Welcome to Saint Herman's, Hudson, Ohio

This blog is a partial compilation of the messages, texts, readings, and prayers from our small community. We pray that it will be used by our own people, to their edification. And if you happen by and are inclined to read, give the glory to God!

The blog title, "Will He Find Faith on the Earth?" is from Luke 18:8, the "Parable of the Persistent Widow." It overlays the icon of the Last Judgment, an historical event detailed in Matthew Chapter 25, for which we wait as we pray in the Nicean Creed.

We serve the Holy Orthodox cycle of services in contemporary English. Under the omophorion of His Eminence Metropolitan Joseph of the Bulgarian Patriarchal Diocese of the USA, Canada and Australia, we worship at 5107 Darrow Road in Hudson, Ohio (44236). If you are in the area, please join us for worship!

Regular services include:
Sunday Divine Liturgy 10AM (Sept 1 - May 31)
930AM (June 1 - Aug 31)
Vespers each Saturday 6PM

We pray that you might join us for as many of these services as possible! We are open, and we welcome inside the Church all visitors. See our Parish web page:

Sunday, March 1, 2015

On the Sunday of Orthodoxy - 2015

The following was delivered as today's (01Mar15) homily in Hudson.  We pray that you will find it helpful.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Glory to Jesus Christ.

My brothers and sisters in Christ:

Together we’re going to go to a couple of places today that other faithful were taken by two who far exceed the humble abilities of your priest to preach on a topic.  In 1985, Fr. Schmemann gave a sermon on this day that is perhaps one of the most moving we’ve read.  So, in part we’ll go to school today at the lectern of Fr. Alexander.  In 1984, Metropolitan Philip gave a sermon on this day, and it charged the American people with a solemn duty to also carry Orthodoxy forward.  We’ll paraphrase from both of these sources as best the Spirit allows us.  It’s not unworth the investment to find the originals of both, and I’d encourage any to do so if you’re interested.

The Holy Orthodox Church celebrates this day on this Sunday of the Great Fast every year.  It was in 787 at the Seventh Ecumenical Council that the victory of the Church over the iconoclasts occurred.  But it wasn’t until a regional council of the Church was called in Constantinople in 843 that this particular celebration was instituted.  At that time, Empress Theodora, her son Michael III, Patriarch Methodius, and monks and clergy restored to the temple Hagia Sophia the iconography that had been removed.  From that day, on this first Sunday of the Great Fast, the Holy Church has celebrated this victory. 

So in a very special way, today is a feast of the past.  And certainly if we are celebrating it today, it is a feast of the present.  But we, as the faithful of the Church today, need to take our place in the life of the Church to assure that the feast will also be a feast of the future.

While the focus of the Triumph of Orthodoxy which we celebrate today is that of the use of icons, there are many “triumphs” in Holy Orthodoxy.  The first and foremost is the reversal of the ultimate defeat that became the most glorious victory.  This of course is the death of God the Son on the Cross, only to have that defeat become the most glorious victory in the history of the world – the triumphant Resurrection.  This is the foundation of all that we are as Orthodox Christians.

The next victory is not unlike the first.  For our Lord chose twelve simple men, uneducated, unskilled, and He gave to them the Holy Spirit, and the power to preach about that defeat turned into victory.  He sent them to the whole world to preach and baptize and build up this Church.  These men were hated, and all save one martyred.  But even their blood was another victory, for the Church grew, until it filled the universe with the True Faith.  Ultimately, the earthly kingdom that sought to snuff out the fledgling Church was converted to the Church.  It only took 300 years for the Roman Empire to become the Holy Roman Empire.

Throughout this whole time persecutions arose.  As did heresies.  As did enemies of the Church.  There were attempts to change this Faith, to change the truth.  But holy people, men, women, and even children defended the truth.  Martyrs all, the Church is washed in their blood.  All of this happened before the council and the events which instituted today’s celebration.  But since then, there have been more such trials. 

And so we ask ourselves today:  Do all the victories of Orthodoxy lie in the past?  Fr. Schmemann makes this observation:  “My dear friends, if the triumph of Orthodoxy belongs to the past only, if there is nothing else for us to do but commemorate, to repeat to ourselves how glorious was the past, then Orthodoxy is dead. But we are here now to witness to the fact that Orthodoxy not only is not dead but also that it is once more and forever celebrating its own triumph — the triumph of Orthodoxy. We don’t have to fight heresies among ourselves, but we have other things that once more challenge our Orthodox faith.”

The challenges that Fr. Alexander outlined are those from that era – a church united by a core faith and divine services and councils, but otherwise ‘divided’ by ethnicities.  We are now thirty years after this proclamation, and what has changed? 

One change is the movement associated with the Assemblies of Bishops throughout the world.  This is a precursor to a new council, scheduled for 2016 in Constantinople (Istanbul).  And that is a momentous and wonderful development for the Church.

Unfortunately, the challenges that face the Church today are more than those associated with ethnicity and the lack of a unified council for more than 12 centuries.  Christians, and many of them Orthodox Christians, are being slaughtered in the political and religious press of Islam throughout the Middle East.  This is perhaps an even greater issue for the Church than the issues intended to be discussed when the upcoming council was first considered years ago.

Still, a unified Orthodox presence worldwide is a stronger advocate for the faithful of all countries and jurisdictions, and therefore, the dream of Orthodox unity around the world is a dream that we need to bring to fruition.  Metropolitan Philip’s address in 1984 contained a passionate plea along these very lines.  Here are a few words from his address.

“It is indeed astonishing that we have not had an ecumenical council since AD 787, despite the many changes which the Church has encountered during the past 1197 years. I shall mention but a few of these global events which affected the life of the Church directly or indirectly since the last Ecumenical Council: the 1054 schism between East and West; the fall of Constantinople; the European Renaissance with all its implications; the Protestant Reformation; the discovery of the New World; the French Revolution; the Industrial Revolution; the Communist Revolution and its impact on the Orthodox Church; the First and Second World Wars; the dawning of the nuclear age; the exploration of space and all the scientific and technological discoveries which baffle the mind….  You might ask, what is the reason behind this Orthodox stagnation? Did our history freeze after AD 787? There is no doubt that the rise of Islam, the collapse of the Byzantine Empire, and the fall of Tsarist Russia have contributed much to our past and present stagnation. The sad condition of our mother churches across the ocean is indicative of this reality….  Have we then lost all hope for an Orthodox renaissance? Is there not a place on this planet where we can dream of a better Orthodox future? I believe that there is a place, and this place is the North American continent. We have a tremendous opportunity in this land to dream dreams and see visions, only if we can put our house in order. Where in the whole world today can you find seven million free Orthodox except in North America?  We are no longer a church of immigrants; the first Orthodox liturgy was celebrated in this country before the American Revolution. Many of our Orthodox young people have died on the battlefields of various wars, defending American ideals and principles. We have contributed much to the success of this country in the fields of medicine, science, technology, government, education, art, entertainment, and business.  We consider ourselves Americans, and we are proud of it—except when we go to church, we suddenly become Greeks, Russians, Arabs, and Albanians.”

Here today, inside of St. Herman’s, we still suffer from this schizophrenia, in that we are the home of people with Greek, Slavic, Russian, Serbian, and speaking for my wife, even a little hillbilly background, and we worship under a Bulgarian omophorion by the grace of God.  And please, this is not a complaint – rather, it is simply a statement of fact.

This unity needs to be found so that the voice of Holy Orthodoxy becomes meaningful within our society.  You've all watched the news.  When moral issues arise, you'll find news reporters seeking clarification from Catholic and Protestant clergy.  But where are the Orthodox?  Why is the voice of the True Faith silent in these important discussions?  It is this way because we have marginalized ourselves by our ethnic divisions.

Metropolitan Philip ended his homily with his own reference to Fr. Schmemann, using these words.  “One can almost visualize the glorious and blessed day when forty Orthodox bishops of America will open their first synod in New York or Chicago or Pittsburgh with the hymn, ‘Today the grace of the Holy Spirit assembled us together,’ and will appear to us not as ‘representatives’ of Greek, Russian, or any other ‘jurisdictions’ and interests but as the very icon, the very ‘Epiphany’ of our unity within the body of Christ; when each of them and all together will think and deliberate only in terms of the whole, putting aside all particular and national problems, real and important as they may be. On that day, we shall ‘taste and see’ the oneness of the Orthodox Church in America.”

It is a vision not only for America, but for Orthodoxy in the entire world.  Pray that our hierarchs will be moved by the Holy Spirit to achieve this unity in Holy Orthodoxy in these coming years!  That would be the next in a great series of triumphs for the Church!


Glory to Jesus Christ!

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