Community

The communal nature of our faith is essential

Christianity is a communal faith, one that requires its followers to be actively involved with others. The Church’s worship is communal, and salvation itself is a corporate act, one that necessitates interaction with others. One is not “saved” in a vacuum, but as part of the corporal life of the Church. Your salvation must be as much a concern to me, as is my own salvation. My relationship with Christ is not about me, but about us.

Our sins are not just against God, but against the Body of Christ, the Church. Our love of God can not be salvific if we do not love others, for just as the Lord said, “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? (1 John 4:20)”.

Given the communal nature of the Church, it is particularly alarming to see increasing numbers of people isolating themselves from others. Many have turned to the Internet as the sole source of interaction with others, finding “friendships” with people who will never be met in person. The importance of social interaction in the central square, as seen in traditional villages where the cafe life and church were the primary source of fraternal interaction, has almost disappeared, pointing the way to a future of estrangement from each other.

Isolated from others, the communal nature that is an important element in what it means to be human, is lost. It is thus imperative that we guard against the temptation of spending too much time in front of the computer, and too little time with others. The sight of young people sitting in coffee houses, together, yet apart, is troubling. Mobile phones, text messaging, ipods, communication through email, and countless hours on facebook, leads to the furtherance of an isolation that is murdering the soul.

As humans, we are meant to be together, for it is in our lives together that we grow in mind and spirit. It is in community that we learn to love God. For friendships to be limited to on-line chat rooms is a tragedy of major proportions, one that will ultimately be the ruin of society.

With love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon

Wednesday June 17, 2015 / June 4, 2015

3rd Week after Pentecost. Tone one.
Apostles’ (Peter & Paul) Fast. Food with Oil

St. Metrophanes, first patriarch of Constantinople (325).
New Hieromartyr Peter priest (1918).
New Martyrs: Archbishop Andronicus of Perm (1918) and Archbishop Basil of Chernigov (1918).
Venerable Methodius, abbot of Peshnosha (1392), disciple of St. Sergius of Radonezh.
Martyrs Frontasius, Severinus, Severian, and Silanus of Gaul (1st c.).
Martyr Concordius of Spoleto (175).
Hieromartyr Astius, bishop of Dyrrachium in Macedonia (110).
Venerable Zosimas of Cilicia, bishop of New Babylon (Egypt) (6th c.).
Hieromartyr Ioannicus, metropolitan of Montenegro and Littoral (1945).
Sts. Mary and Martha, sisters of St. Lazarus (1st c.).
Venerables Eleazar and Nazarius, wonderworkers of Olonets (15th c.).
Venerable Sophia of Thrace (10th-11th c.).
Venerable John, abbot of Monagria near Cyzicus (761).
Venerable Alonius of Scete in Egypt (5th c.).
St. Titus, bishop of Byzantium (3rd c.).
Hieromartyr Apotacius and Martyrs Camarus, Zoticus, Gaddanus, Ninnitus, Julius, Attalus, Eutyches, Amasus, Carinus, Saturninus and 30 others, beheaded at Noviodunum in Scythia Minor (320).
St. Optatus, bishop of Milevum in Numidia (376).
St. Petroc of Cornwall (594) (Celtic & British).

Scripture Readings

Romans 8:2-13

2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. 8 So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. 10 And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

Sonship Through the Spirit

12 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors—not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

Matthew 10:16-22

Persecutions Are Coming

16 “Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves. 17 But beware of men, for they will deliver you up to councils and scourge you in their synagogues. 18 You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. 19 But when they deliver you up, do not worry about how or what you should speak. For it will be given to you in that hour what you should speak; 20 for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.

21 “Now brother will deliver up brother to death, and a father his child; and children will rise up against parents and cause them to be put to death. 22 And you will be hated by all for My name’s sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved.