, and still less as an example of ancient literature.  I want to “hear what the Lord God is saying” to me here and now (Ps 84/85).

So when I read the Scriptures, I try to distill, as it were, the essence of the message, especially when my own particular circumstances are not quite the same as those in the story being narrated.  For example, I recently read about Jesus walking across the sea to calm his clueless and terrified disciples (Mk 6:45-52).   What I took from it was the following: “They were distressed… the wind was against them… Jesus came to them… ‘Take heart, it is I; have no fear’… They did not understand… for their hearts were hardened.”

I was somewhat distressed that morning to begin with, because I had intended to get up extra early to get a head start on my ever-increasing pile of work.  But of course I forgot to set the alarm clock and so I overslept.  (Now one more big sign has now been erected to remind me to do ordinary things I am ever-more prone to forget.)  This is a small enough matter, but it made me all the more aware that all day, every day, there is an endless series of things going wrong, even though most of them are minor things.  Now that may be a bit of an exaggeration, but honestly, only a bit.  Therefore, upon reading the Gospel, I came to the conclusion: the wind is against me.  Whether it’s life’s little white tornadoes, or the Lord fanning his purifying flames, or even some foul gust from Hell, it’s hitting me smack in the face.

So here I am, distressed, with the wind against me.  The next thing, according to the Gospel, is that Jesus comes to me.  It says that Jesus was simply going to pass by them on the sea, but they were freaking out so much that He had to come into the boat to calm them down.  As I’m freaking out over the interminable series of problems falling upon me, the Lord says, “Take heart, it is I; have no fear.”

Those are words that ought to be supremely consoling.  The very One who calms storms is here, encouraging me, assuring me there’s no reason to fear the constant pelting with annoying and even maddening troubles, be they interior or exterior.  But I have to conclude that my heart is hardened, for like the disciples, I do not understand.  I don’t know what’s going on; I can’t interpret what the Lord is doing; I don’t know why the wind has to be against me all the time in the first place.

But here’s another reason my heart is hardened.  The day before I read this passage, I read about the plight of a man in China named Gao Zhisheng, who has been kidnapped and tortured for over 300 days—by the Chinese government—because he dared make public the last time they had tortured him for his Christian faith.  That isn’t happening to me, but I still complain about my endless little troubles.  The same day I received a phone call from a lady who comes to church here, concerning a 24-year-old fellow named Michael who used to come here once in a while with her grandson.  He subsequently got married and had a child.  Someone just broke into his house in a small town not far from us (apparently a robbery attempt) and shot him dead in front of his wife and child.  I didn’t have to witness such a horror, but I still complain about my endless little troubles.

In a sense that’s another one of my troubles: my inability to deal with the inevitable problems of life, while other people suffer incredible things and keep on going.  I try to remind myself that suffering, trials, and even myriads of mere annoyances are simply part and parcel of the nature of things in a fallen world.  Things cannot be otherwise until the Heavenly Jerusalem descends from on high.  That does not mean that all these things are utterly meaningless, fruitless, and absurd, for I can offer them all for the sake of those who are really suffering. I can “take [my] share of suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus”; I can “endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they may also obtain the salvation which in Christ Jesus goes with eternal glory” (2Tim. 2:3, 10).

Maybe you can pray for the un-hardening of my heart, so that I can finally understand. When the wind is against me and I am distressed, I need to hear what the Lord God is saying: “Take heart, it is I; have no fear…”  Perhaps you might need to hear those words as well, when the wind is against you and you feel distressed.  I guess we have to accept that the wind is going to be blowing all our lives, but at the same time He who walks upon the waters is always with us and has words of peace and encouragement for us.  We may not, like the disciples, understand why things are the way they are, and we may not understand the ways of the Lord in sending or permitting various trials. But may it not be due to hardened hearts; may we instead always seek in faith a deeper understanding of the Lord’s providence and wisdom.

It may be that the very busyness of these pre-Christmas days constitutes an adverse wind that causes distress.  But take heart, for the Lord is near and has blessings in store for those who would trust Him, come what may.

I mentioned a few posts back how just seeing a book cover brought me to the verge of tears, through a kind of premonition, perhaps, of what I would experience when I read it.  Something similar happened to me a few years ago when I was in a store on the coast, browsing through some CDs.  A song came over the sound system, just a voice and an acoustic guitar.  I wasn’t even paying attention to the words, but tears started coming to my eyes.  Something extraordinary is going on here, I thought, if just the sound of a voice could bring me to tears.  I went to the clerk to ask who it was, saying that whoever it was I would buy that CD there and then. It was someone I’d never heard of (not that I hear of very many recording artists here in the monastery!): Eva Cassidy.  The song was “Kathy’s Song” (written by Paul Simon), from her CD Time after Time.

I learned a little about her after that.  She died in 1996, at the age of 33, due to cancer.  Most of her songs were recorded live, and I think just about all of them are “cover songs,” previously written and recorded by others.  She seems to have been a Christian of some sort, or at least a believer in God.  She did a few gospel numbers, as well as blues, folk, and some old-time jazz songs as well.  She was equally at home belting out the blues as singing soft acoustic ballads.  I’ve never heard anyone whose music could make me both laugh and cry as hers has.

Why am I paying tribute to a deceased entertainer?  I’m not sure, though a couple reasons come to mind.  The main one is that I think God put me in that store at that time and moved my heart at hearing her voice so that, as she would bless me with her music, I could assist her with my prayer.  Performing artists are not usually known as the most devout in this world, and there are many temptations in such a lifestyle.  I do not know the circumstances of her death, but I thought the least I could do is pray for her and offer the Divine Liturgy once in a while for the repose of her soul.  I have done this, and I still remember her often in prayer.  Perhaps the offering of the Liturgy proved, in God’s compassionate and timeless fashion, instrumental in her salvation. If so, I’m happy to have another intercessor in Heaven, and someone to look forward to meeting there.

I’d also like to share a few lines of one of her gospel songs, an old Curtis Mayfield and the Impressions number called “People Get Ready.”

People get ready, there’s a train a-comin’.
You don’t need no baggage, you just get on board.
All you need is faith to hear the diesels hummin’;
Don’t need no ticket, you just thank the Lord.

It seems to me that this is a good little Advent verse.  This time of year is all about the People of God getting ready to meet the Lord anew at Christmas.  Jesus is a-comin’ and that’s literally what “advent” means: “coming,” or more precisely, “coming toward.” He is coming toward us from Heaven, and we are called to come toward Him from wherever we happen to be.  He has provided everything for our pilgrimage to Heaven, so we don’t need no baggage (and we’d do well to drop all that we usually carry!), we just get on board.  All we need is faith, and He will provide the rest.  We don’t need no ticket, we just thank the Lord.  It’s prepaid; we just have to step up to receive it.  But we do need to step up; we do need to present ourselves to Him, ready to do his will.  He does not save us unawares or against our will.  But if we come to Him as He is coming to us, we will meet and He will ultimately take us to where He is.

So, people, get ready.  There are only a couple weeks left till Christmas.  Don’t count them as shopping days but as praying and fasting days, as spiritual getting-ready days.  Then you’ll be able to hear the diesels hummin’ as the train’s a-comin’, and you’ll get on board and thank the Lord!

I haven’t yet figured out how to stick you-tube videos in my blog, but if you’d like to hear the song I first heard from Eva (just audio with a sunset picture), click here, and for a video of her singing and playing an acoustic version of People Get Ready, click here.

The Gospel (Lk. 8:16-21) for this feast of the Conception of St Anne, meaning St Anne’s conception of Mary the Godbearer (known in the West as the Immaculate Conception), while not dealing directly with the mystery, sets the tone for it: “Nothing is hidden that shall not be made manifest, nor anything secret that shall not be known and come to light.” What could be more hidden than the conception of a child within the womb of her mother?  Yet the mystery of Mary’s conception has been revealed, for the glory of God and our deeper understanding of his work of salvation.

This feast comes at an appropriate time, that of our preparation for the manifestation of Christ, who was hidden in the womb of his Mother.  We are celebrating the conception of the one who would conceive the Son of God and bring Him into the world as our Savior, the Mediator between God and man.  As we prepare for Christmas, we have the chance to see how God prepared for the first Christmas, first by bringing into the world the all-pure dwelling place chosen for his Son: the New Eve who was chosen and destined to bring the New Adam into the world.

As often happens in this fallen world, the great works of God tend to become matters of dispute rather than simply being matters of celebration and thanksgiving.  No exception here.  The proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception by Pope Pius IX in 1854 became the occasion of heated polemics between theologians of East and West, which have not been fully resolved to this day.  We should be able to accept the various differences of emphasis or perspective in the Eastern and Western approaches to the Divine Mysteries without feeling obliged to utter anathemas.  I can hardly imagine the Lord saying: “I’m revealing a deep mystery concerning my Mother to you.  Now I want you all to understand it differently, and then quarrel about it for the rest of your lives.”  But it seems like that is what in fact has happened in response to the revelation.  Personally, the fact that the Mother of God appeared to St Bernadette and said, “I am the Immaculate Conception,” pretty much clinches it for me, but perhaps we should still reflect a bit more upon the mystery.

When I was in the seminary two decades ago, I did a comparative study on the Eastern and Western approaches, and concluded that the issue was ambiguous until the declaration of the dogma, which seemed to be a rallying point for the earnest development of polemics. It’s not hard to find patristic evidence for both the current Eastern and Western positions, but the battle lines were clearly drawn only in the mid-19th century. Before that, it was not really an issue (except among factions within the Western Church in medieval times), and so the patristic “proof texts” that are used today were only garnishes on other issues being discussed at the time.

The origins of the feast in the East were quite humble, and even today it is liturgically structured more as a feast of St Anne than of the Mother of God.  The doctrine did not undergo the same development in the East that happened in the West.  But along with the fact that the Pope, acting as head of the whole Catholic Church and not merely as Patriarch of the West, defined the dogma for the whole Church, we as Americans have further reason to celebrate the feast solemnly. Our Lady, precisely as the Immaculate Conception, was made the official patroness of our country by the American Bishops (back in the day when most American bishops were actually concerned about such things).

Concerning the doctrine of Our Lady’s conception, it’s interesting to note that a devout man I knew (who went to his reward some years ago) actually converted from Orthodoxy to Catholicism over this issue, based on what he found in the Divine Office of the Orthodox Church!  It is sometimes said by Eastern writers, contra the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, that Mary was sanctified at the time of the Annunciation.  But my friend Dmitri, when praying the Offices for the feast of the Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple, discovered that long before she reached the time of the Annunciation, the Church repeatedly calls her all-pure, all-immaculate, and so forth.  If she was such at the age of three, she must have been so from the very beginning of her life.  There’s another text that is even clearer: it speaks of an “ineffable mystery,” which is that Mary “was never subject to the taint of sin.”  That sure sounds like an immaculate conception to me, so why should we fight about it instead of rejoicing in it?  Having prayed these texts, Dmitri decided he could not deny the fact that by the grace and will of God Mary was kept sinless from the first moment of her existence.

As we always sing that it is “truly fitting” to sing her praises, it is also truly fitting that the one chosen by God from all eternity to give flesh to his only-begotten Son be utterly pure and free from the slightest suggestion of sin.  I think that there should be agreement between East and West on this, especially since the East generally understands the legacy of original sin not as the inheritance of guilt but rather of mortality.  I don’t think any Western Christian disputes the fact of the mortality of Mary as a human being, and I think that Eastern Christians would not doubt their own liturgical text that Mary “was never subject to the taint of sin.” Perhaps, as I wrote a few years ago, rather than engaging in theological hair-splitting, which always results in disputes, we should simply call Our Lady (as we do in the East) the Panaghia, the all-holy woman. That seems to embrace the whole mystery.

I discovered another interesting point in my Scripture reading.  I often read the Book of Revelation during Advent, since this time is appropriate for meditation not only on the first coming of Christ but on his Second Coming as well.  Providentially, it seems, on the morning I was planning to prepare this homily I had arrived at the 12th chapter of this mysterious book.  There we find the “great sign” that appeared in the heavens: the Woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of 12 stars upon her head.  It is not so much these symbols of cosmic sovereignty that caught my attention, but what happened after this first manifestation.  (By the way, I’m sure you biblical exegetes will tell me that the “woman” represents Israel or perhaps the Church, but let’s not miss the obvious fact that this woman gives birth to the Messiah, and Mary is the only woman who can be credited with that achievement, so she cannot be excluded from a correct interpretation.)

What happened was that a great dragon appeared, which is identified explicitly as the devil and satan.  The dragon “pursued the woman who had borne the male child,” but it could not touch her.  She was given wings to fly away from him to a place where she was protected by God. The devil pursued her even there but she was protected yet again and he could not touch her. So he went off in a huff to make war on the Christians, who are called “her offspring,” identified as “those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus.”

Now this passage from Revelation was not written to explain the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception.  But neither were all the other biblical texts from the Old Testament—which the fathers used in their allegorical interpretations of the mysteries of Christ and Our Lady—written to explain those mysteries.  But they still support or at least hint at these doctrines without actually proving them. That is good enough, however, because we don’t reason from these texts to the doctrines; the Church has proclaimed them with the authority of Christ, and we simply marvel to see reflections of them in the Scriptures and even throughout all creation.

So we can say that yes, the Mother of God was protected from the great dragon, was able to avoid the least bit of his defiling touch on her person, frustrating his every attempt to get near enough to harm her.  Thus she has always been free from sin.

We also see from chapter 12 of Revelation how the devil was defeated or frustrated at every turn.  First he tried to devour the Child to whom the sun-garbed Woman gave birth, but the Child was taken up to Heaven before the dragon got to Him. Then St Michael and his angels cast the devil and his rebellious followers down to Earth.  Then the devil was unable to touch the woman who was specially protected by God.  Having been defeated everywhere else, the dragon turned against us, and unfortunately in this arena he enjoys a bit more success.  But to the extent that we, the spiritual offspring of the Woman who gave birth to the Christ, “keep the commandments and bear testimony to Jesus,” we can be victorious too.

I’m waiting for the day when these verses from this chapter of Revelation find their definitive fulfillment: “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.  And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony…” (12:10-11).

The sinless conception of Mary of Nazareth must have put terror into the heart of the devil (if he has one), because she was the first since the Fall of Man to enter this world untainted.  He must have realized that something huge was afoot, and that the days of his dominion were numbered.  So he pursued the Woman but could not touch her, and he tried to devour her Son, but the Son ascended into Heaven.  Now the devil makes war on us, but we have the power of the Blood of the Lamb to conquer him, and the help of St Michael and the holy angels, as well as that of the Woman herself, whom the devil fears and hates more than any other creature, but against whom he is powerless.

So let us stand firm in the grace we have received and rejoice in all the mighty works of God, by which He has prepared the coming in the flesh of his only Son, and by which He continues to prepare the coming in glory of this same Son of God.  As Christmas draws nearer, let us draw near to Our Lady and take refuge in her who knows how to keep us safe from the dragon, for she herself was kept safe for the whole of her existence.  To be safe from the devil is not to be preserved from suffering and sorrow, but it is to have sufficient grace to overcome all evil and to join with rejoicing the multitudes of those who have conquered the dragon.  By the grace of God and with the help of the Panaghia, we will hear the word of God and keep it, bearing the joyous fruits of our fidelity for all eternity.

We have another feast falling on a Sunday, so there’s a whole series of readings for the Liturgy, which the hapless preacher has to bring into some sort of coherence (Heb. 13:17-21, Eph. 6:10-17, Lk. 6:17-23 and 17:12-19).  With our Father among the saints Nicholas of Myra as our guide, I trust that all manner of things shall be well.

In the context of today’s readings, I’d like to look at St Nicholas as a kind of spiritual father for us, rather than focusing on the historical elements of his life or the legends that grew up around his, well, legendary charity and holiness.  He was, after all, a bishop and thus a spiritual father to all those within the boundaries of his episcopal see, which was in modern-day Turkey.  That is probably the reason the epistle reading from Hebrews was chosen, in which Jesus is called “the great shepherd of the sheep.” Every bishop is supposed to be a shepherd in imitation of Christ, who said to his chief shepherd, St Peter: “Feed my sheep.”

We are counseled at the beginning of the epistle reading to obey our leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over our souls.  I think we should invoke the protection and intercession of St Nicholas as one who keeps watch over our souls.  We here at Mt Tabor have a special reason for this confidence in him, not only because he is one of the main patrons of Byzantine Catholics, but also because our own monastery temple is dedicated to him.  By his patronage of our holy temple he has accepted the burden of watching over the souls of those who regularly worship and pray here.

In one of the priest’s prayers of the Divine Liturgy, we ask the Lord to “make straight our path… watch over our lives, make sure our steps…” and this calls to mind the watching-over of our souls that we ask St Nicholas to do as he serves the Lord in our behalf.  Again, as a bishop, this is his task.  A bishop, in Greek an epi-scopos, is literally an over-seer, one who watches over his flock.  I think there’s a certain comfort in that, in the fact that there is someone watching over our souls, perhaps many: not only St Nicholas, but our guardian angels, our patron saints, the Mother of God and the Lord Himself. We are in good hands, and we should thank the Lord for all those to whom He entrusts the care of our souls.

If the holy bishop Nicholas is to watch over our souls, what form does this episcopal overseeing take?  From the readings of the Liturgy, I think we can see it in negative and a positive sense (in this case, both negative and positive senses are good things, but here negative means against something and positive means for something).

The watching over our souls that is against something is indicated by the reading from St Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians, in which we are exhorted to put on the armor of God against the wiles of the devil and his fiery spiritual arrows of temptation, delusion, or whatever other trick he might have up his infernal sleeve.  If St Nicholas is to be a spiritual father for us who is to watch over our souls, he has to protect us from the evil one and support us in our spiritual warfare.

We invoke him thus in some of our liturgical prayers: “Surrounded by a multitude of temptations, tossed about by the storms of this life, shipwrecked in the sea of perils and beaten down by all types of sorrow, I place my hope in you, O holy father Nicholas… Having received such a grace from God, O holy Nicholas, you obtain healing for all those who have recourse to your protection.  You drive away incurable possessions by demons and your patronage brings healing to all who are suffering… Intercede with the Lord that He save from all danger those who sing praises to your name.”

So we see that he can help us in our struggle with the spiritual hosts of wickedness.  But that doesn’t mean we sit back and watch him do all the work.  Sometimes it may seem that he sits back while we do the work! This was the case with the Lord and St Anthony the Great, in one of his famous struggles with the powers of darkness.  Anthony fought all night against demons who severely attacked him, and then as dawn broke and they finally left, he turned to the Lord, exhausted, asking Him why He didn’t come and help him.  But the Lord replied that He was there the whole time, only He wanted Anthony to win the crown of persevering endurance, so the Lord didn’t directly intervene. It may be that way sometimes for us. Not being of the spiritual stature of St Anthony, we will not likely be tested as severely as he was, but sometimes we have to learn our lessons or strengthen our spiritual resources through the use of faith alone, without any special divine intervention. In any case, the Lord is always with us, as well as those, like St Nicholas, whom He has commissioned to watch over our souls.  Whatever the Lord does for us (or doesn’t do for us) in our spiritual warfare is always meant for our good, our spiritual growth and maturity, and ultimately for our salvation, so we should always give thanks.

Now let’s look at the positive sense of St Nicholas’ overseeing, that which is not against something but for something.  This is indicated by the Gospel reading of the Beatitudes from St Luke, which is the common reading for venerable fathers.  St Nicholas watches over our souls in our fight against evil and sin, but he also watches over our souls in the positive pursuit of virtue, in the conforming of all our thoughts, words, and actions to the spirit of the Beatitudes, which makes us most like our Lord Jesus Christ.

In this case his overseeing takes the form of leading us into the spiritual poverty, the hunger for righteousness, and the mourning for our sins and those of the world, which make the image of Christ shine more clearly in us.  He exhorts us to accept even revilement and denigration and persecution for the sake of Christ—and even calls us to rejoice in it!  Not that there’s anything joyful in those painful experiences as such, but as the Lord says: “Rejoice… and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven.” That’s what really matters, and that’s what our spiritual life is all about; that’s why we invoke the vigilant overseeing of our souls by spiritual stalwarts such as St Nicholas.  We want to get to Heaven, and we should be willing to do and even suffer whatever it takes, for to miss out on Heaven is to miss out on everything, our whole reason of being and our eternal destiny.

So we need the help of St Nicholas and all the heavenly intercessors that God may be pleased to send to help us. It’s not just a pleasant idea to have heavenly overseers, and it’s not just a thoughtful gesture on God’s part to send them to us—it’s a matter of life or death!  Just floundering about on our own, with nothing more than our own wits to serve us, we would never make it.  We wouldn’t be able to unmask and fight off the deceptive illusions of the devil, and we wouldn’t have the stamina and courage to pursue virtue consistently and diligently.  So we need a constant influx of the grace of God, which often comes to us through the prayers of the members of the Body of Christ, whether they are on Earth or in Heaven.  We tend to trust in the efficacy of the prayers of the heavenly members all the more, since there is no sin or defect or selfishness in them to hinder their prayers, which are always pure and perfect in the sight of God.

Finally, I’d like to say a bit about the Gospel for this Sunday, even though it’s not as easy to relate to St Nicholas as the other readings.  This is the healing of the ten lepers, and the Lord’s blessing upon the only one who had the sense to give thanks for the Lord’s compassionate intervention in his life.  This is perhaps the conclusion to all we’ve seen about St Nicholas watching over our souls, against the encroachments of evil and for the pursuit of holiness.  If we’re without gratitude for all that the Lord has done for us, either directly or through his saints, then we’ll never get very far in our spiritual lives. Jesus cleansed all ten lepers, but nine of them did not give Him thanks.  We don’t know what ultimately became of the nine, if something worse befell them (as Jesus had warned the paralytic when he healed him and told him to sin no more).

But I think that we can safely assume that the one who gave thanks to the Lord was not only healed but saved.  In Greek, the word for “heal” and “save” is the same, so there is at times an ambiguity which translators don’t always agree upon.  Usually the context will tell us.  I think that in this case we should say that the Lord meant, “Your faith has saved you.”  All ten were healed, and the Lord had no praise for the ungrateful nine, so most likely the faith of the grateful leper was at the root of both his healing and salvation.

The point is, though, that we should always give thanks to the Lord, not only when we are aware of some particular gift He has granted us or some specific prayer He has answered favorably.  The fact that we have heavenly overseers like St Nicholas means that God is doing good for us all the time, that He doesn’t let us out of his sight, that He’s trying to guide us and mature us to the point where we can actually rejoice even in our sufferings, knowing that Heaven with all its glories and blessings awaits those who persevere in faith, hope, and love, in gratitude and in fortitude, in spiritual warfare and in the peace that passes all understanding.

Along with everything else I’ve mentioned here, St Nicholas is a kind of icon of the charity that characterizes Christmas, which is why his own legendary generosity is the basis for that legendary figure who gives gifts to children on Christmas.  That holy day is less than three weeks away, so let us intensify our preparations, being concerned not merely with material gifts but with the grace that God wishes to give us for our spiritual growth and salvation.  Let us look to St Nicholas as one who not only intercedes for what we need—both spiritually and materially—but who has been given the charge to watch over our souls, which are most precious in God’s sight.

The eyes of children grow large and bright as they gaze upon all the lights and gifts and colors of Christmas.  Let us prepare now for the Day when our own eyes will at last grow bright with the vision of the face of Christ, who came to Earth so that we could go to Heaven.  And let us thank St Nicholas and all those who even now are assisting us on our way to the Kingdom of Light and Glory.

A representative of Dutton Publishers graciously sent me a review copy of their new book entitled, Messenger: The Legacy of Mattie J.T. Stepanek and Heartsongs.  I got the immediate impression that there would be something special about the book as soon as I looked at it, because tears inexplicably came to my eyes.  I knew just a little of what it would be about, and the cover photo is touching, but that still doesn’t explain it.

The book is the remarkable story of Mattie Stepanek, whom you probably have heard of (but I hadn’t), the boy who became a messenger for world peace and a living testimony to the power of faith and the human spirit in overcoming enormous obstacles to living a full and productive life.  Mattie was the fourth of four children who all suffered and died from a rare disease called Dysautonomic Mitochondrial Myopathy.  He lived the longest, almost to 14, but his siblings died as infants or toddlers.  His mother Jeni, the author of the book, has the adult onset form of the same disease.

Mattie possessed extraordinary intelligence and depth of spirit, and he was writing and selling books of poetry even as a child (I think all of them made it to the New York Times best-seller list), and he became a sought-after public speaker and TV talk-show personality, both for his message of peace and his advocacy for the needs of the severely handicapped.  Yet despite his fame and remarkable accomplishments he remained an ordinary kid who liked his toys and who was a practical joker.  His own self-description, and how he wanted to be remembered, was as “a poet, a peacemaker, and a philosopher who played.” Yet he also knew what it meant to suffer deeply and to struggle just to stay alive.

There’s a kind of sub-theme in the book, which became for me the main theme, and this is where the tears came from—because love makes me cry.  This theme is the love between Mattie and his mother.  It seems that the main intention of the book is to give the world a greater insight into the life and thought and struggles of this exceptional boy, and to show how his extraordinary life has left a lasting legacy through his message of peace and his Heartsong poetry (one’s “heartsong,” according to Mattie, was one’s reason of being, that which is the inner source of one’s peace, happiness, and hope). “When I take God’s message and combine it with my own… that’s my reason for being—my Heartsong.”  His mother is Catholic and raised him in the faith, and that was the foundation of his life, the inspiration for his message, and his hope for eternal happiness.

For me, despite all the extraordinary things you will read about in the book, the most moving thing is the love of mother and son.  Without complaint, his mother made immense sacrifices for him (you have to keep reminding yourself as you read that she is in a wheelchair just as Mattie is, but without all the complicated life-support equipment he needed at every moment).  They were inseparable friends as well as mother and son, and they shared all the joys and sufferings, anxieties and hopes of life together.  We are granted entrance into the sanctuary of their relationship, the way they planned and spent their days, they way they dealt with poverty and then fame, with the fragility of a life that could disappear with barely a moment’s notice. There were many times when Mattie’s situation became critical and his life hung in the balance, and Jeni endured many sleepless nights at his side. It is difficult even to write about; there’s so much there.  You have to read the whole story (which is well-written and includes many photos) to get to know them both.  And when you do, you will not be able to restrain the tears when you read: “At 1:35 PM on June 22, 2004, I felt the last beat from my son’s heart.”

The story is a kind of pilgrimage through suffering to joy, through uncertainty to hope. It is a triumph of a noble spirit housed in a diminutive child’s disabled body, a life that wouldn’t give up until God decreed the moment of his departure to the place of eternal peace.

I heartily recommend the book, but in conscience I do have to point out two things that are not in harmony with the Catholic faith.  The first is a rather blithe dismissal of the teaching of the Bible concerning homosexuality (Mattie knew some “gay” people who, unbeknown to him, stuck a gay pride emblem on the back of his wheelchair; this was the occasion for bringing it up).  This takes up about a page and is never referred to again, and should not have survived the editing process.  The second is Jeni’s sterilization after Mattie’s birth.  Even though this act is one of the moral absolutes that cannot be made good by any circumstance, we can at least understand the anguish of her decision.  All her children were born with the fatal disease and died young from it, and all future children would, too.  She made the decision right after giving birth, in a state of anxiety and fear, so I’m sure she could easily be forgiven, and I trust that she is reconciled with God and the Church.  But a question must be asked: What if she had decided to be sterilized after her third child instead of the fourth?  Then Mattie would never have been born and the world would never have known his unique gifts and contributions to humanity.

I want to conclude this review, however, on a more joyful note.  The story is beyond merely “heartwarming,” though it is not calculated to be a tear-jerker in any melodramatic sense.  It’s just a powerful, true story, told by one who lived it and who loved heroically, beyond the ordinary call of maternal duty and care.  But if love makes you cry, you will cry.  You will love Mattie and his mom (who doesn’t hesitate to admit her own shortcomings) and will be inspired by what a child, hanging by a thread to life, could do, could give, could endure, could enjoy—and how he loved life, people, and God so much.

I’d like to finish with a few lines from a poem Mattie had written to his mother for Mother’s Day, which she never saw till after he died, but which expresses something of his heartsong in relation to her, his gratitude for her love which helped make him the little miracle he was.

Let love make you cry.  Read about Mattie and his mom and the message.  It will enrich your humanity and perhaps even open your heart a little more to God, who stands ready to write a song upon it.

Thanks be to God, it’s Thanksgiving Day!  This is the holiday on the civil calendar that has the closest connection to our liturgical feasts.  When St Paul says, “I give thanks to God,” it reads in Greek, Eucharisto to Theó, so already we see the connection with giving thanks in general to giving thanks for the greatest of God’s gifts, that of the Body and Blood of his only-begotten Son, who gives Himself mystically and sacramentally to us in the Holy Eucharist, that we may abide in Him and He in us.

But as we liturgically give thanks, let us also look at the whole mystery of Thanksgiving in the context of today’s readings (1Tim. 6:6-11, 17-19 and Lk. 12:22-34).  St Paul begins with a statement that is a kind of truism, yet that most people seem routinely to ignore: “We brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of the world.”  Besides the obvious truth of this fact, what does it mean?  It means that we are meant to see all things as gift.  If we can neither enter this world with what we need to live in it nor leave this world with what we have amassed in it, then we have to acknowledge that we depend ultimately on others, and especially on one Other, to provide for us.  If we learn to see all things as gift, then we will easier be able to give thanks.

The Apostle goes on to say that if we have food and clothing we ought to be content with these and not cultivate a desire for riches and superfluous possessions, for these things “plunge men into ruin and destruction,” as well as causing many to fall away from faith in God.  There’s a kind of simple logic here: if God provides you with all you really need, and if your desire for riches leads you to fall away from God, you will end up without God and without his gifts, being thus left with only your “senseless and hurtful desires.”  So the Apostle counsels us to trust in God for the necessities of life, and for the rest: “aim at righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, and gentleness.”  This echoes the message of the Gospel: seek the Kingdom of God and all that you need will be given you.

So we are to avoid the desire to have more than what God actually gives.  But God is not miserly, so we don’t have to resign ourselves to lives of deprivation, for the Apostle goes on to say that rather than trust in uncertain riches, we should trust in God, “who richly furnishes us with everything to enjoy.”  It is perhaps another cliché that we should give our primary attention to the Giver and not merely the gift, but since this is the message of the Gospel, we still must strive daily to put it into practice.

Today’s Gospel reading is not only about Divine Providence, but about our trust in Providence, the laying aside of our anxieties, knowing that if we seek first the Kingdom the Lord will grant what we need to live this temporal life.  But it’s not always easy to trust in God, as the experience of many people (and perhaps at times even our own experience) shows.

There’s a story about trust and lack of trust that perhaps you’ve heard before, but it’s worth repeating, for it exposes our usual approach to trusting in God.  A man accidentally fell over the edge of a cliff and grabbed on to a protruding tree branch.  He was still hundreds of feet above the ground and was unable to pull himself back up to safety.  He wasn’t particularly devout, but people tend to think of God when in life-threatening situations.  So he called out in desperation: “Is there anyone out there?”  God answered and said, “I am here, and I will save you.”  The man said, “What do I have to do?”  God replied, “Let go of the branch and I will catch you.”  The man thought for a moment and then said: “Is there anyone else out there?”

God is ready, willing, and able to help us, but we aren’t always willing to let Him help us, on his terms.  We’d like to arrange for our security in a way that doesn’t involve much risk, but God asks us to take a risk when He requires our trust.  We’re supposed to be seeing life and all that is in it as God’s gift, for which we should be grateful, but the more we exclude God from the equation of our contentment, the less inclined we will be to give thanks, and the more inclined we will be to be anxious about what we need for this life.

The rich Thanksgiving dinner that is part of the usual celebration of this holiday in America is a symbol and expression of God’s bounty.  But we are not to rest in such things alone.  The Lord explicitly says in the Gospel, “Life is more than food,” more than clothing or any other material good.  We are called to give thanks for material blessings, but we are always to remember the “more than.”  Gratitude both presupposes and flows from trust.  It’s a virtuous circle.  So do not be anxious, says the Lord.  The “more than” is the Kingdom of God, which the Father graciously gives to those who put their trust in Him by seeking his Kingdom above all else.

There’s another side to the coin as well.  Even though trust and gratitude are essential elements in our relationship to God, especially in the context of all his bountiful gifts to us, they are not sufficient for the Christian life.  If one is truly seeking first the Kingdom of God, then gratitude and trust will be expressed in generosity to others.  As soon as Jesus tells us to seek the Kingdom, which the Father’s good pleasure desires to give us; as soon as He assures us that God will provide all we need, He says, “Sell your possessions and give alms”!  That’s really the risk of trust, but it is the message of the Gospel.  We aren’t allowed to sit back and say, “God is good; look at all this wealth He has granted me,” while Lazarus is outside starving at our gate.  “Freely you have received,” said Jesus to his disciples, “now freely give.”

Speaking of coins and freely giving, a little while back I recalled that many years ago someone had freely given us a gold coin.  I was “saving it for a rainy day,” and those storm clouds always seem to be approaching.  But I thought to myself, I have these uncertain riches set aside for an uncertain future, but families are starving today.  Why should I be sitting on a piece of gold when it could buy hundreds of pounds of food for the desperately needy?  So I did what Jesus said: I sold the gold and freely gave alms.  Maybe it’s good that I kept it this long, though, because I was able to sell that tiny coin for about a thousand dollars, so I gave a thousand dollars to the poor.

Not only does Jesus say that it is more important to seek the Kingdom than to pursue material security, He says (as an extension of this) that our treasure must be in Heaven, for where our treasure is, there will our hearts be also.  Jesus wants our hearts to be in Heaven, that is, with Him where He is, but they won’t be there if the goods of this world are at the top of our list of priorities.  In further witness of this, the First Great Commandment enjoins us to love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, all our strength.

We heard recently the Gospel of the rich fool, who had his heart and his treasure on earth, in the abundance of his possessions, but the Lord warned us that not only did he miss the meaning of life, he also missed out on the eternal destiny for which God has created us, if only we will acknowledge the priority of his Kingdom and live accordingly.

So if our hearts are not wholly with God, there will be a certain ambivalence to this holiday.  We will see it as a celebration of earthly pleasure and bounty, and perhaps of a material security, which is actually a false security.  How many people who trusted in wealth and in their financial savvy lost most or all of it as the economy came tumbling down, and banks and brokers went out of business!  These are the “uncertain riches” that St Paul warns us about, and such is not what is meant to be celebrated on Thanksgiving.

We should begin by thanking God for his mighty works on our behalf, the greatest of which is his sending his Son into this world to bear our sins and die for us that we might be forgiven and find salvation.  Then we thank Him that we can daily enter into the grace of this saving mystery, eating and drinking the price of our redemption, as St Augustine said.  As we receive the Holy Eucharist, we should say with St Paul, Eucharisto to Theó, I give thanks to God.  The list of things for which we can give thanks goes on and on.  We should walk through our days awake and aware of all that God does for us, all that He gives us, all the things from which he saves and protects us, all the things He has prepared for those who love Him. We should also thank Him for the good that He brings out of things that don’t seem like gifts: the various trials and sufferings of our lives, for He allows nothing to happen to us without planning to bring good out of it, or to make of it an instruction for living more faithfully the life that belongs to those who seek first his Kingdom.

Then, once we are rooted in thanksgiving and trust, let us be generous to those who are in need, in whatever way it is possible for us.  We have many more material advantages than most people in the world, so we shouldn’t be stingy about parting with some of them for the sake of those who have so little.  But even if we are poor, we can give of ourselves to those around us.  Jesus said that we are to give alms from the things that are within.  We give alms through charity, through forgiveness, through a smile, through sacrificing some preference of ours for the sake of someone else.  If we really trust God and are really grateful to God, this trust and gratitude will be manifest in the way we regard and treat others, the joy and blessing we bring into the lives of others.

So let us enjoy the gifts of God and be eager to share with others.  Let us give thanks in the Eucharist and in all other ways.  Let us receive the Kingdom from our loving Father’s hand, having secured our treasure, and thus our hearts, in Heaven.

There’s a little more I’d like to share on trust from Fr Williams’ book, Can God be Trusted? One of the things that is often a factor in our ability (or lack thereof) to trust in God is whether or not we think He has let us down at times, especially at times when we most needed Him.

The problem seems to be that we don’t really know what we need, and so when we don’t receive what we think we need, we assume that God has let us down, didn’t come through for us.  But God doesn’t give us a stone when we ask for bread. In fact, He will only give us bread even when we (unwittingly) ask for a stone!  If we persevere in trust, despite the “evidence” of God letting us down, we will usually be able to see, at least in hindsight, that God was with us all along.  One of the interviewees the author quotes said: “There were times when I thought God let me down… When I look back I realize I felt a sense of anger toward God.  Yet now I see they were blessings and have made me the person I am today.”  The psalmist (Ps 118/119) says something similar: “It was good for me to be afflicted, to learn your statutes… Before I was afflicted I strayed, but now I keep Your word” (vv. 71, 67).

We may not be content with God’s timing, either, and so we may think his “delays” are due to his not loving or caring for us as we think He should.  But He will always prove, in one way or another, and perhaps only at the end, that everything He has done for us has been done at precisely the right time and in precisely the right way.

It may be a source of discouragement for us, and hence a reason for us to abandon trust, that God doesn’t give us what we ask for.  The author spends a couple chapters talking about what God has promised and what He has not promised.  There’s no sense in getting angry with God for not doing something that He never said He would do!  Among the things God has not promised are: perfect justice on earth, an explanation for his own actions, a problem-free existence, foreknowledge of life’s twists and turns, and warm, fuzzy feelings.  It’s likely that if we are tempted to lose trust in God, it is related somehow to one of these “nonpromises” of God.  We simply want things to be other than the way they are, and we get mad at God for not rearranging reality to suit our sensibilities.

The above things that God has not promised belong mainly to the “small picture,” when He really wants us to look at the big picture and realize that what He does promise is much more important, even eternally so, than what He doesn’t.  What God does promise, according to Fr Williams, are the following: He will always tell us the truth, He has always loved us and will never withdraw his love, He will give us everything we need to reach Heaven, He will ask of us only what we can give, He will be with us always, He will give meaning to our lives, He will be our final reward.  It’s clear that these promises are much more profound than the “nonpromises” we tend to expect or demand from Him.  God always has our best, that is, our eternal interests at heart, and so what He promises will always be in some way for the sake of our salvation and eternal happiness.  And in this we can trust.

It seems to me that much of our ability to trust in God hinges upon what we can trust in and what we can’t, that is, knowing what He has promised and what He hasn’t.  We can’t just blithely say, when desiring a certain gift from God or a certain favorable state of affairs: if I just trust God, He will give me what I ask for.  Remember, if from his perspective what you’re asking for is equivalent to a stone, then He will only give you bread, because that is what is best for you.  So we can’t always trust that God is going to grant all the particulars, which means that when He doesn’t, that is no reason to give up trusting in Him.  We trust Him for the things that really matter, the things that have eternal significance, the things that He has in fact promised. This doesn’t mean that He will not answer our prayers for smaller, temporal things, for He often does. But our trust in Him means that whether He does or not, we will not fall away but rather remain faithful to Him who promises eternal life to those who trust in Him.  A good example is found in the words of the three young men threatened with a fiery death if they did not worship the king’s idol: “If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace; and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.  But even if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods…” (Dan. 3:17-18).

Their fidelity to God did not rest on his answering a particular prayer of theirs—even an urgent one!—but rather on the faithfulness of God Himself, who does as He wills, but always for the ultimate good of those who put their trust in Him.

So, the bottom line is: it’s worth it.  Trusting in God is all gain, despite what might have to be endured in the short term, and not trusting in God is all loss. Be it known, then, that come what may, we will not serve anyone (or anything, like our own desires, preferences, perspectives, comforts, or plans) but the true God, who loves us and has prepared marvelous and everlasting blessings for those who choose to believe in Him, trust in Him, and love Him to the end.

Today’s Gospel passage (Lk. 12:16-21) is a short parable, but it is situated in a context that covers most of chapter 12 in Luke’s Gospel.  We’ll try to understand it within that context.  I received a little help from a commentary I found in cyberspace by someone named Hampton Keithley IV, and I’ll incorporate a couple of his insights here and there in this homily.

This parable is commonly called the “Parable of the Rich Fool,” appropriately enough, since it is about a rich man whom God calls a fool.  Now God rarely calls anyone names (especially in the New Testament), so this man, or rather what this figure in the parable represents, must really have been worthy of reproach.

The occasion for telling this parable is given just before the selected reading of today’s Gospel.  Jesus had been teaching the people about relying on the Holy Spirit to speak through them when they were called to witness to Him before hostile authorities.  Some fellow, who was obviously concerned with other things besides Jesus’ teaching, then comes up with a non-sequitur: “Teacher, bid my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”  The only case in which an inheritance would need to be divided is that of the father’s death.  This son doesn’t seem to have been in a state of mourning, but he was doing what many heirs do when their parents die: contest the will and fight over the inheritance.

Jesus responds rather ironically: “Man, who made me a judge or divider over you?” In fact, Jesus would eventually be the Judge of this man’s immortal soul, but the man at this point seemed less concerned with the state of his soul than with the state of his finances.  Jesus didn’t come to settle disputes over material assets, so he did not fulfill the man’s request, but rather made use of the issue to tell a parable about the uselessness of riches to secure one’s true happiness.

He preceded it by saying: “Beware of all covetousness; for a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”  People without money often think that money will buy happiness, and people with money often realize that it doesn’t.  The wealthy heiress Christina Onassis once said, “Happiness is not based on money, and the greatest proof of that is our family.”

So the Lord told a story to illustrate his teaching.  The land of a rich man produced such a plentiful crop that he couldn’t even store it.  We get the impression that the man’s wealth isolated him from the rest of society.  Important decisions in that time and culture were discussed at the city gate.  Major issues affecting any individual always had some effect on the wider community and so it was normal that the community would take part in the discussion.  But in the parable it says that the man reasoned with himself, consulting no others, not sharing either his dilemma or his abundance with anyone in his own community.  Having reasoned with himself, he came to his own conclusion, which benefited only himself: “I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones; and there I will store all my grain and all my goods.”

Notice that in reasoning with himself he never suggested to himself that perhaps he ought to give his excess to the poor, who don’t even have what they need to live on.  What he said to himself was this: “You have ample goods laid up for many years; take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.”

Too bad he only reasoned with himself and didn’t invite God into the discussion.  As we see in the parable, God invited Himself into the discussion and said to the rich man: “You fool!  This night your soul is required of you; and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?”  Here we return to the original setting of the parable.  A man had died, and the question on the lips of his heirs concerning his possessions was: Whose will they be?—meaning, they had better be mine!  But the goods were utterly useless to the man who died, and all that resulted was conflict and division over their distribution.

Jesus concluded the parable by saying: “So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich in the sight of God.”  This in turn provides the context for his famous teaching on the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, on not being anxious about food and clothing but instead seeking the Kingdom of God.  He ends up counseling the exact opposite of the rich man’s reasoning.  Instead of storing up possessions for a comfortable life on Earth, Jesus said sell your possessions and give alms, thus providing treasure in Heaven.

Let’s go back and see where the rich man went wrong.  He was guilty of three basic and grave errors.  The first was that he thought that an abundance of material goods would bring him happiness and contentment.  He was missing the point of the meaning of life and reduced it to earthly pleasures and the satisfaction of the senses, which also led him to a false sense of security when he did in fact enjoy all those things.

The second error was that he was concerned for no one but himself.  If he believed that happiness could come from wealth and possessions, why didn’t he think to make others happy by sharing the excess that he didn’t need?  Not only did he seek happiness in perishable things, he hoarded them all to himself so nobody else could benefit from them.

The third error was the worst one. He didn’t factor God, death, and the afterlife into his plans for happiness or into his understanding of the meaning of life.  He could have repented of his misdirected values and his selfishness, but once he died without God all his chances were lost.

All three of his errors are succinctly indicated in God’s words to him.  First: “This night your soul is required of you.” This refers to the greatest of his errors.  Everything is lost; suddenly the rich man becomes a poor man before God and has nothing to show for his life.  He completely missed the meaning of life and proved himself a fool for ignoring the wisdom of God and taking counsel only with himself. Next: “The things you have prepared…” This refers to the man’s belief that material things could make him happy, content, and secure.  The nature of this fragile and ephemeral life—along with the nature of material things, which cannot ultimately satisfy human nature with its innate longing for transcendence and immortality—proved what a lie he had fallen for.  And finally: “…whose will they be?” refers to his selfishness and refusal to share his goods with the poor.  He had a chance to do some good with his material wealth, but he hoarded it for himself instead.  Elsewhere Jesus actually counseled us to “make friends through unrighteous mammon.”  He knew that material goods cannot win salvation, but they can still help others in need and in this way serve the purposes of the Kingdom.  That’s why Jesus said to give alms so that our treasure would be in Heaven.  If our treasure is on Earth, what will become of us when the Lord says: “This night your soul is required of you”?

The rich man was trying to make for himself a kingdom, as it were, on Earth, made of wealth and possessions.  But in doing this for himself he got it all backwards, and he also didn’t understand about the true and eternal Kingdom.  In the extended context of this parable, Jesus says to those who would seek such things as the rich man did: “Fear not… for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.”  The Kingdom, the Kingdom of Heaven, the imperishable, incorruptible Kingdom, the Kingdom you never have to leave behind, the Kingdom that fulfills the meaning of life and in which alone is found true happiness and contentment.  But it’s a radically different Kingdom than what earthly-minded people envision.

First of all, we don’t have to build it ourselves.  It’s ready-made, and the Father simply wants to give it to us.  But in order to receive it, our hands have to be open and not clenching all manner of lesser things.  So in order to receive the Kingdom we have to sell our possessions (at last our superfluous ones) and allow our treasure to be in the Kingdom of Heaven, because our hearts have to be there too if we are to be able to receive it from the Father.

This Gospel and its entire context tell us what life should be like for those who wish to follow Jesus and receive the Kingdom from the hand of the Father. In the Epistle reading (Eph. 4:1-6), St Paul urges us to “lead a life worthy of the calling” which we have received from God.  The life and mindset of the rich fool are not worthy of the Christian calling.  That’s why the Lord refused to get involved in disputes over money, because they are not worthy of his call to discipleship, to take up the cross and follow Him to the Kingdom.  That’s why the Lord said to beware of all covetousness and to realize that life means much more than possessions.

As for us, we may not be wealthy and building big warehouses to store our possessions.  But we still have to pay attention to the “bottom line” of this parable.  The day will eventually come when the Lord says to us: “This night your soul is required of you.”  How then shall we stand before God?  What will we have to show for ourselves?  Will we be shown to have stored up treasure in Heaven through a charitable and self-sacrificing life and thus be rich in the eyes of God?  Or will we be shown to have thought only of ourselves, our comfort, our security, our insulated niche in life, our having things our own way, which constitute, in Jesus’ words, laying up treasure for ourselves?

Let us then not take counsel merely within ourselves, but let us consult the word of God and such people as can give us a perspective and insight we cannot achieve on our own. Original sin has made us all innately selfish, so we have to make a sustained effort to come out of ourselves and our narrow perspective, so that we can lead a life worthy of the call of the Gospel.

We’re a week into Advent now, so our minds and hearts should be looking toward the Kingdom that the Father wants to give to us, the Kingdom that is revealed in the person of Christ.  He has not come to solve our petty problems but to speak to us the word of life, to reveal the mysteries of the Kingdom, to show us how to walk the narrow but invigorating path to the fullness of life.

Let us then look toward the holy night—not only the night on which we celebrate the birth of Christ, but the night on which our souls shall be required of us.  Let us begin now to grow rich in grace and charity, that we may please the Father, whose good pleasure it is to give us the Kingdom.