Hospice or Hospital?

Spiritual pain control or spiritual healing?

Since the Church is a hospital for the soul wherein we come for healing, it is important that we take full advantage of all the resources the Church offers us for such healing. Frequent confession, where we bare our sins before God with the priest as the witness is an important beginning to the healing process. Receiving the Holy Mysteries of Christ’s Body and Blood on a regular basis gives us the grace needed for the healing of the soul, freeing it from the bondage that comes from the sin that has weighted us down.

Keeping to a regular Prayer Rule, given to us by our priest, confessor, or spiritual father or mother, also contributes to the healing process. Reading spiritually uplifting books, as well as the lives of the saints, also greatly contributes to the transformation that can be ours if we take our faith seriously. As well, the fasting rules of the Church are designed to help us become whole, furthering the healing process that began when we first made a commitment to living a life in Christ.

If we fail to follow these time tested spiritual practices that are meant to bring about healing of body and soul, we will not find the healing that is available to us. Instead, we will find ourselves treating the Church as though she were simply a hospice, where we get a quick fix for the pain and sin that keeps us from becoming whole, and find ourselves with short term results that only mask the sin and sickness that rule our lives.

It is up to us to decide if we will allow the Church to be a hospital that brings about the cure, or simply use the Church as a hospice that only masks the pain and sin. The choice is ours.

Love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon

Photos: Our day began with the Divine Liturgy, served in the chapel of Holy Spirit Retreat Center, owned by the Roman Catholic diocese. Following breakfast, we all drove to a native hospital for the unction service for the Mitered Archpriest Philip, a much revered Yupik priest. It was a deeply moving service, and a first for me. Although I’ve taken part in many Unction Services, this was the first time I’d seen it done for a priest in a hospital, with his brother priests having requested it.

Thursday August 15, 2019 / August 2, 2019
9th Week after Pentecost. Tone seven.
Dormition (Theotokos) Fast. By Monastic Charter: Food without Oil
Translation of the relics (428) of the Protomartyr and Archdeacon Stephen (428) and Translation of the relics (415) of the Righteous Nicodemus, Gamaliel, and Abibus.
Blessed Basil of Moscow, fool-for-Christ (1552).
New Martyr Athanasius (1918).
New Hieromartyr Platon (1937).
Blessed Basil of Kuben Lake (1472).
Hieromartyr Stephen, pope of Rome (257).
Achair Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos (21 c.).
St. Marco of Belavinsk (Vologda) (1492).
St. Friardus of Vindumitta (573) (Gaul).
Translation of the relics of Martyrs Maximus (286), Dada, and Quinctilian at Dorostolum in Moesia (Greek).
New Martyr Theodore of the Dardanelles (1690) (Greek).
Martyr Phocas (Greek).

The Scripture Readings

1 Corinthians 14:6-19

Tongues Must Be Interpreted

6 But now, brethren, if I come to you speaking with tongues, what shall I profit you unless I speak to you either by revelation, by knowledge, by prophesying, or by teaching? 7 Even things without life, whether flute or harp, when they make a sound, unless they make a distinction in the sounds, how will it be known what is piped or played? 8 For if the trumpet makes an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle? 9 So likewise you, unless you utter by the tongue words easy to understand, how will it be known what is spoken? For you will be speaking into the air. 10 There are, it may be, so many kinds of languages in the world, and none of them is without significance. 11 Therefore, if I do not know the meaning of the language, I shall be a foreigner to him who speaks, and he who speaks will be a foreigner to me. 12 Even so you, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, let it be for the edification of the church that you seek to excel.

13 Therefore let him who speaks in a tongue pray that he may interpret. 14 For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. 15 What is the conclusion then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with the understanding. I will sing with the spirit, and I will also sing with the understanding. 16 Otherwise, if you bless with the spirit, how will he who occupies the place of the uninformed say “Amen” at your giving of thanks, since he does not understand what you say? 17 For you indeed give thanks well, but the other is not edified.

18 I thank my God I speak with tongues more than you all; 19 yet in the church I would rather speak five words with my understanding, that I may teach others also, than ten thousand words in a tongue.

Matthew 20:17-28

Jesus a Third Time Predicts His Death and Resurrection

17 Now Jesus, going up to Jerusalem, took the twelve disciples aside on the road and said to them, 18 “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and to the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death, 19 and deliver Him to the Gentiles to mock and to scourge and to crucify. And the third day He will rise again.”

Greatness Is Serving

20 Then the mother of Zebedee’s sons came to Him with her sons, kneeling down and asking something from Him.

21 And He said to her, “What do you wish?”

She said to Him, “Grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on the left, in Your kingdom.”

22 But Jesus answered and said, “You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”

They said to Him, “We are able.”

23 So He said to them, “You will indeed drink My cup, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with; but to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared by My Father.”

24 And when the ten heard it, they were greatly displeased with the two brothers. 25 But Jesus called them to Himself and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. 26 Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. 27 And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave— 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”