ANGER EVIL AND DEADLY

ANGER

EVIL AND DEADLY

     Anger, for the wrong reason, can be extremely damaging and lead to disaster. When wrongly angered we become our brother’s accuser and, we damage him as well as our own souls. If we could see the hideous look of anger on our face, we would shrink from the ugliness of anger. The virtue of meekness stands in opposition to the vice of anger, and a meek person is always welcome anywhere. Unreasonable anger , as is well known, appears under the form of  “road rage”. Often it proves to be deadly and inflicting damage those who are  involved.  Truthfully there is nothing in this world worth being angry about, nor does unreasonable anger or rage solve a single problem, but creates a bad atmosphere which is fouled by its presence.

     Christ, who is risen, expressed the beauty of following Him: “Come all you that are heavily laden (with sins) and I will give you rest Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and humble in my heart. And you shall find rest in your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Mat. 11:28-30)

 St. Nicolai Velimirovic

“Be angry but do not sin” (Psalm 4:4).

   Be angry with yourselves, brethren, and sin no more.  Be angry at your sins of thought and deed, and sin no more. Be angry with Satan, the father of lies, and no longer do his will. Be angry at the sin in the world and at the fouling of God’s holy Church by godless men, but beware of healing sin by sin.  Be angry with your friends when they sin, but let your anger be directed toward turning them back and not driving them into further evil. 

   The anger of a friend towards his friend, of a parent towards his child – and dare I say it?  Of God towards men, is not a storm that uproots trees, but a wind that makes a tree stronger, making the rotten fruit fall so that the good fruit may be even better and finer.  Control your anger, that it might heal and not poison.  To have this control, keep God before you in your anger.  Anger can have no stronger damn or lock than God.  All anger that is not in the name of God and His justice is sin. Do not be angry for nothing, but be angry at that at which God is angered. If your will is set firmly in God’s law, you will always be able to be angry when anger is needed, and to the measure to which it is needed. This cannot all be spelled out with words and explained to the ignorant. Anger in its place acts as mercy does.

     O my brethren, do you see how various powers are put into our souls, that man can use freely for life or death?  Anger with oneself can never be recommended strongly enough.  It is a marvelous fact that the more man learns to be angry with himself, the less he is angry with other, for, knowing his own weaknesses, he either does not look at others or, if he sees them, judges them gently.

     O Lord God, the only Just One, sow in us the remembrance of the day of your just anger, that we may keep ourselves from sin in our souls. To you be glory and praise forever. Amen.

                                                                   (Prologue Vol.4  P20)

PASCHA IS NEVER OVER!

 PASCHA IS NEVER OVER!

    Someone recently remarked: “Well, Pascha is over until next year.”  Indeed, Pascha will certainly come next year, but Pascha can  never be over for those who are living in the unending Pascha of  Orthodoxy.  For every baptized Orthodox Christian becomes a temple of God, who dwells in them through baptism and chrismation. In baptism we all died to sin and put on Christ as a garment.  Hence we sing  with St. Paul: “As many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. Alleluia.” In baptism, the old man of sin is drowned in the baptismal waters, and when we came up out of the waters, we died as the old Adam and arose with the resurrected  Christ.  

  Having Christ dwelling in us, we become the temple of God, and  having been washed and made clean, we were then sealed with the gift of Holy Spirit, who abides within us forever if we remain faithful. 

     Many of us were baptized as infants and so were unaware of the wonderful events which surrounded us when we were baptized into Christ and anointed with holy chrism. The great responsibility concerning the valuable gifts we received, St. Paul mentions in his first epistle to the Corinthians:  “Do you not know that you are the temple of God; and that the Spirit of God dwells within you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple you are” (1 Cor. 3:16-17).  

PASCHA HAS NOT ENDED NOR WILL IT EVER END

PASCHA HAS NOT ENDED

NOR WILL IT EVER END

      Pascha is the continuous celebration by Orthodox Christians being the Feast of feasts, and the time of great joy and exultation. The Feast Day itself is considered and lived as a single day of celebration, not with parties eating and drinking  but in the holy churches, or at home, having  the triumphant hymns of Pascha on our lips. It is also the continuous enjoyment of the divine mysteries. the immortal food which descends from heaven. The Paschal season continues for forty days during which we joyously sing: “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down on death by death and to those in the tomb, He has granted life.”  Even then, the celebration does not end, for in every Sunday Orthos (Matins) we continue to rejoice in the resurrection with the Gospel accounts of the Resurrection of Christ. Pascha is continuous; Pascha raises our souls; Pascha is heaven on earth!

     The objective of all this celebration is to arouse the Orthodox Christian souls to take part in  a new and resurrected life, for the true Orthodox Christian is the resurrected man. In the second Ode of the Paschal Canon we sing in the first tone:

    “Yesterday I was buried with you, today I rise with your arising. Yesterday I was crucified with you, glorify me O Savior with you in your kingdom.” The resurrected man is the man who arises in the resurrection, the man whom God conceived from the beginning, and who gradually becomes more and more His image and likeness. Christ speaks of such men:  “Be holy for I am holy. Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.”

     “Today I rise with your arising,” means that we rise above and out of reach of the demonic powers of this world, above the blasphemies, the cursing, the fornications, the love of money, and the love of this world. As John the disciple whom Christ loves, says: “Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world; And the world passes away, with its desires, but he who does the will of God abides forever.” (1John 2:15-17).

  Rising above the world and its desires, does not mean that we stop eating, drinking, marrying, having children and exercising, but it means that we walk in the brilliancy of the  resurrection, in the newness of life!  We hear in every Divine Liturgy: “Let us commend ourselves and one another, and all our lives unto Christ our God.” Also: “That we may have a good apology at the fearful judgment seat of Christ, let us ask of the Lord.”  Each day of our lives are granted to us by God, to do whatever we choose, but we need to watch and act properly for none of us know when we will be called to give an account for our choices in this life.

   

     The resurrected Orthodox Christian, will certainly arise in the general resurrection after leaving this present world. It is clear that God does not desire that we hate the world which He created and is filled with beauty, but the moral world which the Evil one controls, through sins and transgressions of men. For if everyone disobeyed the Devil, we would have peace on earth and good will among men. There would ne no crime, no tyranny, no fornication, no adulteries, no jealousy no wars or revolutions.

     Pascha is not of this world, but is a continuous state of being for the resurrected man, who is raised above this world having chosen to live in the kingdom now, and his closest friends are the Theotokos and the many saints and martyrs.

   This resurrected life is a life of frequent prayer, reading of uplifting  books primarily the Bible every day. It is attending Church services and receiving with fear, faith and love, the Holy Mysteries, the medicine which eradicates sin within us and is the source of spiritual power and immortality. Where does this resurrected life lead to? Happiness and uninterrupted joy every day of our lives regardless of circumstances. Hope that warms our hearts and causes us to always render thanks to God for everything! May we all become children of the Resurrection and find ourselves welcomed by Christ into the future eternal Pascha!  Christ is risen!

ON THIS HOLY PASCHA A WARNING TO ALL ORTHODOX

ON THIS HOLY PASCHA

A WARNING TO ALL ORTHODOX

     Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!

    The brilliant sun of this great and holy day of  Pascha is a day of great joy but mixed with some dark clouds of danger, for  a papal representative,  invited into a holy Orthodox Church, therein boldly proclaimed that Orthodoxy broke away from the Papacy and he denied that Orthodoxy is the true Catholic  Church! According to an article in the Worcester Telegram Gazette,  the papist Bishop, Robert J. McManus of Worcester, MA boldy and proclaimed the papacy’s self aggrandizement. At St. Spyridon Orthodox Church when he made this statement:  “As you know the Orthodox Church is the Roman Catholic Church.”

     What is couched in these words, is that the holy  Orthodox Church was  once a part of the Papacy, that has broken away, which is nefarious papal propaganda, for they are aware that we have preserved the truth, and for this reason they seek to silence us. Contrary to prevailing opinion, the fact is that there was never a schism by Orthodoxy or the papacy.