Sermons & Homilies
Today is the Second Sunday of Pascha on which we commemorate the myrrh-bearing women as well as Sts. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. In looking at their lives, we do not see them comparable to the Apostles who lived with Jesus for three years, witnessed His miracles, and listened to His teaching. Nor is their life similar to the Apostle Paul who would come later and would be taught by the Lord through Divine visions. Instead, the myrrh-bearers were women, second-class citizens who are denied the benefits of social, political, and economic equality. Joseph and Nicodemus were both secret disciples of Christ and had never previously publicly revealed their commitment to Him or their willingness to sacrifice their reputations or their life for Him.
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We have now reached the end of the most eventful week of the Forty Day Fast, as we celebrate the life of our venerable Mother, Mary of Egypt.
The details of this life are well-known to any faithful Orthodox Christian. They are not very complicated: the chief of sinners becomes the greatest of saints. This story has repeated itself many times throughout the life of the Church. But St. Mary’s life is without doubt one of the clearest and most striking examples, rivalling even the wonderful and unlooked for conversion of the Apostle Paul. As with the great Apostle, so with St. Mary, we see our Lord Jesus Christ show[ing] forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting (1 Tim. 1:16).
The Holy Apostle Paul says, “Brethren, I strove to know nothing among you, except for Jesus Christ, and Him crucified! Why is this, St. Paul? Why is it that you preach everywhere the Crucifixion of Christ? Jesus Christ, and Him crucified—is this not the answer to every perplexity, every question, every existential pondering, and every yearning of the human mind and heart?
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Lent is a small classroom of Orthodoxy within a larger university of Orthodoxy. It is the recalling to Paradise of those who fell away; it is the pronouncement of the resurrection of those dead in sin to life in Christ; it reveals the truth to those deceived by the devil; and it announces sight to the blind, guidance to the lost, a haven for the storm-tossed, and life in a world which kills.
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Today, we hear of the dread Last Judgment of God, when the righteous shall be separated from the wicked, and the everlasting kingdom of God shall be made fully manifest, while the places of eternal torment will receive their unfortunate inhabitants.
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