Mission Monthly Newsletter December 2002

...Meditate on These Things. Phillipians 4.8

"All that is truly beautiful carries the soul to You in a mighty call, and forces it to sing rapturously: Alleluia!"

            Akathist of Thanksgiving – Kontakion 7  

     Ahhhh, vacation!  I will be the first to say it is good to get away from time to time.  I wish I could be the first to say that getting away isn’t necessary.  I wish I could be stronger in carrying the weight of day to day responsibilities and not feel oppressed when the passing weeks seem to allow little let up in life’s demands.  I wish my soul could endure more courageously and see more clearly how God trains His children through restraint and the limiting of our freedoms.  I wish my mind could understand and assimilate how God intentionally binds us to the yoke of His Word through obedience that we might acquire the virtue of self-control and accept His restrictions in order to know His (true) freedom.  I wish…

     There are many characteristics of a great vacation.  Kh. Vanessa could tell you a few of mine (mainly through my complaining when I don’t get them).  There is hope for a sense of adventure, for discovering something new, for anonymity, and for simple rest.  What is it about me that “needs” these things?  Of these four characteristics only one of them (the hope for rest) is obviously healthy for both body and soul.  With weak or no faith a need for adventure, discovery and anonymity could stand in direct conflict with the stable, grounded, and community-centered life we are given to live in the Church.  Why?  Because along with these desires could come grave temptations of self-determination and a lack of accountability.

     I often recall the story of St. John of Kronstadt, reportedly one of the greatest pastors of the Orthodox Church in the modern era (+1908).  It is said of Fr. John that he never took any personal time.  He spent ALL his time serving God and the calling of priesthood, and he was beloved of his people.  If this virtue is indeed true it is nearly impossible to fathom this level of personal sacrifice, NEVER concerning himself with his own “needs.”

     Fr. John was immersed in his faith, as man and as priest.  His first vocation was to his faith in God and living obediently to the life of the Church.  His second vocation, as an ordained priest, was how he expressed his first vocation.  The order of his vocations is the correct priority that each of us, man or woman, should follow: first fulfilling our calling as members of the Royal Priesthood, then and only then fulfilling our life’s occupation in a priestly manner.  What was it that Fr. John possessed, allowing him to be captive to his God-centered vocations?  His diary gives us some insights into the source of his freedom in Christ: “I love to pray in God's Church, especially in the sanctuary near the altar because then I change miraculously through God's grace; during the prayers of repentance and moments of tender emotion my soul sheds its thorns and chains of passions and I feel elated; all the fascination and charm of passions disappear; it is as if I die to the world and the world with its attractions dies for me; I become alive in God and He permeates me and I become one with Him in spirit; I become like a child who finds consolation on its mother's lap, my heart is then filled with heavenly peace, my soul illumined by heavenly light, I see everything clearly, rightly; I feel love and affection for all; oh, how blissfully happy is the soul with God!  The Church, truly, is an earthly paradise.”

     One of my favorite things to do while on vacation (and quite honestly at any time) is to go to a beach where there is a large body of water, i.e. the ocean or a Great Lake.  Whitefish Dunes State Park on Lake Michigan provided for my needs this last vacation.  I noticed something while standing sun drenched in my winter coat, taking in the chilly Fall breeze of this inland sea.  There was in front of me the endless horizon, brilliant, daunting, liberating.  I noticed a weight being lifted from my soul and an inner shout: “Alleluia!”  I recalled how my God, now seen gloriously in His creation, had once illumined and empowered a younger self with a new vision of paradise and the pursuit of a repentant path.  A man once told me that it is good to have a vision and hope.  I accept with gratitude that day’s horizon as a gift of God’s pleasure, renewing my vision with the purpose of His creation and “all that is truly beautiful”  to “carry our souls” to Himself.  I wonder if Fr. John ever needed a horizon?  My hope, however, is to one day be more dedicated to my life in Christ, to the Royal Priesthood and to my vocation, that like Fr. John I might find my “consolation” even more in the “earthly paradise” of God’s Holy Church.