Ending isolation through the Christian life
In an age when families no longer eat dinner together, children watch TV, play computer games, and text message their friends from their bedrooms. When adults can be seen walking in our cities talking on cell phones. At a time in our history when people can be sitting in a cafe with friends, all the while talking to someone else on a mobile phone, we have become a people living together in isolation.
I remember from my youth visiting my elderly grandmother, always finding her radio and TV blasting away. You’d walk into her kitchen and hear a radio, while in the living room you’d find her TV on, even though she rarely was listening to either. I knew this was a sign that she was lonely and the noise kept her company. Yet, when she did have someone there to visit, all the other sounds would be shut off.
On many occasions I’ve had to ask people if they wouldn’t turn off their TV’s when I’d arrive for a pastoral call. People don’t often notice the distractions that they’ve allow to intrude into their homes, having become so accustomed to these foreign invaders. Many husbands are shocked when their wives file for divorce, having been so consumed with outside entertainment, they failed to notice the line of communication between themselves and their spouses had been lost years earlier.
Children are no longer supervised with their homework because their parents are uninvolved, partly because the technology has left them in the dark. They therefore trust their children are working on their homework. The truth is often the case that their children are watching music videos on utube, while text messaging their friends (I once taught both in a high school and a college, so I know this to be true).
Even in our spiritual lives we tend to be living in isolation. Many reserve their prayers to issues revolving around finances, or prayers offered regarding their health, or that of a family member. Yet these people rarely think of the importance of corporate prayer with family and friends apart from the Sunday Liturgy. Prayer is a private matter, rarely shared with others. The fact that public prayer outside one’s parish is now frowned upon by the government, has further eroded our sense of corporate prayer as being something we, as a nation, value.
Entertainment has also taken on a central role in our lives, becoming so important as to have replaced visiting neighbors or friends. I’m old enough to remember the day when neighborhoods were filled with homes sporting large front porches. On those hot summer nights families would be sitting on their porches, sipping lemonade and waving at passing neighbors who were actually out for a stroll. Now we all have air conditioners, and front porches have been replaced with private back patios, where no one can see us. Gone are the days of neighborliness.
Isolation rules!
The Church is the Body of Christ and by Her very nature is anything but an institution wherein one can be isolated from others. We only let it be so if we fail to involve ourselves as the people of God, with one another. The greeting given by Orthodox Christians, passing on the holy kiss when we meet one another, or kissing the hand of our priest, are ways we avoid the isolation that dominates the society in which we live. Staying for the coffee hour, or the agape meal following the Sunday Liturgy, are ways in which we can do battle against the isolation that dominates the rest of our world. Attending midweek services is another way to stave off isolation.
Our youth need to learn from us the importance of communicating directly with their friends and family. Taking children out for a Sunday afternoon drive, exploring the country side, radio off, is a wonderful way families can reconnect. Taking grandmother on a family picnic to a local park, avoiding the back yard, is a wonderful, old fashioned way of introducing community to children. Letting them play with cousins in a park, as the extended family gathers for a picnic, can build families bonds that will last a lifetime.
When was the last time you sat around with a senior member of your family and asked them to share the memories of their youth? What a wonderful way to reconnect an aging grandfather to his own youth and showing him that you value his life experiences and the memories of his own parents and grandparents. What an invaluable legacy you impart to your own children, letting them know they were not born in a vacuum, but are a part of a long line of real people.
Isolation is a terrible threat to our way of life. Young people no longer have the communication skills that past generations learned from older family members. I am astounded when I think of how much of my grandparents are a real part of who I’ve become. It is not just genetics that they passed on to me, but memories of family history that was long gone when I was born. Even parts of my personality were gleaned from my great grandfather. My study, filled as it is with photographs, icons and collectibles, is a style that became my own, having loved the same clutter and warmth of my grandparents home.
Isolation does not have to be a part of our world. It just takes commitment on our part to build family and community. When people visit the monastery I routinely ask that they turn off their cell phones, so we can all leave isolation behind and connect as family, the children of the Most High. What a wonderful thing it would be if each family had two hours each night when the house phone, cell phones, the TV, and all other outside intrusions were banned. How about an evening of playing Uno, as a family, or putting a puzzle together? Then, end the evening with the whole family standing before the icon corner, doing the evening prayers!
Love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon
Photo: Daniel Peters, together with his wife and three sons, came to the monastery for the Sunday Liturgy, from British Columbia. Daniel is a member of the lay Brotherhood of the Salish Sea.
Monday August 10, 2015 / July 28, 2015
11th Week after Pentecost. Tone one.
Appearance of the “Smolensk” “Directress” Icon of the Mother of God brought from Constantinople in 1046.
Holy Apostles of the Seventy and Deacons: Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, and Parmenas (1st c.).
St. Pitirim, bishop of Tambov (1698).
Synaxis of All Saints of Tambov.
New Hieromartyr Nicholas deacon (1918).
New Hieromartyr Basil, Virgin-martyrs Anastasia and Hellen, Martyrs Aretha, John, John, John amd Virgin-martyr Mavra (1937).
New Hieromartyr Ignatius of Jablechna (Chelm and Podlasie, Poland) (1942).
Venerable Moses, wonderworker of the Kiev Caves (14th c.).
Martyr Julian of Dalmatia (2nd c.), Martyr Eustathius (Eustace) the Soldier of Ancyra (316) and Martyr Acacius of Apamea (321).
Venerable Paul of Xeropotamou, Mt. Athos (820).
“Grebensk” (1380), “Kostroma” (1672) and “Umileniye” (“of Tender Feeling”) (1885) of Diveyevo, before which St. Seraphim reposed.
Reverence list of an “Smolensk” Icon of the Mother of God: “Ustiuzh” (1290), “Vydropussk” (15th c.), “Voronin” (1524), “Xristopor” (16th c.), “Supralsk” (16th c.), “Yug” (1615), “Igritsky” (1624), “Shuysk” (1654-16-55), “Sedmiezersk” (17th c.), “Sergievsk” (Troitsk-Sergievsky Lavra) (1730).
“Tambov” (1692) Icon of the Mother of God.
Venerable Irene Chrysoyolantou of Cappadocia (912).
Venerables Ursus and Leobatius (Leubais), brother-abbots (500) (Gaul).
St. Samson, bishop of Dol in Brittany (565) (Celtic & British).
New Martyr Christodoulos of Kassandra (1777) (Greek).
New Martyr Anastasius of Ancyra (1777) (Greek).
Venerable George of Mt. Athos, the Builder (1033) (Georgia).
The Daily Scripture Readings
2 Corinthians 2:3-15
Forgive the Offender
3 And I wrote this very thing to you, lest, when I came, I should have sorrow over those from whom I ought to have joy, having confidence in you all that my joy is the joy of you all. 4 For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you, with many tears, not that you should be grieved, but that you might know the love which I have so abundantly for you.
5 But if anyone has caused grief, he has not grieved me, but all of you to some extent—not to be too severe. 6 This punishment which was inflicted by the majority is sufficient for such a man, 7 so that, on the contrary, you ought rather to forgive and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed up with too much sorrow. 8 Therefore I urge you to reaffirm your love to him. 9 For to this end I also wrote, that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things. 10 Now whom you forgive anything, I also forgive. For if indeed I have forgiven anything, I have forgiven that one for your sakes in the presence of Christ, 11 lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices.
Triumph in Christ
12 Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach Christ’s gospel, and a door was opened to me by the Lord, 13 I had no rest in my spirit, because I did not find Titus my brother; but taking my leave of them, I departed for Macedonia.
14 Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place. 15 For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.
Matthew 23:13-22
13 “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. 14 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.
15 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.
16 “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.’ 17 Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold? 18 And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obliged to perform it.’ 19 Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift? 20 Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it. 21 He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it. 22 And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it.