Author

Aziz Matta

2001, Articles, Raiati

Dispraising the Priest / 28.01.2001

28 January 2001
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Since the priest, through fulfilling the sacraments, is an icon of Christ, then whoever dispraises him would be dispraising Christ. God said: “Do not speak evil about the ruler of your people”. If you wanted to blame him, go and do it with a meek spirit and blame him clearly. And if he committed a big mistake and didn’t fix himself, you could complain to the bishop. These are the limits that you could move between.

If gossip against any person is bad, then gossip against the priest, if it spread, could destroy the parish and the trust between the parish and the pastor. The determination of the dispraised priest and of the faithful both decrease. This could also affect other priests. In this country, we sometimes tend to generalize the accusation.

Perhaps the gossip started from our wish for our priest to be a saint. This wish is good. However, if we noticed a weakness in him, he won’t be healed if we criticized him in front of people. He will be healed through our treatment for him, through taking care of him and our feeling towards him. Create a strong bond between the priest and yourself. Invite him to your home and do not wait for him to pass by you once every year. And if he was a good speaker, listen to him so that he feels that you need him. And do not become sad if he was closer to someone than he is to you. He might be happy with that in his isolation.

Push him into education. The danger lies in him getting bored from books because of being busy with divine services, weddings, funerals and visits. Encourage him to continue studying until he masters his job. Without understanding, how could a priest be beneficial? What could he give? Influence him to be interested in books so that he provides you with knowledge that laymen don’t have enough time to obtain.

Push him into piety. This could increase through human effort and the vigilance of the soul; the priest is an example and a reference of behavior. You could ask from him the best behavior in order for the parish to do the same and become on the road of salvation. He takes care of the parish first through his purity and then through his word, and the word must become a service for him.

Don’t complain if your priest wasn’t the greatest priest in the world. But if you synergized with the brothers in the parish in order not to put on the shoulders of the spiritual father a heavy burden, he might ascend to the higher atmospheres and then descend to you with the greatest love.

The job of the parish towards itself is to be bonded with divine love between its members in a way that no conflicts would exist so that it doesn’t tire itself and its pastor. When disputes occur, the parish must expect a discipline. No one is exempt from being blamed and very few are from being rebuked. The faithful should behave with the priest with meekness that would make him happy and encourage him to do a greater service.

God is the priest’s fortune. Do not push him with your stinginess to seek for money in a sick way. Don’t give him the chance to humiliate himself and then dispraise him. Give him joy by having some affluence so that he wouldn’t have any excuse to be careless towards you. And above everything, have chaste tongues.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “ذمّ الكاهن” –Raiati 04- 28.01.2001

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2001, Articles, Raiati

The Time of Arriving to Church / 07.01.2001

7 January 2001
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We arrive to Church at the beginning of the Divine Service. In the early Church, the group of faithful used to arrive before the priest and he enters carrying the Gospel and saying: “Wisdom, let us be attentive”, which means that what I carry in my hands is the Wisdom so stand up to receive it. The divine words that we say or chant or act with motion is a banquet, and the invited come to the banquet of the righteous in a specified time.

And if the invitation was for the Divine Liturgy, it is one motion that has a beginning and an end. Everything in the Liturgy is a multi-faced food like the Litanies, chants, the two New Testament readings, and also the words of sanctification, communion and the ending. All the phases of the service are overlapping. At the Gospel reading for example, the divine word purifies you and you repent to be able to have communion with worthiness, therefore it isn’t compatible with the phases to go forward to communion if you didn’t get ready with what precedes it.

And if you wanted to live a perfect Sunday, you come to the Matins service in order to enter the ambience of Resurrection. And the meaningful Resurrection is spread in your ears. However, this is another subject.

If you were invited to a wedding, you are originally going to pray for the bride and groom and not only to congratulate them at the end. Congratulating has another place. How ugly it is to see the believers coming throughout the whole hour of the Liturgy. In this archdiocese, the time of the beginning of the service on Sunday morning is at ten or a little bit before. Why all this deceleration? What were you doing before that? If it is an issue of breakfast, this is out of question because you are coming to have Divine Communion. And if the slowing down is a result of being late at night, then this means that you love to stay up more than you love the Liturgy. Also, one of your family members being late cannot be your excuse. Teach your family to have time discipline because in all occasions this is a part of politeness and in the issue of your prayer this is a part of piety.

A flaming person in God’s love does not miss any word of His Words. You might miss a word that could save you from the situation that is causing you pain. You might find in some words an answer to questions that were worrying you. I hope that you also don’t forget that you are not alone in existence and that the Liturgy on Sunday morning or in feasts is the place where the community meets in front of God’s face. You are formed of two things: To be seen by the Lord on his banquet, and to be seen by the brothers as a support for them so that Christ looks at you as his body, i.e. his visible spread. As for going whenever suites your mood, this means that you do not want to condition your mind according to Christ and that you meet him whenever you want while he wants to receive you in every offering and in every season.

As for complaining that your circumstances didn’t allow you, this is unacceptable because your circumstances always allow you to welcome a friend that you love. And if you were an immigrant and a dear person died here, you leave everything to attend a funeral. I know countries in which believers spend one or two hours by car to reach the closest Church of ours. And you leave an Orthodox Church that is not more than quarter of an hour away to go to another Church because it is located in your street. And your excuse in this is that all Christian sects are one.

The issue of time and time accuracy is an essential subject in our education and an essential part in our spiritual belonging. If you were disciplined in time you prove that you are a serious person.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “وقت المجيء إلى الكنيسة” –Raiati 1 – 07.01.2001

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2000, An-Nahar, Articles

Jerusalem and the Glory / 14.10.2000

14 October 2000
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Of all the Palestinian scenes nothing has moved me like the Intifadah [insurgency] of stones since its detonation until it was rekindled now. I am amazed how unarmed children (what weapon can the stones be?) are saying no to armed soldiers. This refusal for me is the apogee of martyrdom – as we understand it biblically – and it’s shiniest representative been, in my opinion, the death of the kid Mohammed Al-Dorra, whom I mentioned in my sermon last Sunday saying: “our love and prayers are offered to Mohammed Al-Dorra.”

The night following the Divine Liturgy, I watched the televised interview with Yasser Abed Rabbo [Palestinian Information Minister] who was able, for three hours, to talk about the pain that his nation is suffering without any sign of grudge: the Palestinian resistance has become for many a tradition of love.

It hurts to see injustice, is there still a need to expose it after all this oppression exercised over an entire nation in the scope of the Holy Lands?  And the greater injustice is the support for the continuation of this oppression despite the cries of the prophets.

They always questioned how could Jerusalem become a killer?

How can the Jews today disregard reading the condemnation for murder written in their tradition?  “Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope.” (Is 5: 20) This is a tragedy befalling a monotheist nation like ours — which was called to do justice — meanwhile their devotees are murderers. They summon all nations if oppression befalls upon them—while oppressing the others doesn’t disturb them. This is the tragedy of their religious atmosphere since no one there can discern the disaster in this domain. Rightfully Jeremiah said: “For who shall have pity upon thee, O Jerusalem? Or who shall bemoan thee? Or who shall go aside to ask how thou doest? Thou hast forsaken me, saith the Lord, thou art gone backward: therefore will I stretch my hand against thee, and destroy thee;” (15: 5-6) Why none of the Western Christians is not using this old rebuke against the present day Israel who, on the contrary, still enjoys the status of the spoiled kid? We declared this truth 52 years ago and kept repeating it over the generations mayhap they shall listen, but they shut their ears as if forcing the blood upon us.

And blood was spilled in the place of worship transforming the souls of the victims to another temple where the blood-sprinkled bodies prostrated a passionate prostration. And the Glory descended upon the Aqusah [Temple Mount]. And God attracted us spiritually to Himself: in martyrdom one passes through heaven. In what meaning Jerusalem becomes a way to heaven? A very complicated say indeed. In some religious literature, Jerusalem is the centre of the world. Of course, this is an image suggesting that, in the cosmic body, Jerusalem is the heart – and one is subsequently included with it in this vision – in the atmosphere of metaphor where one needs the material in order to attain the unseen. From this perspective Jerusalem is the yearned for (Israa in our reading), and the spring of yearning (Meaarag in our reading) at the same time. He who wrote from the exile in Babylon: “If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget its skill!” wasn’t merely longing for his homeland, but was seeking after the Divine presence in its Temple. Later, the Holy City became the image of the Heavenly Jerusalem descending from above as the City of God.

In this spirit, Lady Rabeaat Adawiyah wasn’t seeking the House in her pilgrimage, but the Master of the House. No one seeks after the rocks in the Holy lands but after an icon. And seeking after things on high, Early Christians were not concerned with Jerusalem, which they left before it was captured by the Romans in 70 A.D. Their Saviour was in heaven and here His tomb is empty. Even the Patriarchate of Jerusalem ranked fifth in honour among the other churches since the fifth century. The fact that the Christ did sanctify the land which He stepped upon, is not so critical for the Christians for whom His Gospel and His presence in the Holy Gifts is much more precious than the earth of Jerusalem.

In-depth, despite the historical aspect in which Jerusalem is connected to every religion, the real meeting point for all the monotheistic religions becomes that when the city surpasses itself and stretches forth towards God. But before attaining His face, one remains with the symbols where begins all conflict and political game.

After politicising the symbols, the Hebraic State declares the existence of a Palestinian presence above the earth (the Aqusa Mosque) but an Israeli authority below the earth (the second Temple, despite the fact that this was not archaeologically proved). By artificially migrating from religious symbols to political covetousness everything becomes ridiculously permissible.

There is then an accord between all religions over Jerusalem if we aimed at the meanings, and a disaccord if we pursued the symbols.

The intellectual step that the Arab Christian theologians stepped, starting since the 60’s, was by overlooking the land and focussing on the man. This antinomy was expressed through these words, for the first time by Patriarch Elias IV, who headed back then a joint Orthodox-Maronite delegation to the Islamic summit in Lahore. In a first impression, one is transported from the Holy Places to a no-place—to the face of one’s God. And in a second movement, one descends from the vision of the gracious face of the Lord to the coexisting faces of the inhabitants of the City – this City that becomes holy through the justice – which is their right upon the nations of the earth.

The unity of Palestine, despite all the historic quarrels over the right of existence for this or that party on this or that area, is the essence of justice for both Arabs and Jews only if the Jews abandoned the Zionist idea. We would have then gone to Madrid and to Oslo and the bloodshed would have being spared.

All politics is a compromise, but some compromises are impossible – not only because they are humiliating – but also because they are unviable. Within the frame of a possible political solution today, awaiting the hoped for peace, is:

First, a Lesser Palestine including the West Bank, Gaza and a complete and undivided Eastern Jerusalem.

Second, to stop the expansion of all kibbutzes.       

Third, the return of all the refugees to their hometowns and villages. And the rest is mere details.

This necessitate both parties’ return to the negotiation table, unless the present conflict did not surpass all this deliberation, unless the Hebraic State did not madly insist on its limitless craziness and unless our beloved people in Palestine did not march to the extent of their heroism.

Awaiting this, all Arabs are looking forward towards their upcoming summit. I can’t understand why this summit was delayed, how can they cold-blooded watch the massacres? Is it our destiny to become like the story of Shahrazad [One Thousand and One Nights] awaiting a new story delaying us every night? Arab mentality enjoys the poetry and likes to believe that merely by speech they can substitute the action. The least what can those Arabs who have diplomatic relations with Israel do is to freeze this relation as a symbol of protest. This can be a start for an Arab action aiming at soliciting the mediation of the US to justly interfere between Israel and the Arabs. But most regretfully, the Arab diplomacy can’t understand the impossibility of resisting Israel without the necessity of upsetting the US. This Arabic circus cannot save Palestine. Only one thing can annoy the Americans and that thing is the Arab oil. For the US to keep exploiting limitlessly and without an account the Arab oil – for the US to remain comfortably listening to Arab poetry against her – this means that the US will never cut the “umbilical cord” between her and Israel. The defiance of the entire Arab nation against the American tyranny has no relevance if the oil was not subordinated to serve the Palestinian cause. Arabs themselves must invent a mechanism to limit the American greed in their riches.

Remains all that huddle about sending troops and enlisting volunteers (where from?!) to fight beside the Palestinians and which remains a merely performed song.

None of the Arabs is dying for the Palestinians. No one is saving the Arab dignity except the Palestinian youth in Jerusalem, Nazareth, Gaza and elsewhere. I don’t know the scheme of this salvation, all I know is that it springs from the Palestinian brave hearts, which have signed an eternal pact with life.

Translated by Father Symeon AbouHaidar

Original Text: “القدس والمجد” – 14.10.2000

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Between Orthodoxy and Catholicism / 08.10.2000

8 October 2000
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I feel sad to tell you that the relations between our Church and the Catholic Church are now in a dilemma and that they are paused on the level of the international mixed committee for the dialogue between the two Churches.  This committee met between 9 and 19 July in a region next to Baltimore in the United States and 46 delegates attended from around the world (Father Michel Najm from the Archdiocese of New York represented the Antiochian Church). The topic of the meeting was to examine the unity movement (with Rome) from the aspect of ecclesiastic theology and canon law. However, this meeting failed and the participants didn’t reach an agreement because the Orthodox still refused the existence of a theological basis for the existence of Catholics that have Byzantine rituals.

They discussed deep topics with theological and canonic forms that are related to Catholic Christians who come from Orthodox origins. Therefore, no mutual statement resulted from the meeting as before and the members will only send reports to their Churches about the possibility of overcoming the difficulties that block the dialogue. Nevertheless, the mutual committee expressed its hope to continue this quest and dialogue hoping that it would help to bring back the communion between the two Churches. In addition to the discussions, the delegates participated in prayers that were held in the Latin Church and in the Greek Orthodox Church in Baltimore.

The dialogue on this high level became complicated since 1990 when new Eastern Catholics appeared in Western Ukraine and Romania (After the Communist Regime closed their Churches). Also, Russian Orthodox Christians felt that Catholicism is being practiced in Russia – via Latin missionaries – and that it was snatching their people. The latest document on this issue appeared in a meeting of the international committee that was held at Balamand in July 1993. In Balamand, the process of joining Rome as a way for unity was refused. There is another path for the unity of the West and the East. The document spoke about the notion of “Sister Churches”. However, some Churches, especially the Greek Church and the Greek Catholic Church in Romania, refused this notion. Finally, the “Faith teaching” council in Vatican issued in 30 June a decision that refused this notion and this decision was signed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and was approved by the Pope.

Regardless of this dilemma, the Orthodox representatives expressed their will to continue the dialogue. I have a feeling that the Balamand document was enough and there was no need to add to it another document. It was obvious for us that each addition or adjustment made to the Balamand text would make the issue of Eastern Catholics more complicated. Rome gave us in Balamand more than we expected by confessing that establishing Eastern Catholic Churches was a doctrinal and historical mistake. We didn’t accept the legitimacy of these Churches but we respected their existence and freedom. Canonically, they are a part of the Church of Rome. From this aspect, we deal with the Sacraments of these Churches.

It is normal, while looking at the dialogues of Churches, for every side of us to see that these Churches are raising only one problematic. They are considered as one block although, administratively, they are not. They are considered as one phenomenon in Eastern Europe or in the diaspora. However, some of these Churches have stopped their snatching of believers in a notable and direct way. Also some of them have a brotherly feeling towards us.

It is obvious that an obstacle was created, which isn’t only a psychological one, because of the appearance of these Churches. I feel that our awareness and the ecumenical spirit that have penetrated several places are able to stop the process of “snatching”. Our spiritual renaissance and theirs have proved in some countries – such as ours – that we can cooperate in theological scientific production and in other ways without having a sacramental participation with each other.

Other issues, some that are old and others that are new, have expanded the hole between us. The next official meeting won’t be sooner than two years. How can we continue this mutual strive after the appearance of this obstacle in Baltimore? Only God knows. We pray for Him to let us overcome the barriers.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “بين الأرثوذكسية والكثلكة” –Raiati 41- 08.10.2000

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Mercy / 01.10.2000

1 October 2000
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The first thing that we read in today’s Gospel (Luke 6: 31–36) is an invitation from Jesus for us to treat others the way we want them to treat us. The other is in the path of my life and God made me responsible for him. I became the person that feeds him when hungry and talks to him when lonely. I ask about him and about all his needs. I initiate in all what is good for him, and do not wait for him to ask me about anything.

I love him and don’t wait for him to thank me. I don’t look for a quality in him as a condition to serve him. He might not be my relative or friend. Love is not based on exchanged feelings. From my side, I should love though he might not love me back. I should love and serve him as obedience to Christ.

I often lend him money and do not hope to get it back. Christian love is not a contract. It is a one-sided giving. It is given to any person that needs it, and once we recognize that, we shall understand the Lord’s expression: “Love your enemies”. If someone antagonized me, he would be harming and saddening himself. If the Lord asked me to save him from this hostility, I should heal his soul. And since I knew that he fell in hatred, spite, jealousy, or gossip, I should become his doctor. I have been assigned as his doctor because I recognized his illness. I should think about his salvation and not about the wound he left in me. If I stayed away from him or hated him, the level of my humanness will decrease; I will become a dwarf and enter his game. However, if we knew that love is unconditioned, it I will become easier to understand the expression: “Love your enemies”. Exactly as God is graceful towards the unthankful and the evil, I distribute myself on those who loved me or hated me without differentiation. My heart should be wide enough for the world; therefore, the Gospel ended this text by saying: “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful”.

Exactly as the Lord treats all people with what is good, grace, clemency and fatherhood, I should be. His bosom is wide enough for all his sons, good and evil together. God uses a specific way with every group of people in order to let them reach him. The Lord of the house loves both, the good boy and the bad evil one. He has his own way with every child. In this same way, if we treated all people with the same sympathy, we would be able to manage our life with people in different ways and the purpose is to reveal to them, through our behavior, the divine tenderness.

Man has harshness in him; he has harm, exploitation and love for control. He has all kinds of serpents. You should love the other in order to kill these serpents. Evil is not abolished except through what is good, forgiveness, and constructive work. Negativity cannot be destroyed except through positivity. And what is even better than positivity is to have the initiative in serving, to be the one that washes others’ feet. This is your mission; this is what Jesus did.

A Human relationship is not a contract in which two sides agree on the phrase “I give you if you gave me”. It is a triadic relation in which God is the regulator of the contract. “God loved us first” and he is the one that loves us during our life and the only one that receives us when we die and in the last day. I am merciful with you because I learned the morals of mercy from the Lord, my embracer. And if we looked at people through the eyes of God, we will find out that they are his beloved ones regardless of their sins.

On earth, we should be ready to deal with everyone, and make them elevate from their situation, or at least try to. This is hurtful for the sensitive person and for the pure person that is shocked by the impure. However, the Lord made every person a guard for his brother, and if he didn’t accept this delegation and left the other without mercy, he would be handing him to death.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “الرحمة” –Raiati no40- 01.10.2000

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‘I Am For the Other’ / 03.09.2000

3 September 2000
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Today’s Gospel (Matthew 18: 23 – 35) is an invitation to mercy that happens when you widen your bosom for the other and make him enter, with all his sorrow, deficiencies and misery into it. But before that, you should make him lean back on your bosom as John did on the Lord’s bosom in the Mystical Supper. Every kind of sharing carries a visible or an invisible “leaning back”. This means that if you excluded your brother, you might be killing him through isolating him, and his feelings would be cooled towards you, God and his friends. His heart will become empty from any content and his only content will be hatred and bitterness.

Today’s Gospel tells you to forgive the trespasses of your brother with all your heart. You usually tend to see that your sins are small and that others’ sins are great so that you can always claim that you are right and think that you are great. You want to become a leader in the village or neighborhood even if you were such a small leader that follows greater ones. You frighten a weaker person to convince yourself that you are strong. You want to force your word in order to reject his words and defeat him.

You might not be convinced in anything, but you use your power over the weak in order to prove for the villagers that you are huge. Actually, you just seem huge, i.e. you give yourself a size that’s not actually yours. You want to look high in the eyes or others to abolish the doubt you have about yourself. You are not brave enough to say that the other is also good, that he has good qualities and that he is beneficial. You are not brave enough to say in yourself: “I wish to learn from him and achieve his virtues”, or “I wish that both of us would have good virtues and that both of us would be good people as I am not the only one that carries any good”. You and the people of your parish should all be good together, isn’t that better than having the good qualities limited in you? Life is for all of you and blessings are also for all of you together: Isn’t that better than claiming that you are the only one that has perception and the one with the right opinion?

Why don’t you accept discussion? Maybe the other’s opinion would be better and lead you to life. I am saddened by the fact that all villages are full of familial, personal and political schisms. I am saddened by the fact that these schisms have echoes in the parish especially if the village was pure Orthodox and therefore the entire village forms the parish. All of these schisms come from us not wanting Christ to reign over our souls, from us not wanting to implement his words of salvation and truth that are in his Gospel.

We hear this chanted Gospel as if it is an old story that doesn’t concern us. When it mentions love, we feel that it carries beautiful teaching, but we don’t know that these words are an invitation to all the listeners and not just a reading from an ancient text. We talk about the beauty of Christianity, however, love or mercy obligates us to humble our soul in front of others, make them higher than us, and consider them better than us.

Console me a little bit by forgiving each other’s trespasses and by not asking about them anymore. If the situation continues as it is now, I shall realize that I have built only churches and not hearts. God dwells in people’s hearts, therefore do not sadden them with pride.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “الأخر أنا له” –Raiati no36- 03.09.2000

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Decency in Church / 04.06.2000

4 June 2000
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There is decency in the way men and women dress whether in Church or outside the Church. However, the meeting of the holy community that aims to share the divine sacraments requires a more precise decency because of the goal that we gather for. God’s presence is manifested in the Church through his Word and the sacraments and the Holy Spirit that settles in the faithful during the Divine Liturgy. We build each other and every one of us leads the other to Christ; He is the center of attention of eyes and hearts so that no one of us gets distracted by the other and no one hinders the prayer of the other but helps him maintain the chastity of his sight. We should all obscure ourselves, as much as we can, from the eyes of the brothers in order to be seen only from God.

Yes, we are all within the range of decency. However, according to human nature, this fits women in the first place. If our attraction is towards Christ, this means that none of us should try to attract believers to him except through the piety of his movement and through his silence and reverence. In this reverence the body disappears. Coming from this point, makeup, which is an exaggeration in beautifying, is something undesirable because it drives us away from the only intended beauty, I mean the beauty of Jesus. In the same sense there are the sumptuous expensive clothes that are exposed for show off; and these harm the poor among us. Also there is the noise of shoes when we enter and the perfumes that have no place in a meeting we attended to become spiritually “Christ’s beautiful scent”.

In addition to our commitment to the chastity of sight, humanity focused historically on the fact that decency is required in particular from women. A woman knows her charms. Therefore, I will not talk about what is not proper to expose in Church. Women are more eloquent than me in this domain. And if she wanted to talk seriously, neither summer nor winter would be excuses. God wants from her a way for disappearance. Apostle Paul has talked about this in his first epistle to the Corinthians and said: “Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered?” (11: 13). Our women had literarily obeyed the apostle for centuries. However, if we went beyond words into the intention, the general idea that stays from Paul’s words is the refusal of the obvious uncovering or the harmful tightening. And women know what is harmful.

We live in the time of sin and we haven’t reached the kingdom yet. In the kingdom, there are no earthly bodies but spiritual bodies that are glorified and statures of light.

As long as we are in flesh and blood, we turn a blind eye and we don’t exploit through our eyes the bodies of the other; also the other shouldn’t expose his body for the pleasure of insatiable eyes.

Everything that violates this is an altercation. I don’t think that a sincere woman, if she was warned, claims that she doesn’t know that. I also don’t believe that a believer would use the ecclesiastic community to seduce. In the recent past, men used to stand in a place and women in another one. Churches had a suite for women. The empress and her maids used to stand up there and not next to the emperor. It seems that the modern mind doesn’t accept this separation. However, I see that this was the trend of the Church. Paul speaks in the first epistle to the Corinthians about the isolation of the man from the woman if he wanted to be devoted for “fasting and praying”. The relationship in the praying Church is neither between man and woman nor between man and man or woman and woman. It is the relationship of every soul with Christ. Mixing is not unity. The peak of harmful mixing is the distraction of the man by the women and of the woman by the man because if they did so, both of them wouldn’t be focusing their sight on Christ.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “الحشمة في الكنيسة” –Raiati 23- 04.06.2000

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Clothes of the “Vowed” / 28.05.2000

28 May 2000
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Since I undertook the service of this archdiocese, I meet kids wearing the gown of St. Anthony or St. Elias (which is usually taken from the Capuchins). I have also seen lately (In the Marian month) women wearing white and blue. Perhaps those women are not from Orthodox origins because this dress is obviously copied from the statue of the Lady of Lourdes.

Sometimes, conflicts occur between enlightened priests and the mothers of such children because the mother asks him to bless this clothing and we do not usually have any blessing for any clothing. What goes on in the minds of those women? They usually say: I have vowed my child for St. Elias or St. Anthony; what does this mean? If she was looking for a power or healing or grace, then this must be asked through prayer and has nothing to do with a piece of rag. No rag contains a divine power; if you wanted a prayer, say it directly. You would be thinking about wizardry if you thought that some material secretes a blessing only because it is in contact with the body. Also, if you took some readings from the Psalms or Gospel and wrapped them together and hanged them from your chest, we don’t believe that they would benefit you. On the contrary, we believe that this is a kind of wizardry. Wizardry is when you believe that doing a specific act would give a spiritual result such as healing. Anything other than a personal prayer from you and believing that you will get a response simply by grace is a kind of wizardry and consequently is harmful.

We only have one kind of blessing and it is the blessing of priestly attires. We say to God: “Bless these clothes that are used to honor the glory of your Holy name and for the beauty and decoration of the servants of your holy altar and your pure sacraments”. Then we sprinkle these clothes with Holy water and ask for those who will wear it to be worthy of serving the holy sacraments.

And for the priest not to think that these clothes carry a sanctifying “power” by themselves, he personally blessed every piece of the attire before the divine service. This happens because the clothing is related to himself; he who is called to fulfill the divine mystery.

It is commonly said among us that we should leave people to their faiths. This is not faith for us but believing superstitions and it is our duty to fight superstitions.

It has been said in the New Testament: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household”. It is meant that He, in whom you believe, the Savior, saves you from sin and sickness. The Other saying: “Believe in a stone and you shall be discharged” is rejected. We have never seen a stone that can discharge someone. We are not interested in the movement of the heart towards anything but Christ. Believing everything would ruin your internal entity and leave you in delusions and deadly ghosts.

In this sense, if a cloth was put around the body of a child or an adult, it wouldn’t be different than any other cloth. Paganism can penetrate into the Church through the minds of naïve people that are eager for healing. What does it mean spiritually to vow your child for a Saint? Every one of us is vowed, in Baptism, to God and our hearts are purified without any physical mean. “Enter your room (your heart) and pray to your Father that is unseen”. Your heart is vowed for the Lord: In this exists your healing and console.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “ثياب «المنذورين»” –Raiati 22- 28.05.2000

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2000, Articles, Raiati

Hatred / 21.05.2000

21 May 2000
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In the Sermon on the Mount the Lord takes us from the tangible sin into its origin, into what we call lust, i.e. the internal emotion, as he says for example: “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sisterwill be subject to judgment” (Matthew 5: 21-22). Jesus is interested in the heart; he wants to purify it from the factors that corrupt it. Hatred is one of the things that corrupt man; it is the continuation of grudge and the reasons that activate it.

Hatred is the retraction from others and the isolation of the self that eliminates others mentally as it doesn’t dare to eliminate physically. It is a moral killing of the person that you believe is annoying you or affecting your benefits and pride. We start hating the person that’s different from us, as if his existence eliminates ours; we start considering that he has no freedom to be the person he wants to be.

Hatred is a lust in the soul that many people fall into on all levels, even people that consider themselves spiritual when they are actually not. It is a kind of petrifaction that hits most people. This stubbornness destroys the person that falls into it because he who closes himself in front of others and eliminates them would be threatening and drying his heart.

The Great St. John Climacus recognized the danger of this feeling when he said: “Hatred is the fruit of anger and a desired bitterness”. The bitter person cannot be creative, giving, or serving in his kindness. The wild angry person perishes himself and the others because he doesn’t give them any importance or credit. The danger of hatred is that it takes root in the person and needs grace from heaven to descend on the heart like “dew” and soften it.

When the Scripture talked about God in the Psalms it said that he is “slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy. He will not always chide: neither will he keep his anger forever”. The Lord disciplines without hating any of his sons, while the person that gets angry and hates a lot is somehow mad and needs a heavenly power to be healed.

Yes, people do have stupidity and bad intentions towards us and some of them even carry refusal and compulsion. Most of the time, these people do not know why do they hate. Therefore, the Scripture said about those: “they hate me with cruel hatred”. They wouldn’t like your face, speech, appearance, or a word you have said that they interpreted wrongly and got hurt. They wouldn’t say why they’ve been hurt by you, so they become sad and transform their sadness into hatred. After that, they would start abhorring every action you do and add it to what you’ve said before and make a big deal out of those. However, you might be sweet hearted with no evil or hurting intentions, and in this case they would be killing themselves and you would carry no responsibility. They oppress you, and you’d be wondering if you should disappear from their way in order for them not to harm themselves through hatred. However, where shall you hide if they were from your family or environment or colleagues? Should you stay quiet all the time to make them comfortable? And if you did that, how can you witness for the truth?

You wonder why can’t you be different and stay friends? Isn’t diversity the beauty of this world? What would harm them if you were more talented than them? God gives talents and these are for his glory; may God be glorified in whoever he wants. Some have more gifts than others. You might have fought and tried hard in order to purify yourself and know and understand, while others might have stayed in their laziness wanting you to also be with them in this mental poverty.

If you thought that others are envious (envy and hatred are twins), pray for them so that God would take away their sin and let them revive through an effort similar to the one that made you revive too. Remember those weak people in your daily prayer in order not to become bitter yourself. When you do so, perhaps they might taste love and know how to be happy like you.

Perhaps the miracle happens and the “dew” descends on them.

Translated by Mark Najjar

Original Text: “الحقد” – 21.05.2000

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Homicide / 06.05.2000

6 May 2000
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Our life is a gift which only God gives forth and which only God takes back. You do not have the authority to kill or harm yourself, and certainly no one has this authority over anyone else’s life. You receive both your life and your neighbour from God. The other person may live as he wishes and it is your duty to direct him, to keep him company, to serve him and help him improve his situation and attain a better life. In doing this, your own spirit is beautified. Consequently, you have no right to kill another person even if he has requested you to, because he doesn’t have the right to put an end to his own life which was bequeathed by God to him. Accordingly, abortion cannot be permissible because a mother doesn’t own her foetus. Similarly, as a doctor, you don’t own your patient and you have no authority to kill him, no matter how bad his condition. You don’t have this authority over your patient’s body. You are not to make the decision to allow death for an unconscious patient, even if his condition becomes a complete coma. This is the greatest perversion to the very secret of existence. Your body is not an object for you to use it as you wish. It is a part of your person; it does not belong to the governor to flog or to the judge to execute. 

In the situation of human dialogue, the body is the medium of conversation. If a human connection cannot be established between you and the other, then your destruction of his body demonstrates your contempt for his human nature and prohibition of the dialogue between the two of you. Both your body and his grow upward together. God draws you with your bodies to Himself where He becomes your union. Your journey is always upward, and the other will only accompany you through his yearning for the higher. If you and the other are not both drawn to God, then the dual relationship between you is severed; it becomes either abuse or slavery. Slave and master both become objects like any other object. A relationship between two beings is impossible outside the embrace of God. A “being” in the depths of its truth cannot exist without openness towards its Creator and accordingly towards other creatures because it ceases then from saying “I” but affirms “we.” The “I” can only be fulfilled in the communion of “we.” The same is true for the body. After its self-transcendence and release from slavery, it extends towards embracing and accepting the other. The moment this triune communion between “I”, “you” and the divine “He” is achieved, then the whole man [body and soul] and all humanity dwell in Him. Killing abruptly ruptures this tri-unity. 

Obviously, by annihilating the other you annihilate yourself in the same measure and you actually renounce the dominion of God over both of you. Every sin is a negation, a denial of one of God’s qualities: a denial of His patience, mercy or love. Killing is an absolute denial of God because it is a denial of His existence as the Giver of Life. You annihilate your opponent because you decide that he is obstructing your plan, your business, your passions, your liberty, and anything which issues from this. You decide to become the sole master of your life and you think that in this alone is your protection and guarantee of dominion. Killing is the last stage of separation by projecting your delusions on existence and considering yourself God. Consciously or unconsciously, you replace God. With each transgression, you substitute God in a way – by killing you replace Him completely. 

In a movie about Joan of Arc, I appreciated what I saw in the episode where she was grieved by the abundance of bloodshed in the lines of the enemies after the victory in the battle of Orleans against England. Despite her belief that she was delegated from heaven to fight this war, she couldn’t endure this waste of blood. The commander explained to her that no war is possible without bloodshed. She had a different logic. I will not analyze here the conversation between a virgin saint and a rationalistic commander, but the horror of bloodshed comes to my mind as I recite Psalm 50. “Deliver me O God from blood guiltiness.” Even if you think it is possible to resist, none of us is far from such a temptation. 

Because of the importance of blood in the Early Church, any priest who, although unwillingly, caused the death of a human was immediately released from the priesthood. Similarly, canon law prescribed that if a priest or a bishop slapped another person he was to be defrocked. Relationship between humans is language, otherwise no relationship is possible. Language [in Arabic logat], from logos, is that which St. John’s Gospel uses to preach the Word. The Word is the relationship between you and the other. Without the Word you annihilate both the other and yourself. 

This brings us to the dilemma of genocide. When a group of people proceeds to exterminate another group on the basis of fear, solely because their victims are “different,” this implies that these scared murderers think they are re-establishing themselves in existence apart from the context of coexistence. Cain (Kabeel in Islam) killed his brother Abel, who was a herdsman, because he had a “different” occupation. If the “other” is not from your country, your race, religion or political party, he is sentenced to death. Because he cannot be put to death legally, you slay him without a court because any trial is a dialogue. In a way, every massacre is a massacre against the name of God as He is worshiped in heaven or on earth. Every massacre is “religious” in the sense that ethnicity or political ideology are religions, and religion by definition can sustain neither sin nor the sinners. “The time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service” (John 16: 2). There exists a “liturgy” of extermination. There exist those who permit or prohibit in the name of God, the “chosen of God” whom God assigned the task of eliminating all those who do not belong to their God. 

The logic of genocide is that the world should be of one colour. This is totally different from the logic of the national army, which doesn’t say, “I am going to kill” but says, “I wish, if it is within my power, to restore order and justice and to defend the country without killing anyone and I regret the death of the enemy.” The army has no enemy; it only has temporary opponents. The army is not supposed to do premeditated harm or invade because occupation causes mental harm and humiliation. This is why the greatest leaders were always those who walked the paths of peace because they detested bloodshed. The philosophy of the military is that it defends the entire nation and that it is not, in its essence, hostile to any other nation. Civilized nations do not brainwash their own citizens with hatred and propaganda, and their military exemplar is that of the Byzantine Empire where offensive wars were totally excluded and where the armed forces were solely used as a shield for peace and a defence force. 

Apart from this logic, the militia exists because it is the “military” of a certain group. The militia does not support the general cause of the nation. A militia is always set against another militia. A faction has no cause because it exists specifically for extermination. This is why a civil war, any civil war, is always most difficult to reconcile. Using this philosophy we should put the war which waged in Lebanon on trial. Unless every group which committed a massacre is brought to repentance, none of us can repent to our motherland and to the human integrity it symbolizes. God cannot be the Victor unless every group comes forward and confesses its sins to the other groups in the presence of the entire nation. In the context of this logic, there is nothing worse than this popular saying we use: “God forgave the past!” No, God does not forgive us, and it is not in His nature to forgive unless every one of us has acknowledged and repented from his own sin of murder in thought and deed against the other. Whoever dipped his hands in blood or wished the death, displacement, desolation or diminishment of the other is an accomplice in the sin of extermination. Every victim, no matter what his belief, is innocent because he is a part of God. God does not want anyone to fight in His name. God knows how to put to death whomever He wants. No one is the representative of God in the domain of death. 

He who wants to bring others to life dies himself. This is why Christ is the Life-Giver: His humble submission [“Islam” in Arabic] on the Cross totally destroys any “theology of killing,” any military “sanctification” for any ideology of persecution, any dogma of “revenge,” any punishing “hand of God” and any divine mission using the sword. “Put your sword in its place, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword” (Matthew 26:52). God did not delegate His authority to anyone. Only He judges the hearts of the people and lets them be free to obey or disobey. He does not yet separate the blessed from the accursed “for He makes His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” Hopefully, each of us will receive in proportion to his capacity. 

I don’t see any possibility of teaching man peace if he doesn’t believe in God. If God does not exist then you become a god. This should explain the ever-growing wave of murder worldwide where people, individuals and groups alike, worship themselves. Certainly, sometimes restraint from crime may be based upon the fear of punishment, but this remains strictly within the domain of individual relations. Where no punishment is available – in the context of ethnic and religious wars – the only reasonable explanation is that your god exterminates the other god. I mean by this that your understanding of this god embodied or expressed within the movement of your group invalidates the other embodiment and the other movement. 

The concept that came to be called a “multicultural society” is none other than the culture of variety, acknowledging that there may be another understanding of the one God, or that He has multiple revelations within one society composed of a variety of small groups. Today’s so-called “culture for peace” may be very ambiguous especially as it is practised in many countries worldwide where it is basically an acceptance of treason. But the idea in itself, in its pure form, states that every nation must live in freedom to be able to cooperate. Within this same nation, no ethnic or religious group is beyond error and repentance. Repentance is the God-given fruit to initiate dialogue as the means out of trouble, through mutual acknowledgment of one another’s rights of existence. This means that coexistence and mutual life must be based upon something non-pragmatic and I don’t see any foundation other than God. 

God died in our midst and we made ourselves God. This is why we allowed everything. Will God return? 

I believe that when the Gospel says, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace,” it demonstrates that your glory to God is conditioned by your love for peace. Peace is one of God’s names in Christianity and in Islam. When will He grant us to love this quality in Him?

Translated by Father Symeon AbouHaidar

Original Text: “القتل” – 06.05.2000

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