Sermons & Homilies
When the future Elder, Arsenie Papacioc, was asked as a soldier in his 20s what he would do if he were a general to train soldiers, he replied, “I would teach them to die, if they didn’t fear death, they wouldn’t be so cowardly. They would fight better, and win”. “I would teach them to die”. This lesson from a soldier is pertinent for us today. It is no surprise that analogies between the spiritual life and physical combat are as old as Christianity itself. Just as courage in the face of death is necessary on the front line of war, so too, is it necessary for each one of us as we engage in spiritual warfare. And it’s this unwillingness to die that we see is the ultimate downfall of the rich man in today’s Gospel.
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Today we celebrate the Exaltation of the Precious Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ. But what does it mean to exalt the Cross? And how do we exalt it?
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My brothers and sisters, we arrive today at one of the most joyful feasts of the entire Church year. Amidst the desert of Great Lent, the Annunciation comes as a true oasis for our parched and thirsty souls. As the troparion of the feast exultantly exclaims: “Today is the fountainhead of our salvation, and the revelation of the mystery which is before the ages!”
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God is always providing a means to grant us humility. But humility cannot be acquired without humiliation. Humiliation comes about either through our interior passions and falls into sin, or from painful circumstances of body or soul, or from our brother, or by the feeling of God’s grace having withdrawn from our soul, or from all of these together, or a combination of some of them.
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Today is the Feast of the Nativity, whereon we commemorate the Incarnation of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ. So great is this feast-day that even centuries of unprecedented godlessness and apostasy have been unable to erase it...
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