Newsletter November 11, 2023

The Suffering Church

The question arises first: Can the Church be described as suffering? The answer is yes and no. No, because the Church is a divine entity, its head is the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit is present in it without interruption. And yes, because it is a human entity as well, and its members, who are on earth, are sinful human beings, living in a fallen world, and consequently bearing the effects and signs of the Fall, which appear in the weakness of most of them and the sins of all of them.

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This is why faith and integrity must rise above all else, prioritizing prayer and spiritual practices, and therefore putting emphasis on acts of love. A junior or senior official takes his time in work and implementation, while another sees rushing things as more important in a certain circumstance; one person sees a specific solution to an existing problem, another sees it in another way, etc.; and they fight. Instead of the spirit of cooperation, in order to reach integration, the demon of jealousy begins to attack hearts and ignite anger, pitting believers against each other, instead of covering up each other’s shortcomings and complementing them. Then the pain will be most intense in the Church of Christ. May God have mercy on us and protect us from everything that causes pain to His Church. My Lord, make us “accept injustice, and protect us from being among the oppressors,” as our great saint, Isaac the Syrian, commanded. Amen.

Read the entire article:
https://www.antiochian.org/regulararticle/1814

Please remember that our full calendar continues to be available at our parish web site. Here is a link:
https://stjfc.org/Pages/Calendar/calendar.php

Full schedule:
https://stjfc.org/Pages/Ministries/Prosphora/Docs/prosphora sched 2023 web.pdf

Full schedule:
https://stjfc.org/Pages/Ministries/Altar/Docs/epistle readers for 2023.pdf

Epistle: ST. PAUL’S SECOND LETTER TO THE CORINTHIANS 9:6-11

Brethren, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that you may always have enough of everything and may provide in abundance for every good work. As it is written, “He scatters abroad, he gives to the poor; his righteousness endures for ever.” He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your resources and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way for great generosity, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.

Gospel: LUKE 10:25-37

At that time, a lawyer stood up to put Jesus to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the law? How do you read?” And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” And he said to him, “You have answered right; do this, and you will live.” But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him, and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was; and when he saw him, he had compassion, and went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; then he set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed mercy on him.” And Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.

How To Be Resurrected

Hieromonk Gabriel

The Gospel reading for this Sunday — the story of the widow of Nain — is very brief. Yet, like all of Holy Scripture, it contains many layers of meaning, each of them true, none of them superseding nor contradicting one another, but all blending together into a chorus of divine truth, containing absolutely everything that we need to know about the Kingdom of God, and about our life on this sinful earth.

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Yet our Savior has told us: “blessed are they that mourn.” Not because the Lord wants us to be downcast, guilt-ridden and tormented, but because only those who mourn can be comforted. Only those who know the truth about themselves are capable of being changed. Had the widow of Nain stayed at home and drowned her sorrow in a bottle, or fled to a distant land in search of a geographical cure, she would never have met her Lord; and it was only because she stood next to the bier weeping that she received her son restored again to life. Because the Gospel tells us that Christ performed this — the first resurrection of His earthly ministry — precisely because He “saw her, [and] had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not” (Luke 7:13).

And this is perhaps the most important point in today’s Gospel story: the Lord did not raise the young boy for his own sake. He did not resurrect him so that he could live a full and happy life in this world, taste of its varied pleasures and delights, marry a beautiful wife and raise a family, achieve a successful career, and finally enjoy a peaceful retirement before going the way of all flesh.

No. The Lord raised the young boy for the sake of his mother.

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So let us always remember that for us too, our resurrection — both bodily and spiritual — is not given to us for our own sake, but for the sake of those around us: those who love us, those who pray for us, and even for the sake of those who hate us and do us wrong. Above all, our resurrection is given to us for the sake of our own mother, the Holy Church of Christ, so that we can truly become Her faithful children. For the Fathers also tell us that the young boy, who sat up and spoke after the Lord raised him in today’s Gospel, symbolizes the Christian who speaks instruction and edification to those around him after his return from spiritual death. For some of us, this might indeed take the form of words. But for each and every Christian, such instruction and edification can and must be manifest first of all in our deeds, in our way of life, and above all in the love that we have for one another — the love by which the Lord said all men will know that we are His disciples (cf. John 13:35), the Love of God which is itself our resurrection.

Read the entire article:
https://www.rememberingsion.com/p/how-to-be-resurrected-sermon-widow-nain