As we begin our final week of Lent, Christ the
High Priest sets his face toward Jerusalem, stating
plainly that there in that holy city he will
be delivered over to the high priests and the
scribes who will condemn him to death and deliver
him over to the Gentiles who will mock him, spit
on him, flog him, and kill him. Yet three days
later he will rise, having offered himself through
the eternal spirit to obtain our eternal redemption,
to purify our flesh, and to cleanse our consciences
from dead works in order that we might serve
the living and true God. Today, as Christ proceeds
toward the city, before we join him in this journey
next week, we actually proceed away from it with
a certain priest monk, Zosima, into the desert
beyond the Jordan. Today the church sets forth
St. Mary of Egypt, whose life we read in full
on Monday with the great canon of St. Andrew
of Crete. The life of St. Mary culminates our
entire journey of Lent. It's not by coincidence
that things we commemorate in previous Lenten
weeks and the weeks leading up to Lent make cameos
today. It's an icon of the Theotokos that confronts
and turns Mary of Egypt's life upside down, recalling
the Sunday of Orthodoxy, the veneration of icons
and their significance for the Christian life.
It's the precious and life -giving cross that
Mary first mocks and eventually wants to see,
but is prevented from entering the church because
of her wanton sin, recalling the Sunday of the
cross. It's her participation in the energetic
life of God that enables Mary to discern things
clairvoyantly about Zosima, levitate off the
ground in prayer, speak scripture without ever
having read it, and walk on water, recalling
the life that flows out from the Sunday of St.
Gregory Palamas. It's the life of the prodigal
son that shapes Mary's as she rejects the love
of her parents and her baptism at age 12 to run
away and feed her sexual appetites, only to be
confronted with her own filth. recalling the
Sunday of the prodigal son, we could go on. But
today, I want us to recall the Pharisee and the
tax collector, which we reflected on well in
advance of Lent to frame our Lenten journey.
In that story, we meet the Pharisee and the tax
collector, the pride and self -righteousness
of the Pharisee. I thank you, God. that I am
not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers,
or like this tax collector. And the sheer humiliation
of the tax collector. God, be merciful to me,
the sinner. We have a somewhat easy time tearing
down the Pharisee in this story. I think sometimes
we think of him as if he inhabits a different
religion and faith altogether. But what if the
church, to close out Great Lent, brought this
story a little closer to home and told it fully
in an orthodox mode? What if the Pharisee and
someone like the tax collector, perhaps worse
than the tax collector, met and talked and interacted
and changed one another's life? Today we get
the story of Zosima, the priest monk in Mary
of Egypt. Zosima, a priest monk who does everything
right with intention, dignity, and meaning, fasts
well, always sings praises to God, never ceases
to study the divine scriptures, adheres and accomplishes
everything according to his ascetical rule. undoubtedly
akin to St. John of Sinai's in the divine ladder,
is renowned for his spirituality and his status
as a monastic elder, a staritz. For 53 years,
Zosima does these things. But all these things
bring him to a point where he believes he is
perfect and doesn't need instruction. Is there
a monk on earth? Who can be useful to me? And
show me a kind of asceticism that I haven't accomplished,
that I haven't yet mastered. Is there a man to
be found in the desert who has surpassed me?
Well, kind of. An angel comes to him. That's
how spiritually advanced Zosima is. And yet the
angel reminds Zosima that, no man has attained
perfection but to leave his native land like
Abraham and go into the desert so that the Lord
can eventually bring Zosima to Mary, who is intentionally
in this story not a man but a woman, and a sinful
woman at that, one who has never read Scripture.
who was baptized as a child and loved by her
parents, but scorned them and her life, who ran
away from home at age 12 to go to the city of
Alexandria, where she squandered her life and
her body in filth and gorged her sexual appetite.
We sometimes call her a prostitute, but that's
only partly true. It's much worse. She is a sex
addict, more like a nymphomaniac. The way she
frames her life is through the very words of
Ezekiel the prophet, Ezekiel 16, one of the most
horrific passages in the Bible, worse than a
prostitute. She scorned and mocked payment. At
least a prostitute provides for others, for her
kids perhaps, maybe her family, a sinful and
heinous sense of sacrifice, but sacrifice nevertheless.
In the words of Ezekiel, you gave payment. while
no payment was given to you. At the head of every
street, every hill, you seduced and made your
beauty an abomination, offering yourself to any
passerby and multiplied your whoring. That's
how St. Mary lived for 17 years, to the point
of joining a procession for the exaltation of
the cross, simply to seduce. and make to fall
as many men as possible, and youths, might I
add, away from Christ. She lives this way until
she arrives at the church of the resurrection
in Jerusalem, where the cross is set forth and
stands, and is prevented by the Theotokos as
an invincible force through her icon from entering
into the church. And that's where everything
comes tumbling down. Everything falls into place,
or out of it, perhaps. She sees her life for
what it is, and she resolves to change and give
her life entirely to God, after which she's able
to enter into the church, venerate the cross,
and hear the Theotokos say to her, if you cross
the Jordan, you will find glorious rest. And
Mary does, not before she confesses her sins
and receives communion in the church at the Jordan,
after which she goes into the desert for 47 years
with three pieces of bread and learns to live
on the word of God alone, taught directly by
Christ all the scriptures which she has herself
never read. Despite who she is, the Lord changes
Mary. And Mary enters into that change completely.
She repents. She turns her life toward Christ
completely. It isn't a magical one and done kind
of change. She counts the cost. She has to confront
her sin. It takes 17 years just to do that, likely
to offset the 17 years of debauchery until she
begins to sense. the glorious rest of Jordan.
The Lord answers Zosima's question, is there
a monk, is there a man who can show me up with
this woman, Mary, whom the Lord uses to bring
the celebrated priest monk elder to his knees.
As Zosima himself puts it, truly God has shown
me through this thy handmaid. How far away I
stand from perfection. Perhaps we can distill
the Sunday of St. Mary to two points. And they're
really one and the same point when we juxtapose
our lives vis -a -vis Christ. Brothers and sisters,
there's no one that Jesus can't change, save,
and heal. No one. No one descends below the grace
and love of God. Not anything that we do. Not
anything that we have done. Not anything that
we will even do. No one. Full stop. But there's
also no one who has reached perfection or should
think of themselves as perfect and having arrived
in this life. should think of themselves as more
highly than we ought. No one ascends above the
wisdom and mercy of God. That's not what Lent
reveals to us, or at least that's not what it
should reveal to us. We should not be feeling
like we are doing well. 47 years, 47 years Mary
lives in the desert by herself. before she meets
Zosima. And 47 years, Zosima lives in the monastery
of St. John the Baptist on the Jordan after he
meets Mary. Zosima meets her when he's 53, and
we're told that he dies at 100. You can do the
math. That number, 47, in truth, it's 48 for
St. Mary. is significant for us here, I think.
In her 48th year in the desert, Zosima communes
her on Holy Thursday, and she departs this life
on Holy Friday, anticipating the fullness of
Pascha, the resurrection. For us, that number
48 transfers not into years, but into days. Perhaps
we will be given 48 years to contend with ourselves.
Perhaps some of you have been. But we are most
definitely given 40 and 8 days every year, the
time of Great Lent and Holy Week, to confront
ourselves, the state of our hearts, to ask God
and ourselves, what have we offered him, or perhaps
not offered him, in our bodies? To ask God and
ourselves, how have we died to this world? Or
again, perhaps, not died at all, to juxtapose
our lives vis -a -vis the life of Christ, who
today sets his face toward Jerusalem. How have
we set our face toward him? When situated in
the life of St. Mary, the questions in today's
gospel readings hit us all at once. Who will
love me more? The one who knows how much he has
sinned and been forgiven. or the one who doesn't
think he's really done anything bad at all. Perhaps
that's given to us, who might be a little more
experienced than others. As it is the question
that our Lord asks Simon the Pharisee, as the
sinful woman washes the Lord's feet with her
tears, something that Zosima, the celebrated
priest monk, does three times to Mary, the sinful
woman's feet. Or another question, what is it
that you want me to do for you? Good question.
The question the Lord asks James and John after
they command Christ to do whatever they want
to do for them. A demand that should make all
of us cringe to sit at his right and left in
his kingdom. Rather, the real question should
be the one the Lord asks James and John. Are
you able to be baptized with the baptism that
I am baptized with? Are you able to drink the
cup from which I drink? Maybe put toward the
catechumens who are preparing for holy illumination
a little more pointedly. Are you ready to be
baptized? Are you ready to drink from the chalice?
Because what Christ is really talking about is
entering into his own death, into the cross where
he drinks the cup most truly, into the cross
where he is baptized most truly, drinks the cup
most truly, and it's only through it that he
gives life -giving blood and water for us to
drink. Catechumens, are you ready to enter into
that life? A life that will require your death
and genuine change. A life that will turn your
former life upside down or perhaps already has
begun to, like St. Mary's. A life where you will
lose your life in order to gain it. A life where
you will take up your cross. And deny yourself
in order to feel the power of the resurrection.
In order to experience the love of God coursing
even through you. And it's a reminder to us all
here. The Christian life, Lent is in a sense
designed for the catechumen. Preparing for baptism.
That is its historic purpose. And yet, we all
enter into it to renew that baptismal vow, to
recall the vow we made to Christ. The cup, the
chalice that we drink from. The Christian life
requires that from all of us. We never arrive.
No one here should feel like they have arrived.
No one should ever treat anyone else as if they
have arrived. And are beyond dying to self. Not
in the way that we receive one another. Not in
the way that we talk to one another. In no way.
Because it is only through that life. Our death.
The world becoming crucified to us. And us to
the world. The taking up of our cross and denying
ourselves. The losing our life in order to gain
it. The emptying of ourselves. And all of our
pride. that we will be filled with the fullness
of Pascha, that we will cry on Pascha. Christ
is risen from the dead, trampling down death
by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing
life, the life of the resurrection. Through the
prayers of St. Mary, St. Zosima, and St. Sophronius,
Lord, have mercy upon us.