Who Hinders Us from Attaining this Height?

Christ is Risen!

(An excerpt from Abbess Thaisia’s book Letters to a Beginner: On Giving One’s Life to God, pp. 90-91)

The event which I want to tell you about took place on one of the Saturdays of Great Lent. After dinner both novices went away somewhere, and the nun, taking advantage of the solitude, wanted to pray. Here is what she told me about this occurrence: “I remember only that I began to recite the Akathist to the Sweetest Jesus, Whose presence I still felt in my heart, for that day I had received the Holy Mysteries. I read an ikos, I read another, and I felt that my soul became ever more and more moved and warmed by the love towards the Lord. I remember that I gradually began to wholly tremble both in soul and body, pouring out tears. My physical powers failed me, and in order not to fall I knelt and prostrated before the holy icons, continuing to read the Akathist mentally. It seems that I read it to the middle, but after that I don’t remember anything. Everything around me in the cell, the very floor on which I lay prostrate, everything as it were vanished somewhere, and it seemed to me all different, as though afar off was the Throne of God with Jesus Himself seated on it. Around the Throne was a very great number of those who stood – I don’t know whether they were people or angels – but they all sang wonderfully, wonderfully well. I stood there behind everyone and rejoiced. Anything more I don’t remember and cannot say. Whether this vision lasted long I also don’t know; only afterwards my cell attendants told me that when they came into the cell and saw me cast down before the icons, they thought at first that I was praying, but then seeing that I didn’t arise for a long time, they took me for being asleep and began to call me by name, but without success – and left me in peace. When I came to myself from the wonderful rapture and vision, there was again no one in the cell, for which I was very glad. The floor, on the place where my head had lain, was copiously wet with tears, as though water had been spilled on it. That meant that my bodily members were not devoid of life at that time – my eyes shed streams of tears, but I didn’t feel it and didn’t know. Or to speak more correctly, I didn’t know at all what was happening with me; but the sweetness which filled my heart in those most holy moments long remained in it, as a pledge of the heavenly visit.”

You see Sister, examples of lofty, contemplative prayer of nuns contemporary to us. Who hinders you and us from attaining this height? In the books of the Holy Fathers there are very many similar kinds of examples, but I purposely brought you ones from lives of our own times, because we, reading and listening to narratives about the great exploit of the saints often say in our justification: “Then there were saints!… That was in those former times! But now people are weak and our time is not then!” So, behold, understand from experience that even now there are true strugglers. Neither the time nor the place makes a man holy, but his good free volition and firm will. Pray unremittingly, and the Lord will not deprive you of His blessing.

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All Creation – including Newfoundland – Celebrates Christ’s Ressurection!

At Holy Lady of Vladimir Mission in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

CHRIST IS RISEN! ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ ΑΝΕΣΤH! HRISTOS INVIAT!

Having struggled through the Fast now we celebrate in the Feast:

Yesterday I was buried with Thee and today I arise in Thine arising. Yesterday I was crucified with Thee glorify Thou me Thyself with Thee O Saviour in Thy Kingdom.

Into incorruptible life have I entered today through the goodness of Him Who was born of thee, O pure one.

And Who maketh all the ends of the earth radiant with light.

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We Worship Thy Passion, O Christ!

St. John’s, Newfoundland: Holy Friday morning at a temporary chapel we had for two days while the usual chapel we use was unavailable.

Today is hung upon the Tree, He Who did hang the land in the midst of the waters. A Crown of thorns crowns Him Who is King of Angels. He is wrapped about with the purple of mockery Who wrapped the Heavens with clouds. He received buffetings Who freed Adam in Jordan. He was transfixed with nails Who is the Bridegroom of the Church. He was pierced with a spear Who is the Son of the Virgin. We worship Thy Passion, O Christ. Show also unto us thy glorious Resurrection.

I wish you all a very glorious Pascha – may you be filled with the Light which is Christ as we celebrate His victory over death for our sake! We’ll talk next week, God willing.

Pray for us! Fr. John has been doing all the services, and although he’s still going strong I can see his energy is slowly decreasing (as a priest in Nova Scotia was quoted as saying: “Christ is risen! The priest is dead!”)

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How Great Was Her Repentance!

(Repost from last year)

St. Cassiane (commemorated on September 7) is one of few female hymnographers in the Church. She was born into an aristocratic family some time before 805 and lived during the height of the iconoclastic period. From an early age she desired to become a nun and by the grace of God managed to pursue the monastic life. She was tonsured around 820 and founded a monastery on one of the seven hills in Constantinople. Despite her responsibilities as abbess, she wrote countless hymns and poems, many of which were sung by her nuns, and eventually incorporated into the Church’s liturgical books.

Many of St. Cassaine’s hymns are famous; one of her most famous hymns is sung during the Matins service of Holy Saturday. It foreshadows Christ’s glorious victory over death: “Weep not for me, O Mother, as you now see me buried whom you conceived within your belly seedlessly, your Son, for I shall rise from the dead and shall be glorified and as God shall in glory unceasingly exult those who longingly praise you in faith…” But the most famous of all her hymns is sung on Holy Tuesday evening. This hymn tells the story of “the sinful woman” from the Gospel of St. Luke and often leaves its many listeners in tears.

And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner, when she found out that He was reclining at table in the house of a Pharisee, brought an alabaster of perfumed ointment, and she stood beside His feet behind Him, weeping; and she began to wet His feet with her tears, and was wiping them off again with the hairs of her head, and she was kissing His feet ardently and anointing them with the perfumed ointment (Luke 7: 37-38).

The above woman’s identity is disputed. Some think she is St. Mary of Bethany, the sister of Sts. Martha and Lazarus, others think she is St. Mary Magdalene, still others think she is someone else. We know she cannot be St. Mary of Bethany, however, for her story of anointing Christ’s feet is told in the Gospel of St. Matthew (26:6-7). It is unlikely that she is St. Mary Magdalene, for it would have been unnecessary to keep her name hidden when she is later revealed to be one of Christ’s disciples. No, this sinful woman is unknown, and yet one of the most well remembered penitents in all of history. Her story, as told poetically by the nun and hymnographer Cassiane, paints a story of sin and salvation:

Lord, O Lord, when the woman, who had fallen into many sins, perceived Your divinity she assumed the role of a myrhh-bearing woman, and lamenting brought ointment to anoint You before Your burial. “Woe is me,” she said “for night is forming a frenzy without restraint.” Very dark and moonless, a passionate love affair with sin. “Accept the fountain of my tears, You who draw out from the clouds the water of the sea, take pity on me and incline to the sighing of my heart, You who bowed the heavens by Your ineffable self-emptying. I shall cover your unstained feet with kisses and wipe them dry again with the locks of my hair. Those feet whose sound at twilight in Paradise of old echoed in Eve’s ears whereupon she hid herself in fear. The countless number of my sins and the depth of Your Judgment, who can fathom? O my life-saving Saviour. Do not despise me Your servant since without measure is your mercy!” (To hear this hymn in its original language, go here. Or listen to the English version below.)

What can I say about such spiritual poetry? St. Cassiane saw the sinful woman’s repentance with clear sight. When she read the words in the Gospel she understood their spiritual potency and conveyed it in her hymn. And her poem reveals her own repentant heart. For how can one express the piercing, redemptive pain of repentance without having been wounded by it themselves?

The imagery she uses surpasses any praise I could offer. How profound to equate sin with night, “very dark and moonless” indeed! Not even the moon is able to suffer shedding light upon our sins. And what is the moon? What is its source of light? – the sun. The light of the moon is merely a reflection of the light of the sun, the source of light. Like our Panagia (the All-holy Mother of God), reflecting the light of her Son and our God, how often does she hide her face from us when we sin? Where is the light of God to be found illuminating those dark moments?

Our first mother Eve is woven into the story. She, being naked – no longer wearing the garment of illumination – hid herself in fear. She hid herself because she was guilty of sin. In contrast, the sinful woman reveals her nakedness. She reveals it to Christ, and not just Him alone, but also to the Pharisse (in whose house Christ was staying) and all those present. Why does the one woman hide her nakedness and the other reveal it?

Eve was guilty of sin, and thus, out of shame (not humility) she hid her nakedness, her sin. The sinful woman, burning with repentance and love for our life-saving Saviour hastened to reveal her nakedness so that Christ would be pleased to look upon her sincerity and forgive her sins.

I admire the sinful woman’s bold repentance, to purchase costly ointment, to enter the house of a pharisee with no regard to what others would think of her, and “ardently kiss” the Lord’s feet! What humility, what repentance, what love! I hope that through the prayers of the sinful woman, and those of St. Cassiane the Hymnographer, we might inherit the same humble-mindedness, and celebrate our Lord’s Resurrection with contrite hearts.

May God make us worthy!

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As the Lord Went to His Voluntary Passion…

“Come and let us also journey with Him, purified in mind. And let us be crucified with Him, and die for His sake to the pleasures of this life…”

As the Lord went to His voluntary Passion , He said to His apostles on the way: “Behold we go up to Jerusalem and the Son of man shall give Himself up as it is written of Him.” Come then and let us journey with Him with pure minds, let us crucified with Him and die for His sake to the pleasures of this life, that we may also live with Him and hear Him no longer as now in the earthly Jerusalem due to suffer , but rather saying to us: I ascend to My Father and your Father and to My God and your God and I shall raise you up to the Jerusalem on high in the Kingdom of heaven. (Holy Monday Stichera)

I hope everyone has a very attentive and blessed Holy Week. In my eight Holy Weeks as an Orthodox Christian it will only be the second one I’ve experienced in English. So I’m looking forward to being able to understand the hymnology through hearing, and not only by reading my scribbled English notes on the margins of my Greek Holy Week prayer book (which I bought at a grocery store in Thessaloniki six years ago now).

Let us, like the holy Apostles, also “go up with Him” so that in being crucified with Him we might rise with His glorious arising!

My most sincere wishes for a spiritually transformative week for all of us!

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It’s Never too Late to Make a Beginning (Mid-Lent Self Pep Talk)

Rembrandt: Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard.

It’s never too late: not for fasting, not for prayer, not for conquering our passions. The spiritual clock never passes the “eleventh hour” until the day our soul departs from our body. That is what I have been reminding myself lately.

 Sometimes I look back on my life, particularly on the last several years of being an Orthodox Christian and sigh: “What did I do?” I ask myself dejectedly. “How could I let my spiritual life slip away from my control? How could I have loosened my grip on the zeal I once had for Christ?” And in those moments I need to remind myself – scold myself into remembering – that repentance, true, honest, ugly repentance can bring us to heights of holiness read about in the lives of the saints.

I can’t go back and change the past. I can’t undo the knots I have tied in my heart, or the harmful thoughts I have knit into my mind unless I turn toward Christ with tears, with longing to change, and conviction to struggle against my bad habits, my negligence, my self-created environment of sin and anger.

Great Lent is a joyful and difficult time in the Orthodox Liturgical year. It is the long sought for time period of reflection, the challenging time of abstinence, and the perfect time for repentance. I regret that I have allowed myself to become slothful in regards to my spiritual life, but regret only gets us as far as Judas, who regretted he betrayed Christ, we need to follow St. Peter’s example and change. Otherwise I will merely fulfill the words of Abbess Thaisia, the spiritual daughter of St. John of Kronstadt, who said:

We fast from foods, yet with the soul and mind we take pleasure in forbidden fruits in various forms. We keep vigil, but our mind is weighed with earthly cares. We stand in prayer and psalmody, and our thoughts wander in all directions. We have come to the spring of Love, and in our hearts we often carry “the evil-smelling deceit” of Judas (Sticheron, Holy Thursday), “who with a kiss, as with a sign of love, betrayed his Master and Lord,” the Saviour of light and life, Whom he had once approached precisely to become His disciple and follower.

I need to turn around, face my sin, my laziness, my negligence, and with the help of God change my thoughts, words, and actions so that I keep the Great Fast inwardly as much as outwardly. This Great Lent I’ll be contemplating the following words sung on Holy Tuesday long before I arrive there in hopes that I will have, by then, made a beginning: O Saviour, I have gone astray still count me worthy of this joy, in Your great mercy!

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Out of the African Lands: Six Companions Die for Christ

 

From the Menologion of Basil II (c. 1000 AD)

When the Lord deemed it fitting He called His saints out of the African lands: holy Perpetua, Felicity, Saturus, Saturnius, Revocatus and Secundulus, to witness to their faith through suffering death.  Thus, we have as an inheritance the flourishing tree of Orthodoxy, for they shed their blood, watering the seedling.  Wherefore we cry aloud:

Rejoice, Holy Martyrs Perpetua, Felicity, and your companions

As a catechumen, O holy Perpetua, thou wast taken captive and while in prison thy father besought thee to denounce Christ.  But boldly thou didst proclaim that thou couldst be called by no other name but Christian. Wherefore we marvel at thy conviction and cry out to thee thus:

Rejoice, thou who art a shining example for all catechumens

Rejoice, thou who chose the heavenly over thine earthly father

Rejoice, thou who refused to be called anything other than a Christian

Rejoice, being freed from the bondage of sin through baptism while yet in prison

Rejoice, for being informed by the Spirit thou prayed only for endurance of the flesh

Rejoice, Married Matron mother of a son

Rejoice, thou who wast tempted by womanly anxiety for thy suckling child

Rejoice, thou who wast ministered to by the holy deacons Tertius and Pomponius

Rejoice, thou who didst commend thy son to the care of thy mother

Rejoice, thou who didst comfort thy brother, a catechumen in the faith

Rejoice, thou who didst look upon the dungeon as a palace

Rejoice, Bold One asking the Lord whether thou wouldst die a martyr’s death

Rejoice, Holy Martyrs Perpetua, Felicity and your companions

Beholding a heavenly vision, holy Perpetua wast informed of her martyrdom. She was found worthy to see with spiritual eyes the contest of salvation.  And looking upon the bronze ladder she didst see holy Saturus going up ahead of her, calling after her to follow. Wherefore we call to her:

Alleluia

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It is Truly Right to Make Churches Beautiful

At the parish across the street: A copy of the Axion Estin icon in a beautiful proskinitari and the miracle of the icon and the hymn depicted on the wall above.

It is truly right to call thee blessed, O Theotokos,
ever blessed, all immaculate, and Mother of our God.
More honorable than the Cherubim,
and beyond compare more glorious than the Seraphim.
Thee who without corruption gavest birth to God the Word.
The very Theotokos, thee do we magnify.

The original icon of Axion Estin is located in the main church of Karyes on Mount Athos. According to tradition, an Elder and his disciple lived in a cell on Mount Athos which housed this icon. One Saturday night the Elder left to attend an All-Night vigil in Karyes. He told his disciple to chant the service alone. That evening an unknown monk who called himself Gabriel, came to the cell, and they began the vigil together. During the Ninth Ode of the canon, when they began to sing the Magnificat [Magnify O my Soul], the disciple sang the original hymn “More honourable than the Cherubim…” and afterwards the visiting monk chanted it again, but with “It is truly right…” preceding the “More honorable” part. As he sang, the icon began to radiate with Uncreated Light. When the disciple asked the visiting monk to write the words of the new hymn down, he took a roof tile and wrote on it with his finger, as though the tile were made of wax. The disciple knew then that this was no ordinary monk, but the Archangel Gabriel. At that moment the Archangel disappeared, but the icon of the Mother of God continued to radiate light for some time afterward. That same icon came to be known as Axion Estin (It is Truly Right) and the hymn was incorporated into liturgical use.

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Η Ευχή – The Prayer

Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again (John 4:13)

An excerpt from The Scent of Holiness: Lessons from a Women’s Monastery, published by Conciliar Press, a translation I did of the Greek folk song, Η Ευχή – The Prayer (pp. 170-1). To hear a Greek version of this song see the video embedded below.

From Pharaoh of Egypt, slavery departing,

With my guide Moses, to Sinai arriving.

 

Mount Sinai to ascend! Oh how much I desire,

To the holy summit’s peak and the Prayer to acquire.

 

May God give me patience on the harsh ascent,

Fortitude, endurance, for the Prayer’s acquirement.

 

Primarily obedience, the Scriptures and watchfulness

Combined with holy silence enhance true prayerfulness.

 

In order for you the Prayer to properly say,

From your mind worldly things throw completely away.

 

In the beginning be sure to say the Prayer orally,

And in due time you will find you say it noetically.

 

On the words of the Prayer hold full attention,

For if you imagine you’re in danger of delusion.

 

The Prayer exasperates the one who is tempting,

Wherefore don’t be disconcerted by his relentless attacking.

 

From the tree of prayer the sweetest fruits you receive,

Oh! What honey gushes forth you’re unable to conceive.

 

How the Prayer works, to tell you don’t ask me,

I’m unable to explain, for it’s a divine mystery.

 

When the Prayer energizes within, continually,

Then guard it well, carefully, with much humility.

 

My venerable elder, my noetic Moses, guiding,

To acquire the Prayer bestow upon me your blessing.

 

The Prayer she gives; Christians she blesses,

The Mother of God, the Most Holy Abbess.

 

Mount Sinai to ascend! Oh how much I desire,

To the holy summit’s peak and the Prayer to acquire.

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When the Lord was baptized…

A poem by St. Nikolai Velimirovitch:

When the Lord was baptized in the river Jordan;

On that bright day before all the people,

The Heavens on high became wide open,

And the angels drew near to the water.

At once St. John was filled with fear

On feeling the Heavens breathing so near.

The Spirit Almighty as a dove descended,

To rest on Christ, God’s Son beloved.

In this way God sanctified the waters,

And when the Lord rose up from it,

A strange voice was heard from Heaven:

“This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.

Listen to what He will tell you about Me.

Obey Him so that you can find joy in Me.

Obey Him so that you can crush every devil,

And be received as my sons in Heaven.”

Dear brothers we were baptized also;

Sanctified by the Spirit Almighty

And, in Christ’s army we are called to fight,

And in eternity to glorify His love and might.

When the Lord was baptized in the river Jordan;

On that bright day before all the people,

The heavens on high became wide open,

And the angels drew near to the water.

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