"Be Friends of God"

Sadly, we spend too much time debating the saints. Many Eastern Orthodox are inclined to dismiss St. Francis of Assisi, St. Anthony of Padua, and all of those whose earthly journeys occurred after the Great Schism. (I should that thoughtful people say, "We don't know. This didn't happen on our watch.")

Westerners ask of the Eastern saints, "But where are the confirmed three miracles?" Actually, many Eastern saints and icons are bountifully "wonder-working." Last Sunday, I visited a church that had a icon that streamed myrrh. Cotton was placed to catch the myrrh as the icon was tilted up on an analogion. The small was very strong. It wasn't "bruited abroad." I suppose only the members of this small congregation knew.

But this is devilish confusion. This looks upon the saints as being them — as sports fans might debate a unanimous first-ballot hall of fame selection. But this is a trap designed to distract us from the very serious business of our lives. The saints are not them, exclusively. They are us.

We all want to go to Heaven, which after all is state of being, a state of soul, a state of Heavenliness. Indeed, after the death of loved ones, people who expressed no previous interest in religion just assume that their family member or friend "has gone to Heaven," as if it were a geography. They will tell you solemnly, "They're in a better place now."

In the belief of Evangelical Christians, nothing can stop us from "going to Heaven" — not suicide, not murder, not a promiscuous lifestyle — so long as "you believe Jesus is Lord." Let us call this "instant salvation," and no sin can nullify it, which is called "eternal security."

The Roman Catholic Church has problems with this facile presumption of Heaven. This is why, several decades ago, public eulogies by the laity were banned at Requiem Masses, where it had become de regueure to picture the deceased "in Heaven" and cutely joke about the decedents well-known antics now confounding the saints. Not so funny.

Nonetheless, a historical teaching of the Roman Catholic Church does assume "instant salvation," which is Jesus' sacrifice on the Cross, re-enacted at every Mass, instantly replenishing the world with its immediate effects, as passive observers silently look on in rows upon rows of pews.

The implication is that if you go to Church and live "check-list religion," you will "get into" Heaven. But, again, Heaven is not a place called Paradise. It is not the Miami of the 1950s, not the Hawaii of the 1970s. It is a state of being.

In contrast to both Protestant and Roman Catholic worship, there are no pews in Eastern Orthodox cathedrals (at least the ones that have not been Westernized), no lines of division between ourselves and the saints we see on iconastases, on pillars, and around us on analogia. A great cloud of witness surrounds us (Heb 12:1), and we are with them.

I recall Sr. Mary Anne and I went on a Franciscan pilgrimage some years ago. We visited all twenty-one missions down the California coast. Why we visited Calistoga I cannot say. Arriving there, we read in the paper that an Orthodox monastery was celebrating their patronal feast. So we paid them a visit. We were being invited into the monastery church. The abbess escorted us. We looked in. It was dark, empty, mysterious, and beautiful. Not knowing if I should genuflect, I asked the abbess, "Is the Lord present?" looking in vain for a lighted sanctuary lamp. (The Sisters nod knowingly.) She said simply, though profoundly, "We have good fellowship here." You see, the church was not empty at all, but overflowing with a fellowship that I could not see through my Western eyes.

In the place where we gather to greet the Lord Jesus during the Divine Liturgy, Who is very Present to us, we stand among the saints in light, and we are enjoined to look upon the person standing next to us as being another one in a great cloud: a living, breathing saint. Each is precious in God's eyes (He famously numbers the hairs on their heads) as they continue to climb the Ladder of their sanctification, continuing to do little things and great to attain to spiritual perfection by the grace of God.

You see? The drama of our salvation is not out there, it is in here: in the human heart, which has committed itself to following the Master, emulating Him in all ways (such that a human can). I have seen the pronouncement that "The Church is not a gathering place for saints but a hospital for sinners." I suppose this meme is a drawn from St. John Chrysostom's teaching that the Church is a hospital for sinners and not a courtroom for condemnation. Let us say that the Church is a gathering of saints, who are presently on different stages in their progress towards holiness. Those further behind are not to be condemned but rather encouraged and helped along. And those who further ahead .... we watch them, silently. We watch them and learn.

If I were asked to choose one thing that distinguishes Holy Orthodoxy from the spiritual traditions which followed it, I would say it is theosis, the process of deification, which is the unfolding of the blueprint, set within us at birth. We were all destined to become saints form the start. We were born with a birthright to Heaven. From the beginning we are called "gods":

From Psalm 81,

But we knew this all along: the royal Image has been set upon us from the beginning, and our hearts yearn for our true home from the moment we realize that the world is a landscape of alienation. Now, which adult, I ask you, sees the same world he did as a child? We reach that point when we see the world for what it is.

In wistful moments, we long to return to that native Heavenliness, which is our original state. We are called to be perfect. Jesus tells us,

We are to retrieve the childlike souls of our youth.

Have you seen icons commemorating the Dormition? Have you seen Jesus holding the soul of His Mother? And what does Her soul look like? It is depicted as a tiny child in swaddling clothes.

The Master warns us,

Do you see what I mean about Heavenliness within the human heart and attaining to the state of being which is Heaven. We must become pure:

God gives us the graces we need to attain to perfection, to innocence, and to purity. And He does one more thing: He gives us each other.

Yes, we live in a hermitage. We are religious hermits. But we are not solitaries. Our rule of life (written by St. Francis) states, "at least two but no more than three" because we need each other.

I am a chaplain to nuns. I watch them day-by-day as they go about their ascent: loving God, attempting to live blameless lives, and rejoicing in the Spirit. Their unfailing charity to others in this bumptious world is perhaps the quality I admire most (because it is so hard for me). The Sisters humble me. They remind me of my unworthiness. And this spurs me on to my solemn aspiration to achieve saintliness.

This is why the Lord tells us,

At least two but no more than three .... not four or five or six, for that results in an entirely different dynamic. Three people are able to live as solitaries .... as community. St. Francis wrote that one will be a mother to the others .... in turn. The Spirit will call to each one in season to speak up. We are to help each other, and correct each other when we stumble. Do you know the Italian proverb, "Your enemy does not tell you when you have dirt on your face." And of course we inspire each other.

And the Lord said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother?
And he said, I know not: Am I my brother's keeper?   (Gen 4:9)

Jesus replies in His Parable of the Good Samaritan. Who then is justified?

What is sanctification? It is choosing always for the things of God and rejecting always the world that is in rebellion against God. The earliest semblance of a feast called "All Saints" was to commemorate red martyrs. But we need not spill our physical blood to turn our face against the world.

To be sure, the Scriptural warrants to turn your back on the world are manifold. Jesus tells us,

Understanding this, who would run back to the embrace of the world? And

And St. John reminds us of the Master's injunction:

Do you see? Love of the things of the world is an act of betrayal against Father God.

And the brother you are called to keep? Who is he? He is the one who has acted on his birthright to Heaven, on his adoption by God. For not everyone acts on God's love. Strangely enough. Not everyone acts on God's love. This is part of the drama of the parent and child familiar to each of us — that tears were shed for us though we never paid it any mind.

St. Paul writes,

It is through these eyes, as sons and daughters of God, that we look upon each other as siblings, responsible for each other, helping each other, challenging each other. And we together look out on the world as strangers in a strange land.

Still, we find set within it that sign of our true home: in the world though not of the world, the Kingdom of Heaven which is the assemblage of saints in our sight, the luminous Church. At each Eucharist we pray from our humble chapel,

For if we are son and daughters of God, we have a notable Brother, Who loves us.

said the Western saint Catherine of Siena. Nothing but Heaven all the way to Heaven — this is our life in the Church.

Yes, we are irretrievably in the world. As William Butler Yeats described it, an immortal soul fastened to a dying animal. Yet, we must live in that marvelous and mystical Kingdom of Heaven.

I have just returned from San Francisco to honor St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco, and I set foot in that Kingdom in his Cathedral, where he presided in his incorrupt state. He was set in the midst of all in his incorrupt state with his beautful full head of hair and his beard and hands folded on his chest. And I heard majestic voices that were electrifying. I saw faces radiant with the Holy Spirit. I looked all around as countless people reverently approached the Holy Ones present in their icons — people of all ages from very young to very old. I saw families forging unbreakable bonds in the fire of the Holy Spirit, filled them with His Love.

We must fasten ourselves to the communion of saints — the saints we meet and can talk to and the saints in light. We must set our eyes on Him Who is Life Itself. For He chose us out of the world, and we are His obedient and devoted children:

This is our common destiny. So let us go together. Let us give ourselves to "good fellowship." Let us "Be Friends of God" (Pope St. Gregory the Great).

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.