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Sunday November 2, 2025 by Fr Nicholas Karipoff In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The parables of the Lord usually focus on one important issue and for that reason certain things may be intensified to make the point very clearly. This can be said about today’s parable of the rich man and Lazarus. We see a juxtaposition of extreme egotism of the rich man and the complete lack of selfishness in Lazarus. Abandoning egotism is also the topic of today’s Epistle from St Paul to the Galatians. St Paul writes, ‘I have been crucified in Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the son of God who loves me and gave Himself for me’. (Gal 2:20) By being crucified with Christ, St Paul refers to such a commitment to Christ that he no longer feels the dominance of the ego which feeds from the passions. In the parable, the Lord shows that the rich man is completely ruled by his ego and selfishness, which are fed by the excesses of his life. According to the teachings of the Fathers, these excesses are the passions, He is so self-centred, that over the years, he does not notice that there is a suffering man just outside the door of his house. He continues to live happily, but his inability to love anyone except for himself, lands him in hell. Lazarus, on the other hand, is an image of death with Christ of which we hear in Galatians today. He is like many of the Christian strugglers, the ascetics, who worked intensely at dying to the ego of the passions and rising to the beauty of our unique personhood in Christ. Let us not be put off by the extreme images of today’s parable, thinking, Well there is no way that I am as egoistic, selfish and insensitive as that rich man in the parable - no way! and Neither am I ready to live the life of a Lazarus who has no ego but then he is a complete beggar, he has nothing! Our Christian life is not a solitary pursuit; the life of the church is the life of a spiritual family. Just like in our physical family, we are fed and educated by the spiritual family. This means that we can grow towards that state that St Paul talks about: “no longer do I live, but Christ who lives in me”. It does not mean Paul has disappeared, but it means that the ego has disappeared. Surely none of us would like to share the rich man’s afterlife, yet the fact that there is hell shows that God is love, according to the words of St John Chrysostom. The rich man begins to lose his selfishness in hell, he begins to think and to care about other people. He wants to help his brothers; that is a huge step forward. Brothers and sisters, the Lord Jesus Christ has enabled us to live in the heaven of love here and in the age to come, that heaven is the life of grace. The life of the church opens more as we cooperate with our Savior who says, ‘For my yoke is easy and my burden is light’. Amen. Sunday November 9 2025 By Fr Nicholas Karipoff In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. In preparation for baptism, the priest turns to the catechumen and asks, ‘Do you renounce Satan and all his angels, and all his service, and all his pride?’ and the catechumen answers, ‘I do renounce him’. Our baptism opens the potential of total liberation from Satan. Satan is always ready and willing to torment every human being, just like the man in the country of the Gadarenes that we heard about in today’s gospel reading. We see the liberated former demoniac sitting at the feet of the Saviour, shining with the beauty of God’s image. Today’s gospel story shows these two polarities of the human life in the example of the person who was liberated from the hell of self-destruction. We hear in the Orthodox funeral service ‘I am an image of thy unspeakable glory even though I carry the wounds of transgressions’. Unless we understand the presence together of God’s beauty and the ugliness of sin in every one of us, we understand nothing about humanity and about salvation in Christ. Alas, even Christians often remain in the confines of moralism. This means that every person is viewed as either being good or bad, and our judgement of if a person is good or bad usually depends on whether we like the person! That is moralism. In today’s Epistle reading from Galatians, we hear how St Paul speaks out strongly against those who want to practise this superficial type of Christianity. He speaks of the Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ as the only true transformative force that enables us to die to the world and to come alive to God. Then Satan cannot torment us, or other people through us. We often torment other people but fail to see it. Brothers and sisters, let us focus on seeing and working against the destructive forces within us; envy, jealousy, anger, vainglory and other passions which come from our pride, and our worship of the ego. When Christ sees that we have a serious intention to work against a particular passion He comes to our aid. It is easier to see the failures and ugliness in other people than to see and acknowledge it in ourselves. The Holy Fathers teach us to remind ourselves constantly of the beauty of God that is present in every person. It might be hidden beauty, but it is indestructible. As for ourselves, let us accept the cross of Christ. We have a responsibility to participate in our liberation from these demonic destructive forces. When we renounce Satan properly, we too will sit at the feet of Christ as this man did at the end of the gospel story. We will sit in all the beauty of God’s image as His followers clothed in the robe of righteousness (baptism) in our ‘right mind’, not a chaotic and aggressive, passion-filled mind. Sunday November 16, 2025 by Fr Nicholas Karipoff In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The parables of the Lord usually focus on one important issue and for that reason certain things may be intensified to make the point very clearly. This can be said about today’s parable of the rich man and Lazarus. We see a juxtaposition of extreme egotism of the rich man and the complete lack of selfishness in Lazarus. Abandoning egotism is also the topic of today’s Epistle from St Paul to the Galatians. St Paul writes, ‘I have been crucified in Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the son of God who loves me and gave Himself for me’. (Gal 2:20) By being crucified with Christ, St Paul refers to such a commitment to Christ that he no longer feels the dominance of the ego which feeds from the passions. In the parable, the Lord shows that the rich man is completely ruled by his ego and selfishness, which are fed by the excesses of his life. According to the teachings of the Fathers, these excesses are the passions, He is so self-centred, that over the years, he does not notice that there is a suffering man just outside the door of his house. He continues to live happily, but his inability to love anyone except for himself, lands him in hell. Lazarus, on the other hand, is an image of death with Christ of which we hear in Galatians today. He is like many of the Christian strugglers, the ascetics, who worked intensely at dying to the ego of the passions and rising to the beauty of our unique personhood in Christ. Let us not be put off by the extreme images of today’s parable, thinking, Well there is no way that I am as egoistic, selfish and insensitive as that rich man in the parable - no way! and Neither am I ready to live the life of a Lazarus who has no ego but then he is a complete beggar, he has nothing! Our Christian life is not a solitary pursuit; the life of the church is the life of a spiritual family. Just like in our physical family, we are fed and educated by the spiritual family. This means that we can grow towards that state that St Paul talks about: “no longer do I live, but Christ who lives in me”. It does not mean Paul has disappeared, but it means that the ego has disappeared. Surely none of us would like to share the rich man’s afterlife, yet the fact that there is hell shows that God is love, according to the words of St John Chrysostom. The rich man begins to lose his selfishness in hell, he begins to think and to care about other people. He wants to help his brothers; that is a huge step forward. Brothers and sisters, the Lord Jesus Christ has enabled us to live in the heaven of love here and in the age to come, that heaven is the life of grace. The life of the church opens more as we cooperate with our Savior who says, ‘For my yoke is easy and my burden is light’. Amen. Sunday November 23 2025 by Fr Nicholas Karipoff In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Lord teaches that the greatest commandment is the one that tells us to love God and to love our neighbour as ourselves. This is what he tells the lawyer in today’s gospel reading (Luke: 10:25 – 37)). But the lawyer then asks the question, “And who is my neighbour?” To answer that question, the Lord gives the moving parable of the good Samaritan. This parable teaches us that those who think that they are keeping the law of God are, in reality, insensitive to their neighbour. The beaten-up man, lying there, cannot give anything to the first two people that passed. They illustrate those who feel that they are the centre of the universe and are incapable of feeling the pain of anyone else who is not in a close orbit of that centre. That sort of person asks the question: What’s in it for me?’ Why is it that the Good Samaritan notices his suffering neighbour? He is humble. Compassion is possible only if our pride shrinks to the level where we begin to understand that we are not the centre of the universe. This is easy to understand with the head, but not with the heart. The parable speaks in the broadest possible sense about loving our neighbour but today I would like to focus on one aspect only of that love: patience with our neighbour, and the ability to restrain our irritability and anger. To illustrate this, I would like to read an excerpt from Abba Dorotheus of Gaza in his Maxims on the Spiritual Life, Chapter 22 (English Translation): ‘It is impossible for a man to be angry with anyone unless his heart is first lifted up against him, unless he despises him and esteems himself superior to him’. Our immediate reaction to hearing such words might be, I do not feel that I am superior to that person, but I still cannot cope with this rising emotion of irritability and anger, I cannot cope with it. In all truth, such a reaction means, I am still only understanding only intellectually, that I am not the centre of the universe but not existentially with all my heart, not with all my soul. The beginning, the first step, in our fight against irritability and anger is to keep our feelings to ourselves, or at least not to let this poison out. We have an inner brake, which of course, has to be worked on and kept in proper shape with a lot of help from Christ. Then it becomes a power assisted brake! Most of you are too young to know about cars that did not have power assisted brakes – there is a big difference! The Holy Fathers put it this way: Love is the bridle of irritability. A bridle is what you put in a horse’s mouth when you rein the horse in. Again, St Dorotheus says that if anyone offends you or saddens you, pray for them, as ones who have given you great benefit. Through this your irritability will begin to diminish. Through the prayers of the Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Sunday November 30 2025 by Fr Nicholas Karipoff In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Lord said this parable of the rich man’s plentiful harvest (Luke 12:16 – 21) in response to a jarring, intrusive and dissonant request. This came from a man who wanted to get the Lord to influence his brother to share the inheritance of property. In response to this, the Lord offered this short parable and warned, “Take heed and beware of covetousness for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses”. In other words, life is not about material things. The great Saint Paul today explains what true life, the life of Christ’s kingdom, is about.(Eph 4:1-6): “I, therefore the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling of which you are called, with all lowliness (humility) and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling: one Lord, one faith, one baptism…” The unity of the spirit in the bond of peace is possible only if we have the direction that Christ indicates further in His speech (the Sermon on the Mount): ”Seek ye the kingdom of heaven and all of these things will be added to you”. The message is simple; there is a hierarchy of values. Eternal, spiritual riches should come first, then the rest of our life should be accepted as a gift from God, not as our right of possession. We come to church to thank God, but even more than that, we come to learn to change our attitude to life and the world around us. The rich man is enslaved by his passion for possessions. He thinks that he possesses his riches but of course, they possess him. When human beings worship any idol, but especially mammon, the idol of wealth, they cannot enter into the life of unity of grace and love which Christ gives. The fathers explain that the idol of wealth is especially pernicious because greed firstly disunites us from each other and secondly, it enables the person to to exercise their sinful will through the passions as they seek to pamper the passions much more. What is even more tragic is that you do not have to be a wealthy person to worship the idol of earthly possession, you can be a poor person and still be worshipping that idol. It is all about the focus and hierarchy of values. Even a materialistic person understands that there are things in our life that are more valuable than possessions, such as our physical health, the happiness of our children, harmony in marriage and family. Christ teaches us that life with Him enables us to endure the challenges to our peace, whatever they are. And as the holy martyrs, and all the saints, have shown, even death does not cancel life when we live our life with Christ. But if we fail to live this life then, as Christ shows in the parable, death cancels everything. Comments are closed.
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