The Catalog of Good Deeds

Our neighbors returned from a weekend away at a resort with their two teenagers. They described to us the wonderful food buffet at the resort. The brunch buffet, they reported, had everything, the meats, the scrambled egg bar, tremendous fruit spreads, all the pancakes and toppings you could think of, ten different types of dishes, salmon, croissants, you name it, they had it. They couldn’t hold back their dismay as they told us how their two boys came back from the buffet with a bowl of Captain Crunch cereal! “They can have that at home any time,” they exclaimed. They could have anything they wanted, a feast fit for a king, and they passed it all up for a bowl of cold cereal.

Lent is a time that we are invited to change our lifestyle in preparation for Easter. Like anything else in life, the more we understand what is happening, the more we indulge in the banquet, the more we will experience God’s healing presence in our lives. I won’t be able to highlight all of the delicacies that are laid out before us during this Lenten season, so I will highlight three of the dishes that families can partake in as a way of connecting to the banquet ourselves and teaching our children to partake. Notice the first connection, though. The most effective way to teach our children the joy of the liturgical life of the Church is to embrace it in our own lives.

Make a commitment on how you will fast during Lent

As Orthodox, we fast from food to be able to fast from sin. And it is our sin that keeps us from experiencing God fully. This connection between how we eat and how we sin is what the Fathers of the Church are clear on. This connection is also something that is lost in contemporary society. In America today, we don’t hear a lot about how fasting can help a marriage stay together or how a family can learn to love God through fasting. As a therapist, I see marriages fail because people cannot control how they act towards each other. Essentially the more we indulge ourselves in whatever we want, the more we become enslaved to our desires, rather than free to love. Fasting is not magic, but when we feast at the banquet of our souls through fasting we see God transforming our worldly desires towards His Kingdom. Opening up our marriages and families to fasting opens up our hearts to be filled with the Grace of God and be truly free.

Fasting rules for families is a personal thing. Each family will do it differently. In consultation with your Priest or Spiritual Father, consider following the fasting guidelines of the Church. Consider what you did last year, and take a step further this year. For some, this might mean fasting from meat and dairy the first and last weeks of Lent. For others, it is time to fast from dairy products during every week of Lent, or on Wednesdays and Fridays. Learning to partake of fasting from the buffet of the Church during Lent means letting go of control of our diet and giving this to God. Fasting is not just about food, but also about healing our souls. It is a challenge for us today, but like any sacrifices we make in faith, God’s blessings that come from it are uncountable.

Before Lent starts, decide as a family what your church service schedule will be. Families do this all the time at the beginning of the soccer, football, or basketball season. Families look ahead to commit their evenings and weekends to the sport schedule. The coach demands it and families do this. We do this for earthly rewards: a championship team or to help our kids develop their sports skills. Planning in advance that you will go to every Wednesday night Pre-Sanctified service, or Friday night Salutations service, or Saturday night Vespers is a commitment towards heavenly rewards of peace and healing. Planning ahead what services you will commit to is a way of setting your family’s Lenten journey within the life of the parish; right where it belongs.

Now what should we do if our kids don’t want to go? Or maybe we have mixed feelings about going. Attending the services requires a commitment of our time that will pay off in transforming our hearts and lives towards receiving God’s Grace. God’s Grace heals the ills of our souls, but services don’t have to be boring. Spend time as a family to make it meaningful. Learn about the service. Ask your Priest to teach what is happening to you and why. Participate in the services by learning the hymns and prayers. Suggest coordinating a potluck or discussion group at Church after service for families. This could mean coordinating activities for kids and discussions for adults. Do a family activity following the service that everyone will enjoy, like a family night at home. Like many good things in life, until we learn to love the medicine of worship in our lives, a teaspoon of sugar helps it go down. There are few things as boring as an Orthodox Church service that you are not connected with and there is nothing more transforming than living a life of worship.

Make a commitment to family prayer at home during Lent

Kids are more likely to feel at home at church if their home feels more like a church. While I am not suggesting that we walk slowly and use quiet voices at home, Lent is a great time to build your family icon corner, or come together before your icon corner in prayer. Mom and dad must be taking things seriously if they are lighting a candle before the icons and bowing their heads in prayer. If we are singing Church hymns at home, our kids will feel a familiarity when the hymns are sung at Church. Lent is a time to consider coming together as a family before the icons instead of before the television. If you don’t think you know how to do this, talk to your Priest about how to start to pray or find people to teach you about this.

Consider specifically incorporating the Lenten Prayer of Saint Ephraim as a family. Each evening, following dinner, or before bedtime when everyone is together, gather at the family icon corner and say the prayer all together.

O Lord and Master of my life, give me not the spirit of sloth, faintheartedness, lust for power, or idle talk. (prostration)

But grant me, your servant, the spirit of moderation, humility, patience, and love. (prostration)

Yes, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own faults and not to judge my brothers and sisters. For you are blessed to the ages of ages. Amen (prostration)

After each verse, do a full prostration, or bow, in front of the icon of Christ. This is the same prostration the Priest does at the beginning of services. Nothing shifts a family prayer time like doing prostrations together. Christ is present as we gather, and through the icons. Bowing down to Him makes it real and requires a step in faith. Paradoxically, it strengthens our faith, which is what we need as we try to turn our lives towards Him.

So the Lenten buffet is laid out before us to nourish our souls and prepare us to receive Christ at Easter. We can partake of fasting, church services, and prayer in the home. I have not mentioned many of the other ‘dishes’ available like confession, forgiveness, almsgiving, reading the scriptures, pilgrimages, reading the lives of the Saints, or memorizing scripture or prayers. The banquet is set for us to partake as much as we desire.

The goal or purpose of Lent is not to fast or pray. The goal of Lent is to experience God directly. Helping our kids ‘get more out of Church’ means helping them experience God directly. Lent is a time for families to reorient themselves towards God, but it takes a commitment to open our families to the life in Christ and open our homes to God’s saving Grace. The feast is there for us to partake of, but we can also walk right by, grabbing a bowl of cold cereal. Remember, though, that after a bowl of cereal you will be hungry again in an hour. But God promises those who partake, that “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.”

An article by Philip Mamalakis, PhD

Source: http://www.antiochian.org/699

The following is one of Eugene Rose’s lay sermons entitled “Weeping Icons of the Mother of God”, delivered in November 1966. Eugene Rose was later tonsured as the monk, Fr. Seraphim, a great modern-day ascetic and writer.

Of all the many ways in which the All-Holy Mother of God reveals Her mercies to men, there is one that stands out both as being undeniable (for it is a completely objective phenomenon) and as touching the heart in a most immediate way. This is the phenomenon of weeping icons, in which images of the Mother of God produce tears that are exact replicas, on the scale of the icon, of human tears – originating in a corner of the eye and coursing the side of the face, sometimes as distinct miniature teardrops, sometimes as a flood of tears that moistens the whole face.

America too, so late to receive Holy Orthodoxy, is now the witness of this miraculous phenomenon. Three weeping icons appeared quite suddenly, one after the other, within two months in the spring of 1960 among Greek families in Long Island, New York. The striking nature of this sign has drawn considerable attention to these icons, especially among Orthodox believers, but also among those outside the Church.

It is not, perhaps, well-known that this phenomenon of weeping icons is not new, for there are records of such miraculous icons in Russian Church history as early as the 12th century. Here we will give an account of one from the 19th century, together with an interpretation of its meaning by a bishop who lived at that time. [From The Orthodox Word, Nov.-Dec. 1965]:

This icon was located in the church of the Theological Academy at the Sokolsky Monastery in Romania. After the Liturgy in the seminary church on February 1, 1854, it was noticed that the icon was weeping. The rector of the seminary, Bishop Philaret Skriban, was among the witnesses of this miracle. He took the icon out of its frame, looked at it carefully, wiped the traces of the tears off with a piece cloth and replaced the icon. He then asked all to leave and he locked the church. When the rector, together with the teachers and seminarians, came to the church for Vespers several hours later, all were struck by the same miraculous flow of tears from the eyes of the Mother of God. The rector immediately served a moleben and read an Akathist before the icon.

Soon all of Romania knew of the miracle and began streaming to the monastery to venerate the icon. News of it spread throughout Russia also. The miraculous flow of tears occurred sometimes daily, and sometimes with an interval of two, three of four days. Many were thus to see the very miracle of the icon weeping, and those who did not could see at least the traces left by the tears. Even skeptics became convinced of the miracle. A certain colonel was sent to the commanding officer of the Austrian occupation force (during the Crimean war) to investigate the rumoured miracle, and to his astonishment he witnessed the actual flow of tears.

An important testimony of the miracle was offered by Bishop Melchisedek of Romansk, one of its first witnesses. Thirty-five years after the event he spoke of how he had long pondered the question of the meaning of the tears of the Mother of God. He came to the conclusion that such weeping icons had existed also in ancient times and that such an event always foretold a severe trial for the Church of Christ and for the nation. History justified this conclusion in the case of the Romanian weeping icon. During the Crimean war the Principality of Moldavia was occupied by Austrian troops and subjected to severe trials. The Sokolsky Monastery in particular had a sad future: this formerly great religious center of Romania, serving for a hundred years as a seedbed of spiritual culture, was suppressed, the seminary moved elsewhere and the monks dispersed.

The meaning of the weeping icons of America today is not yet evident; at least one of them is still weeping after five years. What is certain is that these tears of the Mother of God speak directly to the heart of every Orthodox believer, calling all to repentance, amendment of life and return to Orthodox faith and tradition in their fullness.

Source: https://iconreader.wordpress.com/2012/06/08/why-do-icons-of-the-mother-of-god-weep/

Pt. 4, Ch.1. Spiritual Life in the Family

Children and the spiritual life

— Geronta, if a mother gives holy water to her child and he spits it out, what should she do?

— She should pray for her child. Maybe the way in which she gives the holy water to her child causes a reaction. For the child to be on the path of God the parents must also live right spiritually. Some parents who are religious strive to help their children to become good, not because they are concerned for the salvation of their souls, but because they what to have good children. In other words, they are more worried about what people will say about their child instead of whether they might go to hell. So how can God help? The aim is not for children to go to church through compulsion, but to love the church; not to do good through compulsion, but to feel the need to do good. The holy lives of parents instruct the souls of their children and they naturally follow. In this way they grow up piously, with health of both soul and body and without spiritual injuries. If parents force their children out of fear of God, He helps and the child is benefited. If, however, they do it out of egoism, then God does not help. Children are often troubled because of their parent’s pride.

— Geronta, some mothers ask us what prayer should a child of three or four years old do?

— You should tell them: “You are the mother; see how much your child can handle.” They shouldn’t give them a rule.

— Geronta, what if the little children get tired when their parents bring them here for vigils?

— During Orthros they should let them out a little to relax, and during Divine Liturgy bring them back into the church.

Without forcing their children mothers must teach them to pray. Villagers in Cappadocia intensely lived the ascetic tradition. They would take their children to hermitages, do prostrations and pray with tears, and in this way, the children learned how to pray. Chetes would sometimes go by night to rob them; and when passing the chapels they would hear crying and stop in surprise. “OK, what’s going on?” they would say. “During the day they are all smiles and at night they cry?” They couldn’t understand what was going on.

Miracles happen through the prayers of small children. Whatever they ask of God He gives them because they are guileless and He hears their pure prayer. I remember one time our parents had gone out into the field and had left me in the house with my two younger siblings. The sky suddenly darkened and a torrential rainstorm began. “What will our parents do now?,” we said. “How will they get back home?” The two little ones began crying. “Come here,” I told them, “we will ask Christ to stop the rain.” The three of us knelt down before the family’s icons and prayed. In just a few minutes the rain stopped.

Parents must use discernment to help their children draw near to Christ from their early years, and from their childhood to live the joy on high—spiritual joy. When they start school they should learn, little by little, to read spiritual books to help themselves live spiritually. In this way they will become little angels, and their prayers will have greater boldness before God. Such children are spiritual heads of the home. The lives of saints especially help small children in their spiritual lives. As a small boy I found a little book of the lives of saints which they had back in those days. I went out into the forest to read and pray. I was flying with joy. From the age of ten to sixteen, when the Greek-Italian war began, I lived the spiritual life without restraint. Childhood joys are pure; they leave an imprint on a person that greatly affects him when he grows up. If children live spiritually they will live joyfully in this life, and in the next they will rejoice eternally with Christ.

Temptations on feast days

— Geronta, why do temptations often occur on feast days?

— Don’t you know? On feast days, Christ, the Panagia, and the Saints are joyful. They treat people, giving blessings and spiritual gifts. If parents give gifts when their children celebrate their namedays and kings release prisoners when a prince is born, why shouldn’t the Saints care for us on special occasions, too? Certainly the joy they give greatly endures and our souls are greatly helped. Knowing this the devil creates temptations in order to deprive people of the Divine gifts: they neither rejoice nor benefit from the feast. Sometimes you even see when a family is preparing to commune on a feast day, that the devil will send them a temptation to fight and then not only do they not commune, but they don’t even go to church! That’s how the little demon does it, so as to be deprived of all Divine help.

The same thing can be seen in our own monastic life. Many times the little demon—tempter that he is, because he knows from experience that we will be spiritually helped on some feast—will, beginning on the eve of the feast, create an atmosphere of temptation. For example, he might get us to quarrel with another brother, and then afterwards torment us in order to overpower us both spiritually and bodily. In this way he doesn’t allow us to benefit from the feast, with its joyous atmosphere of doxology. But the Good God helps us when He sees that we had not given occasion, but that this happened only by the envy of the evil one. And God helps us even more when we humbly reproach ourselves, blaming neither our brother nor even the devil, who hates everything good. For his work is this: to create scandals and spread evil—while man, as the image of God, should spread peace and goodness.

Source: http://orthodoxinfo.com/praxis/elder-paisios-on-family-life.aspx

Part I Part II

On the second Sunday of Great Lent, there is a great feast in the blessed city of Thessalonika, Greece. It is the feast of St. Gregory Palamas. On this day, the holy relics of the saint are taken from the Church of St. Gregory in a procession throughout the city, escorted by bishops, priests, sailors, policemen, and thousands of faithful. One wonders why his earthly remains are still held in such great veneration. How could his bones remain incorruptible more than six hundred years after his death? Indeed, St. Gregory’s life clearly explains these wondrous facts. It illustrates the inspired words of the apostles that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit (see 1 Corinthians 6:19) and that we are "partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4).

A Childhood Passion for the Eternal

St. Gregory Palamas was born in the year 1296. He grew up in Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey) in a critical time of political and religious unrest. Constantinople was slowly recovering from the devastating invasion of the Crusades. It was a city under attack from all sides. From the west, it was infiltrated by Western philosophies of rationalism and scholasticism and by many attempts at Latinization. From the east, it was threatened by Muslim Turkish military invaders. The peace and faith of its citizens were at stake.

Gregory’s family was wealthy. His father was a member of the senate. Upon his father’s sudden death, Byzantine Emperor Andronikos II Paleologos (1282–1328), who was a close friend of the family, gave it his full financial support. He especially admired Gregory for his fine abilities and talents, hoping that the brilliant young man would one day become a fine assistant. However, instead of accepting a high office in the secular world, Gregory sought “that good part, which will not be taken away” from him (Luke 10:42).

Upon finishing his studies in Greek philosophy, rhetoric, poetry, and grammar, Gregory, at only twenty or twenty-two years of age, followed a burning passion in his heart. Like a lover who strives to stay alone forever with his loved one, Gregory was thirsty for this living water (see Revelation 22:17). Therefore, no created thing could separate him from the love of God (see Romans 8:39). He simply withdrew to Mount Athos, an already established community of monasticism. He first stayed at the Vatopedi Monastery, and then moved to the Great Lavra.

Gregory’s departure was not a surprise to the rest of his family. Many priests and monks, friends of the family, frequently visited the family home. The parents were careful to pass on to their children the “pearl of great price” (Matthew 13:46). Great wealth and high education were not a hindrance, but an excellent tool in their pursuit of salvation. As a result of their way of life and belief, Gregory’s mother, two brothers, and two sisters soon distributed all their earthly possessions to the poor and entered different monasteries.

Living the Spiritual Experience of the Church

In Athos, the novice Gregory took as his spiritual guide St. Nicodemos of Vatopedi Monastery. This holy man of prayer guided Gregory on the path of ascetic labor: prayers, vigils, fasting, continuous repentance, and monastic obedience. The young novice Gregory was especially attached to the prayer of the heart, also known as the Jesus Prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner” (see Luke 18:38).

The experienced practice of the Jesus Prayer, requiring solitude and silence combined with physical exercises and breathing methods, is called "hesychasm" (from the Greek hesychos, meaning inner stillness, peace, or silence). Those practicing it are called "hesychasts." Inner silence of this kind makes us capable of listening to the whispers of the divine within us. "The kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:21). Therefore, the Jesus Prayer is the prayer of the whole person, involving the human body, mind, soul, and heart.

The hesychasts spoke and wrote about their unique experience. They taught people to pray without ceasing, as the Apostle Paul commands all Christians to do (1 Thessalonians 5:17). They explained that in prayer, man is filled from within with the eternal glory, with the divine light beheld at the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor. The hesychast Gregory explains:

For, on the day of the Transfiguration, that Body, source of the light of grace, was not yet united with our bodies; it illuminated from outside those who worthily approached it, and sent the illumination into the soul by the intermediary of the physical eyes; but now, since it is mingled with us and exists in us, it illuminates the soul from within. (Triads I. 3.38)

The Jesus Prayer is not a mantra, as in Eastern religions, and it cannot be taken as such. The prayer’s call for “mercy” involves inner repentance and change. It is also a prayer practiced within the sacramental life of the Church, a prayer combined with Holy Communion, confession, reading the Word of God, fasting, loving one’s neighbor, and so forth. Finally, it is not a prayer using “vain repetitions” or babble, but a prayer recited again and again, in persistence (Luke 18:1), from the inner heart of man reaching the divine heights of glory, confessing Christ as the Lord and Savior, in sincerity, humility, and faith.

For that prayer (the Jesus Prayer) is true and perfect. It fills the soul with Divine grace and spiritual gifts. As chrism perfumes the jar the more strongly the tighter it is closed, so prayer, the more fast it is imprisoned in the heart, abounds the more in Divine grace. By this prayer the dew of the Holy Spirit is brought down upon the heart, as Elijah brought down rain on Mount Carmel. This mental prayer reaches to the very throne of God and is preserved in golden vials. This mental prayer is the light which illumines man's soul and inflames his heart with the fire of love of God. It is the chain linking God with man and man with God. (Palamas, “Homily on how all Christians in general must pray without ceasing,”in E. Kadloubovsky and G. E. H. Palmer, Early Fathers of the Philokalia, London: Faber and Faber, 1981, pp. 412–415)

Such prayer was practiced from the early Christian period. The hesychasts were drawn by God's unconditional graceful love (Romans 5:15) to fill a certain human need around them. Many hesychasts abandoned their solitude to serve their brothers, “since he who loves God must love his brother also” (1 John 4:21). Some cared for the sick in hospitals, like St. Basil the Great in Caesarea; others helped the poor, like St. John the Almsgiver in Alexandria; and yet others welcomed the faithful for confession. Nevertheless, they did not abandon the Jesus Prayer and their inner silence. In this sense, all Christians are called to follow this hesychast way leading to salvation.

Let no one think, my brother Christians, that it is the duty only of priests and monks to pray without ceasing, and not of laymen. No, no; it is the duty of all of us Christians to remain always in prayer every Christian in general should strive to pray always, and to pray without ceasing, this very name of our Lord Jesus Christ, constantly invoked by you, will help you to overcome all difficulties, and in the course of time you will become used to this practice and will taste how sweet is the name of the Lord. For when we sit down to work with our hands, when we walk, when we eat, when we drink we can always pray mentally and practice this mental prayer—the true prayer pleasing to God. (“Homily on how all Christians in general must pray without ceasing”)

In addition to his spiritual practice and daily scriptural readings, St. Gregory studied the works of the great Fathers, theologians, and ascetics of the Church. Just as a scientist builds on the evidence and data provided to him by his predecessors, Gregory made a fascinating synthesis of the scriptural and patristic teaching on the prayer of the heart, combined with his personal experience.

Although the monk Gregory in his youth had diligently studied Greek philosophy, he was not influenced by its views on matter. Ancient Greek philosophy believes that the body imprisons the soul, and thus it detests matter. Christians respect the body, since Christ made the flesh a source of sanctification, and matter (water, oil, etc.) a channel of divine grace. In his writings, St. Gregory affirmed that man, united in body and soul, is sanctified by Jesus Christ, who took a human body at the Incarnation. “When God is said to have made man according to His image,” wrote St. Gregory, “the word man means neither the soul by itself nor the body by itself, but the two together.” In another place, he added:

Thus the Word of God took up His dwelling in the Theotokos in an inexpressible manner and proceeded from her, bearing flesh. He appeared upon the earth and lived among men, deifying our nature and granting us, after the words of the divine Apostle, “things which angels desire to look into” (1 Peter 1:12). (A Homily on the Dormition of the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary)

Father Gregory, Teacher

His unquenched thirst for God’s sweetness experienced in prayer moved the righteous Gregory to live as a hermit in a cell outside the monastery. In the year 1326, the threat of Turkish invasions forced him, along with his Athonite brothers, to retreat to Thessalonika. There he was ordained to the holy priesthood.

As a priest, Gregory did not abandon his spiritual labor and hesychasm. He spent most of the week alone in prayer. On the weekends, he celebrated divine services and preached sermons. He cared for the youth, calling them to discuss religious issues with him. Father Gregory was not concerned about abstract problems of philosophy, but about Christian faith experienced in prayer. He wanted to preach solely about problems of Christian existence, which are more attractive and meaningful to the young.

Soon, many of his spiritual sons expressed their desire to live in a monastic setting. So in the serene area of Vereia, near Thessalonika, he established a small community of monks, which he guided for five years. In 1331 the saint withdrew to Mt. Athos and lived in solitude at the Skete of St. Sabbas. In 1333 he was appointed abbot of the Esphigmenou Monastery in the northern part of the Holy Mountain. In 1336 he returned to the Skete of St. Sabbas, where he devoted himself to theological writing, continuing with this work until the end of his life.

But amidst all this, in the 1330s events took place in the life of the Eastern Church that placed St. Gregory among the most prominent teachers of Orthodox spirituality.

The Challenge of Rationalism

Around the year 1330, a certain monk Barlaam arrived in Constantinople from Calabria, Italy. He was a famous scholar, a skilled orator, and an acclaimed Christian teacher. Barlaam visited Mt. Athos and became acquainted with hesychasm.

Barlaam valued education and learning much more than contemplative prayer. Therefore, he believed the monks on Mount Athos were wasting their time in contemplative prayer when they should be studying. He ridiculed the ascetic labor and life of the monks, their methods of prayer, and their teachings about the uncreated light experienced by the hesychasts. Countering the traditional stance of the Church that “the theologian is the one who prays,” Barlaam asked: “How can an intimate communion of man with the Divine be achievable through prayer, since the Divine is transcendent and ‘dwelling in unapproachable light’ (1 Timothy 5:16)? No one can apprehend the essential being of God!” Barlaam was convinced that God can be reached only through philosophical, mental knowledge—in other words, through rationalism.

The words of Barlaam were not merely a challenge to a few monks. They defied the experience of the Church as a whole. The West, with its rationalistic tendencies, has associated the image of God with man’s intellect. Barlaam’s mind was full of rational arguments, but his heart was cold. Certainly, life with God is not just information, but also experience. Our living God cannot be conceived and described only by study, but must be spoken about from experience. “Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?” (Luke 24:32).

Journeying from Mt. Athos to Thessalonika and Constantinople, Barlaam clashed with the monks, refusing to test their way of vigils, prayer, and fasting, or to accept their spiritual experience. Unfortunately, many monks were swayed by his arguments and stood by his side. Deceived by considering the living faith as mere rational knowledge, Barlaam waged a war against the ascetics.

At the request of the Athonite monks, St. Gregory countered at first with verbal admonitions. But seeing the futility of such efforts, he put his theological arguments in writing. Thus appeared the Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts in the year 1338.

The Presence of God in Prayer

In his Triads, Palamas interpreted the experience of the Church by presenting logical arguments, based on the Scripture and the writings of the Fathers. Addressing the question of how it is possible for humans to have knowledge of a transcendent and unknowable God, he drew a distinction between knowing God in His essence, or nature, and knowing God in His energies, actions, or the means by which He acts.

To elaborate more, he made a comparison between God and the sun. The sun has its rays, God has His energies (among them, grace and light). By His energies, God creates, sustains, and governs the universe. By His energies, He transforms creation and deifies it, that is, He fills the new creation with His energies as water fills a sponge. These actions or energies of God are the true revelation of God Himself to humanity. So God is incomprehensible and unknowable in His nature or essence, but knowable in His energies. It is through His actions out of His love to the whole creation that God enters into a direct and immediate relationship with mankind, a personal confrontation between creature and Creator.

Towards the year 1340 the Athonite ascetics, with St. Gregory’s assistance, compiled a general reply to the attacks of Barlaam, the so-called Hagiorite Tome. Since the heated arguments flared everywhere in the churches, a general council was held at Constantinople in the year 1341. In front of hundreds of bishops and monastics, St. Gregory Palamas held an open debate with Barlaam in the halls of the Great Church of Hagia Sophia. On May 27, 1341, the council accepted the position of St. Gregory Palamas that God, unapproachable in His essence, reveals Himself through His energies, which are directed towards the world and are able to be perceived, like the light of Tabor, but which are neither material nor created. The teachings of Barlaam were condemned as heresy, and he himself was anathematized and returned to Calabria.

Second Triumph of Orthodoxy

But the dispute between the Palamites and the Barlaamites was far from finished. Politics came into play, and the politicians used the disputed religious issue as a threatening tool against those who supported Palamas. The great turmoil led to five consecutive church councils. One of the many scholars who advocated Barlaam’s position was the Bulgarian monk Akyndinos, who wrote a series of tracts against St. Gregory. Emperor Andronikos III Paleologos (1328–1341) was Akyndinos’s friend. Fearing the emperor, Patriarch John XIV Kalekos (1341–1347) backed Akyndinos, calling St. Gregory the cause of all disorders and disturbances in the Church (1344). He had St. Gregory locked up in prison for four years. In 1347, John XIV was replaced on the patriarchal throne by Isidore (1347–1349), a friend of St. Gregory. He set St. Gregory free and ordained him archbishop of Thessalonika.

In 1351, a sixth and final council was held to settle the heated controversial issues in the church. The Council of Blachernae solemnly upheld the orthodoxy of Palamas’ teachings and anathematized and excommunicated those who refused them. The anathemas of the council of 1351 were included in the rite for the Sunday of Orthodoxy in the Triodion. This council was considered the second triumph of Orthodoxy (the first being the restoration of icons). Later on, the memory of St. Gregory Palamas came to be celebrated in the Church on the second Sunday of Great Lent.

Imprisoned by Muslims

Gregory’s suffering for Christ did not end here. Again, because of the political influence of the West in Thessalonika, its citizens were divided upon the issue proclaimed by the councils. They did not immediately accept St. Gregory as archbishop, so that he was compelled to live in various places. On one of his travels to Constantinople, the Byzantine ship on which he was sailing fell into the hands of the Turkish Muslims. They took Archbishop Gregory as a prisoner, but displayed tolerance toward him. Even in captivity, St. Gregory preached to Christian prisoners and even held many debates with his Moslem captors. His love and respect for all men made his captors admire him and treat him with reverence. A year later, St. Gregory was ransomed and returned to Thessalonika.

The Proclamation of His Sainthood

St. Gregory was a living Gospel. God gave him the gift of healing, especially in the last three years before his death. On the eve of his repose, St. John Chrysostom appeared to him in a vision. St. Gregory Palamas fell asleep in the Lord on November 14, 1359. The Virgin Mary, the Apostle John, St. Dimitrios, St. Antony the Great, St. John Chrysostom, and angels of God all appeared to him at different times. Nine years after his repose, a council in Constantinople headed by Patriarch Philotheos (1354–1355, 1362–1376) proclaimed the sainthood of Gregory Palamas. Patriarch Philotheos himself compiled the life and services for the saint.

When we hear in the Lenten Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts, “The Light of Christ illumines all,” may we remember the call of the illumined Gregory for unceasing prayer and ascetic labor, that we be truly illumined by the light of the Resurrection.

By Fr. Bassam A. Nassif

Source: https://vk.com/im?sel=17300736

By Matushka Constantina Palmer

Great Lent is a wonderful, if trying, time. It’s an opportunity to recharge our spiritual batteries and tell ourselves that despite falling down all year, now is the time to get back up. It’s a time to guard ourselves and give of ourselves in a multitude of ways. We often hear that it is not enough to merely abstain during Lent; we should also do during Lent. To be specific, we should give alms. But almsgiving does not need to consist only in giving money. If that was so, those who have little would find it nearly impossible to give alms.

Giving alms can be done in a variety of ways. The Greek word eleemosyne means “alms, charity, mercy.” In other words, almsgiving is also the act of being merciful, so something as simple as a kind word, or a word not spoken, can be alms. Going to three different grocery stores to find those special ingredients so you can make your husband a delicious recipe because he is tired and a tasty fasting meal will lift his spirits, can be alms.

If we are watchful and mindful, we can find opportunities to give alms when we are shopping, by letting someone behind us go ahead. We can smile at someone on the street who looks like he’s having a hard day. We can go out of our way to help those we see struggling or say an extra prayer rope for those we know need it. We can visit the sick, spend an extra five minutes during coffee hour listening to someone unload about their difficult week, and tell an uplifting spiritual story. We can volunteer to help a young mother with her energetic little ones, and pick up after our own children for possibly the umpteenth time without grumbling. If we look for opportunities to give alms, if we ask God to put those opportunities in our lives, then we will see them on a daily basis.

Here’s my challenge to all of us: to give this Great Lent, to give and to pray and to thank God for the ability to do so. But, I would like to add an extra element to this challenge. Let’s give and not tell. Let’s give and not even recall our good deeds to ourselves. Let’s give and forget that we did good. For in reality it is God who should be credited for inspiring us to give. This is what the Gospel teaches us, to give to the poor (in whatever way we are able, to whatever kind of poverty we encounter) – but not let our “left hand” know what we’ve done (Matt 6:3).

Let’s become cheerful givers. And if we’re not cheerful right off the bat, let’s not be dismayed. I believe we’ll become cheerful through giving. It’s a worthy goal, for God loves the cheerful giver (2 Corin. 9:7).

Let’s arrive at Pascha having given of ourselves, having hidden our good deeds from others and ourselves. And let’s pray that while we were giving, our neighbour saw Christ in us – the True Giver of all good. Let’s pray that when we give alms, when others see us being merciful, we will be able to honestly say, “he who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9) because it is not us who gives, but Christ who gives through us.

Lastly, let’s not be found giving alms with our right hand and taking away the spiritual profit with our left by becoming puffed up, thinking we are good Christians. No, let’s give God the glory.

Source: https://oca.org/reflections/misc-authors/almsgiving-a-challenge-to-give-with-the-right-and-hide-from-the-left-matt

Subscribe to: Comments ( Atom )

Search This Blog

featured Slider

How to Make Lent Great For Your Family

The First Week of the Great Lent in St. Elisabeth Convent

Why do Icons of the Mother of God weep?

Excerpts from "Family Life" by Elder Paisios the Athonite, Part III

Light for the World: the Life of St. Gregory Palamas

Almsgiving: A Challenge to Give with the Right and Hide from the Left

Partners