The Communities of New Skete

Scripture Readings: Is 29: 13-16, Rm.11:33-12:5, Mt. 15:1-14

Reflections from a Nun

As some of you know I recently went to Indiana to bury my father who lived a good three months past his 95th birthday.I do believe that my father tried to do the will of God, as in this mornings Epistle —what is good and acceptable and perfect all his life. While he was affected by his culture and by being human, it seems to me he was ahead of his time in seeing some of the injustices of the times and not following the crowd. Relatives and friends attested to his goodness and willingness to do for anyone who was in need, no matter how big or small the need. I was struck by the comments of those who really had to put themselves out to get to Indiana to pay their last respects. It made me think how much better the world would be if there were more people like him. It made me wonder if it was my father’s religious beliefs that made him a truly loving individual or something else. I truly don’t know. There were many individuals of different “religious persuasions” gathered there but all of us were united in our various degrees of affection for the deceased.

It made me wonder why so many of different religious persuasions pit themselves against the “other” rather than accept and love the “other”. How many pay homage to God with their lips while their heart is not in it. God has said if you love me love one another. God did not say only if the other agrees with what you think or does what you want are you obliged to love the other.

It is truly hard to love another when they appear self righteous-better than you, or I’ve got all the answers. It is hard to love another when the other appears to hate and hurt others, and even more so when I am the one hurt or hated.

Let us recall how Christ treated others. He did not always say everybody was wonderful. He did take people to task. Consider his words “you hypocrites” or “you brood of vipers”. He also cured and healed many without their even asking him to do so.

So how do we discern what is the will of God for us? Do we sometimes think we can discern the will of God for the other? Parents certainly need to exercise some control of their children so that the child can live safely and learn not to harm others. Certainly we can sometimes see what would probably make the other a happier person and therefore try to influence them for their own happiness. We do not need to control them but can influence them for the good.

Discerning the will of God requires that we look within. How am I reacting or responding to everyday life? There are some of us that if we are honest, when we look within find that we think we are better than others, better even than God. The reading from Isaiah this morning indicated the clay believed itself to be the potter. Or sometimes it is the opposite. We think rather that we are the worse kind of person and truly unlovable. For most of us that is equally false. Both these attitudes can be changed. The truth is more than likely somewhere in the middle.

We have to be brave enough to be honest enough to discover why we feel what we feel and why we react the way we do before we can really change. It does not happen overnight. It will not happen just by willing it. We do have to work at it as if it depends entirely on us while realizing without help from our loving God, no real change will be made. When we work at it this way, our words will not just be from our lips but will be from our heart.

Though we may not live as long as my father did, however long our life may be, let us strive to live a good life, a life discerning the will of God, a life filled with loving others.

Glory be to Jesus Christ!

Our Annual Pilgrimage will be held on Saturday, August 11th. The theme of this year is “Encountering God through Creation.” This all-day event will feature a food court, tours, hiking, dog training demonstration, exhibits, activities for children and teens, and time for quiet reflection. For more information, please see our poster.

Our phone system has been repaired. Thank you for your patience.

Scripture Readings: Mi 4:6-10; Rm 7:-14-25; Mt 9:2-8

Reflections from a Monk

Last week our country celebrated the nation’s birthday. Since July 4th fell in the middle of the week this year’s celebration seemed to take up the entire week. It is always a celebration of Freedom. Freedom is one of the foundation stones of our nation’s history and a primary symbol of our country’s mythology. In our public discourse the issue of freedom colors the national debate. We attach the word freedom to many things and ideas. President Roosevelt during the depression of the 1930s and ‘40s spoke of “freedom from fear”, President Lincoln at Gettysburg spoke of a “new birth of freedom,” and we routinely speak of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of conscience, to mention only a few. Freedom can also mean liberation from oppression, which was the idea behind our nation’s declaration of independence. The American colonists wanted freedom from the oppression as they saw it of British rule. Unfettered, unbound, set free, liberated, released, these are all various ways of expressing concepts and ideas that spring from the same source: Freedom. And when one is free, what consequence is implied? What do we do with that freedom?

I love lists, they are so appropriate to a compulsive person, they are so me… As I was agonizing over this homily, struggling with the concept of freedom, I began to construct a list. What do we want to be free from? And I began to think of Carl Orff’s drinking song In taberna in Carmina Burana. This doesn’t really work with that song, but the obsession was there. Bibit hera, etc…

free from clutter

free from worry

free from illness

free from pain

free from responsibility

free from entanglements

free from cares

free from conflict

free from disputes

free from evil memories

free from grudges

free from misunderstandings

free from sin

free from work

free from school

free from noise

free from cars

free from computers

free from phones

free from you

free from in-laws

free from others’ expectations

free from dogs

free from birds

free from cats

free from bugs

free from anxiety

free from obsessing over all these things.

FREE - free at last!

In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus offers healing to a paralytic and thereby sets him free. What is this freedom all about? A bit of an answer comes when Jesus asks the rhetorical question: “which is easier to say: ‘your sins are forgiven’, or ‘get up and walk’?” Jesus already said to the paralytic “take comfort my child, your sins are forgiven,” which presumably was the easier thing to say. To break open the meaning of this somewhat obscure exchange requires that we go back and try to understand what people in those days understood to be the link between sin and illness. The common view found in many rabbinical writings was that illness was the result of sin. And one had to be freed of the sin through forgiveness by God in order to be free from the illness. So Jesus was unlocking the chains of sin that had paralyzed this man so that he could accept healing and go home. If Jesus had just said get up and go it would not have worked. The man had to be convinced that his sins were forgiven before he could receive the healing.

St Paul in his letter to the Romans also expresses his exasperation at being paralyzed by sin, which always seems to make him do the wrong thing instead of the right thing he wants to do. We also can be paralyzed by things we may think won’t let go of us, but also by things we won’t let go of. They could be hurts, memories, anxieties, expectations, compulsions and fears, real or imagined, present or past, things we need to get free of in order to live.

One of my favorite books on the Gospel of St Matthew is by Erasmos Leiva-Merikakis^[1] who is now a monk at St Joseph’s Abbey in Spencer, Mass. On the point in this passage where Jesus tells the man to go home, this writer commented: “The first thing the intervention of Jesus in our lives bestows is freedom: the freedom to be fully who we are, the freedom to live our lives, to possess a sphere of action of our own, to belong to a human community and to interact with it. In other words, the freedom to be at home.” This is the “going home” that we heard the prophet Micah speak about Jesus did not say to the paralytic, get up, pick up your bed and follow me, he said get up pick up your bed and go home, which he did. By doing so he did follow Jesus’ word.

Our neighboring state New Hampshire has one of those great colonial phrases on its license plate: “Live Free or Die!” It means, “If I can’t live free I’d rather die.” The message from Jesus is a little different, if we don’t live free – free of sin – free of all that paralyzes us – we WILL die. And Jesus offers us an avenue to God’s loving forgiveness and if we but accept it we can then go home and live the life we were created to live. Not paralyzed, but free!

Glory be to Jesus Christ!

[1] Fire of Mercy, Heart of the Word: Meditations on the Gospel according to St. Matthew, by Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis. San Francisco: Ignatius, 1996, p. 416

His Grace Bishop Alexander (of the Antiochian Archdiocese) visited New Skete, Sunday afternoon, July 7, 2007. He is pictured here in our Holy Wisdom Temple with Fr. Elias Nasr of St George Antiochian Orthodox Church of South Glens Falls on his right and Brother Luke, Prior of the Monks of New Skete on his left. The bishop toured the monastery churches and the Monks’ residence and Gift Shop and met the entire community at the Companions monastery.