The Eucharistic Gift

Fr. Alexander Schmemann always had a way with words. In the following passage Fr. Schmemann is trying to show the reader that in our modern western (America) society we have forgotten our Eucharistic vocation and in losing this vocation we have turned the Eucharist to a Sunday practice. By divorcing the Eucharist from our day to day lives we have forgotten what it means to live a life in Christ. Christ is present in all places and fills all things showing us what it means to be a human being. Fr. Schmemann warns us that if we continue to separate the Eucharist and the life in the world then we have lost the meaning of living a Eucharistic life. I recommend this book as Fr. Schmemann shows us the meaning of Lent through understanding what it means to live a Eucharistic life.

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It is useful to note here that the Orthodox liturgical tradition, different in this from the Latin practice, has no adoration of the Eucharistic Gifts outside Communion. But the preservation of Gifts as reserved sacrament, used for Communion for the sick and other emergency situations, is a self-evident tradition which has never been questioned in the Orthodox Church. We mentioned already that in the early Church there even existed a practice of private "self- communion” at home. We have thus the permanent presence of the Gifts and the absence of their adoration. By maintaining simultaneously these two attitudes, the Orthodox Church has avoided the dangerous sacramental rationalism of the West. Moved by the desire to affirm—against the Protestants—the objectivity of Christ’s "real presence” in the Eucharistic Gifts, the Latins have, in fact, separated adoration from Communion. By doing this, they have opened the door to a dangerous spiritual deviation from the real purpose of the Eucharist and indeed of the Church herself. For the purpose of the Church and of her sacraments is not to "sacralize” portions and elements of matter and by making them sacred or holy to oppose them to the profane ones. Instead her purpose is to make man’s life communion with God, knowledge of God, ascension toward God’s Kingdom; the Eucharistic Gifts are the means of that communion, the food of that new life, but they are not an end in themselves. For the Kingdom of God is "not food and drink but joy and peace in the Holy Spirit.” Just as in this world food fulfills its function only when it is consumed and thus transformed into life, the new life of the world to come is given to us through the partaking of the "food of immortality.” The Orthodox Church consistently avoids all adoration of the sacrament outside Communion because the only true adoration is that having partaken of Christ’s Body and Blood, we "act in this world as He did.” As to the Protestants, in their fear of any "magical” connotation, they tend to "spiritualize” the sacrament to such an extent that they deny the presence of the Body and Blood of Christ outside the act of Communion. Here again the Orthodox Church, by the practice of reserving the Holy Gifts, restores the true balance. The gifts are given for Communion but the reality of Communion depends on the reality of the Gifts. The Church does not speculate on the mode of Christ’s presence in the Gifts. She forbids the use of them for any act other than Communion. She does not reveal, so to speak, their presence outside Communion, but she firmly believes that just as the Kingdom which is yet to come is "already in the midst of us,” just as Christ ascended into heaven and sits on the right hand of the Father yet is also with us until the end of the world, the means of Communion with Christ and with His Kingdom, the food of immortality, is always present in the Church.

Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Great Lent. Pages 59-60! 

Great Lent: The Meaning of Repentance

Great lent is a time of repentance and forgiveness. Repentance at the root is a change of the mind and body. We have grown accustomed to thinking that repentance is feeling bad for our actions and that we need to be punished in order to revert back on the right path. This is a good thought if we were still 12 years old. We must see repentance as a renewal and change back into the communion of God. Sin is a breaking away from God. It is a separation in which we must find our way back to the love of God. Yes there will be days when we skip the fast, missed our prayers or become angry with others however, the only way to correct our actions and thoughts is by uniting to the body of Christ through the renewal and change of mind, body and spirit. True life and true repentance will only come once we realize that we have lost communion with God and through Him we can be made whole through the Eucharist.

The following is an excellent quote from Fr. Schmemanns book Great Lent. I recommend this read during this time period. If you are interesting in reading any of the ancient fathers I would recommend St. Athanasius On the Incarnation.

Repentance is often simply identified as a cool and "objective" enumeration of sins and transgressions, as the act of "pleading guilty" to a legal indictment. Confession and absolution are seen as being of a juridical nature. But something very essential is overlooked--without which neither confession nor absolution have any real meaning of power. This "something" is precisely the feeling of alienation from God, from the joy of communion with Him, from the real life as created and given by God. It is easy indeed to confess that I have not fasted on prescribed days, or missed my prayers, or become angry. It is quite a different thing, however, to realize suddenly that I have defiled and lost my spiritual beauty, that I am far away from my real home, my real life, and that something precious and pure and beautiful has been hopelessly broken in the very texture of my existence. Yet this, and only this, is repentance, and therefore it is also a deep desire to return, to go back, to recover that lost home. Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Great Lent

The following is a prayer of St. Ephrem which is recited during the Great Lent. This prayer serves as a reminder that we are constantly being formed and united into the body of Christ as we grow in love and service for others.

O Lord and Master of my life, take from me spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk.
But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to thy servant.
Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou, unto ages of ages Amen.

The following is a link to an earlier entry on fasting. May God bless you all on our journey through the Lenten season.

Why Fasting?

Last words of Fr. Alexander Schmemann-Let us give thanks!

Today, the feast of Thanksgiving is celebrated across the United States (mid-October for our Canadian readers). On this feast day Father Alexander Schmemann gave his final words in the church before his passing away a few weeks later (Dec 13 1983). It is quite fascinating how the Eucharist translates into thanksgiving. These final words were written down by Father Alexander, even though all his sermons were never written down. The beauty about this feast is that the church is always thankful because it is through our thanksgiving that we come together in love in the body of Christ.

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Everyone capable of thanksgiving is capable of salvation and eternal joy.
Thank You, O Lord, for having accepted this Eucharist, which we offered to the Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and which filled our hearts with the joy, peace and righteousness of the Holy Spirit.
Thank You, O Lord, for having revealed Yourself unto us and given us the foretaste of Your Kingdom.
Thank You, O Lord, for having united us to one another in serving You and Your Holy Church.
Thank You, O Lord, for having helped us to overcome all difficulties, tensions, passions, temptations and restored peace, mutual love and joy in sharing the communion of the Holy Spirit.
Thank You, O Lord, for the sufferings You bestowed upon us, for they are purifying us from selfishness and reminding us of the "one thing needed;" Your eternal Kingdom.
Thank You, O Lord, for having given us this country where we are free to Worship You.
Thank You, O Lord, for this school, where the name of God is proclaimed.
Thank You, O Lord, for our families: husbands, wives and, especially, children who teach us how to celebrate Your holy Name in joy, movement and holy noise.
Thank You, O Lord, for everyone and everything.
Great are You, O Lord, and marvelous are Your deeds, and no word is sufficient to celebrate Your miracles.
Lord, it is good to be here! Amen.

Why Fasting?

St. Catherine of Sienna-A role model to us all who held fasting in high regard throughout her life.

The church imitates Christ. Fasting in the life and works of Christ represent our first response to the act of unction and being filled with the Holy Spirit. Sadly enough many think that fasting is a physical act of giving up food and a simple change of diet. This of course is important to the concept of sanctifying a fast because if we cant learn to give up our own desires and pleasures how do we expect to imitate Christ if the passions have taken a hold of our nature. If we look to scripture we see that many forms of fasting had taken place and this did not necessarily include giving up food. If we look to the Samaritan woman in the gospel of John we find an individual who came to get water and left with the everlasting water, the water that will never make her thirst again. What was this water? Christ! How did she receive this water? By stripping away her passions through her honesty in answering Christ's questions and allowing Christ to penetrate her life in order to purify her body and was made worthy to behold Christ.

Fasting is a divine act of life which we have received from Christ himself. The first act Christ did following his Baptism was to go into the wilderness and fasted for 40 days and 40 nights. The church from the very beginning has always infused its own body, the acts of Christ' life, in order that those acts become life-giving for the life of the world. The church, which is one with Christ, becomes the image of the life of Christ. If the church becomes imitators of Christ then fasting has become a fundamental phase that not only Christ went through but we also must go through to sanctify our bodies. To claim that we live in the body of Christ and to overlook fasting is to misunderstand the person of Christ. If we are to follow Christ in our baptism, death and resurrection we are to also follow with our own fast! We should take note that all actions done in the person of Christ, revolve around Christ and end up in him. This is why He spoke and said "for my sake", "come, follow me", "for my name's sake", "come after me". All these acts, fasting, baptism, enduring persecution and suffering lead to our union in the body of Christ.  

Why then do we fast? Fasting is a test in which the personality defies the self. It is an an exercise in which the self is resisted by man. Fasting then, should be considered an act of love of the highest order, a physical way of entering into the experience of the cross (Good Friday in the Coptic Rite calls for all parishioners to abstain from food). The fasting that Moses and other prophets did was to profit them and mankind. On the other hand, the fasting of Jesus, was not done that He might receive anything, but to make a free offering of Himself in an act of love and to manifest the coming sacrifice of the cross. We fast by offering our bodies as a sacrifice. The outward form is naturally our fatigue, but the true essence is the our intentional acceptance of death, that we may be born again in life in the mystery of Christ. It is then and only then we become, in the sacrifice we make, a pure sacrifice, capable of interceding and redeeming in the image of Christ for the life of the world.

Fasting should not be viewed from the paradigm of changing your diet as we naturally are taught but rather fasting should be viewed from the paradigm of death and life. We die to the world in order that we are given life in the body of Christ. All acts within the church lead to our salvation. All acts the church administers and teaches is meant to bring us in the body of Christ. All the mysteries of the Church point to the paradigm of death and life. If we learn to shed the passions of the body then we become imitators of Christ. Fasting is one of many acts that lead to this realization.  

Great Friday Contemplation: Father Matthew the Poor

The following Contemplation is taken from the Chapter entitled Resurrection and Redemption in the Orthodox Concept from the book Communion of Love by Father Matthew the Poor:

Thus through resurrection, the cross was transformed from being an instrument of retribution and death in the hands of the crucifers to being an effective instrument of divine love in the hands of the good Shepherd, who redeemed His sheep and who today also follows the lost sheep to the end of the earth. What place in the world is without a raised cross, a cross that seeks sinners to restore them to the Father’s fold? The cross has become an instrument of joy for all those who comprehend within it the mystery of forgiveness, the mystery of divine love, "for He loved me and gave Himself for my sake.”

So Christ died only to offer Himself as the sacrifice of all sinners in the world, and through this sacrifice to give His broken body and shed blood to every person just as He did on Thursday, so that He might eat and drink forgiveness, resurrection, and everlasting life.

Christ still practices in every Church and among His beloved people the mystery of His Supper. Just as He did at the Thursday Supper He offers on every altar with His own hands His body and blood to communicants for remission of sins and for life eternal; the Eucharist has come to convey to us all the Thursday Supper power of infinite love, the power of the pains endured by the flesh on the cross, and the power of the resurrection in which the body rose and left the grave empty.

Mary, Mysteries and Mission- Part 4

At the annual Lenten Retreat (2013) for SVOTS Seminarians, Fr. Chad Hatfield, the Chancellor of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, discusses three assured paths to spiritual renewal as we participate in the Great Fast: Mary and the Incarnation, the Mysteries of Baptism and the Eucharist, and our vocation to Mission. This is part four of four forthcoming presentations.

Taken from Ancient Faith Radio. Here is the link to part four:

http://ancientfaith.com/podcasts/svsvoices/mary_mysteries_and_mission_part_four

Mary, Mysteries and Mission-Part 3

At the annual Lenten Retreat (2013) for SVOTS Seminarians, Fr. Chad Hatfield, the Chancellor of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, discusses three assured paths to spiritual renewal as we participate in the Great Fast: Mary and the Incarnation, the Mysteries of Baptism and the Eucharist, and our vocation to Mission. This is part three of four forthcoming presentations.

Taken from Ancient Faith Radio. Here is the link to part three:

http://ancientfaith.com/podcasts/svsvoices/mary_mysteries_and_mission_part_three

Reflections on Fasting- Part 3

The following are reflections on fasting written by Father Matthew the Poor. In the book, Communion of Love, it has a chapter entitled "The Deep Meaning of Fasting" which these reflections are taken from. A recommended read for all during the Lenten period. The book is a complication of Father Matthew's smaller booklets put into one book:

-For whoever fails to offer his life totally, or is dismayed at the prospect of self-sacrifice, and so of death, finds that his intention retreats and that he rejects death. He becomes evasive and offers an outward sacrifice, such as an act of service or an offering of money, or uses some other stratagem to avoid sacrificing his own self. So he loses his portion in Christ the Redeemer, for Christ redeems from death those who have accepted death.

-Once more we repeat that Christ, blessed be His name, cannot become a ransom for the human soul unless man offers his soul on the altar of love, in death to the world, making a total offering with all his will, relinquishing himself forever, raising the knife with his own hand in determination and earnest resolve, proving that he has accepted death.

-The Lord crucified Himself for the world before the world crucified Him. He carried out the offering of His body, His self, as a sacrifice on behalf of the world immediately after He was baptized when He was led by the Spirit. He gladly obeyed and went to face the test of fasting. This is the volitional aspect of the cross. Thus it was that the Lord was careful to institute and celebrate the rite of the Eucharist prior to the cross, not after the resurrection, to show that the sacrifice and offering were a free act.

-That is the meaning of “Take, eat . . . Take, drink . . . this is my body . . . this is my blood.” This was said a whole day before the crucifixion, but He saw that the coming events were completely in accordance with His will. He saw the cross standing and on it the body being slain and the blood being shed; He saw Himself content with it all. And so He took bread and filled it with the mystery of the broken body, and wine and filled it with the mystery of the shed blood, and He fed His disciples. They ate from His hands the mystery of His will and drank the mystery of His love, the mystery of His sufferings, the mystery of salvation. Therefore, when we share in the mystery of the body and the blood in the Eucharist, we share not only in the cross, but also in a mystical life poured out and a body that has struggled with severe fasting, deprivation, want, and pain.

-When asked what, then, is our fasting? Father Matthew replies: We fast and offer our bodies as a sacrifice; the outward form of this is bearing fatigue, but its essence is the intentional acceptance of death, that we may be counted fit to be mystically united in the flesh and blood of Christ. It is then that we become, in Christ’s sacrifice, a pure sacrifice, capable of interceding and redeeming.

-Fasting, since it is an incomplete sacrifice because of sin, has to be consummated in Communion, partaking in the pure body and blood, to become a perfect sacrifice, efficacious in prayer and intercession. Every Holy Communion Has to be preceded by fasting, and every fast has to end with Holy Communion. When we receive Communion in this way it is right for us to intercede, for our offering and sacrifice are made perfect. "Pray to receive Communion worthily. Pray for us and for all Christians” (Coptic Liturgy).

In Lent we prepare ourselves for the Last Supper. We prepare for two like things coming together. How could those who do not sacrifice themselves be worthy of Him who sacrificed His life? If we eat of a sacrificed body and do not sacrifice our own selves, how can we claim that a union takes place? The Mystical Supper on Thursday, which is the intentional acceptance of a life of sacrifice, is but a preparation for accepting sufferings openly, even unto death.

Whenever we eat of the body and drink of the blood, we are mystically prepared for preaching the death of the Lord and confessing His resurrection. Every testimony to the death and resurrection of the Lord carries with it a readiness for martyrdom. And every martyrdom carries with it a resurrection.

Mary, Mysteries and Mission-Part 2

At the annual Lenten Retreat (2013) for SVOTS Seminarians, Fr. Chad Hatfield, the Chancellor of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, discusses three assured paths to spiritual renewal as we participate in the Great Fast: Mary and the Incarnation, the Mysteries of Baptism and the Eucharist, and our vocation to Mission. This is part two of four forthcoming presentations.

Taken from Ancient Faith Radio. Here is the link to part two:

http://ancientfaith.com/podcasts/svsvoices/mary_mysteries_and_mission_part_two

Reflections on Fasting- Part 2

The following are reflections on fasting written by Father Matthew the Poor. In the book, Communion of Love, it has a chapter entitled "The Deep Meaning of Fasting" which these reflections are taken from. A recommended read for all during the Lenten period. The book is a complication of Father Matthew's smaller booklets put into one book:

-We should notice that all the commandments of Christ regarding works—whether they be voluntary poverty, asceticism, renunciation of kindred, divestment, or bearing the cross—revolve around the person of Christ and end up in Him: "for My sake;” "come, follow Me!” "for My name’s sake;” "be My disciple;” "come after Me;” "watch with Me.”

-All the works we perform in the name of Christ, for His sake, and in imitation of Him—whether they be fasting, vigil, patience, endurance of suffering or persecution, service, sacrificial love, or crucifixion—are but a voluntary translation of the desire to imitate and unite with Christ ("Follow me”). They express communion in spirit, heart, and intention.

-The Church has inherited this living apostolic experience; it has inherited Christ working in the Apostles. So the importance, or rather the inevitability, of works in the Orthodox Church means that the Church focuses on Christ Himself working in us just as He did in the Apostles, doing the same deeds He did for our salvation. The Church believes in exactly what St. Paul meant when he said: "For God is at work in you, both to will and to work” (Ph. 2:13). It is equally confident that this also leads to St. Paul’s words, "Do all to the glory of God” (1 Co. 10:31). It is through Christ and in His presence that works should be done; it is only the work of Christ that leads to the glory of God: "Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Ph. 2:11).

-To this perfection belongs Christ’s whole action and, better yet, even His entire mission and compassion for all humanity. Works, then, are not limited acts done by the human will to relieve the ego. The importance of works in Church thought is based on the fact that all works must spring from the will of Christ and be perfected by His power: "I can do all things in Him who strengthens me” (Ph. 4:13). Works must end up in the glory of God the Father. In other words, they must reveal Him and testify to Him: "That they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Mt. 5:16). Henceforth, the concept of "faith and works” in the Orthodox Church is inseparable from the living person of Christ, who is the source of faith and works alike in human life. The utlimate end of both faith and works is the glorification of God the Father—an essential work that belongs exclusively to Christ: "Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Ph. 2:11).

-If we delve deep into the essence of divine love, which is the model of love we intend to follow, we find that it only can be attained by self-denial to the point of self-renunciation, or even destruction.

-Fasting is a test in which the personality defies the self. It is an exercise in which the self has to be forsaken and resisted by the whole being. Fasting may therefore be considered an act of love of the highest order, a physical way of entering into the experience of the cross, and an inseparable part of that experience.

-Thus, when we fast we exhaust the body, and so, indirectly, subdue the self. If we subdue the self through the subjugation of the body, we have in fact come close to the destruction of the self, at least partially.

-This is attained by the mental acceptance of death itself, willingly with no dismay or restraint. But we received the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves (cf. 2 Co. 1:9 ).

Mary, Mysteries and Mission-Part1

At the annual Lenten Retreat (2013) for SVOTS Seminarians, Fr. Chad Hatfield, the Chancellor of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, discusses three assured paths to spiritual renewal as we participate in the Great Fast: Mary and the Incarnation, the Mysteries of Baptism and the Eucharist, and our vocation to Mission. This is part one of four forthcoming presentations.

Taken from Ancient Faith Radio. Here is the link to part one:

http://ancientfaith.com/podcasts/svsvoices/mary_mysteries_and_mission

Reflections on Fasting- Part 1

The following are reflections on fasting written by Father Matthew the Poor. In the book, Communion of Love, it has a chapter entitled "The Deep Meaning of Fasting" which these reflections are taken from. A recommended read for all during the Lenten period. The book is a complication of Father Matthew's smaller booklets put into one book:

-It represents the first battle in which Christ did away with His adversary, the prince of this world.

-It is then extremely important to accept and to feel the power of each of these three acts (Baptism, Holy Spirit and Fasting) in our depths and draw from Christ their action in us as they worked in Him, so that His same life may identify with ours. The ultimate aim of baptism, of being filled with the Holy Spirit, and of fasting is that Christ Himself may dwell in us: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Ga. 2:20).

-In baptism the connection with our old Adam is cut off for us to receive our sonship to God in Christ. In being filled with the Holy Spirit, our connection with the devil and with the life of sin is cut off for us to receive the Spirit of life in Christ. And in fasting, the connection between instinct and Satan is cut off to give the flesh victory in its life according to the Spirit, in Christ.

-The point to understand is that fasting is a divine act of life, which we receive from Christ complementary to baptism and fullness. Since its beginning the Church has been occupied with infusing into its own body the acts of Christ’s life so they would become life-giving acts to all its members. If the Church imitates Christ in its life discipline, it is because it has been given grace and authority by God to possess Christ Himself as a life of its own. The Church, which is one with Christ, is a lively and efficacious image of the life of Christ. The Gospel describes it as the "bride of Christ” united with her Bridegroom. Though the Gospel declares that the Church has become one with Christ, it still reiterates that Christ will remain a Bridegroom on His own, no matter how much He offers Himself. Neither does Christ become a Church, nor the Church become a Christ.

-This confirms to us that we, as members of the body of Christ, always need to strive to acquire Christ to become more like Him and to be a bride "without spot,” a betrothed "pure bride” in a perpetual state of betrothal like the Virgin who conceived and bore the Logos.

-Fasting in this sense is one of the fundamental phases that Christ underwent. We have never been able to claim that we live in the full maturity of Christ, or that Christ abides in us in His full measure, particularly if we overlook fasting. If baptism is one phase and crucifixion another, fasting is an extremely important stage between baptism and crucifixion. Fullness with the Holy Spirit, which Christ consummated by baptism, elevated the flesh to the level of extraordinary fasting, i.e. total deprivation of food and drink, utter seclusion and prayer. He thus raised the flesh to the stage of the cross.

-Their power (Christ’s work), however, is not imparted to us unless we experience and practice it. Those who are baptized put on Christ, those who are filled with the Holy Spirit live by means of Christ’s life, and those who fast win Christ’s victory over the prince of this world.

-Here He reveals that He has placed Himself as a model of life and works, as our “Forerunner,” as the "first-fruits,” that in everything we would be "like Him.” He became like us so we would become like Him.