WEBVTT 00:00:00.010 --> 00:00:04.150 Back in 1983, while I was at St. Vladimir's Seminary, 00:00:04.410 --> 00:00:08.330 we had this service, and Fr. Alexander Schmemann 00:00:08.330 --> 00:00:13.710 gave the sermon that evening, and it was transcribed, 00:00:13.910 --> 00:00:16.390 and I want to read just a little bit about what 00:00:16.390 --> 00:00:19.910 he said on that day. Once more, we're about to 00:00:19.910 --> 00:00:23.350 enter Great Lent. I'd like to remind us, myself 00:00:23.350 --> 00:00:26.769 first of all, and all of you, fathers, brothers, 00:00:27.010 --> 00:00:31.120 sisters, of the verse that we just sang, and 00:00:31.120 --> 00:00:34.039 that the verse that says, let us set out with 00:00:34.039 --> 00:00:38.659 joy upon the season of the fast. Only yesterday 00:00:38.659 --> 00:00:42.600 we were commemorating Adam, weeping, lamenting 00:00:42.600 --> 00:00:45.619 at the gates of paradise, and now every second 00:00:45.619 --> 00:00:48.060 line of the Triodion, the hymn book of Lent, 00:00:48.079 --> 00:00:50.479 and the liturgical books will speak of repentance, 00:00:50.960 --> 00:00:54.359 acknowledging what dark and helpless lives we 00:00:54.359 --> 00:00:58.560 live, in which sometimes we are immersed. And 00:00:58.560 --> 00:01:02.560 yet, no one will prove to me that the general 00:01:02.560 --> 00:01:06.299 tonality of great Lent is not that of a tremendous 00:01:06.299 --> 00:01:11.200 joy. Not what we call joy in this world. Not 00:01:11.200 --> 00:01:13.879 just something entertaining, interesting, or 00:01:13.879 --> 00:01:17.400 amusing, but the deepest definition of joy, that 00:01:17.400 --> 00:01:20.540 joy of which Jesus Christ says, no one will take 00:01:20.540 --> 00:01:25.620 from you. Why joy? What is that joy? Lent is 00:01:25.620 --> 00:01:29.159 a gift. Lent is a gift from God to us, a gift 00:01:29.159 --> 00:01:32.939 which is admirable, marvelous, one that we desire. 00:01:33.840 --> 00:01:37.359 Now a gift of what? I would say that it is a 00:01:37.359 --> 00:01:41.060 gift of the essential. That which is essential 00:01:41.060 --> 00:01:43.260 and yet which suffers most in our life because 00:01:43.260 --> 00:01:46.239 we are living lives of confusion and fragmentation, 00:01:46.319 --> 00:01:49.659 lives which constantly conceal from us the eternal, 00:01:49.920 --> 00:01:53.099 the glorious, the divine meaning of life and 00:01:53.099 --> 00:01:56.439 take away from us that which should push. Push 00:01:56.439 --> 00:01:59.500 us and thus correct and fill our life with joy. 00:01:59.959 --> 00:02:03.680 And this essential, what is this essential? Thanksgiving. 00:02:04.319 --> 00:02:07.140 Thanksgiving, the acceptance from God of the 00:02:07.140 --> 00:02:11.340 life, as St. Peter says, created out of nothing. 00:02:12.379 --> 00:02:15.900 Created exclusively by the love of God. For there 00:02:15.900 --> 00:02:19.780 is no other reason for us to exist. Loved by 00:02:19.780 --> 00:02:23.340 him even before we were born. We were taken into 00:02:23.340 --> 00:02:27.280 his marvelous light. Now we live and forget. 00:02:28.139 --> 00:02:31.580 When was the last time I thought about it? But 00:02:31.580 --> 00:02:33.620 I do not forget so many little things and affairs 00:02:33.620 --> 00:02:37.419 that transform my life into empty noise, into 00:02:37.419 --> 00:02:41.280 a kind of traveling without knowing where. Lent 00:02:41.280 --> 00:02:46.039 returns to me, gives back to me this essential, 00:02:46.280 --> 00:02:49.539 the essential layer of life. Essential because 00:02:49.539 --> 00:02:53.219 it is coming from God. Essential because it reveals 00:02:53.219 --> 00:02:57.000 God. The essential time, because time again is 00:02:57.000 --> 00:03:01.520 a great, great area of sin. Because time is the 00:03:01.520 --> 00:03:07.159 time of what? Of priorities. How often our priorities 00:03:07.159 --> 00:03:10.360 are not at all as they should be. Yet in great 00:03:10.360 --> 00:03:16.060 Lent, waiting, listening, singing, you will see 00:03:16.060 --> 00:03:20.099 little by little that time that is broken and 00:03:20.099 --> 00:03:22.639 deviated, taking us to death and nowhere else. 00:03:23.370 --> 00:03:26.650 without any meaning, you will see that time again 00:03:26.650 --> 00:03:30.270 becomes expectation, becomes something precious. 00:03:30.509 --> 00:03:33.669 You wouldn't take one minute of it away from 00:03:33.669 --> 00:03:36.689 its purpose of pleasing God, of accepting from 00:03:36.689 --> 00:03:43.509 him his life, together with our gratitude. It 00:03:43.509 --> 00:03:46.090 is also the rediscovery of the essential link 00:03:46.090 --> 00:03:49.849 among ourselves, the rediscovery that we belong 00:03:49.849 --> 00:03:53.659 to each other. The rediscovery that no one has 00:03:53.659 --> 00:03:56.259 entered my life or your life without the will 00:03:56.259 --> 00:04:00.379 of God. And that rediscovery, there is everywhere 00:04:00.379 --> 00:04:03.120 an appeal, an offering to do something for God, 00:04:03.180 --> 00:04:06.360 to help, to comfort, to transform, to take with 00:04:06.360 --> 00:04:09.379 you, with each one of you, that brother and sister 00:04:09.379 --> 00:04:13.020 of Christ. This is the essential relationship. 00:04:16.399 --> 00:04:18.939 Don't we understand? Don't we understand, brothers 00:04:18.939 --> 00:04:22.500 and sisters? what power is given to us in Lent. 00:04:23.040 --> 00:04:26.300 Lent in spring, Lent in beginning, Lent in resurrection. 00:04:26.839 --> 00:04:30.399 All of this is given to us free. Come, listen 00:04:30.399 --> 00:04:32.980 to that prayer. Make it yours. Don't even think 00:04:32.980 --> 00:04:36.079 on your own. Just join. Just enter and rejoice. 00:04:36.639 --> 00:04:39.939 And that joy will start killing those old and 00:04:39.939 --> 00:04:44.420 painful and boring sins. And with that, you will 00:04:44.420 --> 00:04:47.019 have that great joy. which the angels heard, 00:04:47.180 --> 00:04:49.720 which the disciples experienced when they returned 00:04:49.720 --> 00:04:52.680 to Jerusalem after Christ's ascension. It is 00:04:52.680 --> 00:04:56.899 that joy which was left with them that we nobly 00:04:56.899 --> 00:04:59.480 adopted. It is, first of all, the joy of knowing, 00:04:59.720 --> 00:05:03.480 the joy of having something in me which, whether 00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:06.660 I want it or not, will start transforming life 00:05:06.660 --> 00:05:10.680 in me and around me. If we would think of the 00:05:10.680 --> 00:05:14.589 real sins we have committed, We would say that 00:05:14.589 --> 00:05:17.029 one of the most important is exactly the style 00:05:17.029 --> 00:05:20.910 and tonality which we maintain with each other, 00:05:21.029 --> 00:05:25.490 our complaining and criticizing. I don't think 00:05:25.490 --> 00:05:28.449 that there are cases of great destructive hatred 00:05:28.449 --> 00:05:31.410 or assassination or something. It's just that 00:05:31.410 --> 00:05:33.870 we exist as if we are completely out of each 00:05:33.870 --> 00:05:36.350 other's life, out of each other's interests, 00:05:36.509 --> 00:05:39.189 out of each other's love, without having repaired 00:05:39.189 --> 00:05:42.220 this relationship. there is no possibility of 00:05:42.220 --> 00:05:45.899 entering Lent. Sin, whether you call it original 00:05:45.899 --> 00:05:49.920 sin or primordial sin, it's broken the unity 00:05:49.920 --> 00:05:53.939 of life in this world. It's broken time. It's 00:05:53.939 --> 00:05:57.240 broken relationships. It's broken family. Everything 00:05:57.240 --> 00:06:01.480 is diavolos, divided and destroyed. But Christ 00:06:01.480 --> 00:06:04.160 has come into the world and said, and when I 00:06:04.160 --> 00:06:07.839 am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all 00:06:07.839 --> 00:06:12.029 men to myself. If there is a strict commandment 00:06:12.029 --> 00:06:15.310 in the gospel, it is that commandment, if you 00:06:15.310 --> 00:06:18.730 forgive, your heavenly father will also forgive 00:06:18.730 --> 00:06:20.769 you. But if you do not forgive, neither will 00:06:20.769 --> 00:06:24.610 your father forgive. So, of course, it is a necessity. 00:06:25.110 --> 00:06:28.629 But the now of that, I repeat it once more, is 00:06:28.629 --> 00:06:33.209 to be horrified by that fragmentation of our 00:06:33.209 --> 00:06:36.949 own existence, by the pettiness of our relationships, 00:06:37.189 --> 00:06:40.740 by the destructive words. by the abandonment 00:06:40.740 --> 00:06:44.639 of reverence for one another. Now, we have to 00:06:44.639 --> 00:06:47.720 forgive each other, whether or not we have any 00:06:47.720 --> 00:06:50.639 explicit sins or crimes against one another. 00:06:51.720 --> 00:06:55.259 That reconciliation, that forgiveness, is an 00:06:55.259 --> 00:06:57.759 epiphany of the church as the kingdom of God. 00:06:57.860 --> 00:07:00.439 We are saved because we are in the body of Christ. 00:07:00.639 --> 00:07:03.019 We are saved because we accept from Christ the 00:07:03.019 --> 00:07:05.500 world. And finally, we accept Christ when we 00:07:05.500 --> 00:07:09.069 accept each other. Everything else is lie and 00:07:09.069 --> 00:07:14.269 hypocrisy. So fathers, brothers, sisters, let 00:07:14.269 --> 00:07:16.790 us forgive one another. Let us not think about 00:07:16.790 --> 00:07:20.350 why. There's enough to think about. Let us do 00:07:20.350 --> 00:07:23.350 it right now in a kind of deep breath. Say, Lord, 00:07:23.470 --> 00:07:27.509 help us to forgive. Lord, renew all these relationships. 00:07:27.910 --> 00:07:30.470 What a chance is given here for love to triumph. 00:07:31.689 --> 00:07:35.319 For unity to reflect the divine unity. Let us 00:07:35.319 --> 00:07:37.980 gladly accept it. This is the beginning of Lent. 00:07:38.040 --> 00:07:41.480 This is our spring repair time because reconciliation 00:07:41.480 --> 00:07:46.399 is the powerful renewal of the ruin. So please, 00:07:46.459 --> 00:07:49.600 for the sake of Christ, let us forgive each other. 00:07:49.800 --> 00:07:52.300 The first thing I am asking all of you, my spiritual 00:07:52.300 --> 00:07:56.000 family, is to forgive me. Imagine how many temptations 00:07:56.000 --> 00:07:59.360 of laziness, of avoiding too much, so on and 00:07:59.360 --> 00:08:02.439 so forth. What a constant defense of my own interests, 00:08:02.620 --> 00:08:05.500 of this or that. I know that I don't even have 00:08:05.500 --> 00:08:08.279 an ounce of this self -giving, self -sacrifice, 00:08:08.279 --> 00:08:11.240 which is truly a true repentance, the true renewal 00:08:11.240 --> 00:08:14.980 of love. So let us forgive one another.