Category Archives: love

Love’s triad confronts modern man.

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This very meditative homily on the words of St. Paul, when he wrote about faith, hope and love, I found to be truly rich and encouraging. Father Patrick Reardon points out in his sermon the strange reductions of St. Paul’s teachings that came from various Christians writing many centuries after the apostle’s letters were circulating among the churches.

In fact, it can only be theoretical to separate love from hope and faith, as St. Paul does in I Corinthians 13, for the purpose of making clear that love is preeminent; true love is not manifested without faith and hope. We also learn in this Bible lesson of another fruit of the Spirit that makes up a second triad of virtues, further fleshing out the reality of what it means to live in love. The interrelated meanings of the several words and their contexts lift one’s mind right up to the throne of God where the Three Persons live eternally in Love, a Love in which we are invited to partake.

If you are interested in further contemplation about this Love that originates in the Holy Trinity, and how it contrasts with Faust, or is described by Dante, you will want to listen to the 16-minute talk on the Ancient Faith site here:  “The Supremacy of Love,”  or by means of the direct MP3 file linked at top.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

If you have a heavy heart, that is okay.

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Saturday being the day of Sabbath rest, we Orthodox often have memorial services this day, and pray for those who rest in death, waiting for the Resurrection. For that reason I thought to share these words spoken at a funeral earlier this year. But also, my parish has seen two of our community fall asleep in death this month, and we are feeling the sorrow right now. Read on to hear what the rabbis say:

“If you have a heavy heart and are grieving, that is OK. We weep for those we love and who have loved us. One hears from time to time: ‘Oh, you should not cry. He is in a better place.’ But Christ God Himself wept at the death of his friend Lazarus. And the rabbis say that God weeps at the death of every human being. So, don’t be afraid to weep.

“You can also hear it said among some Christian groups: ‘Oh, that is not Father Anthony. He is with the Lord! That is just a shell.’ I ask you then who is that there in our midst?! You see, to be a human being is to be a soul enfleshed, that is, a soul wrapped in a physical body. Angels do not have bodies.

“The tragedy of death is that the union of soul and body is torn asunder! That is why Christ died a real human death, and rose from the dead as a real human person, his body and spirit united again. Fr. Anthony’s body is as much Fr. Anthony as is his soul which awaits the last day when it will receive a new body.”

-Archbishop Benjamin at the funeral of Father Anthony Karbo, March 2024

Memory eternal!

To make broken things beautiful.

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From Mother Melania:

Japanese kintsugi mending tools“Have you ever heard of kintsugi? Literally ‘golden joinery,’ kintsugi is ‘the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with urushi lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum … As a philosophy, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise’ (Thanks, Wikipedia!). I won’t presume to discuss the Japanese philosophies related to this art. But there are certainly deeply Christian parallels to be drawn. Three come immediately to mind.

“First are those who valiantly and humbly endure life’s inequities or unjust persecution, such as Job, Patriarch Joseph, Jeremiah, and the beggar Lazarus. Crushed in various ways through no fault of their own, these saints became beautiful not despite the cracks, but because of how they dealt with them. Without such trials, these saints would never have become as great as they are.

“Second are those who sinned greatly but repented deeply, such as King David, Peter, and Paul. Their great sins are there for all to see and the sins remain sinful. Yet, Christ healed their fractured souls with the gold of their repentance and faithfulness.

“Then there is Christ Himself. He didn’t just valiantly and humbly endure unjust persecution: He came to earth for that very purpose – for OUR sake. So, His wounded side and hands remain in eternity as visible signs of the beauty of His victorious self-sacrificial love.

“So, let’s take heart. Are we innocently enduring persecution? Christ can make us beautiful through our trials. Have we fallen into serious sin? We can repent and still become great saints. We can even go past these things to suffer freely for love of Christ and His people. Thus, we shall most deeply resemble Him Whose greatest glory is that He was freely broken for our sake.”

—Abbess Melania, Holy Assumption Monastery

People are weeping – St. Tikhon of Zadonsk

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On this day we remember St. Tikhon of Zadonsk, a man born into a poor Russian family in 1724. He excelled in school, and after attending seminary became a teacher, and then a monk. After being elevated to the bishopric, at one time he had over 800 churches under his care; the story of his life is well told: here.

It was a huge job, and he accomplished a great deal, but his health began to suffer to the point that he wasn’t able to carry out his duties. He was transferred to a monastery in Zadonsk, and in solitude and relative rest continued to write. Bodily afflictions didn’t cease, but changed, and he became plagued with insomnia and depression, as this article “Victor over Melancholy” explains:

“It was a time of desperate and total battle with his thoughts, of overcoming the spirit of melancholy, despair, and despondency, and of a reassessment of his life circumstances; in the end, his soul acquired the priceless experience of overcoming, and with that the boldness to comfort the despairing….”

Being in seclusion was in some ways harder than overseeing hundreds of parishes, and the saint considered a petition to go back to his former overly-busy life. But eventually he gave up trying to change his situation, and gave himself to ministering to the many needs of the people in the community:

“In the small house where he lived, he organized a type of hospital for those who contracted any kind of illness on the way to work or on pilgrimage. He also offered spiritual alms, tearfully praying for the needs and illnesses of those closely and not so closely known by him.”

His writings were widely read by this time; in one of his compilations of “spiritual treasures” he exhorts us:

“We see in the world that people are weeping… They are born with weeping, live with weeping, and die with weeping. People weep because they live in the world—a place of weeping, the vale of tears… And you weep, Christian!… Weep, while time yet remains, while tears are yet beneficial. Weep, and you will not weep eternally. Weep, and be comforted.”   Source

The first Orthodox monastery established in the United States is dedicated to St. Tikhon of Zadonsk: St. Tikhon’s Monastery in Pennsylvania was founded in 1905 concurrently with an orphans’ home, and the current campus is shared with St. Tikhon’s Seminary and Bookstore as well.

Annual Memorial Day Pilgrimage to St. Tikhon’s Monastery, May 2024

Before falling asleep in death, at the age of 59, St. Tikhon was delivered of his melancholy. But in the years previous, during which his writings were proving beneficial to so many, it’s clear from them that his spiritual struggles were already bearing fruit. His example is inspiring, and his words confirm it:

“A manifest sign of love for God is a heartfelt gladness in God, for we rejoice in what we love. Likewise love of God cannot exist without joy, and whenever a man feels the sweetness of the love of God within his heart, he rejoices in God. For so sweet a virtue as love cannot be felt without joy. As honey sweetens our throat when we taste of it, so the love of God makes our heart glad when we taste and see that the Lord is good (LXX-Ps. 33:9 [KJV-Ps. 34:8]). –“On Love for God”

Saint Tikhon was glorified on Sunday August 13, 1861.