Below are three of Fr. Abbot's homilies: for the 6^th Sunday after Pentecost, the Sunday of the Fathers of the 1^st Six Ecumenical Councils, and the 9^th Sunday after Pentecost, 2007.

Last Sunday we saw Jesus "crossing over to the other side" in order to confront and cast out the evil that was lurking there. This Sunday's Gospel (Mt 9:1-8) follows immediately upon last Sunday's, with Jesus crossing back over to "his own city." The reaction of the people on "the other side" was negative and harsh—they demanded that He leave them. The people in "his own city" welcomed Him and sought his compassion and power to heal, as they brought to him a paralytic. I will follow here, in general, Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis' commentary on this Gospel account.

The coming of the people to Jesus, says Erasmo, "is the symbol of a heart thrown open to God by the very wounds that afflict it." The more self-confident and self-sufficient we think we are, the less likely we are to humble ourselves before the Lord, seeking his mercy and help. But as Jesus' own pierced Heart symbolizes his love and openness to us, our wounded hearts ought to manifest our openness to the Lord, and our need for the grace of forgiveness and healing, which can only come from Him.

Those who brought the paralytic to Jesus did so because they believed in Him. Perhaps they had already had some personal contact with Him, or maybe they had only heard that He had worked miracles in other places. In any case, it was faith in Jesus that inspired them to come to Him. It was also love for their paralyzed friend that emboldened them to make their way through the crowd and bring him to Jesus. The carrying of the paralytic to Christ by his friends is an image of the Church. As members of the Body of Christ, we are called to carry our needy brethren to the Lord, through intercession and charity. St Paul says that we are to bear one another's burdens and thus fulfill the law of Christ (Gal. 6:2). At the same time, we have to accept the fact that we often need others to carry us, since we too are afflicted and weak and needy, in constant need of forgiveness and healing. This is how the Lord wants his love to flow within the Church: when we happen to be strong, we are to carry others; when we are weak, others are to carry us.

Jesus recognized both their faith in Him and their love for their paralyzed friend, yet what He first granted was not what they had originally come to Him for. They wanted physical healing, but Jesus first granted forgiveness of sins. He sets the stage for this divine gift by saying: "Take courage, child." Regardless of the age of the paralyzed man, Jesus called him "child" (teknon). It is as if to say that Jesus was bringing to him the Father's love and compassion. Jesus does the works of the Father, as He said, and he who sees Jesus sees the Father. So He looks upon all as his children, especially when they are most in need of his paternal solicitude. So, with the Father's love and divine authority, Jesus says: "Your sins are forgiven." A more accurate translation would be: "Your sins are being forgiven." That is, at that moment, as Jesus speaks, the man's sins are being taken away, for Christ is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world—directly, personally. This is part of his claim to divinity. Jesus didn't say, "I shall ask the Father to forgive your sins." He didn't even invoke the name of God. He simply made the pronouncement on his own authority, that is, He was doing something that only God could do.

Probably the paralytic was not reflecting on this issue, since he was most likely trying to get over his disappointment at not having been healed of his paralysis, not realizing that the greater of his afflictions was addressed first by Jesus. What benefit is there in a healthy body if your soul is sick? Jesus always orders his priorities according to the logic of the Kingdom of Heaven, where the first priority is the healing and salvation of souls.

But the bystanding scribes sure noticed the import of what Jesus said, and they immediately accused Him of blasphemy in their hearts. They knew the law well enough to know that only God could forgive sins. And the only outward signs they knew of that would indicate God's forgiveness of sins were the ritual ablutions and atoning sacrifices required by the law. Jesus prescribed none of these—He simply made a declaration of forgiveness, thus placing Himself on the level of God. They weren't interested in the sins of the paralytic, which they would have assumed were the cause of his affliction, but rather in what they deemed the greater sin of the one who dared to forgive the paralytic's sins!

The irony of all this is that in accusing of Christ of blasphemy, the scribes thereby committed blasphemy. They accused the Son of God of a grievous offense against God. This is similar to what Jesus called blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which is explained by St Mark as saying that Jesus had an unclean spirit. That's an unenviable position to be in: blaspheming God by accusing God of blasphemy. But the Father could forgive them, for they knew not what they did. At this early point in Jesus' ministry, they did not know that He was the Son of God. Yet their ignorance is not neutral but culpable, for their hearts were hardened. When later Jesus told them quite plainly that He was in fact the Son of God (Mk 14:61-64) they again accused Him of blasphemy and condemned Him to death.

When we encounter Jesus, we have to be prepared to let go of our presuppositions and expectations. He may manifest Himself in a way that runs counter to the image of Him we may have built up in our own thoughts and prayers. He may do things in our lives, in our souls, that we do not expect, and perhaps that we do not even like. He may upset our comfortable piety with a divine wake-up call that will leave us reeling and realizing that we didn't know it all after all, but were blind and ignorant until the light of Christ showed us both our sins and his glory.

But if our hearts are open, if we have an a priori disposition to do his will—whatever it may be, whatever it may require of us—then we will recognize and receive Him, even if He doesn't give us what we want or think we need. The paralytic wanted to walk, but Jesus took away his sins. Yet even if the paralytic was initially disappointed, he must have taken courage as Jesus told him to, and put his trust in the Lord. For Jesus did in fact give the man what he wanted, but only after giving him what He wanted to give, which was the most important thing.

Jesus knew the thoughts of the scribes who were interiorly murmuring against him. Erasmo says, "In the scribes [Jesus] recognizes the introverted scholars' habit of monologing endlessly with their own thoughts," and so Jesus made their evil thinking public: "Why do you think evil in your hearts?" So often we criticize or judge others in our hearts, when we know about as much of their inner dispositions or their relationship to God as the scribes knew of Jesus' own dispositions or relationship to God. So the Lord has to say to us, too: Why do you think evil in your hearts? You are judging what you do not know—indeed, what you cannot know.

The scribes needed to see some ritual sign in order to believe that God had forgiven sins. Jesus gave them a sign of his own choosing. He said: "That you may know [in this case, the verb is actually a form of the verb "to see," so we could translate: that you may see] that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins"—and then He commanded the paralytic to walk, and he did! Jesus words are expressed by actions. The invisible reality of the healing of the soul was given visible expression by a healing of the body. The people responded with both fear and glorification of God, which means they got the message, but the accusers remained hard of heart, for within a very short time they were on hand with fresh accusations.

Let us not be among the hard of heart, but among the humble believers who come to Jesus with faith and love, who hear his words, "Take courage, child," and who do just that. Let us be ready to have Him enter our lives on his terms, granting us what He knows we need. Then, even if we still have to bear some wounds within us—which He allows only because of the good that will come through this, for ourselves or for those whom we carry to Him—we will know his forgiveness and we will rise and walk and glorify the Lord.

This Sunday on the Byzantine calendar is (yet another!) Sunday commemorating the Fathers of the Ecumenical Councils. There are several of these "Father's Days" during the liturgical year. But why do we call these men "fathers" in the first place? Didn't Jesus tell us to "call no man father" because we have only one Father, the One in Heaven? (see Mt 23:9). Well, He did say that, but his words have been subjected to some rather ridiculous interpretations. Yet it remains true that if we Christians do call anyone on earth "Father" it cannot be without reference to our Father in Heaven. Any form of human fatherhood, if it is to be legitimate and fruitful, must be in some way an image, however imperfect, of the fatherhood of God. St Paul reminds us, in the Letter to the Colossians, to set our minds and hearts on things of Heaven, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God the Father. Jesus reminds us as well: look to Heaven, where your true and everlasting Father is, who alone is your source of life and joy and all good things in the Holy Spirit. God doesn't mind if you call a priest or the fathers of the Church or your father on earth "father"—as long as you know where he gets his name and his responsibility: from his Father and ours, who is in Heaven.

In order to get a little more understanding of the fatherhood of God, I'll give you here a little sneak preview of the chapter on the Lord's Prayer from my forthcoming book:

Jesus' revelation of God as his "Abba"—not a formal term for "father" but a term of filial endearment—was something quite new and astounding. While there are a few scattered references in the Old Testament to God as Father, there is neither consistency in addressing Him as such, nor are we given any theological justification for doing so. Only Jesus could bring this revelation to mankind, for only Jesus has the absolute right to call God "Father." Jesus has known Him as such for all eternity, and we can only know Him if we accept the revelation from his Son. "No one knows the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him" (Mt 11:27). Only Jesus intimately and uniquely knows Him as Father and hence is in a position to reveal Him. "No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, has made him known" (Jn 1:18)…

Because Jesus has spoken of God as our Father, we have a new and precious perspective on the mystery of the Absolute, of the Transcendent Infinite Power which is sometimes referred to in an impersonal way as the "God of the philosophers." Without denying God's transcendence, infinity, omnipotence, etc—indeed, we must not, if we do not wish to stray from the truth—we can actually enter, through the Son, into a personal relationship with the God whom Jesus revealed as Father. We don't have to try to understand God from the perspective of a philosopher, but we can love and relate to Him as one of his own children. This is quite a revolutionary approach to God, though even the New Testament still maintains that God "dwells in unapproachable light" (1Tim 6:16).

When Jesus describes his Father, He doesn't list divine attributes in theological terms. He simply tells us about the way God relates to us in his love and providence, his justice and mercy. "Your Father sees in secret… your Father knows what you need… if you forgive, your Father will forgive you, but if you do not forgive, neither will your Father forgive you… how much will your Father give good things to those who ask Him!" Jesus is thus bringing the profound, consoling, and sometimes terrifying mystery of the Divine into the experiences and concerns of our daily life, for it is precisely there that we work out our salvation. God as Father is near at hand, guiding, instructing, admonishing, encouraging us to "be perfect" as He is, that is, to relate to all people out of the fullness of love, without making distinctions to justify the withholding of love from anyone, or to act only according to our feelings or preferences (see Mt 5:43-48).

If we are to know and love God as Father, we must desire and develop, in the words of Pope Benedict XVI, a "filial will." This, along with purity of heart, will help us "see God." Our own self-understanding must have as its foundation our relationship with the Father as a son or daughter. A child of God is who you are, and so the way you live must reflect this basic identity. The Pope writes: "To be a son [or daughter] is to be in relation: it is a relational concept. It involves giving up the autonomy that is closed in upon itself; it includes what Jesus means by saying that we have to become like children." This is described in radical, mystical terms by St Paul when he writes: "I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me" (Gal 2:20). This profound union with the Son is what enables us to live in filial relation to the Father. In the same Epistle, Paul writes: "God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!' So through God you are no longer a slave but a son" (4:6-7). The Spirit of the Son crying "Abba, Father!" within us: this is how we pray the Lord's Prayer. This is how we live our lives in relation to God here on Earth—as we will in Heaven! We ought to ponder the Gospels, especially that of John, to understand the relationship of the Father and the Son, and pray that we may be granted the grace of that "filial will" by which we partake in that profoundly loving communion.

So, now we're in a position to look at the Gospel reading from St John (17:1-13) and reflect a little more on the Father and the Son, for St John gives us a glimpse here of their intimate communion. Since we are invited to share in this communion, we need continually to learn about the God who is our heavenly Father, and about the relationship with us that He has established through his Son.

Jesus was sent to Earth to glorify the Father in the presence of his people. The whole first section of this Gospel reading is about the mutual glorification of the Father and the Son. Jesus would glorify the Father first by revealing Him and then by offering Himself in sacrifice for our sins. The Son could do this because, as He said, the Father gave Him the power to give eternal life to all those the Father entrusted to Him. Eternal life is the fruit of the knowledge of the True God and his Son, Jesus Christ. When we know, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, the Father and his Son, we learn what it means that we are children of God, that we are led by the Spirit of God, who cries "Abba, Father" within us, as a testimony that we have been "adopted" by the Father into the family of the holy ones, out of his great love for us. Jesus prayed to the Father to glorify Him now, as man, with the same glory that the Son had with the Father "before the world was made."

Where do we fit in here, if we are to be called children of God? We weren't around before the world was made and so can't claim the glory that Christ claimed. Yet listen to St Paul: "God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. He destined us in love to be his sons [and daughters] through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will" (Eph 1:4-5).

The Son shared the Father's glory from all eternity, before the world was made, and it was within that mutual love and dialogue of the Father and Son that we were foreseen and chosen. The Father gave the Son power to give eternal life to those who believe in Him because He had already chosen us in Him before the world began! That is why Jesus refers to his disciples (of all times) in his prayer to the Father as "those whom You have given Me." And the reason Jesus has revealed the Father's good pleasure to his disciples is "that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves."

This is why Jesus was sent, why He revealed to us the True God, why He sacrificed his life to take away our sins: that in the knowledge and love of the Father, we would have the Son's own joy fulfilled in us—both in this age and in the age of everlasting glory to come.

The Fathers of the Church have defined for us the true teachings concerning the divine revelation of the nature and relationships of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We call them our fathers in the faith, for they have brought us closer to our Father who is in Heaven. So let us, as the primary work of our spiritual lives here on Earth, strive to know and love and serve the heavenly Father and his Son our Lord Jesus Christ, by the grace of the Holy Spirit. For in this lies the eternal life that the Father gave the Son the authority to give to us.

The psalmist says that God tested him by fire and water. In today's epistle (1Cor. 3: 9-17) St Paul speaks of our works being tested by fire. In the Gospel (Mt. 14:22-34), we have a test by water. What manner of test is this? It becomes clear that it is a test of faith, but there is more to it than that. It is a test of one's entire relationship to Jesus.

In Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis' commentary on this Gospel, he takes seriously the actual event and its historical reality, but he sees it as a kind of symbol of our life in Christ and the tests we have to endure to prove our fidelity and trust. That is the way I'd like to look at this Gospel today.

It would be helpful if we could somehow visualize the scene that the Gospel describes, so that we could realize the full drama of it. It is one thing to say, "there was a storm at sea," and quite another to hear the howling wind, to feel the lashing rain, to try to keep your balance (and your lunch) in the pitching boat. So let's look at what happened on that fateful night.

Jesus must have planned this in advance. The text says that He made his disciples get in the boat and leave before Him. They probably had expected Him to go with them, but He refused and ordered them to leave without Him. This is already a test of obedience. Then He took to the hills by Himself, in order to pray. By evening, the disciples in their boat were about halfway across the sea. They were having a hard time; the wind was against them, the Gospel says, and their boat was beaten by the waves. So, try to imagine it: this storm was going on all night and they hadn't made much progress. The storm began in the evening, but Jesus didn't come to them until "the fourth watch of the night," which is around three or four o'clock in the morning. It was pitch black, the boat was lurching and filling with water as the waves repeatedly pounded against it. The wind was fierce and they had to shout just to communicate. It was like this for hours.

Suddenly they see an apparition on the raging waters. Jesus must have been radiating light, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to see Him in the middle of a stormy night. They were already exhausted and in fear of perishing on the sea. Now this—a ghost, or the spirit of the primordial chaos that lurks beneath the waves, was rapidly approaching them. The Gospel says that they were terrified and cried out in fear! Think of it—one fearful disaster on top of another!

Into all this chaos, danger, and fear, a voice is heard over the wind: "Take heart, I AM; do not fear." Jesus pronounces the divine name (ego eimi) as He demonstrates his power over the elements and calls his fearful disciples to trust in Him. In Psalm 76(77) the psalmist wrote: "When the waters saw you, O God… they were afraid, yea, the deep trembled… The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind… Your way was through the sea, your path through the great waters." When the disciples saw the waters, they trembled, but when the waters saw the Lord, they trembled! For the Lord is in control of all He has made, and all things serve Him. Jesus was trying to elevate his disciples from the level of natural fear to that of supernatural trust.

Peter's response to the divine apparition is characteristic of our own ambivalence in our struggles with the mystery of God. Jesus had told them it was He Himself and not to fear. Peter, in the midst of this test of faith, seemed to want to test Jesus! "If it is You," he said, "bid me come to you on the waters." Jesus said, "It is I," yet Peter said, "If it is You…" This was the first instance of why Jesus would call him a man of little faith. But there is more. Peter was willing to risk his own life if it really was Jesus, and so he took the plunge—literally! When Jesus called Peter to come to Him, Peter must have finally believed, for he did the incredibly dangerous thing of jumping out of the boat into the churning sea—talk about a leap of faith! (Remember that the storm was not calmed until after Peter was rescued and they both entered the boat. So this whole dialogue and drama was played out in the midst of the furious storm.)

Amazingly, Peter passed this part of the test. Jesus invited him to walk upon a turbulent sea, and Peter walked. But then he began to fail the test. His "better judgment" took over; his reason reasserted itself even in the face of an amazing miracle. He faltered. He began to lose what he had gained by his act of faith in stepping out onto the waters. He considered the power of the wind and the waves and not that of the Creator of the wind and waves, who was standing before him and inviting him to share in his divine authority by means of faith. He couldn't do it. He began to sink and to cry out to the Lord. There was a lot of shouting going on that night. They screamed in terror at the sight of the "ghost" and now Peter is crying out as he is about to drown. The chaos of fear and doubt is here likened to that of the primordial chaos, both of which had to be calmed and ordered by the word and action of the Lord. The psalmist again describes the scene, this time from Peter's perspective, in psalm 68(69): "Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I have come into deep waters and the flood sweeps over me… O Lord, let not…the deep swallow me up…"

As he sank into the water, we can imagine Peter reflecting—though I'm sure he didn't at that moment—that it would have been better if Jesus, foreseeing this predicament, would not have named him "Rock" but rather "Cork" or some other non-sinking substance!

But Peter the Rock did sink. "Lord, save me!" the Apostle cried. Jesus reached out his hand and rescued the drowning disciple, who emerged from the waves shaken and drenched, full of fear and wonder and confusion and gratitude. Erasmo remarks: "Like Peter, I do not in the end ever actually enter into the Lord's embrace as his love and mine blissfully and serenely proceed toward one another with unfaltering step. No: I will always fall into the Lord's arms gasping for breath after a close brush with death, having had to be rescued by Jesus from impending annihilation. Jesus is not my ‘savior' because in my piety I confer upon him this honorific title. He is my savior because he has in fact saved me: he has laboriously earned the title…"

Jesus, after reminding Peter that he was a man of little faith, asks: "Why did you doubt?" The Greek word literally means "to be divided in two," and this is more expressive. It wasn't merely a matter of not believing. It was a matter of believing two things! He believed in Jesus enough to get out of the boat and walk on the water, yet he began to believe more in the power of the elements and in his own reasoning which told him that what he was doing was foolhardy and impossible. St James cautions his readers that the one who is "double-minded" in prayer will not receive anything from the Lord.

Once Jesus brought Peter back into the boat, the waves died down and the wind ceased—literally, "grew weary." No matter how much the world, the flesh, and the devil rage against us and threaten us, if we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus and move steadily towards Him—not considering the violence of the storm, but only the word of the Lord—our enemies will eventually grow weary and cease, and we will remain secure with the Lord.

The disciples' hesitation eventually turned to adoration. Now it was no longer, "if it is You," but rather, "Truly You are the Son of God!" Our lives are a long journey from doubt to faith, from fear to trust, from faltering to total commitment. Our lives are a perilous walk across the uncertain waters toward Him who says, "Take heart; I AM, do not fear—Come." The storms will rage until we are safe in the boat with Jesus and his holy ones, that is, until we have reached the shores of the Heavenly Kingdom. For now we walk in faith and trust—crying out, "Lord, save me!" when we feel ourselves sinking—but always reaching out for that hand, that nail-pierced hand, which rescues us from the deep waters and carries us safely home.

The Abbot's Page