June 11, 2012 Mayfield, PA: "We look over the sin to see the person, and
embrace the person in reconciliation:" Met. Jonah’s sermon in St.
John the Baptist Cathedral
On Sunday, May 27, with the blessing of the First Hierarch of the
Russian Church Abroad, His Eminence, Metropolitan Hilarion, the
Primate of the Orthodox Church in America, His Beatitude Jonah,
Metropolitan of All America & Canada, celebrated the Divine Liturgy
in St.
John the Baptist Cathedral in
Mayfield, PA. After the Gospel reading, Metropolitan Jonah addressed
the parishioners with the following words:
In
the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
Today we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Fathers, the Holy Fathers
of the Ecumenical Councils: those who struggled to preserve, and
often to restore, the unity of the Church. And today is truly an
historic day, on which I come to you in a spirit of love, a spirit
of forgiveness, and a spirit of reconciliation and healing. I know
and understand, I fully acknowledge and weep for, the great pain
that was caused by decisions made by my predecessors, and ask your
forgiveness; because we truly live only by forgiving one another,
only by rising above these hurts that we cause one another ‒ and how
often we cause hurt to one another, especially the closer we are! If
somebody, some stranger says some cross word to you in the
supermarket, you ignore it; but if it’s your family, it cuts right
to the heart.
I come here today seeking that forgiveness from you, extending an
apology our behalf, because we’re one family, we’re one Church; and
we’re also now at this time celebrating that Reunification, when
five years ago, by the prophetic vision of His Eminence,
Metropolitan Laurus of blessed memory, and His Holiness, Patriarch
Alexey of blessed memory, there was a Reunification between the
Patriarch of Moscow and the bishops of the Synod of the Russian
Orthodox Church Outside of Russia. That reconciliation has continued
and has grown and has been realized also by the reconciliation
between the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia and the
Orthodox Church in America, so that now I know and have an authentic
relationship with His Eminence, Metropolitan Hilarion, as a true
brother in Christ, and with the fathers, my brothers in the Synod of
Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, as true
brothers in Christ. We also celebrated that reconciliation with the
entire Synod of the Orthodox Church in America and the entire Synod
of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia. These are glorious
things, and it can only be accomplished because we’re Christians,
and we’re willing to set aside those hurts, that pain, the
bitterness, the anger, the judgment, so that we might be reconciled.
I recognize how often as a bishop my own decisions can deeply affect
the lives of other people, and how easy it is to make a decision,
the consequences of which you have no concept. Today, in this
country, in our situation today, we need to stand fast together as
One Church that shares the same faith, that shares the same life,
that shares the same liturgical life, that shares the same
spirituality – albeit with different administrations – to stand
together for the full integrity of the Orthodox Tradition as it has
been given to us unchanged by our fathers in Christ. We need to
stand up against a world that is hostile, and increasingly hostile,
infringing on the liberty of the Church, on the freedom of
conscience of the faithful, and on how the Church is able to operate
within society. We need to stand together, because none of us can do
it alone, and because we are able to overcome the trials and
temptations that have afflicted us in the past, and we have grown
stronger through them. That’s why God allows these things: He allows
trials and temptations, even the most horrific and bitter things, to
happen for our growth – so we can work out our salvation. There’s an
old saying in the monastic tradition: "Безъ
искушенія
нѣтъ
спасенія!"
‒ "Without temptation, there’s no salvation!"
Without temptation, there’s no salvation! We have to realize that
when trials come to us, God sends them to us! It is His visitation
to us for our growth in faith, for our out growth in the fullness
and depths of our personal integrity, so that we can see ourselves
revealed by how we deal with the trials and temptations, and repent
of what we need to repent of, and grow to overcome that pain.
There’s a story from the Desert Fathers, of one of the great fathers
who lived in the Egyptian wilderness, and a pilgrim comes to him and
says, "Father, how are you? How are things going?" and the elder
replies, "Oh, it’s horrible! Everything is going too well! God has
not visited me: I don’t have any temptations left! God has abandoned
me!" As Christians, this is what we expect when we wear the Cross:
the way of trial, the way of temptation, because through the Cross,
joy comes into all the world. Our task is to proclaim that joy to a
world that doesn’t know what joy is, only happiness and
gratification, which are a long way from joy: that same joy that we
experience on Pascha, when we know in the depths of our souls that
Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, when we know that God has come
into our midst and has united us unto Himself, and that He leads us
into the Heavenly Kingdom! that joy, which we experience when,
having gone to confession, we have the whole burden of our sins
lifted off of our backs, and we feel light and full of Grace, and
indeed we are! that same joy, which we experience in receiving the
Holy Mysteries, as our soul is deified and permeated with the Holy
Spirit!
This joy is something that we in the Church have, it’s something we
share, and sometimes, I think I’m afraid we take it for granted! But
how important it is for us to be able to go to our neighbors, to go
to those who are around us, and to share that joy, to bring people
conciliation, to bring them the word of Salvation, to bring them the
word of Life; because truly, those who are in the world are living a
life of despair, and how often, how tragically, our own culture as
Americans has embraced this culture of Death, which denies even the
possibility of joy in this world.
Our joy is also that joy that we experience when we forgive one
another, when we’re reconciled to one another, when we’re able to
lay aside the bitterness, to overlook the sins, and see the person
and embrace that person, who through his or her sins has hurt us.
It’s what forgiveness means. It doesn’t mean to say that when
somebody’s sinned against us, it was all right, and it certainly
doesn’t mean we deserved it, it doesn’t mean that I caused it: if
that person sinned, that person sinned. But we look
over the sin to see the
person, and embrace the person in reconciliation; and that’s what
Christian forgiveness is all about: we acknowledge our sins, we
confess our sins. That’s what it means: we take responsibility for
our sins.
But God doesn’t hold it against us, He doesn’t identify us by our
sins: God sees the person we are, knowing our weaknesses, knowing
our strengths, and He loves us
despite our sins.
And so, brothers and sisters, what we’re called to do is to love one
another despite our sins against one another, whether they’re little
or whether they’re huge. And how much growth it takes to overlook
the huge sins that cause so much pain, and yet how profound that joy
of reconciliation, when we can overcome that darkness! Because, it
is not just us, it’s the power of Jesus Christ in our hearts, Who
has overcome the World, Who has overcome Death, Who has overcome
Darkness, and Who has Himself overcome the power of Sin, so that
identifying ourselves with Him and He Himself with us, we might
forgive and be reconciled with one another!
The Holy Fathers fought great battles, and some of them fought among
themselves, but in a spirit of Love they reconciled, because they
recognized that what they were fighting for is the fullness of the
integrity of the Apostolic Tradition: the fullness of that Faith
given once to the Apostles by our Lord Jesus Christ, and given by
the Apostles to the Bishops, and from generation to generation to
generation has been passed down even now, that the bishops share
with the priests and with the other clergy, and with all of the
faithful.
We have one life, we have one hope, we have one salvation: Jesus
Christ. Brothers and sisters, let us give thanks to God for that
Salvation; let us give thanks that He has allowed us and given us
the strength to forgive and be forgiven! For He Himself has brought
Forgiveness into this world through His own suffering, and by that
Suffering overcame the very power of Death itself! By forgiving one
another, by loving one another, by being reconciled with one
another, we too overcome that power of sin, the power of death, and
rejoice in Christ’s Resurrection.
