Seek out the Saints
From the website of our church in Ireland

     The task of the Orthodox Christian convert in the West today is to bridge the gap between our time and the neglected and forgotten saints of Western Europe, who were our spiritual forebears. As St. Arsenios of Cappadocia (1924) said: "Britain will only become Orthodox when she once again begins to venerate her saints." In this task we are very fortunate to have had a living example of one who did this: St. John Maximovitch. During his years as a hierarch he was appointed to many different lands, including France and Holland. One of the first things he set out to do upon reaching a new country was to tirelessly seek out, venerate and promote the Orthodox saints of that land, that he might enter into spiritual relationship with those who did the work before him, and enlist their help in his attempts to continue their task. He considered the glorification and promotion of local Orthodox saints as one of the most important works that a hierarch could do for his flock.

     We too must actively labour to venerate our ancestral saints, and must enter into spiritual relationship with them as St. John did. While we should not merely "appreciate" their lives and their example as an intellectual or aesthetic exercise, neither should we selectively reinterpret their examples and way of life in the light of modern fashions and "spiritualities." We should, through our efforts, strive to bring these saints into as clear a focus as possible before our mind's eye, reminding ourselves of the fact that they are alive and are our friends and spiritual mentors. The saints are, according to St. Justin Popovich of Serbia (1979), the continuation of the life of Christ on earth, as He comes and dwells within the "lively stones" (cf. I Peter 2:5) that constitute His Body, the Church (cf. Eph. 1:2223). Therefore, honour given to the saints is honour given to Christ; and it is by giving honour to Christ that we prepare ourselves to receive the Holy Spirit.

Troparion to the saints of Britain ~ Tone 8

     As a beautiful fruit of the sowing of Thy salvation, the land of Britain offereth to Thee, O Lord, all the saints that have shone in it. By their prayers keep the Church and our land in deep peace, through the Mother of God, O Most Merciful One.

 

A Week in Cambridge

A very abridged account of the IOCS Summerschool entitled “The Ascent to Holiness”

     My week in Cambridge was never meant to make a Holy person out of me – it will take more than a course with the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies to do that! Instead it was a week of lectures, most by eminent speakers, on the subject of “Holiness” – what is it, how is it acquired, how does it show itself and so on.

     My week was spent at Sidney Sussex College with a variety of other students from very diverse backgrounds – Orthodox (from Antiochian, American, Russian and Greek jurisdictions), and a variety of other Christians and some not. In all there must have been about 40 of us.

     My tiny room at the college, while not having enough space in the bathroom to swing even a small shrew was comfortable and provided lovely views across the “Masters Garden” over to the tower of St. John’s.

  Sidney Sussex College

     So what is Holiness?
     Dr. George Bebawi spoke twice during the course of the week, both times with much humour and frequent digressions from his script. His first lecture was on “Discernment” and at an early stage in his presentation he warned us against any “method” being applied to discernment and the search for holiness.

Dr Bebawi enjoys a spot of lunch – yes, it is yoghurt and not face cream!

     “Christian life is not controlled by methods or guided by techniques. We have a fellowship with the persons of the divine and Holy Trinity,” he told us. So, to participate in the life of God denies for us a method or a technique. We cannot be part of the life of a person – any person – by learning a method or a technique”.
     But he also warned against what he described as “learning wisdom”. He quoted from the Egyptian Desert Father, Abba Poemen, who said: “A man who teaches without doing what he teaches is like a spring which cleanses and gives drinks to everyone, but is not able to purify itself.”

     He told us the story of a monk in Egypt who wanted to be martyr. His abbot warned him against false heroism and told him it was easy to be unusual. True heroism, the abbot said, is found in daily life, looking for reality and finding God’s will there.
     The monk persisted in his quest for martyrdom however, and headed off to an area controlled by nomadic tribes, and demanded to become a martyr. But once they captured him, he was unable to resist, and rather than accept the pain of martyrdom he worshipped their idols.

     He returned to the monastery, tearing his robe, where the abbot reminded him that true heroism often lies in dealing with daily realities rather than seeking to be dramatic or unusual.
     The speaker Revd Dr Nikolai Sakharov looked at “Holiness in the Old and New Testaments.” He traced the movement from early ideas that saw holiness as the holiness of God, whose holiness was linked to being separate from the world; through later ideas about the physical dimensions of holiness, including the holiness of inanimate objects set aside for the worship of God, the holiness of people who were set aside for worship and who were expected to be ritually pure, or the holiness of soldiers, prophets and Israel as a nation, before moving on the concept of the holiness of people being found in spiritual holiness.

Revd Dr Nikolai Sakharov

     However, in the New Testament, holiness comes not so much with separation, but with living the word and following Christ in loving others. “For us Orthodox Christians, to love is not just to be nice,” he said. “To love is no longer an ethical or moral category, but an ontological category.”
     (I had to look this up too – so I will save you the trouble! Ontology – the study of being or existence)
     And he added: “Christ is our living commandment. How otherwise can you teach people to love? There is no other way aside from example”.
     In the afternoon Fr Andrew Louth spoke about “The Holy Man in Late Antiquity”.
     In an insightful paper, he looked at the difference between the saint and the martyr, between the holy man and the saint, between the holy man and the wise woman, and the between holy man and the holy place.
     I certainly left the lecture room that evening with my brain fizzing and wondering if there was enough room for a whole week of similar talks!

     One highlight of the week – only marred by the coach leaving Cambridge at 6:00am – was our visit to the Monastery of St John the Baptist in Tolleshunt Knights where we attended the Divine Liturgy.

Breakfast in the wonderfully painted refectory

     I had to wonder if the church might have been better fitted with pews as there were all manner of stools and chairs brought along by the congregation for their comfort!

     We then breakfasted with the Monks and Nuns – enjoying excellent homemade bread, preserves and much welcome coffee before settling in the Silhouan Room for an inspired talk by Sister Magdalen on “Monastic Holiness” and “Monastic Spirituality.”
     For her, “Holiness is the divine life lived in human life, made possible in the incarnation, which shows us it is possible to live as the sons or daughters of God.”

Sister Magdalen in the Silhouan Room

     In the monastic life, she explained simply, if you love Christ then you do his will. If you are irritated by the habits or behaviour of another member of the community, you do not get angry or complain, but pray in words such as: “Lord, have mercy on Sister Magdalen and by her holy prayers have mercy on me.”
     If I will take anything with me from this week – and I have much to take – then these words will be the ones which I hope I can put into practice.
     After a wonderful lunch with the community, we enjoyed the peace and quiet of the monastery for an hour or so before returning for Vespers at the college.

     Singers were quickly volunteered from our party on the very first evening to form a choir under the direction of the wife of our Chaplain Fr Raphael, Carolyn. We sang Vespers each evening and Matins every morning at 7:30am. If anyone thinks this was a holiday, then please think again! 7:30am to me is no holiday!
     Musically, the toughest thing to get the hang of was the curious notation for Troparia and Kontakia known locally as “chicken bones”. This identifies where the tune goes – but it is up to the other parts to fit their harmonies in accordingly. It is a sort of hybrid Byzantine notation which was – and largely still is – a bit of a mystery to the uninitiated.

     Wednesday saw Dr George Bebawi back on the stand for a talk on “Holiness in the Eastern and Western Churches” – the lecture which was of most interest to my wife, Carolyn (an Anglican) who asked me to take notes. Dr George spent little time in discussion of the topic however but there were some really inspired words of wisdom in what he offered and some great digressions into stories of his fascinating and eventful life. “Holiness is not a virtue,” he told us, “but is a participation in the holiness of God, period.” Humility, silence and asceticism are virtues in the practice of holiness, he explained; but holiness is a participation in God’s holiness. To be holy is to receive or to participate in the holiness of God. When we receive Holy Communion, we receive and participate in the holiness of Christ. But we cannot acquire holiness. We can protect holiness by asceticism, but we cannot acquire holiness.
     To stay in the realm of grace requires practice. But grace is received, not achieved.
     Christ is the head of the body, which is the Church, and every member of the body participates in the holiness of Christ. Holiness, in its definition, is deification; it is not a virtue, but is the work of the Holy Spirit within us.

     Every human being is made in the image of God. And so, if holiness means being dedicated to God, then in every person there is a glimpse of God.

     Later, Professor Sebastian Brock spoke on “Holiness in Song: St Ephrem the Syrian.” Saint Ephrem wrote most of his theology, at the height of the Arian controversy, as poetry. He wrote of the interior liturgy of the heart which is required as a response to the outward liturgy of the Church, and spoke of the three churches that need each other and need to function together - the heavenly church with the heavenly liturgy; the church of the altar and the liturgy on earth; and the church of the human heart with its interior liturgy.

     The afternoon didn’t see Dr Christine Mangala at the lectern as billed, as she had been unavoidably delayed in Syria. Her husband Professor Frost read her lecture instead. Coming from a Hindu background and a family of Brahmen poets, she is ideally experienced to talk on “Holiness in Eastern Religion: an Orthodox Perspective.”
     Dr Mangala described so-called holy men on the banks of the Ganges with their ascetic practices, many of them extreme cases with fakirs, swamis, and gurus engaging in self-torture, growing lengthy nails and beards, standing on one leg, or lying on beds of nails.
     She asked “Can there be saints in non-Christian religions? Can there be manifestation of the Holy Spirit in other religions? And how should Christians respond to them?”
     She offered by way of response that she had found true holiness in the everyday life of ordinary Hindus, expressed in their everyday lives, their music, their poetry and even in their dance. The search for the love and grace of a personal God are deeply rooted in the Hindu psyche, and in their poetry especially we can find a longing for the divine, the holy, the pure.
Father Samuel preached one Sunday early in my journey to St Michael’s that we cannot know where God is, and in whose soul he chooses to lodge.
     We sing in the Beatitudes “Blessed are the poor in Spirit – for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven”. It was ventured that some of these religions might fall into this category but that a glimpse of something Christian can often be seen in them.
We sing “Blessed are the pure in heart – for they shall see God” and this certainly encompasses many believers in many religions who in their devotion put me to shame, although when they meet God, they may be a little surprised.

     Metropolitan Kallistos arrived and sat opposite me for lunch – a charming and witty man indeed whose lecture on “What is a Saint?” did not disappoint.

Metropolitan Kallistos

     He described the moment in the Divine Liturgy when the Priest says “The Holy Things are for the Holy,” which he pointed out could also be translated as: “The sacraments for the saints,” or: “The holy things for the saints.”

     There is one, he said, who is holy - Jesus Christ. Sanctity belongs to God, and we merely participate in God’s holiness. “But sanctity is a universal vocation, to be a saint is the norm; a saint is a normal human being, as God intended humanity to be. All the baptised are called to be saints.”
     The saints are intensely alive, and living in and with the living Christ, he said. “They share the mind of Christ and hear our prayers.”
     He added “The saints are surprising. It is sin that is monotonous. Sanctity is surprising. There are no new sins, but always new forms of sanctity … Saints express the uniqueness of our human vocation.”

     Later, Archimandrite Ephrem Lash, who has been a regular lecturer at the institute in Cambridge, spoke about the Liturgy in his paper, “Sober Drunkenness: Holiness in the Liturgy.”
There was little by explanation to follow.
     He said that he had been given the title on which to talk and while he agreed to using the title, the content would bear no relation!
     I learned much about the Liturgy in this lecture which I had not considered before.

Archimandrite Ephrem Lash

     To sum up his talk however, he said the Liturgy is a communal act, not private devotions. “We do not go to church to pray as individuals, we go to make a joyful noise unto God.” Everything about the Liturgy is holy, and the object of the liturgy is to make us partakers of God’s holiness, to have communion. The gifts are made holy by the work of the Trinity, where the Holy Spirit is the agent of the Holy Trinity. The Epiklesis or invocation of the Holy Spirit is not a magic moment, but about hallowing or making holy.

     He said again that the purpose of the Liturgy is not to produce the “real presence”, but is communion, with the holy gifts transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ so that we may eat and drink them.

     And so drew to a close what had been a wonderful week.

     We enjoyed a celebration meal together and then a small group of us retired to “The Mitre” pub where we drank “The Reverend James’ Ale”.
     This couple of hours summed up the spirit of the week – one Orthodox Priest, and Anglican Woman Priest, a Lutheran from Iceland and a Church of Ireland Priest and me, discussing not only the lectures of the day but talking about our own experiences. All over a refreshing couple of drinks.
     As closing time approached, we adjourned to the cloisters of the college where we sat for a further two hours drinking Cockburns Port – kindly supplied by our Icelandic friend!

Father Alexander Tefft from our sister
Antiochian Parish in London sums up
the week before retiring to The Mitre

     As Father Patrick (who as you might guess was the aforementioned Church of Ireland Priest) so aptly asked – “Were we indulging in sober drunkenness or was it drunken sobriety? We may not have been holy fools, but we certainly had what came close to “magic moments” or even communion with one another this past week.”

     Martin Shorthose – with thanks to Father Patrick who made far more notes than I did and had the foresight to take down the quotes.

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