Those colorful pages of store ads that come tucked
into the Sunday newspaper tell us something about our culture. They tell us
that every day has become the same as every other day. Here is the ad for chocolates
wrapped in red and decorated with hearts on sale for Valentine’s Day. Identical
chocolates but in a different shape and wrapped in red and green were on sale
for Christmas. And a month from now, no matter how long it is till Easter,
they’ll be offered for sale in egg or bunny shapes and wrapped in pastel
colors. But it’s the same chocolate, the same sales pitch, the same enticing
“sale price.” Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Easter — what’s the difference? One
day is like all the others. We constantly experience this sad reduction of all
days to one day. It’s certainly convenient in some ways (you can buy your
chocolate any day of the week because the stores are always open) but sameness
can be deadly, leading us almost imperceptibly from boredom to depression to
despair.
An Antidote to
Sameness
Standing as an antidote to this numbing sameness is
the insistence of the Orthodox Church that all days are decidedly not the same.
If we really pay attention to the rhythm of the church year and let it permeate
our family life, we won’t be bored. We won’t be tempted to that despair that is
the opposite of peace because it makes us feel angry and cheated: wasn’t there
supposed to be more to life than this endless roll of identical days?
Our homes can reflect the peace of knowing that life
is leading us somewhere, and that we are preparing for something. A simple act
like keeping the Wednesday and Friday fast (not refraining altogether from
eating, but refraining from animal products) can be a constant reminder that we
are not bound to this world. We are in it, and we care for it and honor it as
God’s creation, but we have a higher destiny, and fasting helps us prepare for
that destiny by loosening the grip that this world has on us. We won’t die
without meat and butter, we learn with relief. In fact, our bodies and souls
may be lightened enough to hear God’s voice more clearly than before.
Anticipation
Another antidote to boredom is anticipation. This,
too, is part of the Orthodox rhythm of life that can be reflected in our homes.
Great Lent is a prime example. Our culture, if it pays attention to Lent at
all, treats it as a somber period during which we must “give up” something. And
even this has now become a joke. For several weeks before Easter the sign
outside our local car wash reads “Don’t give up a clean car for Lent!”
But Great Lent in our families can be a period of
nurturing a peaceful atmosphere that gives us time and mental quietude to
prepare for the Resurrection. Cutting down on outside activities, giving less
of our time to TV or radio, ignoring for just a few precious weeks the noisy
entertainments that constantly grab at our attention — all these things can
help us maintain a state of reflective anticipation. This is why the Church
urges us to look at Great Lent as a gift rather than a deprivation. It is a
gift of time — a piece of special time we are given to remember what a great
victory has been achieved for us, and what a great destiny awaits us.
Like the Prodigal Son, we may have squandered
everything our loving Father has given us. But we have the chance now to
recognize, reflect on, and rectify that sin. We can go back to Him. He will
receive us with love and without reproach. And when the day of the Resurrection
comes, we will be among those once dead who now know that Christ has “trampled
down death by death” for us. That knowledge is true peace.
We Belong to
Someone
A major source of disquiet for many people in our
culture is a feeling of rootlessness. We want to belong; we want to have a
purpose in common with others. This is another gift the Church offers us, and
one we should strive to share with those not yet in the Church. We belong,
first of all, because we are one with the creation of God that worships Him and
acknowledges Him as its maker. Jesus Christ referred to this when He said to
the Pharisees who wanted Him to rebuke His cheering disciples, “If these should
keep silent, the very stones would cry out” (Luke 19: 40).
Because we are part of, in fact the crowning glory of,
God’s creation, we share with the rest of creation the privilege of offering
Him our thanks. This is beautifully expressed in one of the hymns for Christmas:
Every creature made by Thee offers Thee thanks: The
angels offer a hymn; the heavens, a star; The wise men, gifts; the shepherds,
their wonder; The earth, its cave; the wilderness, a manger. And we offer Thee
a virgin mother!
A family standing together in front of a candlelit
icon of the Nativity of Christ and singing or reciting this hymn can certainly
feel the peace and wonder of knowing that we have a place in God’s creation.
Icons reassure us that we also belong to the
long-established family of God’s people. For example, in the icon known as the
“Hospitality of Abraham,” based on Genesis 18, the three seated figures
represent the angels who visited Abraham with good news. But the Church
understands them as representing the Holy Trinity as well. Looking at the icon,
we remember that we are not only the “heirs of the promise” made to Abraham; we
are also the sons and daughters of the Triune God who showed Himself to us in
Jesus Christ. To have icons prominently visible in our homes , and to talk as
families about what they represent, can bring us the peace of knowing who we
are and whose we are.
Wonderful Promises
A few years ago, a beer company advertised its product
with the slogan, “It doesn’t get any better than this.” Now, conviviality is a
fine thing (though it doesn’t always have to be beer-induced). But if there are
people who really believe that human conviviality is “as good as it gets,” they
haven’t yet heard the Gospel message.
Our homes can be places where we proclaim that message
and challenge the idea that some limited earthly happiness is all we can ever
expect. Look at the icon of the Ascension: Christ goes up in glory, leaving us
with promises that tell us what we can really expect. He has said, “And when I
go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself,
so that where I am you may be also” (John 14: 3.)
What is this place that Christ goes to prepare for us?
As Saint Paul writes, it is wonderful beyond our ability to conceive: “What no
eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has
prepared for those who love Him” (I Cor 2: 9). So we needn’t scramble to find
some meaning in this earthly life, or to measure its value in terms of beer.
Icons and Scripture remind us of the promises of God. They tell us that His
purpose and plan are at work for us. We must work to fulfill the plan and
purpose, but we can be at peace knowing that He has declared the great things
He has in store.
Just by displaying the icon of the Ascension, we
create an opportunity to talk about these things in our families. We can offer
a mealtime prayer thanking God for His promises, and asking His strength to
help us be worthy of them in our lives. Feeling a sense of life’s divine
purpose will contribute to our families’ peacefulness of heart. It will dispel
the restlessness that constantly disturbs those who search for meaning and who
know perfectly well that if it “doesn’t get better than this,” there is not
much point in it at all.
Choosing a Different Course
D.H. Lawrence’s “The Rocking Horse Winner” is the
story of a family whose mother is bent on becoming socially prominent. Her
ambitions drive her to need more and more money, and the pressure of this is
reflected in the family. Lawrence writes that the house itself seems constantly
to whisper, “There must be more money. There must be more money.”
The loving young son in the family wants to help his
mother. He discovers an extraordinary talent in himself: by riding his rocking
horse with great attention and intensity, he can discover the names of winners
in future horse races. He does this for several months, placing bets through
the family’s gardener and secretly giving his winnings to his mother.
But the huge effort takes a terrible toll on the boy,
as his mother’s ambitions and needs grow. She worries about his deteriorating
condition, but has no idea what is causing it. The boy finally works himself to
death on his rocking horse in one last extreme effort to still the whisper of
“There must be more money.”
Though Lawrence’s story is set in England decades ago,
it reverberates in our society today. Many families and homes are uneasy
because of a perceived need to accumulate as much money and “stuff” as
possible. This need can drive us unrelentingly, especially because the ability
to accumulate is widely seen as a sign of success.
Once again, the Church offers us a chance to step back
and take another look at those things that may be driving us. The troparion
used for several saints, including the beloved Nicholas of Myra, contains these
words: “Because of your poverty, riches were granted to you.”
Suppose this line from the hymn was made part of a
family discussion with the question, “What do you think these words mean?”
Suppose too that the discussion could be brought around to the idea that many
saints chose material poverty in order to pursue spiritual riches without any
distractions. This idea might open up a whole new way of thinking for our
children, so accustomed to seeing prominent figures who are willing to do
almost anything to pile up wealth for themselves.
We can look at more recent Church members. The Grand
Duchess Elisabeth, sister of the last Russian Tsarina, Alexandra, was one of
the most beautiful and privileged women of her time. Raised a Protestant, she
eventually embraced Orthodoxy and wrote letters to her grandmother, Queen
Victoria, explaining her choice. After her husband’s assassination, she chose
monasticism, and she chose martyrdom in Russia during the Revolution, though
her fellow European royals would gladly have gotten her out of Russia before
her arrest, had she chosen to leave. But she refused to abandon the nuns in the
monastery she served as abbess, nor could she turn her back on the poor and
needy people of Moscow who depended on her.
It may be that we and our children will not make
choices that go so dramatically against the mainstream as Nicholas and
Elizabeth did, but by offering us examples of people who made such choices and
who achieved spiritual greatness, the Church reminds us that this path is at
open to us no less than to them. That knowledge can bring peace to people —
young or old — who have to make a living in the success-oriented world, but who
also seek the Kingdom of God.
Everybody Fits In
We all know that each human being is unique, yet most
of us want to “fit in.” For some people that is much harder than for others.
Unusual personalities or interests, even physical appearance, can make being
part of the group difficult. For children and young people especially, this can
be a real problem, troubling to the soul.
The great panoply of saints can offer peace to a
troubled young soul. If in our homes we follow the daily calendar of saints, we
can introduce our children to holy people so varied in their abilities and
personal styles that anyone can find a “model” in one of them, if not more than
one.
The saints’ stories are often surprising. Who would
have thought that gentle Saint Nicholas could strike anyone, even the
arch-heretic Arius? The stories of the saints open several layers of meaning
that invite us to dig deeper into them. For example, Saint Simeon the Stylite,
living on his pillar, intrigues us with his approach to holiness. It adds to
our amazement to learn that he did not stay in isolation, but counseled and
prayed for the countless people who came to him for advice and guidance. Perhaps
most surprising of all, when his monastic elders asked him, as an obedience, to
come down from the pillar where he had become such a revered figure, Simeon did
so immediately. There is much to be learned and contemplated in these “layers”
of Saint Simeon’s story!
All the saints’ lives tell us that any person, and any
kind of person, can find the peace of God.
If we can make our homes places that reflect God’s
love, our children will believe that Jesus Christ speaks the truth when He
says, “My peace I give to you… Let not your hearts be troubled; neither let
them be afraid” (John 14: 27).
Valerie Zahirsky is a graduate of St. Vladimir’s
Orthodox Theological Seminary in New York (M.Div.) and of the Claremont
Graduate University in California (M.A. in English.) She has represented the
Orthodox Church at several international meetings and writes church school
curriculum for various Orthodox jurisdictions. She frequently speaks on topics
concerning women and families in the Church, and her article “Growing Up
Orthodox and Female” appears in the book Orthodox Women Speak. Her husband is a
priest of the Orthodox Church in America. Their two children are Barbara and
Peter.
Source: http://www.pravmir.com/family-life-in-an-orthodox-rhythm/
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