“The Self-knowledge of the Publican”

A homily by Fr. Athanasios Mitilinaios

Sunday of The Publican and the Pharisee (Luke 18:10-14)

Before our eyes, once again, my beloved, is the precious parable of the Publican and the Pharisee. With this parable the Lord wishes to teach many lessons. He speaks to us about humility and pride, about “spiritual ethics”, if you will, sufficiency and insuffiency, about what makes a prayer good or bad, about the appearance of two types of people who go before the Lord, about the self-confidence of the one and the self-knowledge of the other. All this was spoken from the authentic mouth of our Lord Jesus Christ, so every point of the Lord’s teaching is an authentic answer.

The twist of the parable is known. Two men went up into the holy place, that is into the temple, in order to pray. One was a Pharisee, from the known order of the Pharisees, and the other a tax-collector, from among those who collected for the Romans, by way of auctions, in order to get the tribute.

The Pharisee, weighed down with self-confidence from his status, knowledge of the law and good deeds, stands and says his prayer to God with a great amount of self-confidence and arrogance. The tax-collector is also weighed down, however with crimes and various sins, and stands at one end to also say his prayer. His guilt, however, does not permit him to raise his head. The Evangelist Luke points out that He did not even wish to lift his eyes to heaven. He beats his breast constantly, is cut to the heart, grieving in his heart over the multitude of his many sins, and says continuously: “O God, be merciful to me, the sinner.”

We see, my beloved, in the behavior of the tax-collector a conspicuous self-knowledge, for he observed his condition and, as a result, asked mercy from the Lord. He was looking at himself. This is precisely what self-knowledge means: To be able to see yourself.

The Pharisee was not looking at himself, because his arrogance and his self-confidence were in the way, and thus, he was not able to see how he truly was. He thought that only the heavy hitting sins are those which defile a man. This is what the Pharisee believed. He was the type who says (and to this day, there is still the type who say): “I haven’t stolen anything. I haven’t killed anyone. I’m ok.” Whereas the tax-collector, he was looking at his true self.

We ask: What is self-knowledge? Self-knowledge is to be able to see the true condition of yourself. To have knowledge of yourself. Self-knowledge doesn’t deceive you like a delusion or arrogance or self-confidence, because at every moment this self-knowledge shows you the measure of your ability and the depth of your sinfulness. It asks you: Who are you? Self-knowledge, then, is the true knowledge of ourselves. It is the knowledge of the Ancient Greeks: “Know thyself.”

This knowledge of self is dynamic – not static – because at every moment I must know myself. Then, if I know myself, I will not think highly of myself. Instead, I will have in front of me the true, precise knowledge of myself, and this, of course, is humility automatically. I will have made, says St. Basil the Great, a return to my intrinsic worth, a return to my actual worth, that which I truly am.

Self knowledge is always bound with humility. It is not possible to have humility before, automatically. We have humility from a good objective: self-knowledge. Thus, when I have humility, I will also certainly have, inseparably, the help and grace of God, because “God gives His grace to the humble” (Jas 4:6). He gives His grace.

St. Peter Damascene says,

There is nothing better than to know one’s own sickness [weakness] and ignorance, nor anything worse than not recognizing them.1

Moreover, Blessed Nikitas Stithatos emphasizes,

Know yourself; this is indeed humility, the humility that teaches us to be inwardly humble and makes us contrite.2

The work which we have to complete on the earth is the spiritual work. God gave the first-formed couple three commands: the command of fasting (only from one tree, but to test them); the command of cultivating Paradise; and of preserving the hedge of Paradise (Gen. 2:15-17). But Paradise is within us, the kingdom of God is within us (Lk. 17:21). Adam, therefore, had to work and maintain the inner Paradise. Blessed Nikitas says that this is our task, to cultivate and to guard it:

You must cultivate and guard this humility, for if you do not yet know yourself, you cannot know what humility is and you have not yet embarked truly on the task of cultivating and guarding.”3

My beloved, of course we cultivate the earth, we do our biological work, but our primary work is this, the spiritual work. Why is spiritual work also called work? How is it possible to make myself better? Blessed Nikitas continues,

To know oneself is the goal of practicing the virtues.4

And Saint John of the Ladder tells us,

The one who knows himself never sets out to do something beyond himself.5

The one who has knowledge of himself, who knows who he is, also knows his abilities and his limitations. At no time will he be tricked into taking something up which is greater than his abilities. This one, my beloved, has strength in all things, in his spiritual condition, his profession, in anything whatsoever.

You cannot take up something if you do not have self-knowledge, since you may lack this or that. How will you take it up? The Lord tells us two parables about this: The parable of a king preparing to go to war (Lk. 14:31-33) and the parable about building a tower (Lk. 14:28-30).

Someone, it says, begins to build a tower that is very tall (and this is not about our spiritual building), but he does not sit down to figure out the cost, and once it reaches a certain height, the construction is abandoned. Then the passers-by mock, saying, “This man could not complete his construction.”

Is this not someone who is beginning the spiritual life? At some point, he sees that he cannot afford the roof, that is, to cover the spiritual restoration work and he stops the construction altogether. Do you know that we inhabit our buildings which have not been completed? I will put it in simple language: The crows nest there, that is, the passions of the soul return, and they encircle us in the world. Why? Because we do not estimate our abilities.

Did you begin? How will you figure out the cost? Did you start to be Christian? It is straightforward, but be careful. Have you considered whether you will endure the mockeries and persecutions, as we heard in today’s Epistle reading? It says, “Whoever wishes to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim. 3:12). Are you prepared? Are you perhaps someone who does not withstand temptations? Do you compromise with the world? Are you strong? If you have self-knowledge and humility you will know these things.

And how will we maintain true self-knowledge so that we are not tricked into thinking that we know ourselves when we do not? With a constant increase in humility; by becoming as humble as we can be so that our eyes open better; by taking a sincere look at ourselves, straight in the eyes.

If two men, who have no association with each other at all and who do not know each other, both tell me that I have the same shortcoming, then I register the thought, because if only one tells me, it is possible for me to dismiss it, but if both tell me, then I surely begin to ponder and say, “This is how it is”, even though I do not see it. I will begin to see it, and then I will discover it.

Moreover, at every moment, look within and examine yourself. Why? Because as I said, self-knowledge is dynamic. Must I examine how things are going with myself at every moment? The one who does so does well. Isn’t it good to ask forgiveness from God?

Saint Basil the Great suggests a certain technique, a method, that helps greatly in preventing repeated mistakes: When the day is over, make an examination of our past misdeeds, a cross-examination our consciences. How did we sin? How did I do today? How did things go? Did they go well? Did they not go well? 6

In our evening prayers, the Psalmist says, as he lays in bed (and we also in our own prayer): O Lord, today I struck You; I did this, this and this. Please forgive. And if it is something considerable, we make a note of it during our prayer to confess it. Are we doing well? We say “Glory be to God.” Are we not doing well? “Forgive us, O Lord.” Do this every evening. Then we can recognize ourselves at every hour and understand where we are.

The fruit of self-knowledge, my beloved, is the entire posture and movement of the tax-collector in his prayer. Did you see him? Did you observe? Did you also see the other? “Standing”, it says. He wore himself out offering prayers and said, “God, thank you.”7 Certainly, it is very important to say thank you to God and we must give thanks at every moment: “Glory be to God”, “Thank You, O Lord”; and every evening, “Thank you, O Lord”, but to say the thank you with arrogance, “that I am not like the others, the sinners”, this is something very terrible. He sees the tax-collector in the back. What was he doing there? Not only was he showing humility of soul, but also humility of body. How? With tears, with bows, with groans, with the downward inclination of his head. “He did not dare”, it says, “lift his eyes to heaven.” He looked to the ground.

Most significantly, the tax-collector in the parable grieved in his heart, and also had a prayer in his mouth and in his heart: “God, be merciful to me, the sinner.” That is, O Lord, be merciful, sympathetic, compassionate. Forgive me, the sinner. It means: If you exercise Your justice, O Lord, who can stand before You? The Psalmist says: Who is able to stand before God if God exercises His justice? No one. (Ps. 142:2)

Moreover, the fruit of self knowledge is that which we encounter frequently in the sayings of the Desert Fathers: “All will be saved but me.”

Moreover, it is that which St. Paul said: “I am the greatest of sinners” (1 Tim 1:16). As more time passed he descended the stairs. He says in his epistles, “I am the least of the Apostles” (1 Cor 15:9). Then later, as he had matured more, he writes, “I am the least of men” (Eph. 3:8). Finally, toward the end of his life he writes, “I am the greatest of sinners” (1 Tim. 1:15).

It is that which Saint Silouan the Athonite said: “Keep your mind in hell and despair not.” 8

Beloved, our Lord painted a colorful picture in the parable of the tax-collector and the Pharisee, in order to teach us self-knowledge and humility. We conclude with the same line of the parable: “All those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

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ΚΑΙ ΤΩ ΘΕΩ ΔΟΞΑ

1. Philokalia, Vol. 3, St. Peter Damascene, Book 1, Treasury of Divine Knowledge, “That We Should Not Despair Even If We Sin Many Times”.
2. Philokalia, Vol. 4. On the Inner Nature of Things and on the Purification of the Intellect: One Hundred Texts, #35
3. ibid.
4. ibid.
5. see The Ladder of Divine Ascent, Classics of Western Christianity Series
6. Quote amended. See also Saint Basil and his rule, E.F. Morison, B.D., Oxford, London, 1912. pp. 64-65.
7. This note is the author’s, which we made a footnote: “(God is used as the vocative case, O God; very many times we find the nominative case used as the vocative)”
8. See St. Silouan the Athonite, [St.] Elder Sophrony, tr. Rosemary Edmonds.

“TODAY’S YOUTH AND ASPIRATIONS” – a homily by Fr. Athanasios Mitilinaios

Thirteenth Sunday of Luke (Luke 18:18-27), Homily Β308

The account of the rich young man, my beloved, who approached the Lord seeking what he must do to gain eternal life, is truly very moving for us. Although the question, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” is an enormous topic, it seems that the Lord’s reply is very mundane. What did He tell him? “Keep the commandments.” Very simple. “Keep the commandments.” Perhaps the young man thought there was some great, extraordinary, unknown law, and for this reason asked: “Which ones?” (Mat 19:18) And the Lord listed for him the laws from the decalogue which were very familiar to everyone.

It is the same today, my beloved, they dismiss the Ten Commandments because they are very familiar. It is a peculiarity of man to disdain something he already knows. Always. Is it something said in a homily? the commandments? the Divine Liturgy? They feel a need to set aside what they learned, disdain it. Why? “Eh, we know these things; we’ve heard them a thousand times.” This is because the person does not always see the same thing as if it were the first time! This is an enormous subject.

This is not only the case with spiritual things, but also with our nature. We like to go all around, to the mountains, to the forest, to the sea, always. We also want to see new people. How many times do we get bored being with the same person every day, whether our spouse, children or friends. They get boring. We are always interested in something new.

“Eh, we know these things.” We do not see with new eyes. We should sense that we are seeing something for the first time. Where is this ability found? Within us. Only within us. It is the same with the Ten Commandments. “Eh, I know them.” What did the young man say? “I have kept them from my youth.” Yes, he kept the commandments from the time he was a small child. However, had he truly been keeping the commandments all his life, there would have been no need for him to ask the Lord which commandments to keep, because he would have known that the commandments are the road, the way, the conduct whereby we reach eternal life.

Boredom of the commandments is the mistake of this young man, his failure. “The commandments?” “Yes, my good young man, there are things which never get old – the commandments of Christ. They are timeless. They are always the same, yet always new.” It is the same with the New Testament, reading about the person of Jesus Christ. “Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever” (Heb 13:8), the Apostle Paul says. The Ten Commandments must be lived, not just known.

Yet there is also something that surpasses the commandments, and this is what the young man was after. The Lord told him: “One thing you lack.” “What is it, Sir?” “Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come follow Me.” Where does the emphasis fall in this sentence? Not on the wealth, not on “distribute to the poor”. Where, then, does the emphasis fall? on “come follow Me”. The estate of the rich young man was, quite simply, an obstacle, therefore it was necessary for him to leave the heart of it, in order to follow Christ

What is this “come follow Me”? It is a dedication; something that goes beyond keeping the commandments. It is no longer “what will I keep”, but “who must I become.” I repeat. It is no longer “what will I keep.” If the commandments are kept, they are not kept for the sake of keeping them, as many as they may be, but for “Who have I become? How have I been formed by them? How have I been built up?” The young man, however, stopped at “what should I keep”. He could not get beyond himself and his money. The Lord told him to sell whatever he had for no other reason than to free him from the “what do I have to do” mentality and to advance to “who do I have to be”.

In any case, more than whether the rich young man misses the mark or not, what is of interest in this young man is his search for an aspiration. This is very significant. It is about eternal life. “What must I do to attain eternal life?” In the Evangelist Mark’s account of this dialogue, he informs us that the Lord showed the young man sympathy, “and Jesus looked at Him with love.” (Mk 10:21) Who did He have sympathy for? The one who had an aspiration, and certainly the greatest of aspirations, eternal life.

What are aspirations? They are worthy desires. They are what draw a man toward the higher things. They remove him from what is mundane in life and show him “the good life”, in the spiritual sense of the term. (When we say “the good life” it usually means one eats and drinks well, but the spiritual meaning is to become a very spiritual man, a very lofty man.) Aspirations are those worthwhile things innate in us all; they are according to our nature. To say, “our nature” means “I am a human being, whether I want to be or not; I cannot be something other than my nature.” The worthy desires, the aspirations, then, are things in accordance with our nature that are transferred, passed on, in order to reach the point of resembling God. Aspirations, worthy desires, make a person be that which he must become. It is what Pindar said: “Become who you are.” (Pythian 2, line 72) Be what you are by nature. In other words, become a person.

The aspirations, the worthy desires, are many: religion, country, family, education, relationships, virtues, work; all these things are worthy desires. The Apostle Paul writes something marvelous to the Philippians. He shows us these worthy desires and lists them: “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is holy, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasant, whatever is of good repute, if there is any virtue, if there is anything worthy of praise, consider these things and do the same.” (4:8-9) In the same epistle he writes: “Our citizenship is in heaven.” (3:20) What does this mean? It means that the highest of aspirations is heaven, the highest of aspirations is the Kingdom of God, eternal life.

All of these worthy desires are attained either from revelation (whatever the word of God reveals to us) or from the natural innate ability. As human beings, we were made in the image of God, we have reason and we think; therefore we can be a perfect container for worthy desires and aspirations. What did the Ancient Greeks philosophize about? What did Pindar say? “Become who you are.” This is not from revelation, but from an innate ability.

We pose the question: Do young people today, like the young man we heard about in today’s gospel passage, have aspirations? What aspirations do they have? It well known that our times are characterized by cultural or spiritual decline. We are declining continually, and the result is a severely scarred society, decayed humanism. The scars are deep.

Other than the exceptions, of course, our youth today do not have aspirations. To be precise, their aspirations are faults, not worthy desires. They show their approval for things which, in other eras, people would feel shame. It is this which the Apostle Paul writes about to the Philippians: “whose God is their belly, who praise what they should be ashamed of, who think of earthly things.” (Phil 3:19) These are the aspirations of our youth today.

Furthermore, Saint Paul writes about the ancient world and its spirit, which our Christians today have surpassed. In his epistle to the Romans, he writes: “They have become vain in their thinking, their senseless heart has been darkened; claiming to be wise, they became fools. (Rom 1:21) Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts, to the uncleanness of dishonoring their bodies between them” (Rom 1:24) (he is speaking about homosexuality here). “So you want to be left to yourselves, wherever you end up.” “Just as they did not want to think about God, God gave them up to an unprincipled mind… (oh, this unprincipled mind, beloved, an unprincipled mind; an unprincipled, childish mind), …doing not what it should, but filling up with every unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, greed, evil, envy, murder, quarreling, deceits, bad morals, gossip, backbiting, hatred of God, wantonness, pride, arrogance; they are inventors of evils, disobedient to parents, senseless, unfaithful, cold-hearted, stiff-necked, merciless.” (Rom 1: 28-31)

The list is long. These are faults. Our youth people remain in these faults. Why? To honor their parents? “Honor your father and your mother” (Ex 20:12) is the Fifth Commandment, which we heard from the Lord today. Whose parents are honored today?

The aspirations of our young people today are always faults, a systematic, organized laziness, carelessness. Carelessness, laziness, is the sin of the second half of the twentieth-century. We see irresponsibility, unmerciful laziness, everywhere.

Go take look around the square at 10 in the morning in our city of Larisa. Whether it is winter or summer, young men and women go there to do what? They go there to sit… and sit… and sit. Don’t tell me, “they sit there because they are unemployed.” Don’t tell me this. They go there to sit. They sit longer than frogs. It appears that they exert the least possible amount of effort; whenever possible, they do less. At the same time they look for money. From where? From their parents, of course. They are thieves. Today this thievery happens on a grand scale. Why? In order to waste it on all kinds of pleasures: the cigarettes, the drugs, the hard liquor. They spend endless, wasted hours at the restaurants, the nightclubs, in front of the TV, at the dances and concerts, where they have demonic content; and they also have a demonic look: bedraggled, moronic, absent minded, with the boys deliberately tearing their jeans. Only serious boys and girls do not adopt this lifestyle, the earrings, the rings, the long hair, and intentional idleness – not unemployed – idleness, willful laziness. They don’t want to work. All of our young people today desire to acquire faults, to fill their souls with them. It is pitiful, very pitiful.

But how did our youths end up with these faults? How did this happen? There are many ways: The two world wars in our century, the confusion and realignment of foreign relations, the development of extreme individualism, are how we arrived at the borders of anarchy, like we know this anarchy and live in it today. God, religion, family and country are viewed as worthless; and “where God is removed, then everything is allowed” says Dostoyevsky. It is true. If God is out of the picture, then I am allowed to do anything.

So we find ourselves in a climate of deep decline where the young people do not have aspirations anymore. Instead, they pursue faults. The family cannot help, because it too is, unfortunately, mixed up with rotten ideas (there are exceptions of course). Even good children from Christian families find themselves in this widespread bad climate which affects everyone, and they become corrupted also. The child will go down the street, into society; he will go to school and he will be suffer great harm.

Can we do anything about this? One time, beloved, the Lord said about a demon-possessed child: “This kind of demon cannot be driven out except by prayer and fasting.” (Mt 17:21, Mk 9:29) “Lord,” the disciples said, “why couldn’t we heal the child?” “This kind of demon cannot be driven out except by prayer and fasting.” What does this mean? It means that people in our days are prey for the devil. Therefore, those who understand, those who are pained, those who still maintain within them their spiritual health, let them fast and pray, not neglecting Wednesdays and Fridays and the Lenten Fast. We also pray to the Lord to cast out the demons which are ravaging mankind, particularly our youth.

Furthermore, the Lord needs witnesses in everywhere, to speak to the young people, to wisen them, to enlighten them. The educational system we offer today is, of course, like one big paralytic (who will deny it?). The children cannot do a thing on their own. Perhaps we fear and disapprove of what they are taught. Those of you, however, who are teachers and who are listening to me, who have your spiritual health within, should present them an alternative. Tell the children, your elementary school students, your middle-school students, your high-school students, TELL THEM WHAT IS CORRECT. We will do whatever we can, nonetheless. We are beginning to see it, the value of boundaries, not to go beyond them…

Beloved, the young man of the Gospel is to be commended, of course, for seeking to attain eternal life. For certain, He did not attain it. He did not attain it because his heart was held captive by the passion of greed. Though he did have tenacity; he had tenacity. He saw things to aspire to and he desired them.

There are, of course, young people among us who have beautiful aspirations, with elevated thinking, with love for Christ. Glory be to God, they exist. We are to guard these young ones, protect them, praise them, and give them encouragement in these days which are so disappointing.

To conclude, we will do whatever we can, as each of us understands we can do, in order to save those who are left. So we will give our witness. Let them not pay attention to us at all. We will give our witness, nonetheless. There will always be people to find, there will be a remnant, there will be a people of God. There will be “the small flock”, as the Lord said. (Is 11:11) He will watch over it; they will benefit. Let God, beloved, let God be saddened over the new generation and let Him show them mercy.

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ΚΑΙ ΤΩ ΘΕΩ ΔΟΞΑ

AM I PERHAPS FOOLISH? – The parable of the Rich Fool – Fr. Athanasios Mitilinaios

Ninth Sunday of Luke (Luke 12:16-21), Homily Β387

It is a heavy thing for God to characterize you as foolish, my beloved. God praises a man when he is correct, as God wants him to be, but gives the heavy characterization when a man has left the road of doing His will. This He makes clear in the parable of the rich fool which we heard today, beloved, in our gospel passage.

In this parable, the Lord tells us that a certain man’s field had a bumper crop that year, and He indicates that this man was rich. The man was absorbed in thought. He was thinking where he would store his new crops. Do you see? Another care to think about. (You also see the poor having cares. Both the poor and the rich have cares. The one says: “How am I going to eat today?” The other says: “I have so many choices; what am I going to eat today?”) However, the rich man does not think to give away some of last year’s crop to the poor, but decides to gather together whatever he has and store it in new barns.

The characteristic of the rich man in the parable is dreadful self-love, love for himself. This is shown by his manner of speech throughout the parable, by the repetition of “my”. What does he say? “And I will gather up all my fruit and my grain, and I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have much good stored up for many years; relax, eat, drink and be merry’” (Luke 12:18). Do you see? “They are my goods. They are mine.” He did not consider how others were doing, only how I am doing, how I will live well. Not a single thought of giving to the poor, to his neighbor who might presently be in need.

The night on which he had these thoughts of greed, God appears to him in his sleep and says to him: “Fool, tonight your soul is demanded of you (By whom? The demons.); all that you have stored up, whose will they be?” The voice of God is fearful, my beloved. It is fearful also to be called “fool”. God called him “fool”… Can we truly comprehend God saying this to us? Can we comprehend what this means? What is a “fool”? He is the opposite of the prudent man. Foolishness is the opposite of prudence. He is someone without understanding, not prudent. He is foolish. [The word in Greek for foolish, άφρων (ahfron), is composed of the prefix ά- , which negates, and φρήν/φρενός “thinking”, hence “not thinking”, without prudence, foolish.]

It is known that there are four cardinal virtues for man; every other virtue arises from one of these four. (I have spoken many times about these four cardinal virtues in other homilies. It’s ok if we talk about them again, because a homily is not a flowery talk, but a lesson, a catechism; and school teachers say that repetition helps one remember something permanently.) So then, the four cardinal virtues are prudence, temperance [self-control], courage and justice. We also find these virtues mentioned in the Fourth book of Maccabees, verse 18: “There are four kinds of wisdom: prudence, justice, courage and temperance”. We must also say that these four cardinal virtues are found in the wise Ancient Greeks.

Prudence corresponds to thought, to the mind. Those who are prudent use their mind; temperance corresponds to feelings, the heart; courage corresponds to the will; and justice (also called discrimination), on the other side counterbalances the first three. When we say justice, we all think of a scale. The symbol of justice is the scale. It is these, I repeat, which are in equilibrium: prudence, temperance and courage. What does “counterbalance” mean? For one not to be very large and another very small, as with an right triangle, where one leg, prudence for example, is very long and another, courage, is very short. You may have a strong mind and understand many things, yet have no courage. So the virtue of justice counterbalances the other three other virtues, and balance is achieved. This is very very important.

And now we see how foolishness appears, which is what the passage we heard today is about. The delusion “happiness is found in abundance” is created. “I am so happy! My crops produced abundantly! and I still have so much from last year, even from two years ago. And this year, my, what a good crop!” So then, this delusion is created, a delusion, that happiness is found in abundance, “because if I do not have money, I will die miserable’. (St. John Cassian the Roman mentioned that a certain monk acquired money and stashed it under a plank on the floor of his cell, for if I do not have money, I will die miserable.) It is an expression. “I will die miserable.” Pay attention, I will make a distinction (of course I do not say it to my children): “Children, look, this money I have is for my funeral”; or, “Put this shroud (which they buy from the Holy Land), on me for my burial”. We do not mean this. Far from it. They are in no way related.

Voluntary poverty, willing poverty, remedies this. And this voluntary poverty, the Fathers say, is first on the list of virtues. How did the Lord begin the Beatitudes? “Blessed are the poor in spirit” (Mt 5:3). What does this mean? The poor in spirit are those who are poor from choosing to be poor. They want to be poor. They are not fools. They are not stupid. They are not inept for getting rid of money. Why, then, do they wish to be poor? To attain a goal. That is to say, “because I want to work for the Kingdom of God.” This is also why they do not marry. “I am not inept,,” some will say, “test me a little, to see if I am inept.”

So then, “blessed are the poor in spirit” means those who are poor by a deliberate choice, so that “God’s Kingdom will belong to them” (Mt 5:3). If you were to open the collected works of St. Isaac the Syrian, you will see that the first of 80 or 90 homilies are about voluntary poverty. Why? Because it is the starting point of acquiring all the other virtues. Not that a rich man cannot be saved, of course. However the Lord did say that “it is difficult for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God” (Mt 19:23), because they are deluded from their possessions, from their wealth.1 And then the disciples said: “Who, then, can be saved?” And the Lord said: “What is impossible for man is possible for God”. Yes, a rich man can be saved, the one who gives to the poor, the one who is charitable, whose wealth does not hinder him, whose heart is not attached to material things.

So then, the one who is greedy, the one who amasses, is proud deep down. He has arrogance, of body. The one who chooses not to fast has arrogance of body, not of spirit. Arrogance of body is to say: “I don’t fast because I want to keep my body healthy”. Whereas fasting humbles the body. That is, I humble my body by giving it ordinary food and moderate portions. Fasting, then, breaks the body’s arrogance. A man’s greediness prompted the Lord to speak the parable of the foolish rich man, in order for the greed to be made manifest. He had the dialogue beforehand, [“…speak to my brother, and tell him to divide the inheritance with me.” (v13)], and this offered the occasion for Him to relate the parable.

And He said: “Be careful; guard yourself from every kind of greed; for a man’s life does not consist of his many possessions” (Lk 12:15). It is the delusion I mentioned, that happiness is found in abundance, which motivates a man to be greedy. He is deluded. What is the right amount? The Apostle Paul tells us: “Reverence with contentment” (Heb 13:5, Phil 4:11, 1 Tim 6:8). That is, “be devout and content with what you have. Limit yourself.” The Apostle Paul says, “If we have food and shelter we have enough” (1 Tim 6:8) (shelter includes the clothes we wear and and our house, the roof over our head). We have food to eat. Glory be to God. We should not want to become one of the rich, because those who want to become rich, from all the deceptions that are required, fall into traps and desires, says the Apostle Paul (1 Tim 6:9)2; they pierce their heart [with many sorrows]. Indeed, the rich man has many cares, many more than the poor man, who is content with little and lives on a day’s wage, with almost no cares at all.

Concerning foolishness, I remind you of the saying, “he wasted the help of riches.”3 “Do other people exist?” Yes, my good man. “Are there also other people?” Do you understand what I am saying? “We have our heating, we have our food, we have our table, our clothes.” How many people are there right now in this cold weather who sleep by a river under a bridge! In Paris, the poor sleep under the bridge over the Seine. In London, the poor sleep under the bridge over the Thames. The poor sleep in half-completed buildings and are hungry. Is this not known to everyone? But concerning the poor we will say, “No one can get through to them, they are mentally ill, they don’t understand anything.” And prudence, this marvelous product of the mind, is completely absent, because we are foolish. So they cannot develop charity and a social conscience.

Moreover, in their foolishness the perception is born that “Everyone will die but me”. Mr so-and-so died. “Eh, he died. I didn’t die.” In this way the delusion is created, that “I am the only one who will not die”. Such a man, the fool, puts death out of mind; for him death doesn’t exist. The rich man in the parable did not figure that he might die one day. “Soul,” he said, “you have goods stored up for many years. Your life is in front of you.” And then the surprise came, “this very night your soul is required of you”. Frightening! The emphasis falls on “this very night”, that is, tonight you will die! It happens to all of us, my beloved, we think we will not die. Pay attention to this if you will… there is, of course, a hidden explanation here: God made man to live eternally, and this is the reason he believes he will not die. So we have here a case of I will not die so I can enjoy all of my goods. The mind says: “You will die. This is logical. Everyone dies.” The heart says: “No, you will not die.”

There is yet another delusion. In their foolishness, they cultivate the destructive perspective that there is no life after death. They say: “Who died and came back to tell us there is life after death?” This perception is clearly the suicide of our existence. There is nothing after? You say nothing exists. Is this not suicide? That is, don’t you think you will end up in eternal punishment and in eternal hell? And yet there are many who wish to think: “There is no other life. Life is food and drink. There is nothing after this life”. This is utter materialism. (On the pedestal, my beloved, of the statue of Sennacherib, the last of the Assyrian kings, is inscribed the same law: “Life is to be passed with whatever food, whatever drink, whatever pleasure”, pleasure meaning erotic pleasure of the body. And it seems that Sennacherib was a very much homosexual. A king… and yet he was wearing women’s clothing in front of the people… A dreadful condition!) We hear this erroneous idea: “It is known that there is no other life”, repeated over and over by the press and by the mass media. “What is there beyond? Nothing. Where will we go? Will we go to the stars? We will go to the stars, I know this. After that, what will we do? Nothing.”

The parable continues with the voice of God saying to the foolish rich man: “That which you stored up, whose will it be?” Hmm, indeed, the heir will arrive and say the old expression: “A problem, death is a unexpected problem” [literally, “bean by bean, then death comes”]. That is, a man saves “bean by bean” in order to become wealthy. “A problem, death is a problem… bean soup for the heir!” The heir takes the entire inheritance and eats it up! Indeed, you gather it up, O man, you gather it, but for whom? For your children? For your nephew or niece? For them to consume it all. You gather bean by bean and they will make bean soup, and eat it all at once. How foolish indeed the man is!

But when he feeds on the food of foolishness, of senselessness, then the monster is born, which is called atheism4. The Psalmist speaks about such a fool in Psalm 13: “The foolish man says in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (13:1). Who says God does not exist? The foolish man. The man with no sense. Yes. The wasting of the mind gives birth to atheism; because nature, which we all perceive, is like an open book, from which we learn Whose Creation it is. And you say, “God does not exist”? You say everything happened by chance? By chance? By chance? Is there any chance of this? And you say everything began by itself? By itself? A spontaneous beginning? That everything began by itself? You are foolish! Someone will say, “But I am a knowledgeable scientist.” You are foolish! You are a senseless man. The absence of prudence, then, leads also to atheism.

The atheist is senseless in every way to those around him. The atheist does not have “a sane mind”. I put “sane mind” in quotation marks, because they are not crazy for the nuthouse, but they are crazy nevertheless. Foolish. Senseless. Because atheism is irrational. Saint Basil the Great says: “God called him ‘fool’ because he was godless.”

The usefulness of the parable and its value – Fr. Athanasios Mitilinaios

Fourth Sunday of Luke and of the Fathers of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, Homily Β384

The Parable of the Sower (Luke 8: 5-15)

Today, my beloved, we heard the Parable of the Sower, which The Lord told in order to show to His listeners that not all were equally disposed toward His teachings. Through this parable, He shows that there were four categories of listeners.

There are those whose hearts were completely hardened towards the word of God; those whose hearts were shallow (about whom He says, “the seed fell upon the rock, and because it did not have moisture, it sprouted, but withered”); those on whom the seed fell on thorns (that is, those who, because of the cares of life, did not bother to develop the spiritual life.); but there is also “good soil”, the good heart, “on which,” He says, “the seed fell and produced a hundredfold.”

The Lord sees that a large crowd is gathering. Luke says: “And when a large crowd had gathered, having gone out from the city to Him, He spoke using a parable” (8:4). People, many people, a stream of people! But why did the Lord speak with a parable?

What is a Parable

It was the Lord’s custom to discourse using a parable. The parable is a short fictional story, however it contains believable events, which have different and varied goals. Take Aesop’s fables. One of them says that a crow was holding a bit of cheese in its beak, and the fox down below said to it, “O what a charming creature is the bird that sings…” This is not something believable, because foxes do not speak and neither do crows. Therefore they are fables, parables without real events. Although all the parables of Christ, as a rule, are fictional, they are believable stories. They have the force of reality.

The parable consists of a hidden divine contemplation which clarifies one’s thinking. Pay attention to this. Mark says: He did not speak to them without a parable (Mk. 4:34). The Lord conveyed a thought when He said: “Be on guard against every kind of greed” (Lk. 12:15), but He made clear, by way of a parable, the danger which exists there, greed, by relating the parable of the foolish rich man (Lk. 12:16-20).

In order to put the event of salvation into proportion, how many men are sinful and how many are acceptable before God, He related three parables: The parable of the lost drachma (Lk. 15:8-10), of the missing sheep (Lk. 15:4-7) and of the prodigal son (Lk 15:11-32). You see, the Lord makes a statement regarding behavior or faith and follows it up with a parable. Why? In order to make clear what He said.

The parable expresses the wealth of a thought which you can view from all angles. This is the advantage a parable has. Although you cannot say anything more within the constraints of the parable, you can, nevertheless, say very many things about it and draw many conclusions about reality when a parable is told. We will say, “The parable also means this, it also means that, and this too.”

The parable, moreover, my beloved, is a well-knit teaching, a single teaching with few words. With a single image, the entire teaching is encapsulated. There is a saying going around in our days, “a picture says a thousand words.” Take a picture of an event and publish it, a picture of some event that you cannot say a thousand words about, and it can be made into a lead story. It is the same with the parable. The parable is an image which contains it all, a way to see something all at once. (That fable which you say is something different, it is nonsensical.)

The parable, moreover, is a memorable teaching because it is dressed up with imagery, and when a teaching is dressed up with imagery, with some presentation, a man remembers it much better.

It is at the same time both a parable and a mine from which one can, in the future, however much he may change, broaden his knowledge from what is contained within it; from which he can draw out more and more, an inexhaustible amount of conclusions. Whatever may happen to a man, he can always turn to the parable to discover what it conceals and say, “Look, the parable means this.”

With the parable, what is inexpressible is expressed. A parable, then, is this: an image of a divine reality clothed in earthly garments. When the Lord wished to speak about the Kingdom of God, He said, “To what can I compare the Kingdom of Heaven?” (Lk. 13:18) He found a way, but with difficulty. What can I compare it to? He told three parables, not one, but three, and with each parable He could develop an aspect of the Kingdom of Heaven.2 The languages which we have created are poor and inadequate. We see this in everyday life. How many times have we found it difficult to switch from one language to another, to translate something, some sense of a word, some concepts. We do not find it easy. How much more when we express things which are inexpressible. Human language, then, is very very poor.

The parable, moreover, differentiates the listeners. “The value of the parable and its worth is obvious,” says the holy Chrysostom, “It makes a distinction between the one who is worthy and the one who is not worthy.”3 This is also the case here in the present parable of the Sower. There were those who went out to hear the Lord, but with what disposition? Out of curiosity? (We encounter this in other cases related by the holy Evangelists.) From mischievousness, like the Pharisees? For some superficial reason? Or from genuine desire? You can see here that the parable makes a distinction between the listeners.

The parable, moreover (and this is important), reveals and conceals, it makes clear and it darkens. It does both. The two are yoked. I repeat, it reveals and conceals. The parable is like the light [of God] the Hebrews had in Egypt. For them it was like a sunny day, but at the same time there in Egypt (this was the land of Goshen, a little southeast) the Egyptians were living in deep darkness. The holy historian tells us that the darkness “was felt” (Ex. 10:21).4 That is, they had to feel around in order to grasp something, whereas the Hebrews had dazzling light! This is what the parable is like. Some see and others do not see. The parable may clarify entirely for some and leave others in the dark. Listen to what Matthew writes:

“The disciples approached Him and said, ‘Why do You speak to them in parables?’ He replied, ‘To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven, but to these it has not been given.’” (Lk. 8:10, Mt. 13:11)

“For whoever has, more will be given to him; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away” (Lk. 19:26, Mt. 25:29). That is, if you have a little of the Spirit of God, if your eyes are well-disposed to it, then you will be able to distinguish very many conclusions. On the other hand, if you really have something, but do not have faith within and cannot discern that which you have, God will take this from you. Does this not make an impression?

Why did the Lord speak in parables?

“This is why I speak to them in parables, that seeing they may not see and hearing they may not understand” (Is. 6:9, Mt. 13:15). You will say to me: “Are you saying that the Lord does not want all to understand?” That is not what we are saying, my beloved, because understanding depends on your disposition when approaching the word of God. The word of God is sealed with seven seals. There are seven seals if one does not have a good disposition. This is why many who do not have the Spirit of God read Holy Scripture and call it nonsense. Do you want to know something more? They also scorn the teachings and blaspheme them. This is because they do not have the Spirit of God. They see but do not see, they hear, but do not hear. He says: “Here is the meaning. You still do not hear? Even now you don’t get the message?” and says to them, “You are blind” (Is. 42:18; Mt. 23:16,17,19,24,26). “Blind?” they say, “We see and hear you!” “No,” He says, “if you were seeing, you would be standing in front of me differently.” (Jn. 9:40-41)

“Blessed are your eyes that see and ears that hear” (Lk. 10:23). Which eyes? The eyes of the soul. Which ears? The ears of the soul. You are blessed. You see here, then, a differentiation is made. Some like this, some like that.

You will say to me, “Why is it this way?” My beloved, because of God’s love for man, so that the scoffers will not to be punished more severely. Do you know what He will say to the scoffer? Something dreadful! You see, but you disregard it, you do not respect it, but turn your back on it. Saint Theophylacht says,

“Christ conceals these things from them so that they will not be judged more severely, as ones who know the mysteries and scorn them; it is for their sake that Christ conceals these things from them, for upon knowing and then scorning, they deserve grave punishments.”

Beloved, the key to interpreting and comprehending all of Holy Scripture, both the natural events and the parables, is obvious. It is Christ. Do you believe in Christ? You will find in Holy Scripture an astonishing revelation; both the Old and New Testament will speak to you continually about Christ. However, if you do not believe, you will not profit, you will understand nothing.

The flesh of Christ, the human nature of the Logos of God, is like the parable. You see [the man], but you do not see [the divinity]. Some of those listening to Christ say: “What is that man saying?” They understand nothing.

What did the disciples say? Explain to us what You said (Luke 8:9). The holy Chrysostom says: “The Holy Spirit is the Maker of other eyes.” Do you have the Holy Spirit? Then you see what others do not see, those who do not have the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit changes our eyes. He creates new eyes for us, spiritual eyes. And so, my beloved, we also must have the Holy Spirit to live, for our eyes to open.

Can I tell what kind of listener of the word I am? Hardened? Obstinate? Superficial? Shallow? Or good soil? You can make a self-examination using today’s parable. To tremble. To be corrected. To be saved. Amen.

2. The mustard seed (Lk. 13:19, cf. Mt. 13:31, Mk. 4:31), leaven (Lk. 13:21; cf. Mt. 13:33), narrow door (Lk. 13:22). [Three additional parables about the Kingdom of Heaven are related by the Evengelist Matthew: The hidden treasure in the field (Mt. 13:44); the pearl of great price (Mt. 13:45); the net (Mt. 13:47)
3. Explanation of the Psalms. Psalm 48, #3, PG 47-64
4. “And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Stretch out your hand to heaven, and let there be darkness over the land of Egypt—darkness that may be felt.’” (Ex. 10:21)

Homily of Blessed Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios

THE RESURRECTION OF OUR YOUTH

Luke (7:11-16)

The scene, my beloved, of the resurrection of the widow’s son in Naïn, is described simply, but very vividly. By His word alone, the Lord resurrected the lad who was the only child of that poor, widowed woman. He said to him, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” And the young man came back to life.

Fear seized the people and they were astounded, as the holy Evangelist Luke narrates to us. And the people, quite rightly, drew the conclusion: “a great prophet has arisen among us; God has visited His people” (v.16).

However, my beloved, the youth of today submit to a worse kind of death, spiritual death. When a young person dies a biological death, we all say, “O what a shame that a young person died”, and there is much mourning. How much more mourning should there be when not one person, but all the youth have died. It is appropriate to wail much over the death of the youth and to shed many tears.

When we walk down the street and see these living dead who belong to our youth, I assure you, the soul cries, certainly the souls of all who understand what has happened cry, those who can feel and mourn. They mourn when they see the dead young people who belong to the new generation passing by, those who are from our children.

If, however, my beloved, the Lord performed at least three resurrections (the number recorded in the holy Gospels), He probably resurrected many more spiritually dead people. He performed, and performs, and will continue to perform these resurrections. But let us take a closer look at how the holy text is narrated to us.

The holy Evangelist says that when that funeral procession was exiting the city gate of Naïn, the Lord was entering, accompanied by a very large crowd who admired Him and were following Him. The Lord, seeing all the mourning, said to the mother, “Don’t cry” and then, “approaching the casket”, the holy Evangelist says, “he touched it”, that is, the casket, and the corpse which was inside it. One sees here that Jesus Christ needed to approach the dead youth.

We often say, “Jesus must reach the youth.” What does this mean? That this approach is made by the grace of God when God gives His Grace. Just as the rays of the sun come down and touch objects and persons, so do the rays of divine Grace come and touch and caress us. But the second element must also come, the living word of God, offered by the Church.

So then, two elements are needed, the Grace of God and the living word of the Church of God. This living word, which comes from the outside and is offered, must find contact points. Notice, the Lord says, “touched” the corpse. Therefore, the word of God must find these contact points with the dead youth. However be careful here, because when we say “contact points” it does not mean that the Church will throw away its principles to win over the youth. There is a misunderstanding here. We say, “Let’s introduce instruments in church because our kids love music; it will be a way to attract them to our services.” So, because we understand they like the beat of rock music we are going to introduce rock music to attract the kids? This is surely a mistake, my beloved. “What do you do in church?”, we ask. “We find the word of God to be the contact point between the Church and the people of God, especially the youth.” There can be no compromise.

It has been proven abundantly that when the word of God is offered solid, pure and unadulterated, with much love, love that reaches and exceeds the bounds of self-sacrifice, then these contact points are created. We do not need to change anything. It is enough that this word of God be alive, pure, and, I repeat, with love; because the soul seeks what is true, what is offered sincerely and with love. Therefore, when we say “approach” and “find contact points”, in no way does this mean that we must make compromises and concessions, so that we end up reaching them through a dialectical way, and if we offer it this way it does not save. There is no need to offer the word of God if it does not save and offer a Church that does not save.

“Young man,” says the Lord. How beautiful this address of the Lord is. It is not his name, but his age that is revealed. Indeed, adolescence is the most beautiful age, but also the toughest and most difficult. It often happens that when one grows up he looks back on his life, to the days of his youth, and reminisces. However when he reflects how difficult his life was, he does not wish to go back to those days. He was faced with many existential problems.

A young man stops to consider his life in front of him and wonders who he is, who the others are, who God is, what existence means. Does he have a soul or does he not have a soul? What is the destiny of man? What is the meaning of life? These so-called “existential problems” are agonizing for a young person who ponders them. Even the most carefree youth has moments where he reaches a dead-end. He asks himself, “Is life worth living or not?”

There are job-related problems. We see this clearly in our children. What will they pursue? and how will they achieve what they wish to pursue?

There are moral problems. My oh my, are there moral problems!

There are problems of a spiritual nature: “What path will I follow? How will I be guided in my life?”

There are interpersonal problems. We emphasize this last one, because we see it vividly in our days. My beloved, we see young people not having a good relationship with their parents, with their home life in general, with the Church and with society. Anarchism, in those who are lackadaisical and say, “I don’t care”, “What does it matter”, “I am who I am and no one else in the world matters” creates terrible interpersonal problems. These problems are so great, that if they were the only ones we had, we would say that all the others are unnecessary. But we can say that all the other problems are found in this one, which is why we have the problem of acidic relationships.

But who will solve these problems? Who else but Jesus Christ? Our youth must realize that they labor in vain in their pursuits, in materialistic and political theories, in pleasures and drugs. They labor in vain. They will not find anything there. All such paths lead to a dead end, to chaos. Therefore the voice of the Lord comes:

Young man / young woman, I am talking to you, I who am the Incarnate Son of God, I who was a baby, I who was a teenager and a young man, who also passed through all the phases of human development, including the one you are now passing through; I am He who has learned from what I passed through, from what I have suffered. I who was tempted in life, I who was tempted by the devil (Mt. 4, Lk. 4) (who tempts you too), but whom I defeated. I have also overcome the world (Jn. 16:33), and I have overcome the devil by remaining without sin.

My young brother / young sister1, I am addressing you personally. You who live the spiritual crisis of your time so strongly. You who have deep experiences of sin. You who have even turned against Me. I am turning to you, My young brother / my young sister.

I consider you My friend, and I want to help you. No one else can help you and raise you up from being dead. Turn to Me, do not war against Me, but to listen to Me. What do I have to say to you? GET UP! Arise! Young man / young woman, I say to you, arise! Get up! Stand up! Yes! Get up! I who am your Lord, who created you to be in an upright posture, which is an expression; because you walk on your own two feet, it expresses that you yourself are king and ruler of everything. Yes. This is why you call Me Lord, “Lord of lords.” (Deut 10:17, Ps. 136:3, Rev. 17:14, 19:16, 1 Tim 6:15)

Who am I Lord over? The rulers of men. This is why you also call me “King of kings.” (Rev. 17:14, 19:16, 1 Tim 6:15) Who are my subjects as King? Those who rule. Who are those who rule? All the people. Because you humans are lords and kings, and I am Lord of lords and King of kings. This then, the upright posture, how I created you to be, is an expression of My own image in your being.

This upright posture moreover is an expression of one who searches for Me, your Creator. It expresses a way to live your life that is different from the life of the other animals. Therefore, being truly honored, you should not compare yourself with the animals, neither should you stoop to their level and wish to be like them. You are of noble origin. Do not fall into passions which equate you with the animals. I gave you all the good things of Creation. Look no further. I have given you wine to gladden your heart (Ps 103:15). Do not get drunk. I have given you bread to strengthen your heart (v.15). Do not be a gormandizer. I have given you all the beautiful things of life to enjoy, and your senses also. Do not gather in the fruit of prostitution. Do not go and become one who hunts for the pleasures of this life. Be careful. When you do these things, in spite of being an honored creation, you resemble the animals. But there is something more: You descend lower than the animals.

Death is what makes a man lay horizontal, when a man becomes a corpse. But I am Life and I am here to say to you: “Young man, get up! Young woman, get up! In your days, my young friends, people are “walking on all fours”, even though I created them to walk with two! And because they walk on all fours, they are not able to look high up. In fact, they only consider what they see; and what they don’t see, they ignore! All they see is whatever is down, because they are looking down all the time. They see whatever is material. Whatever they see that is passionate, that is how they live. Walking around on all fours, they cannot raise their mind and heart towards Me, to seek Me and to recognize Me. Young man / young woman, you are living in a time when people are walking on all fours.”

Beloved, this is how the Lord speaks to every young person, to our youth. But we, the grown-ups… woe to us grown-ups… we grown-ups are the ones who drive the youth to the cemetery to bury them. We are the ones carrying the caskets of the youth. The youth do not lose their lives by themselves. We the grown-ups have taken away the reins, we have removed the “do not’s”, the laws, the commandments, the guardrails and tell them that they are free, that they can do whatever they want and go wherever they wish. Even if they turn against us and spit on us, we still say to them: “You are doing fine, dear children!” We, then, are the ones who removed all these, the reins of God’s law and of reason and of humanity. And the youth have come to rebel.

But when the Lord, my beloved, approached the casket of that young man of Naïn, the holy Evangelist says: “The pallbearers stood still.” (v.14) Yes. Let us also stop the pallbearers who are carrying the youth. Yes, the youth, the new people, His “new people being built up”, as the Psalmist says (Psalm 101:19). We are the ones who lead the youth to physical as well as spiritual death with our morally corrupt laws, with our corrupted logic, with out corrupt teaching, with the deadly directions we give to our young men and women, with the apostasy we have created. Let us stop. Let us give Christ the opportunity to approach our dead youth and He will resurrect them and return them to the mother Church, their mother, their homeland. At some point may we realize that only Christ raises the dead, those who are physically dead and those who are spiritually dead, because He is the resurrection and the Life (Jn 11:25).

1. Heb. 2:11 : “For both He that sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all of one; therefore He is not ashamed to call them brethren…”)