Rachel Levine ist derzeit Gesundheitsministerin im US-Bundesstaat Pennsylvania
Foto: Joe Hermitt / AP
El peregrino ruso
oración constante al andar por los caminos escabrosas de la vida. Vía unitiva y hesicasmo de quietud en la certidumbre deque todo pasa. No así tu palabra, Señor. Comprendí entonces el don de la filocalía y el amor a la belleza pero a Dios no se le puede explicar. Hay que sentirlo en la belleza del canto, se plasma en el arte de la pintura y la arquitectura. El cristianismo es liturgia y tradición. Constante presencia de Dios. Nada importa de lo que pasa. Alejo todo pensamiento. Aprendí la manera sinaítica. Para mí escriboir es una forma de rezar, vivo un exilio interior. La palabra salva. Es un dardo que procede del aljaba de Señor, que conmueve y traspasa. Camino verstas y más verstas. Treinta kilómetros muchos días y no me siento cansado. La plegaria alivia mis dolores, con ella renuncio a las pasiones pero nada de lo humano me es ajeno: la lujuria, la envidia, la traición. Padre nuestro que estás en los cielos lava mi culpa en la cual fui engendrado. He encontrado a Dios mediante la quietud, escuchando el sonido de la respiración mientras mis labios musitan lña letanía del Kirie eleyson. El hesicasmo viene de la palabra griega “hesikia” que quiere decir quietud con la cual pacifico y me uno a la renuncia. El mundo es bello pero este no es más que un alto en el camino hacia una vida mejor. Apenas voy a la iglesia católica. Mi templo es el cielo raso el gran sabaoth o el apartamiento de mi celda. Donde gozo de la libertad tan española. Por la noche mirop las estrellas bajo la helada del Día del Bautiosmo del Señor la gran fiesta de la ortodoxia rusa. Los popes bendicen las aguas y algunos fieles exaltados se revuelcan en el hielo purificador. Señor, lava mis culpas. Soy un yurodivi, un pobre vagabundo, no otra cosa soy, un loco de Cristo. Las gentes me miran con compasión. ¿Adonde oirá ese majara de Dios? Lejos de la apologética y la teología occidental el Oriente me llevó hacia la senda de las grandes verdades evangélicas hacia la palabra que no pasará en un mundo cambiante. Este desasimiento me libra de la vanidad de agobios y preocupaciones. Soy dispsomanos y Cuando siento ganas de echar un trago abro un capitulo del evangelio de Marcos y se me pasan las ansias del alcohol. “pokaiani” ces la palabra rusa que más me gusta significa tranquilidad y arrepentimiento. La iglesia católica debe recuperar su esencia en la iglesia oriental. Nosotros divinizamos al hombre lo endiosamos. Ellos humanizan a Dios. Todo es muy simple y sencillo en el cristianismo. Busco así el reino de Dios y todo lo demás se nos dará por añadidura. No temais. La peste pasará, como pasaremos nosotros pecadores pero Su Palabra no pasará. Basta de escudriñar y de explicar. Dios es lo bello, lo bueno y lo perfecto. La fuerza del Paráclito se oculta en la sonrisa de un niño en el médico que atiende a un enfermo en el maestro que enseña a los párvulos el abecedario y en el joven que ayuda a cruzar un semáforo a un anciano. Sí, yo soy un yurodivi, un borracho un pecador pero predico en estas págiinas la palabra de Dios. Nada me asusta. Entro en las cárceles en los hospitales en los lupanares en las casas de contratación y hay una coraza que me pone a salvo de los dardos enemigos. Un vagabundo, un pirado, locura de Cristo en mis genes. Salgo al campo de la Red a desfacer entuertos a librar a las doncellas en peligro y a ofrecer a mis semejantes un poco de amor y compasión
The following homily was delivered on the feast of Theophany in 2020 following the Divine Liturgy and the Blessing of the Waters at the Epiphany Cathedral in Moscow.
Photo: patriarchia.ru
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit!
Today is a great day—we are celebrating Theophany. We also call this day [in Russian] Baptism, because the feast was established in honor of the Baptism of our Lord and Savior in the waters of the Jordan by the hand of St. John.
It was on this day that the Holy Trinity was manifest to the world: The Son of God being baptized, the Spirit of God descending, and the Father pronouncing the great Divine mystery: This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased.
The Holy Spirit descended upon the Savior in a wondrous manner, although He was not in need of it. Reflecting upon this, St. John Chrysostom asks that if the Savior did not need the Spirit to descend, then what did the Spirit descend upon? The Spirit descended upon the visible, material world—the same world that, from the moment of the Fall, was full of hatred, strife, enmity, wars, and all kinds of impurity. This world was in need of sanctification, and not just people with their darkened minds and soul—but nature itself was caught up in and oppressed by the vortex of ever-expanding sin.
Therefore, on the day of Theophany, the Spirit descends not only upon the Son of God and the Son of Man, not just upon the human nature of Jesus Christ, but upon the waters of the Jordan, meaning upon all of creation, upon all of God’s world. And this occurred before the atonement, as a prefiguration of the great liberation of both mankind and the entire universe from the pull of sin.
We well know that, despite the mercy of God revealed to all of creation and to mankind, sin has not disappeared from our lives, but continues to exist. Sin, according to St. John Chrysostom, triumphs over mankind, but not forever. It cannot be the ultimate victor, because sin is defeated by the Savior. It is thanks to the death and Resurrection of our Lord and Savior that the great grace of the Holy Spirit is granted, so that, relying on this Divine power, every man, the whole of mankind, might be able to transfigure both itself and the surrounding world.
But it is very important that the transfiguration brought about by man, for example, regarding nature and the world around him, be brought about not in the name of sinful egoism, not in order to possess more and more tangible goods, not in order to relax and satisfy his needs, but rather that, in harmony with man, the world might manifest the Divine plan that was manifested in the act of creation, but was then damaged by human sin.
The day of the Baptism of the Lord testifies to the fact that the world has been recreated by the grace of God. The power of the grace of God is a power able to take a sinful man and recreate him as a man sanctified by Divine grace; to recreate the ravaged and darkened world as a world in its original beauty. But none of this happens automatically—it happens with the participation of man. And we must remember that every one of us must respond to this Divine grace sent down upon the whole of mankind and upon the whole of creation with faith, participation in good works, and prayer.
There can be no real improvement of the world without it. None of the well-known projects for improving human society by reform or revolution attain their goal, because they do not ensure human happiness. Human happiness is impossible without the presence of Divine grace.
This is why today is a day of the triumph of God’s mercy. The granting of the grace of the Holy Spirit for all of human nature is very important for all our worldviews. The feast of Theophany calls us to participate in God’s work of transfiguring the world, which begins with the transfiguration of our bodies and souls. This is the great responsibility on all those who have entered into the Church through the baptismal font, who are children of God, to whom is first extended the Divine call to cooperate with the grace of the Holy Spirit, with the transfiguration of ourselves and the world around us. We are called to all of this.
To some, these words may seem too abstract and far from life, but everyone who has experienced the effect of God’s grace, liberation from sin, the joy of communing of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, the joy of the renewal of the body and soul, knows what we are talking about. All of this is possible, if only we desire it, and if in response to the Divine call, we, relying on our faith, walk the great path of sanctifying ourselves and the world around us by the power of the grace of God.
Amen.
Zaporozhye, Ukraine, January 18, 2021
Photo: spzh.news
Another cleric of the Zaporozhye Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church was attacked with a knife on Saturday night following the All-Night Vigil.
“Following the All-Night Vigil, there was attempt to attack our deacon Fr. George Cherpakov. He was walking with is matushka and his child in the same area as Fr. Vladimir Gumenyuk. Fr. George was in his cassock. The attacker also tried to cut him with a knife, but glory to God, everything worked out and they got off with just a fright. The police were called and wrote a report,” writes Archpriest Gennady Elin, the head of the Zaporozhye Diocese chancery.
Archpriest Vladimir Gumenyuk was stabbed in the head on January 12 while out in plain clothes. He went to the hospital, where he underwent surgery to remove a hematoma.
Archpriest Vladimir Ovcharenko, the press secretary of the Zaporozhye Diocese commented that “It looks like a series [of attacks]; how I would like to be wrong. A list of countries where its most difficult to be a Christian was recently published. Ukraine was not on it. Yet.”
After the attack on Fr. Vladimir, His Eminence Metropolitan Luke of Zaporozhye wrote:
Any parishioner of our Church or any resident of our city could be in his place tomorrow. It could also be a warning to both the ruling bishop and the clergy of our diocese. But to those who directed this man to do such a thing, we note that the entire history of the Church’s earthly existence testifies that neither Herod, nor Diocletian, nor Stalin, nor Hitler, nor others like them, could do anything with the Church. It stands and affirms the word of Truth, so even now it is possible to kill our body, but not our soul! The Church stood, stands, and will stand! And all its spiteful opponents will fall into oblivion!
