Below are three of Fr. Abbot's homilies: for the feasts of the Circumcision of Christ, Theophany, and the Sunday of the Pharisee and Publican, 2008.

Well, we’ve gone and done it again—finished one year and started another. I always have the impression when I give a homily on New Year’s Day that I’m not going to make it to the next one, yet somehow I always do, though I’m quite certain that one of these years my impression will actually be true!

As each year comes to an end, I also have the impression that I’ve just barely "escaped the snare of the fowler," that I’ve survived the sorrows and sufferings of the previous year only on a wing and a prayer. So what is going to happen this year? It’s going to be something of an apocalyptic year, I think. I’ll be turning 50 this year, so that surely means that the world will soon be coming to an end. The Feast of Annunciation falls after Easter this year, another rather bizarre event. Ushering in the collapse of civilization as we know it will be the presidential election toward the end of this year. So, we have a lot to look forward to!

Even though New Year’s Day is a secular feast, and there are other reasons on our liturgical calendar why we’re having a solemn Divine Liturgy today, there is a kind of "theology of the new" that is worth reflecting upon at this time. This doesn’t mean a "theology of new, untested, untraditional, and untenable ideas," but rather looking at the mystery of newness in light of the good news of the Gospel. Christ is the New Adam who has inaugurated the New Covenant through his death and resurrection, so that we can, through the Holy Spirit, "walk in newness of life," as St Paul says, and eventually find our way to the New Jerusalem coming down from Heaven in the glory of God, who says: "Behold, I make all things new."

The first day of the new year is significant not only for marking time or having a party or getting a day off from work. The irruption of the New into our weary "oldness" is a sign of hope, an influx of energy (hopefully the Uncreated Energy that is Divine Grace), and a motivation to persevere. It throws back the towel to us that we have thrown in, and says, "Get up and fight; you can do it!" It’s easy enough to collapse into a blob of dejected jelly after a long year of hardships and disappointments, but the arrival of the new brings with it a whispered promise of better things to come—or at least better ways to deal with whatever is to come! Like it or not, we still have to get up every day and face the music, leaving the comfortable world of unconsciousness for the land of the living, where lives are made or broken, where souls are saved or lost. We are there, and we have a role to play, a mission to accomplish, and miles to go before we sleep. We will have to account for the choices we make in 2008, the acts we place, the words and thoughts that proceed from within, the fruit we bear—or not—the talents we multiply—or not.

So the coming of the new year is not a time for dissipation and juvenile frivolity, but for regrouping, re-vitalizing, and setting our sights on the accomplishment of the will of God in the situations in which He will place us. This is why we are celebrating the Divine Liturgy and not cracking open a keg of beer! The Liturgy is, of course, a joyful celebration, but this joy grows out of a serious commitment to the truth of the Gospel, to receiving and sharing the love of God which upholds us on our perilous pilgrimage to the Kingdom of Heaven. Let us have open eyes concerning the times in which we live, and not mindlessly play the fiddle while Rome burns.

This year will be an important one, as the tensions mount in several ways: the conflict between the new and best-selling breed of atheists and those who are trying to keep Christianity and its values high-profile in this country; the conflict between those who call themselves Catholic but do not believe or practice as the Church requires—and who still dare approach the Sacred Mysteries—and the leaders of the Church who are entrusted with the stewardship of the Holy Eucharist. There are other conflicts in the Church, like that between those who uphold the traditions of the Church and those who want to lead the Church down the deceptive path of new-age adulteration and quasi-paganism. And the geopolitical tensions that increase between the Middle East and other Islamic countries with the countries of the increasingly unstable West. Much more can be said, but you get the picture. Decisions will have to be made that will affect us all.

Now we may not be directly involved in world events or in high-level decisions of the Church, but we do have a role to play, and on the spiritual level this takes place primarily through prayer, fasting, sacrifice, fidelity to the sacraments and the other elements of spiritual life. We don’t have to sit on U.N. councils to influence world events. For the Lord God is the Creator and Savior of the world and He has the power to work all things for the good, even when things look like they’re going bad. To a certain extent, perhaps a quite large extent, He relies on us, on our union with Him through prayer and sacrifice, to bring his grace to bear on the persons and events shaping this world on the "horizontal" level.

And here we finally get to the readings for this feast. First of all St Paul warns us in the Letter to the Colossians (2:8-12) about the need for purity in the true faith. This is the bedrock of our spiritual life and hence of our spiritual influence in the world. He writes: "See to it that no one makes a prey of you by empty philosophy and deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ." There sure is a lot of empty philosophy and deceit out there, and people worshiping the spirits of the universe and claiming their personal divinity, even daring to use the holy name of Christ to describe the source of their bogus spiritual transports. But that is not according to the true Christ, that is, Jesus Christ, who actually lived and died and rose from the dead and who sits at the right hand of the Father and who is coming to judge the living and the dead!

We are celebrating the feast of the circumcision of Christ, and you might think that circumcision has nothing to do with what I’m talking about here. But St Paul doesn’t think so, because he immediately brings it up in the same passage from Colossians. Circumcision involves a cutting away of something, for the sake of inclusion in the people of the covenant. In a spiritual sense, he goes on, the sacrament of baptism is for Christians what circumcision was for Jews. It is our incorporation, by immersion into the mystery of Jesus’ death and resurrection, into the Body of Christ, the Church, the people of the New Covenant, the New and Final and Everlasting Covenant.

But Paul speaks of circumcision not only in a sacramental context but in that of faith, which is the context of our daily spiritual life. We still have to cut away that which is not of Christ, whatever tends to cling to us that belongs not to Christ but to the world, to those "elemental spirits of the universe," and to our own unredeemed tendency toward selfishness and sin.

Christ submitted to circumcision in his "new year," the very first few days after He was born in this world as a new human being, to show that He wished to save his people as a member of his people, to show that the promises made to his people of old were true and that He had come personally to fulfill them—even at the price of suffering. His life was marked with the shedding of blood from the very beginning, but this was his will, out of love for us. As powerful and enduring as his words of preaching and teaching were, they were insufficient to draw the whole world out of its darkness and stubborn sin. He had to go to the Cross; only his complete sacrifice in love and obedience to the Father’s will would be sufficient to atone for all the sin of the world.

Let us not, then, fear the sacrifices which fidelity to Jesus require. Let us courageously cut away all that is not of Him: "circumcise our hearts," as the biblical saying goes. Only thus will we have to wisdom and the strength to face whatever the new year brings, and we will make our personal contribution to the advancement of the peace and the salvation of the world. God is counting on us—the true God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who makes all things new and who prepares even now the New Jerusalem for those who shall be judged worthy to enter his glory. So, as we are exhorted in the Letter to the Hebrews, this is no time for drooping hands and weak knees; make straight paths for your feet, run the race with perseverance, strive for the holiness without which no one will see God. This is really the only way to have a happy, blessed new year.

The Gospel reading for this feast of Holy Theophany (Mt 3:13-17) is quite short and is limited to the actual baptism of Jesus and his short dialogue with St John. But I would like to begin by looking at it in the larger context of the ministry of John and what that means for the understanding of Christian baptism.

According to St Matthew, the first words of John’s preaching—like the first words of Jesus’ preaching—were "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." This sets the context for everything else that is to come. From the moment Christ was born into this world the Kingdom of Heaven has been at hand, but all the more so when He began his ministry. The Forerunner is, in a sense, a catechist. He has to prepare the people to understand and accept the Messiah and all that He has come to do. So the baptizer has to give the pre-baptismal catechesis. He gets right to the point: "Repent!" For that is the most important and indispensable element of preparation. This is what John’s own baptism was all about. The evangelist writes that the people came to John and were baptized by him in the River Jordan as they confessed their sins. His baptism was not yet the baptism in the Holy Spirit and fire that Jesus would bring; this preliminary baptism was still part of the catechumenate, so to speak.

What is Jesus’ baptism in the Holy Spirit and fire? According to John’s preaching it is a baptism of blessing and of judgment, of gathering and of separation. On the feast of Pentecost the Liturgy makes the contrast between the scattering of the peoples and their languages at the tower of Babel and the unifying of the disciples through the gift of tongues given by the Holy Spirit. So part of the work of the Holy Spirit is to gather the elect and keep them in a holy unity. That is why St John, when speaking about the baptism in the Holy Spirit, says that the Lord will gather his wheat into his granary. But the other aspect is fire, and about this St John says, "but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire." He undoubtedly means here that evildoers will experience the fire of Hell as a result of the judgment of their deeds when the Lord takes his seat as Judge of the living and the dead.

But perhaps, in the context of Christian baptism, we can see this fire as a purifying fire that burns up the "chaff" of sin while immersing us in the grace of the Holy Spirit. When we perform the great blessing of the water on this feast, part of the ritual is to immerse a burning three-branched candle into the water, signifying the flaming tongues of the Holy Spirit, purifying and sanctifying the water, so that all those who partake of it will likewise be purified and sanctified.

So now we have received from the Forerunner our pre-baptismal catechesis. The first thing to do is repent of sin, so that the purifying fire of the Spirit may not have to work painfully (and overtime) upon our souls, but that we may be refreshed by the divine grace poured out upon the elect. We should also remember that every time we go to confession and receive absolution, we are connecting again to the grace and mystery of our baptism. This sacrament of confession receives its efficacy and fruitfulness from the mystery of baptism and continually immerses us in that healing and saving grace.

But we see in the Gospel that Jesus Himself approached John to be baptized. We just said that John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. Jesus didn’t need to repent of anything. Why didn’t He simply take over from John and start baptizing others instead of submitting to baptism Himself? Like everything He does, Jesus did this "for us and for our salvation." On one level it was simply an act of humility and of solidarity with sinful mankind, whom He came to save. He entered fully into the human condition, and though He was personally without sin, He chose to belong to the sinful human race. As our representative before the Father, He submitted to the rite of baptism.

But there is more. As the liturgical texts repeatedly remind us, Jesus entered the waters to sanctify them, to give them the power to engender children of God, born of water and the Spirit. In a general sense, the incarnation of the Son of God put into all creation the potential for sanctification and transfiguration. But here is a specific example for a specific purpose. He entered the waters of the Jordan in order to make water the means for our sanctification, the introduction into the life of grace and communion with the Most Holy Trinity.

As a witness to this, the Holy Trinity was publicly manifested at the Jordan for the first time. As the Son arose from the water, Heaven opened and the Holy Spirit descended visibly upon Him in the form of a dove, and the voice of the Father was heard, blessing Jesus as his beloved Son.

Aside from the reasons already given, there is another reason why Jesus was baptized. It was a preparation for his mission as preacher, healer, and savior. The Holy Spirit rested upon Him for this purpose and then immediately sent Him into the desert to fast and to overcome the devil. So we cannot say that Jesus’ ministry was only public and "active." His mission began in the desert, in silence and solitude, in prayer and fasting and spiritual warfare. Only after that did He engage in preaching and other public works.

So how does our baptism relate to Jesus’ baptism? St John Chrysostom asks why there was a glorious manifestation of the Holy Trinity at Jesus’ baptism. He answers by saying: because that is what happens at our baptism! We go into the water with and in the Son, we are anointed by the grace of the Holy Spirit, and the Father pronounces his blessing and good pleasure upon his newly adopted son or daughter. Chrysostom reminds us that St Paul said that extraordinary signs are for getting the attention of unbelievers, but since we are supposed to believe before we submit to baptism, these realities are accessed only by faith. I’m speaking here not of infant baptism, of course, but in those cases, the parents are supposed to believe and not wait for the heavens to open before they accept the truth of God’s presence and power in the mystery of holy baptism.

The fire of the Spirit takes away all sin, and then the grace of the Spirit rests gently upon us like a dove. We are anointed. One word that used to be commonly used for baptism is "christening." This means that through baptism we are "Christed," anointed. In the Byzantine tradition, the anointing is made explicit by the immediate conferral of the sacrament of Chrismation, though which the grace and gift of the Holy Spirit is communicated through anointing with Holy Chrism.

After the Holy Spirit thus rests upon us and grants us his presence and his gifts, and after the Father graciously acknowledges us as his beloved children, our own mission begins. Like Jesus, we may not be given much time to bask in this divine love and grace, but may be at once sent into the desert of struggle and spiritual warfare, of asceticism and contemplation, in short, of fulfilling the mission of an anointed one of God. This connection will be made especially clear this year, since Easter comes so early this year. Already next Sunday we will be bringing out our Lenten liturgical books, to begin the period of pre-lenten preparations. So, today we celebrate the joy and grace of the manifestation of the Holy Trinity at Jesus’ baptism—as we give thanks for the immeasurably gracious gift of our own baptism—and next week the Spirit will begin to lead us to the desert, to fight the devil and fulfill our mission and sons and daughters of God.

So let us hear the words of St John the Forerunner: "Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!" And let us reflect on just what this means, in the world and in our own lives. We have been sealed by the Holy Spirit, and this sets us apart from unbelievers and evildoers—but we still have to live accordingly if we wish to be gathered in like good grain and not burned up like useless chaff. Baptism is not a guarantee of salvation; it is rather an equipping for salvation, granting us all we need for our pilgrimage to Paradise. So let us be encouraged—by the anointing of the Spirit, by the presence and constant companionship of the Son, and by the words of the Father, which will be our everlasting delight: "You are my beloved son (my beloved daughter); in you I am well pleased."

Already this Sunday we are beginning our pre-lenten preparations with a series of Sunday Gospels that help us to recognize, and hopefully acquire, the proper spiritual dispositions that will enable us fruitfully to live the season of Lent and thus to be open to the grace and glory of Easter.

This Sunday we endeavor to gain the proper perspective on our relationship to God to each other while learning something about pride and humility in the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican (Lk. 18:9-14). This is one of those "how to be, how not to be" Gospels, and it is very important for our spiritual life and hence for our salvation. St Paul says in the epistle (2Tim. 3:10-15) that the "sacred writings are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus." So let us listen to the instruction of Christ in the Gospel.

First of all, we are given an indication what the parable is about and specifically to whom it is directed. St Luke says: "He told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others." That one line itself is worthy of much meditation, and the parable dramatizes it.

Let us first look at the Pharisee, or "how not to be." Here we have the example of one who trusts in himself that he is righteous while despising others. First the righteousness: "God," he begins with all self-confidence, "I thank you that I am not like other men." Let’s stop here for a moment. His pride pours forth from him from the first moment of his prayer. He is not like others—which means, as is clear from the rest of his prayer, that he thinks he is better than others. So he could have started, "I thank you that I am better than other men." What a way to start one’s prayer! Just in case God is not quite convinced, the Pharisee gives some evidence. Not only is he not a criminal or an adulterer, or, glancing down at the prostrate figure some distance behind him, a despicable tax collector—he fasts twice a week and pays tithes to the temple treasury! God must really be impressed!

But God was not impressed. God was grieved and offended. Why? The Pharisee did speak the truth, at least about some things. He really wasn’t a criminal or an adulterer, and he really did fast and tithe. But for all that the Lord did not declare him righteous. We go back to the beginning of the parable. He trusted in himself for his righteousness and not in God, and at the same time he despised others whom he did not deem righteous, even though God did not give him authority to pronounce judgment on anyone else. So we learn here that it is not the deeds themselves that make one righteous, but the direction of one’s trust, and the faith and love that underlie the deeds. If we trust in ourselves, our deeds come to nothing before God, but if we trust in God as the source of whatever good may be in us, our deeds acquire a value they could not otherwise have.

Now for the "how to be" part: what about the publican, the tax collector? He could not pray like the Pharisee, for he was like other men: unjust, an extortionist, etc. But he, having no deeds with which to defend his righteousness, put his trust in God. He humbled himself, not daring even to look up toward Heaven, and beat his breast, saying, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!" Both the Pharisee and the Publican started their prayer the same way: "O God…" But how different these prayers were! One was a proud self-justification, the other a humble plea for mercy. And the Lord pronounced his judgment on these two men. The sinner who begged for mercy was deemed righteous ("went down to his house justified") and the proud though law-abiding man was deemed unrighteous. Why? Jesus explains: "For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted."

This teaching exemplifies the general thrust of the Gospel that God is looking at the heart, at its conversion and purification and complete turning toward Him in faith and love, and not merely at an external performance of good deeds. Good deeds are important, even indispensable, as we also see in the Scriptures, but they only acquire their value when the heart is right with God, and such a heart must be a humble one.

What then is humility, and how do we acquire a humble heart? Much has been written or said about this, but not all of it gets to the essence of it. Humility begins with honesty; it is not a pious façade of downcast looks or self-deprecating words. Such a façade usually is a cover for a self-satisfied pride or for giving oneself permission to look down on others who aren’t quite so humble. Someone once told me of a monk in a community who, in false humility, called attention to himself by saying, "Woe is me! I am the greatest sinner!" The abbot quickly put him in his place by saying: "No you’re not; you’re insignificant." So the poor fellow immediately lost his claim to fame! I wonder if we should even say, as we do in our pre-Communion prayer, that "God came to save sinners, of whom I am the first" (that is, the foremost). Perhaps we should rather say, "of whom I am a run-of-the-mill, unimportant, nondescript specimen."

Be that as it may, the fearless honesty that comes from a self-examination totally free from self-deception is the basis of true humility. Only when we see ourselves as we really are—not as we’d like to be or as we imagine ourselves to be, or as we assess ourselves to be as we look down on others—can we truly pray the prayer of the publican. How can we ask for mercy if we already think we are righteous? The Lord himself said that the righteous need no repentance (Lk 15:7). So it is a contradiction to think we are righteous and still pray for mercy. The humble person knows that he needs help, that he needs healing and counsel and guidance. He knows he is not self-sufficient, that he lacks wisdom, that he just doesn’t measure up. He doesn’t pray phony prayers that merely make him sound humble (for he knows that God cannot be deceived); he is well aware from bitter experience that he really is in desperate need of mercy and of as much grace as God is willing to give! And to the humble God is willing to give. For we read several times in the Bible: "God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble." The humble person also knows that, in one way or another, he deserves the trials and sufferings and reproaches that fall on him for, like the publican, he is a sinner. He accepts them without resentment or bitterness, and offers them to God as so many sacrifices. This element of humility is repeatedly stressed by the monastic fathers.

Sometimes humility, rather that ascetical feats or great deeds, is what God really wants from us. I remember taking on a certain penance that was fairly severe, believing that God was asking this of me (and maybe He was, but perhaps for other reasons than I thought). Well, it turned out that I just didn’t have the strength for it, and it was even doing me some harm. I was somewhat crestfallen over that (which may be a sign of pride, thinking I could do what was beyond me), so I asked the Lord, "What do I do now?" The question was barely out of my mouth when the answer came: "Humble yourself." So I did, and that may have been the main reason He asked for a difficult penance in the first place. I accepted my inability to do what I set out to do, though I did retain—in all humility!—a modified form of the penance, which I hope is still acceptable to God. Now this doesn’t mean that we can say to God, "Well, I’m too weak to overcome this particular sin, so I’ll just humble myself and keep on doing it." God sees right through that charade, for He always grants sufficient grace to overcome sin. Yet whenever we do fall—and since his grace is sufficient we know that every sin is really our own fault—we must indeed humble ourselves, repent and confess our sins, and firmly decide to be more responsive to God’s grace in the future. To fall in the first place is not such a grievous evil—but to refuse to learn the lessons of the fall is the root of further falls.

So, as we prepare for Lent, the time of spiritual struggle and purification, the time for an extended examination of conscience, the time for rooting out pride and cultivating humility, let us learn the lessons of this parable. We are called to do good, but not to use good deeds either as leverage before God or as a criterion for judging others. If we do this we will find ourselves, like the Pharisee, walking away unjustified, unrighteous in the eyes of God, which eyes are the only ones that matter. Let us rather honestly recognize our weakness, our inadequacy, our sinfulness, and turn to God wholeheartedly in humble repentance. The one who knows his own sins has no time or inclination to look around and notice the sins of others.

So what shall it be: "God, I thank You that I am better than others" or "God, be merciful to me, a sinner"? The Lord hears the cry of a humble heart, but He hears not the empty words of the proud. Christians tend to approve of the virtue of humility but are loath to actually practice it. Let’s try it, though. It might actually bring us closer to God. If we find that we resist correction or instruction, if we think we know it better than others, if we become defensive when a fault of ours is pointed out, we are without humility. It’s a difficult task, but necessary one. For it is only in humbling ourselves that we will be exalted to the heights of the heavenly Kingdom.

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