Always Praying

I received an e-mail a few days ago with an attached document entitled "Always Praying". I found the document made an excellent point about our relationship with scripture and what it means to be in consistent prayer. The document was translated by Dr. George Bebawi! Dr. George is a good friend and my teacher! To a man who I look up to and have learned by sitting at his feet I hope we can all learn and become enriched from what he has to say. Dr. George is a well known Patristic scholar and has taught countless courses on Islam at Cambridge University and other Institutions throughout the world. Thank you very much for this document Dr. George and I hope we can all absorb this and make it applicable for all.

____________________________  

Our true freedom comes from a free vision of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ our Lord, who united our humanity with his divinity without separation. The implications of this are that Jesus came to liberate us from the need for any other mediator between us and God. He came to us out of love. Insights into that freedom in this vision reveal that of the One and Only Mediator is Jesus Christ.

Jesus did not come to subject the soul to any another form of slavery. For slavery to sin was enough. True humility of children of God is the love that moves according to Christ’s purposes.

His purpose is to unite us all in Himself and in Him to God the Father by the Holy Spirit.

The freedom of is rooted in our commitment to the fellowship of Jesus. This fellowship puts Jesus our Lord first, before even necessary things such as eating and sleeping. This is the desire of children of God, not of slaves. This desire directs us freely in the Sprit and is not a “law” for slaves. If it ever becomes a form of slavery, love is absent. If it becomes a form of self-protection, maturity in Christ is lacking.

In love’s freedom we can make more progress than when we are subject to “the law.”  The rules to live by which we choose must be according to the apostolic teaching on love (1 Cor 13:1ff). This apostolic teaching frees us from ourselves and allows love to be the royal road of love. On it we do not retreat to the way of sin where slavery is obvious to us as we see we love our life more than God.

Here are some guidelines for walking on this royal road:

The freedom of love is rooted in the Incarnation of the Son of God, anchored on the cross, where we are crucified with Christ (Gal. 2:20).

Putting Jesus first does not negate our love and care for our fellow humans for they all are his brothers and sisters and if loved as we love the Lord, our freedom from lusts allows us to serve them all as we serve our Lord. (See 1 John 1:4)

For this reason the saints of old who completed their course without going astray, governed themselves by love with Jesus as the king who enthroned in their hearts and coming before any person or element in their lives. Because of his Incarnation and his death, we can live by that crucified love where “the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the Law” (Rom 3:21).

Children of God live by love but slaves live by fear. Fear seeks to please God but ignores the fact that God loves the unworthy. Fear creates obligations and ties a person to what he created as a law. The root of freedom is the union of the divine and human in the Son of God which was not according to any Law.

The Christian keeps watch over his heart and, sensing any deviation from the life-giving commandments, hastens to repent.

Help those who want to have fellowship with the Lord in the busy world:

Watch and see the sings that remind us to pray.

When it is hot, pray for the fire of the Holy Spirit and let this outside heat be your constant reminder of it.

When it is cold, pray for more unity with the Lord and let the cold remind you of how sin can bring coldness of heart and put out the fire of love.

When it rains, pray for the free grace which is given to all of us and pray for those who have not the grace of God in their life.

At midday remember our Lord was crucified at midday.  Do not let go of this moment in which we were reconciled to God. It is time to forgive all sins and injuries that we have sustained.

When you see the clouds, pray for the Shekinah glory of God to protect you from evil.  Pray also that this Shekinah covers the church.

At evening, remember your own death and give an account of what has happened during the day.  Give thanks for what you have done and pray for the people whom you have seen and pray for a peaceful time for your sleep.

Let the trees remind you of your growth (Ps 1:3) and the roads remind you of Jesus who is your Way, who is building our eternal dwelling with the Holy Trinity.

When you enter your home, remember your eternal dwelling in God and be grateful you are secured by God’s justifying grace which cannot be compared with your doors and walls.

If you have your hope in the life to come and in the resurrection and the eternal life, pray that your bed be your grave and your covers be your shroud.  Say with the Lord, “Father into your hands I commit my spirit” and sleep.

Do not let this become a ritual. 

When you sit to pray, remember you are sitting at the Right-hand of God the Father in Jesus Christ.

When you stand to pray, remember you are in the position of the resurrection of Christ our Lord.

When you kneel to pray, say the same words of our Lord in the garden and surrender daily to regain your peace, the gift of God to us.

Enjoy sleeping as someone who is waiting to be raised by the Lord.

When getting dressed, put off the old life and put on the new one (1 Corinthians 5:15).

Give thanks for everything you eat and drink, for this is not, in essence, separated from the Holy Eucharist. If Christ is the food and the nourishment of your life, then every meal is a chance to pray to receive Hi and to be nourished by Him.

May your walking be always a renewal to commit your life to the Way of the One who is our only Mediator.

Translated from the 5^th dialogue by George Bebawi

Edited by Ellie Hashman 

Carmel, INDY 2009 

Woe to the Church

"Oh, how great is this trial which Christ entered into with Satan and conquered for us! The Church should never desire rule or ownership on earth. Woe to the church that possesses much! Woe to the church that has numerous investments stored away in the national and central banks, only to be eaten away by the moth. Woe to the church whose assets are large while her poor are hungry! Woe to the church which owns many ares and buildings but has no poor eating at her table! But blessed is the church which is satisfied with Christ the Word, and gives daily from her riches, that the people might claim ownership with her in heaven-possessions which cannot be buried, pass away, or perish. They are preserved for the last day. Blessed be the Lord Jesus Christ, who gained for us this third victory, and granted us to be poor on the outside; but we are rich with possessions greater than all the stuff of this world".

Father Matthew the Poor, Words for our Time, page 120 (chapter entitled: The Temptation of our Lord).

The church is a place that stands outside of time gathering together the elect in the body of Christ. In the wisdom of Father Alexander Schmemann he spoke "Religion is needed where there is a wall of separation between God and man. But Christ who is both God and man has broken down the wall between man and God. He has inaugurated a new life, not a new religion". Religion as we know it had ceased to exist with the incarnation of Christ. Christ has become for us the example of what it means to become gods. Christ is our example and mediator of what it means to live a life in Christ (cf. 1 Tim 2.5-6). If Christ, having become our mediator, has given up his life for the world than we to must give up our lives for the world. Entering the church, receiving the Eucharist and the life we live within the church is a sacrifice, a death on its own in the body of Christ. However, this death has become for us life. We enter the baptismal font dying in our corrupt nature and being born new in the body of Christ. This great paradox was first witnessed by Christ whom having died on the cross received new life when he had risen from the dead. We then live in the joy of the resurrection because it is in the resurrected Lord that we have hope in the life to come.

I began this blog entry by offering a quote on the church from Father's Matthew's new book. Its bold, scary yet edifying. Father Matthew was a man who spoke greatly about the preservation of the church. Sadly, what we seeing happening today, and I witness this a whole lot, the church has become a place of comfort or a social club to be more direct. The body of Christ is broken and shattered with the notion of multiple liturgies which splits up the community at large. We forget the true purpose of what it means to part of a church community. It brings me great grief during the liturgy when we offer the kiss of peace, the congregation giving the kiss of peace to each other does not even know who they are offering it to. How can we offer the kiss of peace (done out of love for the person standing next to us) if we do not know the person standing next to us. At this point the church ceases to be a church and has become nothing more than an institution or as Fr. Alexander puts it a "religion". The church then begins to cater to the people of the community and completely neglects the poor. "Woe to the church which owns many ares and buildings but has no poor eating at her table!" The church from its very establishment was meant to be a mission. The church was the mission for the life of the world. Spreading the words of the gospel to all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Can we say this is reflective of our community? Can we walk into a church today and see those great nations in our churches or do we just see one specific ethnic group whom the church caters to and forgets that aspect of mission. Do not take my words for it. I challenge all to walk into any church and see what the make up of the church is. These walls that we have created for ourselves need to be broken down in order to bring all in Christ. If Christ is not present then the church is not united in the body of Christ. How can the church continue being a mission if Christ is not present? However, Father Matthew and Father Alexander do not stop at criticizing the church for this reason but instead continue on by offering the solution to his dilemma. The solution is and always has been Christ!

What did Father Alexander mean when he said Christ has brought us new life and not a religion? Father Alexander shows us that in order to be a Christian is not shown in how you speak or write but rather in how you live. A true Christian is the one who lives in the world and is engaged by it. This is why prayer, liturgy and everything that the church teaches us is meant to become a sacrifice for the life of the world. Prayer is not an isolated concept only done in church or at the comfort at your home but rather prayer becomes a lived aspect within your entire life. If prayer is lived out in the world then the true Christian will be able to engage the world and people will see Christ in him or her. By seeing Christ in others we are then able to appreciate the beauty and goodness in others. Instead of always focusing on the negative we are able to see the good in everyone because all creation is good given to us by God for God is good. This is what it means to bring the life of the church into the world. By constantly living out the words of Christ Christianity ceases to become a religion and another institution but it becomes the life for the world. If the church is able to bring Christ to the world then it will truly have the poor eating at its tables. It will truly have servants dedicated and wanting to serve. If Christ is the starting point, if the body and blood of Christ is the starting point this life can be achieved in the world. However, if we continue to show the world that Christianity is a religion of do's and dont's then we will continue to lose our youth to Atheism and other religions which can present themselves better than Christianity. However, if we show the world the bread of life then this is when the world will truly see Christ as the offering for the life of the world.

I will conclude with a story. A friend of mine at the seminary was talking to me about Christianity in America. Knowing my background as a Copt he boldly told me that all of American would be Christian Orthodox if only the church broke down all its cultural barriers that keep Americans away from the church. To my surprise I looked at him dead in the eyes saying I agree. We need to continue to strive to bring Christ to the world in order that people can see that the true bread of life lies within the church and not within the materialistic world. The church needs to stop being a social club and start opening its doors to all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. It is only then when all of the world will become Christian. However, the more we cater to those who are comfortable , have the faith and continue building big churches the more these big churches will just lose its members to the world that offers only instant gratification and not Christ.    

"...blessed is the church which is satisfied with Christ the Word, and gives daily from her riches, that the people might claim ownership with her in heaven-possessions which cannot be buried, pass away, or perish. They are preserved for the last day. Blessed be the Lord Jesus Christ, who gained for us this third victory, and granted us to be poor on the outside; but we are rich with possessions greater than all the stuff of this world".

As a final remark I recommend this new book by Father Matthew the Poor. Essentially it is his teachings he gave in Arabic translates by James Helmy. An excellent read and aimed at a wide audience. Father Matthew had a gift that was able to touch the hearts of many and will always be remembered as the greatest church father of the 20th century. 

The Speech - Science wins?

A close friend of mine (Vanda) had sent me the other day this speech. I found it quite enlightening and relating to our modern times. Give it a read and leave your comments. Also I have attached a link at the bottom to a talk given by Fr. John Behr. The theme is death and I thought it relates quite well to the theme of this particular speech.

"Imagination is more important than knowledge"

________________________________________

With the world watching he began to speak...

To those of science, let me say this. You have won the war.

The wheels have been in motion for a long time. Your victory has been inevitable. Never before has it been as obvious as it is this moment. Science is the new God.

Medicine, electronic communications, space travel, genetic manipulation...these are the miracles about which we now tell our children. These are the miracles we herald as proof that science ill bring us the answers. The ancient stories of immaculate conceptions, burning bushes, and parting seas are no longer relevant. God has become obsolete. Science has won the battle. We concede.

But science's victory has cost every one of us. And it has cost us deeply. Science may have alleviated the miseries of disease and drudgery and provided an array of gadgetry for our entertainment and convenience, but is has left us in a world without wonder. Our sunsets have been reduced to wavelengths and frequencies. The complexities of the universe have been shredded into mathematical equations. Even our self-worth as human beings has been destroyed. Science proclaims that Planet Earth and its inhabitants are a meaningless speck in the grand scheme. A cosmic accident. Even the technology that promises to unite us, divides us. Each of us is now electronically connected to the globe, and yet we feel utterly alone. We are bombarded with violence, division, fracture, and betrayal. Skepticism has become a virtue. Cynicism and demand for proof has become enlightened thought. Is it nay wonder that humans now feel more depressed and defeated than they have at any point in human history? Does science hold anything sacred? Science looks for answers by probing our unborn fetuses. Science even presumes to rearrange our own DNA. It shatters God's world into smaller and smaller pieces in quest of meaning...and all it finds is more questions.

The ancient war between science and religion is now over. you have won. But you have not won fairly. you have not won by providing answers. you have won by so radically reorienting our society that the truths we once saw as signposts now seem inapplicable. Religion cannot keep up. Scientific growth is exponential. It feeds on itself like a virus. Every new breakthrough opens doors for new breakthroughs. Mankind took thousands of years to progress fro the wheel to the car. Yet only decades from the car into space. Now we measure scientific progress in weeks. We are spinning out of control. The rift between us grows deeper and deeper, and as religion is left behind, people find themselves in a spiritual void. We cry out for meaning. And believe me, we do cry out. We see UFOs, engage in channeling, spirit contact, out-of-body experience, mindquests-all these eccentric ideas have a specific veneer, but they are unashamedly irrational. They are the desperate cry of the modern soul, lonely and tormented, crippled by its own enlightenment and its inability to accept meaning in anything removed from technology.

Science, you say, will save us. Science I say, has destroyed us. Since the days of Galileo, the church has tried to slow the relentless march of science, sometimes with misguided means, but always with benevolent intention. Even so, the temptations are too great for man to resist. I warn you, look around yourselves. The promises of science have not been kept. Promises of efficiency and simplicity have bred nothing but pollution and chaos. We are a fractured and frantic species...moving on a path of destruction.

Who is this God science? Who is the God who offers his people power but no moral framework to tell you how to use that power? What kind of God gives a child fire but does not warn the child of its dangers? The language of science comes with no signposts about good and bad. Science textbooks tell us how to create a nuclear reaction, and yet they contain no chapter asking us if it is a good or bad idea.          

To science, I say this. The church is tired. We are exhausted from trying to be your sign posts. Our resources are drying up from our campaign to be the voice of balance as you plow blindly on in your quest for smaller chips and larger profits. We ask not why you will not govern yourselves, but how can you? Your world moves so fast that if you stop even for an instant to consider the implications of your actions, someone more efficient will whip past you in a blur. So you move on. You proliferate weapons of mass destruction, but it is the Pope who travels the world beseeching leaders to use restraint. You clone living creatures, but it is the church reminding us to consider the moral implications of our actions. You encourage people to interact on phones, video screens, and computers, but it is the church who opens its doors and reminds us to commune in person as we were meant to do. You even murder unborn babies in the name of research that will save lives. Again, it is the church who points out the fallacy of this reasoning.

And all the while, you proclaim the church is ignorant. But who is more ignorant? The man who cannot define lighting, or the man who does respect its awesome power? This church is reaching out to you. Reaching out to everyone. And yet the more we reach, the more you push us away. Show me proof there is a God, you say. I say use your telescopes to look to the heavens, and tell me how there could not be a God! You ask what does God look like. I say, where does that question come from? The answers are one and the same. Do you not see God in our science? How can you miss Him! You proclaim that even the slightest change in the force of gravity or the weight of an atom would have rendered our universe a lifeless mist rather than out magnificent sea of heavenly bodies, and yet you fail to see God's hand in this? It is really so much easier to believe that we simply chose the right card from a deck of billions? Have we become so spiritually bankrupt that we would rather believe in mathematical impossibility than in a power greater than us?    

Whether or not you believe in God, you must believe this. When we as a species abandon our trust in the power greater than us, we abandon our sense of accountability. Faith...all faiths...are admonitions that there is something we cannot understand, something to which we are accountable...with faith we are accountable to each other, to ourselves, and to a higher truth. Religion is flawed, but only because man is flawed. If the outside world could see this church as I do...looking beyond the ritual of these walls...they would see a modern miracle...a brotherhood of imperfect, simple souls wanting only to be a voice of compassion in a world spinning out of control.

Are we obsolete? Are these men dinosaurs? Am I? Does the world really need a voice for the poor, the weak, the oppressed, the unborn child? Do we really need souls like these who, though imperfect, spend their lives imploring each of us to read the signposts of morality and not lose our way?

Tonight we are perched on a precipice. None of us can afford to be apathetic. Whether you see this evil as Satan, corruption, or immorality, the dark force is alive and growing every day. Do not ignore it. The force, though mighty, is not invincible. Goodness can prevail. Listen to your hearts. Listen to God. Together we can step back from this abyss.

Pray with me...

Liturgical Experience

Last week I was speaking to my father about the progression of the church from the 1st century to the modern times. We concluded that the beauty of the church is not about how "it has stayed the same", which it has, but rather the progression of the faith throughout the century has made the church what is it today. Many complain that the church is out of date and that 3 hour liturgies need to be dropped. I would challenge such an idea and ask the question since when did 3 hour liturgies ever remain the same? In the early church celebrating the Eucharist probably took less than an hour however, the fellowship spent at the church house probably lasted the whole day. Liturgy should then not be viewed as an "3 hour service" but liturgy should be taken in as the service of love. Liturgy lived for the life of the world is the liturgy that people can see Christ in us. By seeing Christ and seeing the love we live by then Christ becomes the ever present reality for the life of the world. Liturgy by definition is the ever lasting work of the people. It is not about a priest doing a few funny things in front of the holy of holies but it is the work of the people coming together in the body of Christ to fulfilled the commandment of Christ. To go out to the rest of the world and to preach the word of Christ baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. In the liturgy of St. John Chrysostom the priest always recites "Your own of your own we offer unto you, on behalf of all and for all". The work of the people is the liturgy that is lived for the life of the world. The following is a nice passage I came across from a book I was reading that relates the message of the progression of the liturgy. Enjoy. 

_____________________________

Liturgical Experience

'During divine service be trustful, as a child trusts his parents. [...] Cast all your care upon the Lord [...]; "Take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in the same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father, which speaketh in you." Long ago has the Lord freed us from this care, having by His Spirit taught the Church what to say, how to pray, at divine service." Such an attitude to the worship of our Church does not stem from conservatism.

Nor were the Church's hymnographers inspired by the principle of newness. New elements do not come into Orthodox worship from any feeling that past forms are stale, but for positive reasons:

• 1) Teaching - for example when heresy threatened, or a Feast was instituted to focus more specifically on an event such as Christ's birth.
• 2) New events, such as a saint's canonisation or a miraculous deliverance.
• 3) An aspect of life is made the subject of common prayers - for instance, the environment, or a child's beginning school.
• 4) Local celebrations and adaptations are more widely adopted.
• 5) God inspired the composition and its insertion without any previous pastoral decision giving rise to it.

Orthodox teenagers were speaking disparagingly about forms of worship they had experienced at an ecumenical service.

Girl: 'They even had guitars in church.'

Another girl: 'We had to sing - and mime! - a "harvest" thanksgiving chorus about MacDonald's hamburgers!' [I was treated to a rendition.] 

S.M.: 'I'd feel an idiot singing that in a church! But be careful to get your reasons for being so scathing right! At least they were thanking God, singing about Christ. That's quite something nowadays. You can glorify God by a guitar. Or just enjoy it anyway, there's no sin in that. The really important point is not that it was laughably corny, but that it is a mistake to keep adapting the Liturgy, to replace inspired services. It is not wrong in itself to add another means of worshipping for other moments.'

Girl: 'The girls at school don't want it; the teachers make it up to try and be up to date.' 

S.M.: 'Yes, to "keep the young people in Church". C.S. Lewis says, "If something is not eternal, it is eternally out of date." Look at the rock charts. By the time you compose a service based on this week's style and get it approved by a liturgical committee  you'll be ages behind the fashion and have to start again. And there's no guarantee you're inspiring truth about God. It is not a service tested by centuries of praying saints. I'd rather struggle to pray like St. John Chrysostom myself. It's more sure. And it will take me a lifetime to get all I can out of it. The things that don't matter so much can change week by week.'

The saints who expressed reservations about elaborated hymnography in comparison with monologistic prayer (monologistic means concentrated in a short phrase; the Jesus prayer is the most widely practised of this type) were not rebels. Some ascetics live at such a depth of prayer that they have less need of liturgical richness. For the rest of humanity, the forms of our public services take people in a positive direction, freeing their minds from heterogeneous preoccupations. Common worship is also valuable as means of uniting with others in prayer. Athonite monks are taught that even thought prayer in the cell can go deeper than prayer in the church, monks who conclude that it is therefore better to skip the services will not gain grace in their cells.

+ Sister Magdalen of Essex, "Conversations with Children: Communicating our Faith," (Essex: Stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist, 2004) 194-6. ISBN 1 874679 21 5

I Believe in God but I don't go to Church

I cam across this blog entry: http://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2013/07/i-believe-in-god-but-i-dont-go-to-church.html and I thought this would be excellent to re-blog here because it deals exactly with a lot of issues that many priests and clerics deal with on a daily basis. Archimandrite Paul Papadopoulos get's to the heart of the issue which is focused on egoism. Egoism fuels the drive to be above scripture, to be above the church and everything that it stands for. Of course being united to Christ is not the work of the individual but the work of the community.

______________________________
I believe in God but I don't go to church."

We often hear the above phrase from acquaintances, friends and relatives, so our discussion will focus a little more on spiritual matters.

The basic argument of people who say that they believe in God yet do not go to church to participate in the Mysteries of our Orthodox Church, is that they are bothered by certain things, such as the luxuriousness of churches, obnoxious priests and chanters, the language is ancient (they don't understand it), the microphones, the lights, the candle offering (where they give money for a candle), the time the Divine Liturgy is celebrated, etc.

The excuses are certainly a lot when someone DOES NOT WANT to live according to how the Church says. Unfortunately these people consider themselves outside the Church since they do not accept the basic components of the life in Christ, which is the participation of a Christian in the Mysteries of the Church. These people are not Christians, at least not Orthodox, because while they (supposedly) believe, they do not follow any word of Christ.

The issue of course is that most baptized Christians do not know who Christ is or what the Church is, and what Christ and the Church offer to people. Thus they do not attend church, because essentially they do not know what they are missing, and they do not know what the sacramental life can offer.

The Church, with all Her Mysteries, transforms us, sanctifies us, and brings us into communion with God. Our participation in the Mysteries of the Church is the key to this personal resurrection of ours.

The Church does not exist merely to take the position of medicine and exhaust all its capabilities, as some wrongly treat it. The Church exists to lead people, the faithful, to the Love, the Light and the Life in Christ through the Mysteries.

To say you believe in God is easy, but to believe in God in an Orthodox manner and to do corresponding works is difficult, though not impossible.

If a person really wants to know Christ, they can do this through the sacramental life offered by the Church. If you want to fool yourself you can claim to achieve this on your own. However, I do not know anyone that has been sanctified outside the Church. (The crazy thing is that some people consider as saints people like Elder Paisios, Elder Porphyrios, etc., yet they do not accept their lives.)

All this happens for just one reason: Egoism. When each person believes themselves to be a better interpreter of the Scriptures, and they believe the God-bearing Fathers of the Church are beneath them, and they believe they are smarter, more worthy and holier than the old "religionists" as they call them, and when they believe they have no need to repent of any of their sins (!), and they could be saved by themselves (whatever that means to them), then this text will probably not trouble them at all, rather it has been a long time since they fell into the abyss of self-love and delusion.

The biggest obstacle that prevents contemporary man from reaching communion with God is precisely this: they are trying to know Him the wrong way, using the wrong means, outside the Church. They dismiss the mystery of love and remain willfully grounded in a sterile faith which in a best case scenario simply means "acknowledging the existence of God" and not trusting and surrendering to Divine Providence.

Marriage and Ascetisicm

Marriage has had a changing form throughout the centuries and it continues to be challenged in our modern era. The following entry will try to establish and challenge the notion of what ascetical marriage means within the context of our modern times. Marriage a few thousand years ago was viewed as a means to survive through the process of pro-creation. Marriage today has been characterized as a self-fulfillment of both security and fulfillment of one’s own career. These two notions of marriage I plan to challenge to see if truly the meaning of marriage is for only pro-creation or for the establishment of one’s own career.  

    

Abstinence and procreation have become two ways to understanding martial asceticism. However, by examining the paradigm of marriage we will begin to see that abstinence and procreation are nothing more than a teaching tool to the fuller picture of what marriage is understood to be. They’re both very positive tools are procreation and abstinence are needed tools for marriage however, when they start to define the marriage that is when the marriage begins to collapse from within.

The foundational words for understanding marriage occur when one opens scripture. God created the human being in his image and likeness. He created them male and female asking them to be fruitful and multiply. Theologians point to this passage as being the main reason one gets married. I would challenge this notion because God also allowed the animals to procreate (cf. Gen 1.22). Human beings were created by the word of God while every other creation was spoken into existence. God said let it be and it was. Humanity was the only creation made in the image and likeness of God from the creation accounts. So why would God bestow a great mystery of procreation to the animals? One answer might be that the purpose of marriage was not only limited to procreation but a deeper meaning lies beneath understanding the purpose of the ascetical marriage.    

Marriage then, understood in the context of the Genesis account, can be viewed as a giving up of the self to be restored in the image of God. This paradigm continues on in the Scripture of the New Testament. Marriage is understood by the Apostle Paul as a sacrifice being made for the other individual. He summarizes in to the Corinthians that a man or a woman should not rule over their body but to give up the body for the other (cf. 1 Cor 7.1-6). Paul later on would tell the community that he would wish everyone to be like him, which is to say, to remain celibate. Celibacy has its reward as a sacrifice to Christ through the formation and breaking down and rising up of the human being, to be formed in Christ’s image and likeness. By conclusion the New Testament through St. Paul demonstrates that both marriage and celibacy have a unique place within the church. The church later on would hold this beauty of marriage and adopt it as one of the mysteries of the church. 

By way of conclusion, marriage then should not only be viewed from the realm of procreation. This can happen if God allows it to be. The challenge then that Christians must bring to marriage or the celibate life, is not how to cope with either but rather it should look towards Christ. By making Christ present in this world this will spiritually procreate Christ. A Christian marriage is thus defined neither by its procreation function or unity two people together as two separate aspects of the marriage. If these two are understood to stand alone within the paradigm of marriage then this will lead to a self-centered ideology. Rather Christian marriage is a means of manifesting Christ, continuing and showing his liturgy for the life of the world. In turn marital asceticism as temporary sexual abstinence is not what it has mistakenly become in modern thought on marriage, a means of making sexual activity more unitive. Rather, temporary sexual abstinence, should be viewed in light as a God given means of refocusing our center of attention, with the aim of achieving, what was given from the beginning-to be made males and females in the image and likeness of God. But the truth remains of this is still hidden with Christ in God, who stature we continue trying to attain throughout the progression of life.   

Father Alexander Schmemann sums it up beautifully on what it means to married:

“A marriage which does not constantly crucify its own selfishness and self-sufficiency, which does not “die to itself” that it may point beyond itself, is not a Christian marriage. The real sin of marriage today is not adultery or lack of “adjustment” or “mental cruelty.” It is the idolization of the family itself, the refusal to understand marriage as directed toward the Kingdom of God. This is expressed in the sentiment that one would “do anything” for his family, even steal. The family has here ceased to be for the glory of God; it has ceased to be a sacramental entrance into his presence. It is not the lack of respect for the family, it is the idolization of the family that breaks the modern family so easily, making divorce its almost natural shadow. It is the identification of marriage with happiness and the refusal to accept the cross in it. In a Christian marriage, in fact, three are married; and the united loyalty of the two toward the third, who is God, keeps the two in an active unity with each other as well as with God. Yet it is the presence of God which is the death of the marriage as something only “natural.” It is the cross of Christ that brings the self-sufficiency of nature to its end. But “by the cross, joy entered the whole world.” Its presence is thus the real joy of marriage. It is the joyful certitude that the marriage vow, in the perspective of the eternal Kingdom, is not taken “until death parts,” but until death unites us completely.” – Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World

Memory Eternal Fr. Matta El-Meskeen (Matthew the Poor)

Father Matthew was not only a monk but a man who allowed Christ to penetrate his heart in order to learn the true love of Christ. His words were simple but powerful, he was gentle but effective, always treated others like Christ did but never asked for anything in return. Father Matthew was a key figure in the revival of the modern Monastic movement which began within the Coptic Church in the 1950s. He was appointed abbot of the monastery of St. Macarius in 1969 and was given the task by his Holiness Pope Kirolos the 6th to revive and restore the monastery. By the time of his death the community had grown from 6 aged monks, two of whom were blind, to a 130 monks by the time of his departure (June 8th 2006). During his time many monasteries had been revived and new one's were build. He was not only a monastic but was also a prolific writer. Retreating to his cave in the desert he composed over 170 books and over 300 journal articles on Biblical exegesis, ecclesiastical rites, pastoral and theological matters, and much more. 

The following are words spoken out of Fr. Matta's wisdom:

Whenever physical hunger turned cruel against me, I found my gratification in prayer. Whenever the biting cold of winter was unkind to me, I found my warmth in prayer. Whenever people were harsh to me (and their harshness was severe indeed) I found my comfort in prayer. In short, prayer became my food and my drink, my outfit and my armor, whether by night or by day.

It is no joy for the church to many active members of varied services who lack the spiritual proficiency for renewing souls and regenerating them in a genuine spiritual rebirth to win them for the Kingdom of Heaven. The true joy of the church lies in leaders who possess spiritual insight, who walk ahead of their flocks so that the flocks can follow a sure path. It is not possible to obtain spiritual insight by action or study, spiritual insight is attained by silence, retreat and long prayers in their various stages.

The following is a documentary about the Monastery which was filmed shortly after his repose: