In this sermon, Father Nicholas discusses how for the Christian, spiritual freedom is liberation from our passions. The Church – the Kingdom of Christ that is freedom. How? Christ offers the rich young man the option of selling everything he has and giving the proceeds to the poor. The young man baulks at this because of his enslavement to his material wealth. There are many rich people in both the Old and New Testament, however none of them were told to do this by God because they were not enslaved. In contemporary society, freedom is “when I can do what I want to do” and of course, money is helpful to achieve these ends. The Kingdom of heaven belongs to people with the heart of a child. Adults are fraught with passions… pride, alienation, selfishness. Other passions develop to protect our carnal self – our so-called ‘freedom’ to do what we want – acquisitiveness, sensuality, love of money, vainglory. Christ offers us the option to walk away from these. Freedom FOR passions vs. freedom FROM passions In this sermon, Father Nicholas Karipoff talks about how hard it is, but very necessary, to forgive and love our enemies and to follow Christ’s example as He was being nailed to the Cross when He said “Father, forgive them for they know now what they do”. If we cannot do this, how can we call ourselves Christian? This call to repentance is how Christ began His ministry, echoing the words of the Forerunner St John the Baptist “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand”, and He ended it on earth with words about forgiveness. Why else would our Lord say in the model prayer “forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” if this wasn’t so important to God? God, in His bountiful mercy, sends blessings to those who can pray for their enemies with their whole heart, and only He can transform our hearts so that we are more like Him. “There is nothing more pleasing to God than prayer for our enemies and forgiveness...praying for the person who hurt you with all your heart, and then you’ll see how God reacts”.
Just as Christ fed a multitude with bread and fish, so at every Eucharist we experience a miracle with the undiminished lamb. Do we have a spiritual hunger like the people of the gospel who listened to Christ, day and night? The body without the soul, says Father Nicholas, is called a corpse. And while we might able to live without God in our soul, it is not a real life at all. The Holy Fathers wrote that the image of God within us, is an indestructible blueprint. We can truly develop into this likeness if we seek God. Our passions are like the strings of a puppet. With them we are no longer able to do what we want to do, we are controlled instead by demons. In this sermon, Father Nicholas laments that when people do not actively attend services, particularly vigils, they miss out on reading, hearing or understanding what is said about God at church. Liturgical theology is imbued with beauty and insight. Theology can be one of two things – learning about God or actually getting to know God by communicating with Him. "The theologian is the one who prays," he says. In the process of learning about Him, our hearts are filled with love - His indescribable beauty and love fill us? Listen below for more. On the feast day of one of Russia's greatest icons, the Kazan icon of the Mother of God, Father Nicholas discusses the difference of those who call upon the name of the Lord and those who only talk about it. "Just talking about it is religion at the level of ideology," he says. On the feast day of Saints Cosmas and Damian – two brothers and healers who were famous across the Roman Empire and who ultimately were stoned to death – Father Nicholas discusses the miracles of Christ which were mostly healings. The Orthodox teaching is that sin is separation from God, a condition which causes spiritual and physical illness and ultimately leads to death. The entire life of the Church is filled with things that heal – the sacraments such as unction, confession and communion, prayers. Troparion — Tone 8Blessed art You O Christ Our God / You have revealed the fishermen as most wise / By sending down upon them the Holy Spirit / Through them You drew the world into Your net / O Lover of Man, Glory to You! Тропарь В Неделю Пятидесятницы (День Святой Троицы)Благословен еси, Христе Боже наш, / Иже премудры ловцы явлей, / низпослав им Духа Святаго, / и теми уловлей вселенную, / Человеколюбче, слава Тебе. After the gospel reading where Christ heals the blind man, Father Nicholas Karipoff discusses the miracle. The glory of God, he reasons, is not only in the miracle that occurred and was witnessed. The greater miracle is the human being who is filled with the glory of God. Such a person is fearless, not faint-hearted. |