Luke 24:1-12 (Matins)
Ephesians 5:8-19
Luke 12:16-21

Be Merry

The first time we heard the proclamation, "Eat! Drink! Be merry!" no doubt, a great positive was heard. I looked around me and saw all the adults filled with anticipation and joyfulness. As at the house of Chaucer's squire, where it "rains food and drink," we hear, hospitality, a gathering of friends and family, and the warmth of hearth and home. How sobering it is, therefore, to discover that the origin of this phrase has no positive feelings connected to it whatever. It is rooted in the most negative connotations possible: not family revels, but rather family grieving .... yet worse than that, for the scene depicts not merely a departure from the world but the arrival to a world far worse.

The wealthy plantation owner must face his Eternal Judge. The gravest event of his life has begun to unfold. Yet, he, in a godless state and in a giddy spirit, is not ready. He sits in his counting house. He will drink toast after toast to himself, and then he will fall into his bed in drunkenness and from there ... out of the world.

Perhaps you have heard the story of the "village idiot" and the king. One poor fellow in a kingdom is picked out for derision. His simple mind has marked him to be the "public fool." One day the king passes by and joins the others in their mockery of him. Seeking to top the others in clever insult, he hands the poor, bullied man a walking staff saying, "Go! Travel all the world! And if you find a fool greater than yourself, hand him this staff." Predictably, the obedient and simple man hears the command and does it. He departs through the city gate with his walking stick, heading down the road, setting off general hilarity. The poor man travels from kingdom to kingdom seeking a man more simple than himself. And many years pass until finally he returns to his own kingdom.

"Where is the king?" he asks. "The streets are empty."

The king, he is told, lies ill. He is on his deathbed. So the poor man heads toward the palace asking leave to draw near the royal bedside.

When the king sees him, he sighs. "I fear that I am too old. And now I must depart on a long journey. It is, by far, the most important mission of my life. But I find, here at the point of departure, that I am not prepared for it."

Hearing this, the fool replies, "You are about to set out on the most important journey of your life, and you have not prepared for it?! Sire, take this staff, for truly you are a greatest fool than I."

This is ironic, for the Western Christian calendar intended the opposite. All Hallows E'en (called Halloween) for centuries was an occasion for reflecting on the greater life. We were summoned to meditate on our own lives, which all too soon must end. Halloween was said to be the day when the dead stirred from their sleep reminding us that we belong to a vast human family, beyond counting — all those who have lived on earth. The ones now living represent a microscopic minority. You know, we occupy ourselves taking censuses asking ourselves, What is the present population of New York? What is the population of China? But these are nothing compared to the population of people who once lived.

The next day on the Western calendar is All Hallows Day (also called All Saints Day), a day to celebrate the greater life and the heroes who have preceded us. The day after this, we observe All Souls Days, praying for souls whose eternal fate is unknown to us but who might profit by our prayers.

There three used to be called "Little Triduum" — All Hallows E'en, All Hallows Day, and All Souls Day, a time for contemplating our own lives, our deaths (which must come all too soon), and the greater life. It anticipates Great Triduum, which will arrive with Great Pascha.

Not long after this an official day of banquets and feasting, a harvest celebration, is obverved, focusing on family and home. It is a time for taking stock. For inevitably your past and your future are held up in high relief. And you must face all those aunts and uncles who want to know, "What are you doing with your life?"

After this, Western Christians embarks upon the season of Advent, which a special time for examination of conscience, preparing ourselves for the arrival of the Savior. You recall: "Let very heart prepare Him room!" And you look around at your house and ask, "Am I ready to receive the King of Kings?" And you look at your life and wonder, "Am I ready to receive the Lord of my life?" He numbers the hairs on your head. He watches over your every thought and deed.

That such a long season, should have devolved into a prolonged, wearisome season for feasting, conspicuous consumption, drinking, and all the things you do when your drunk is surely a dark victory, the devil's victory, affirming very different divine figures in our fallen lives, the fallen angels who run rampant in our fallen world. Are they not the ones who cry out, "Eat, drink, and be merry!"

Are not these, by far, the dominating figures in our lives and in our world generally? So which feast is their high holy day? In America I nominate, "Black Friday" — a phrase made of two words that inevitably call to mind the martyrdom of God's Son. Yes, I know its historical meaning celebrates the day when retailers are "in the black," enjoying huge profits. But isn't it ironic that the co-incidence of these words, Friday and Black, inescapably touch upon the greatest tragedy in human history, which is the rejection of God and the murder of His Son? It is the one day in the year that I take a chasuble out of the closet which is black and dress the chalice with a black burse and veil.

Tell me, Is this not a sign from sign from Heaven, a marker in our divine journeys that we would be foolish to disregard? We might say that this is the Age of Black Friday. To dismiss this irony is to become the sort of person who also dismisses the existence of spiritual warfare, of angels and demons, of Heaven and Hell, and of God Himself.

Remember, the Father is the Master of All Timings. So-called coincidence is the primary instrument He uses to communicate with us. Now, what do great diagnosticians, famous detectives, and people of God have in common? They reject the category, "Coincidence."

I recall a conversation maybe fifteen years ago. I was attending a reception in my Roman Catholic diocese. The clergy was gathered with the bishop. In those days, I suppose we had sixty-five priests and more than a hundred deacons. Drinks were served. A spirit of conviviality reigned. But the bishop had a concern he wanted to take up with me in private conversation.

"Father," he said, "I have heard that you think of 'the devil' as being an actual person present among the people, and you speak about him in this way. Now, surely there is evil in the world. But a literal, historical 'devil'? Isn't that going a bit too far?!"

I replied, "Excellency, I see him all around me. Lately, I have been contemplating his strategies and tactics. And now he is very close to victory. Consider his primary targets: marriage, our children, the Church — checkmate." I have rarely seen a man turn pale faster than this bishop, and he walked away in silence.

We must never forget that a core principle of the Christian faith, going back to the Apostles, is that literal facts and events have an allegorical meaning. But we must not turn that around. With John Updike, we must say, "Let us not mock God with metaphor." You see, just because there exists an allegorical meaning (Satan's empire of evil, for example) does not mean that there is not a historical, literal level from which it arises.

It follows that that every biography in the world also must be read on two levels. Each person will tell you about the historical level: of family and friends and of things that happened to them. Yet, inevitably all of these biographies also have an allegorical meaning, have a spiritual significance. And the same is true of all histories, of all cultures, and of all civilizations. Yes, each sets out a chronicle of historical persons and events, but inevitably it also tells a spiritual story, with deeper, allegorical meanings, leading to a spiritually significant conclusion. For each is either a godly story or it is a tragedy, a tale of alienation from God.

Roughly half-century ago I began to study languages and literatures as I prepared to become a medievalist, a specialist in the English Middle Ages. During that time I studied occultism and learned more about "black arts" than I ever wished to know. I learned that by ancient tradition, the fallen angels have no prayers or liturgies of their own. The essence of Satanism is to take what is holy and turn it on its head. For example, the tradition teaches that God made the world by breathing His Real Name over the void, which set of vibrations. And these vibrations set up more ibrations, which set up more vibrations, and so forth, until all coalesced and crystalized into the material world. But to utter God's Real Name backwords would be being all crashing down into original chaos dissolution.

You see, goodness alone belongs to God (Mk 10:18). And all that is not good is God's Creation subverted.

Soon after Thanksgiving Thursday, the Orthodox Catholic world begins the forty-day Nativity Fast (which we are not in). This most ancient practice bids us rein in feasting and drinking and conspicuous consumption. Living each day on the slenderest of food stuffs — vegetables and leafy greens without dressing, bread without butter, water, not milk.

Yes, the holy worlds of the Apostles and the Early Church could not have foreseen Black Friday and the long orgy of self-indulgence leading up to the birth of the Savior. It could not have foreseen America, its great promise, and then what would become of it, the erosion of our Freedoms: Freedom of Speech (whether others agreed with you or not); Freedom of Worship (as the FBI puts devout Catholics on their watch list); and Freedom from Fear from tyranny (for surely we live now in a tyrannical period).

Happily the Nativity Fast has the effect of reminding us each day of great imperatives that cannot be dislodged from the sober mind or the godly heart. You see, your faith cannot be taken from you. And so we commence the fast contemplating certain truths: