A person in need is the coming of the Lord.

West exterior of Voroneţ Monastery chapel, 1550

Today is Meatfare Sunday – the third Sunday of the Triodion – the Sunday of the Last Judgement. This means that we are now but one week and some hours away from the beginning of the Great Fast – and today is the last day before the lesser fast of Cheesefare Week. So, we must prepare ourselves to embrace again the rigor of a penitential season. 

The three pillars of every penitential season are – as is well-known – prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. These means of bringing us to repentance are revealed to us in scripture – especially in the Sermon on the Mount – and are recommended to us by the fathers of the Church – for example by St. Maximos the Confessor.[i] Today, I would like to focus in on that last pillar, which I feel is often somewhat neglected and which, I think we will see, is particularly important when it comes to the Last Judgement.

Jesus – the son of Sirach, that is – teaches us not to neglect the giving of alms (Sirach 7: 10). And Jesus the Christ, in his Sermon on the Mount, assumes that we will give alms. He says "when you give alms," he doesn't say "if you give alms” – just as he says, “when you pray…” and “when you fast….” These things are not optional if we are Christians.

Whatever good things we have are not truly our own alone but belong also to those who do not have these good things. Giving simply helps to restore balance to the cosmos upset and distorted by our sins. We can be covetous even with what we regard as our own property, let alone the property of others, and this covetousness separates us from the God who gave us everything we have so that we can be generous with others.

And Jesus tells us how to give – in secret and not so that we may be seen by others (Matthew 6: 2). Today, he might have said, when you give to the poor, do not film it and post it on YouTube under the guise of a social experiment, but give in secret, and your Father who watches in secret will reward you (Matt 6:4).

It's interesting – I just want to point out – we often hear this list of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving – and there's a logic to this order. After all, in one sense, almsgiving results from prayer and fasting – so it comes after. Fasting leaves us with more to give and prayer inspires us to give. Nonetheless, it's worth pointing out that, in his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus puts things in a different order – he speaks first about almsgiving and then about prayer and fasting (Matt 6). So maybe this gives a little more primacy to the issue of almsgiving then we are generally wont to do.

In the Book of Tobit, the Archangel Raphael says that "prayer and fasting are good, but better than either is almsgiving accompanied by righteousness. A little with righteousness is better than abundance with wickedness. It is better to give alms than to store up gold; for almsgiving saves one from death and expiates every sin. Those who regularly give alms shall enjoy a full life" (Tobit 12: 8 - 9).

Now, first of all, what constitutes almsgiving? Well, it's giving dollars to bums, right? Or, it's donating money to charitable causes? Something like that. Well, these are good things and almsgiving encompasses them, but it's interesting if we look at the Greek word that were translating here. The Greek word is ἐλεημοσύνη. Maybe this sounds a little bit familiar because we so often repeat the phrase, Κύριε, ἐλέησον, which means Lord, have mercy. The word here has “mercy” as a root.  

So the word means a bit more than giving alms as we tend to think of it, though it carries that meaning as well. It refers also to compassion and to practicing the virtue of mercy and beneficence. In other words, it refers to doing the works of mercy – including the very works upon which we will be judged when the Son of Man comes in his glory, according to the teaching of Jesus Christ today (Matt 25:31).

When we give something to eat to someone who is hungry, when we give something to drink to someone who is thirsty, when we welcome a stranger with hospitality, when we give clothes to someone who is naked, when we take care of someone who is sick, when we visit someone who is in prison or bound by whatever circumstances – all of this is ἐλεημοσύνη – these are all ways of showing mercy and compassion – and they are all forms of almsgiving (Matt 25:35-36). Just note that – according to what Jesus is teaching us today – it is our practice of mercy in these ways that will determine whether or not we are entering the kingdom prepared for us from the foundation of the cosmos (25:34). It is on the basis of our almsgiving – and not our fasting, for example – that we are judged.

Remember that the desert fathers kept a strict rule of prayer and fasting. Well,

A brother came to see a certain hermit and, as he was leaving, he said, "Forgive me abba for preventing you from keeping your rule." The hermit replied, "My rule is to welcome you with hospitality and to send you away in peace."

Love is the highest rule and the greatest commandment and hospitality is the clearest expression of love.

It was said of an old man that he dwelt in Syria on the way to the desert. This was his work: whenever a monk came from the desert, he gave him refreshment with all his heart. Now one day a hermit came and he offered him refreshment. The other did not want to accept it, saying he was fasting. Filled with sorrow, the old man said to him, "Do not despise your servant, I beg you, do not despise me, but let us pray together. Look at the tree which is here; we will follow the way of whichever of us causes it to bend when he kneels on the ground and prays." So the hermit knelt down to pray and nothing happened. Then the hospitable one knelt down and at once the tree bent towards him. Taught by this, they gave thanks to God.

Fasting is good because it teaches us self-control, discipline, and detachment from the things of this world and, when we have learned these things, we can be more hospitable. Again, as Raphael teaches Tobit and Tobias, “Prayer and fasting are good, but better than either is almsgiving accompanied by righteousness,” and the Eastern Christian tradition is right, I believe, in emphasizing hospitality as its most cherished form of almsgiving. In giving hospitality, we sometimes give of ourselves in a more personal way than when we give money, food, or clothing. Hospitality causes us to share our homes, our time, and our very way of life. [ii]

Indeed, we must "not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares" (Hebrew 13:2). Remember the hospitality of Abraham to the three strangers who came to his home (Gen 18:1-5). By this, he showed hospitality to the Lord and, through his hospitality, the Holy Trinity is revealed to us. Jesus teaches us today that whatever we do to the least of these, we do to the Lord (Matt 25:40, 45). This is never more clear than in the case of Abraham showing hospitality to the three strangers who are in truth of the appearance of the Lord to him. It's really something – isn't it? – that the icon that we know as the Rublev Trinity was first known as the Hospitality of Abraham. When we show hospitality, the Lord is revealed to us. When we see the face of Christ in the face of all of our brothers and sisters and in every stranger that we meet, we will welcome him in them, show them hospitality, and give them all we have to give. Every person in need who comes to us is a coming of Christ and a theophany of the Lord – if we have eyes to see.

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[i] "Almsgiving heals the soul's incensive power; fasting withers sensual desire; prayer purifies the Intellect and prepares it for the contemplation of created beings" (Maximos the Confessor, First Century on Love, 79).

[ii] Light for Life, Part Three, 48

Do what they say, not what they do.

One Sunday morning, two men came to our parish church to pray and attend liturgy.

One was a pious and learned Byzantine Catholic gentleman. He had studied and knew our faith well. He rigorously observed the traditional fasts as described in the Typikon – even fasting twice a week on Wednesdays and Fridays throughout the year.  He always knew the tone of the week and often made well-informed comments on Facebook. He prayed the Divine Praises daily with his family. And, more than this, he really was an upright man. That is, he did not drink too much nor did he eat too much. He did not look at pornography, or look at others lustfully. He gave a full 10% of his income to the parish before taxes. He was honest with his employer and faithful to his wife.

The other man was a drug dealer from the neighborhood.

What if Jesus's parable of the publican and the Pharisee (Luke 18:10-14) began this way? I retell it this way to help us hear what Jesus is really saying.

In this day and age, when we hear the word "Pharisee," we think immediately of hypocrisy. Its second definition in the dictionary is, “a self-righteous person; a hypocrite.” When we hear the word "Pharisee," the admonition of Jesus – “Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites" – is always ringing in our ears. To call someone a Pharisee is to insult them.  

But this is not how those listening to Jesus would have heard that word. By "Pharisee," was meant someone who belonged to a group of Jews who rigorously observed the law, the Torah, and the tradition, who revered the scripture, and believed the prophets, who believed in the resurrection of the dead, and that the greatest law was to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, and with all our souls, and with all our minds and to love our neighbors as ourselves. In short, they were pious and upright men, rather like the pious and upright Byzantine Catholic I've just described. And seemingly rather like Jesus himself.

I once attended a talk by a local rabbi in Pittsburgh and a man asked him during the Q&A section at the end what he thought of Jesus. And he said that Jesus was a Pharisee. This is shocking to our Christian ears, but that is very much how the original audience of this parable might have understood things.

When we hear that a publican and a Pharisee go up to the temple to pray, we already know who the bad guy is – the Pharisee! Jesus’ hearers, on the other hand, would have been shocked by the notion that the publican would be justified and that the Pharisee would not – that the Lord would receive the repentance of the tax collector, but shun the self-glorification of the pious and observant man.

But maybe if we hear that a drug dealer and a pious and learned Byzantine Catholic attend church together, we'll tend to suspect the drug dealer of being the bad guy. But if that drug dealer comes here to pray with a repentant heart, he will be justified. And if that pious Byzantine Catholic comes here pridefully and exalts himself rather than God, he will not be justified. And that’s what this parable is supposed to do. It's to turn our assumptions on their head – especially our assumptions about ourselves.

Jesus isn't saying that it's all alright to defraud people of their income, or that it's alright to sell illegal drugs or any other sin. "Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!" (Rom 6:15).

The Pharisee was not an extortioner. He was not unjust. He was not an adulterer. He fasted twice a week and paid his full tithe to the temple. Jesus elsewhere praises these things by his words and his actions.

Just last week, when the tax collector Zacchaeus repents before Jesus of defrauding people of their income, Jesus responds, saying "Today salvation has come to this house." Jesus is no friend of extortion or fraud. It is repentance from these things that brings salvation. And to repent means to turn away from evil – not just to say we’re sorry, but to go and sin no more.

Regarding adultery, Jesus teaches us that "who looks at a woman with lust - or covetousness – has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt 5:28). He condemns this adultery, even as he does not condemn the adulterous woman.

Jesus himself fasts and prays.

So no, Jesus is not telling us that it's all right to sin, nor is he telling us not to tithe and fast and pray. Far from it.

The Pharisee’s avoidance of certain sins and his prayer and fasting and tithing are good things. We should imitate the Pharisee in these things, but never in his self-exaltation. Jesus teaches us elsewhere that “the scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat; so practice and observe whatever they tell you, but not what they do; for they preach, but do not practice…. They do all their deeds to be seen by men…. [Remember,] whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted” (Matt 23:2-12). This is an important warning for us as we prepare to enter the Great Fast. Do not make a show of your fasting.

With this parable, Jesus is teaching us, as St. John Chrysostom would later put it, that " “Even if we have thousands of acts of great virtue to our credit, our confidence in being heard must be based on God’s mercy and love for men. Even if we stand at the very summit of virtue, it is by mercy that we shall he saved.”

We pray repeatedly in our liturgies that we may spend the rest of our lives in peace and repentance. Repentance is a way of life, not just a moment, and we must embrace it if we are to go away from the temple justified.

Today, we begin the Triodion. We begin preparing for the great fast. And this first week of preparation, we are forbidden to fast. Some say that this is so we will not be able to boast of our weekly fasting like the Pharisee. We must pray, but we must not pray like the Pharisee, pridefully comparing ourselves to others. Soon, we will often pray the prayer of St. Ephrem: "O Lord and King, let me see my own sins and not judge my brothers and sisters." Like the publican, let us see and confess our own sins and not the sins of our neighbors, our families and friends, or our enemies.

"Oh faithful, let us not pray as the Pharisee, for those who exalt themselves will be humbled. Let us humble ourselves before God with the publican and let us say: Lord have mercy on me a sinner."[i]

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[i] First Sticheron of Vespers for the Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee