Homily for the Third Sunday Evening of Great Lent
By Holy Hieromartyr Sergius Mechev
(Delivered in 1929)
By Holy Hieromartyr Sergius Mechev
(Delivered in 1929)
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit!
For one who repents, my dear ones, it is not fitting to judge or to engage in idle talk. One who repents should, as much as possible, be silent, in order to work out his salvation in repentance. But we are constantly speaking idly, constantly judging and re-judging others, constantly doing evil with our tongue. By this we bring harm both to ourselves, who speak evil, and to those who listen to our evil speaking. And the Holy Fathers point out that our tongue is a small member, yet it does great evil, setting on fire the course of life (cf. Jas. 3:6). How easily it arms one person against another. And our carelessness about our speech becomes an instrument of murder. Saint Anthony the Great says plainly: “He who receives a slanderer or a backbiter becomes a partner with a murderer.” You see, according to the words of the Holy Father, a slanderer and a murderer are one and the same. “Flee from the slanderer, whoever he may be, and do not be ashamed to flee from him.” “It is safer to live with a snake than with a slanderer,” say the Holy Fathers. And John of the Ladder forbids us to show respect to such people. “Never show respect to the one who speaks maliciously to you about his neighbor. By this you will heal both yourself and your neighbor.”
But you may say, my dear ones, that here the matter concerns slander. But if you hear that something bad is said about a person, and what is said may possibly be true — what should be done then? Since we are so inclined, my dear ones, to evil speaking, it is better for us not to listen to such conversations. For we may pass along to the one about whom they spoke: “They are saying this and that about you,” or we will begin discussing it with one, another, a third, and so on. And when you begin to stop the speaker, he usually justifies himself by saying that he heard it with his own ears. And what comes of this? The one who speaks evil falls into pride. No, my dear ones, a Christian should not act this way, even if he himself was present when some vile act occurred. One should not spread another person’s sin, but cover it with one’s love.
Let us learn from the saints how they acted in such cases. I will now tell you one example of such a Christian attitude toward the evil speaking about one’s neighbor.
A certain hermit came to a skete where ascetics were living and settled there. One of the elders of the skete gave him a cell, and he began to live in harmony with the abbot and the brethren of the monastery. But soon this harmony was broken, because the elder of the skete who had given the ascetic the cell became envious of the newcomer, to whom many people began to come for counsel and spiritual guidance. Moved by envy, he sent his young disciple to the visitor with the command that he should leave the monastery, and told him to convey it in these words: “Go away to the place from which you came.”
The disciple went, and although he had to convey the words of his elder exactly in obedience, he began to reflect: “If I convey to the visitor the words exactly as the elder said them, I may arouse anger in him, and hostility will begin between the elders. It is better that I, in the name of the Lord and for the sake of peace, conceal these evil words and take everything upon myself.” (Abba Dorotheos in his teachings allows this when it is done in prayer and spiritual struggle.)
And so the disciple, when he came to the elder, instead of saying “go away,” as he had been commanded, bowed and said: “My father asked me to inquire whether you are well.” To this the other replied: “Tell your father that I ask for his prayers, as I am a little ill.” Returning, the disciple told his elder: “That elder has found another cell for himself and will soon leave.”
Notice, my dear ones, what love this was.
After some time the elder again sent the disciple to drive the hermit away. But when he came to him he said: “My father, having heard that you are ill, sent me to visit you.”
“Tell your father that by his prayers I am now completely well.”
To his elder the disciple reported something entirely different — that the guest asked to remain in the monastery for only one more week and then would move to another cell.
After a week the enraged elder himself went to drive the hermit from the cell. But the disciple, learning of this, out of love for peace and for his elder, ran ahead and informed the visitor that his father himself was coming to invite him to his table. Hearing this, the hermit immediately went out to meet the elder with a look full of love and said: “Do not trouble yourself to come to me — I am coming to you myself.” Struck by the meekness of the visitor, the elder himself was moved in soul; his anger vanished, and he indeed led the guest to his table.
When the guest returned to his cell, the elder learned how his disciple had acted. He fell at his feet and said: “From now on you are my teacher, for by your words our souls have been saved.”
This, my dear ones, is how the saints acted. Even when they were sent to say or do something evil, they did not do it, although they were supposed to, because their elders commanded it. But we, with the greatest readiness and even joy, will recount everything evil, everything vile about a person; and if we ourselves have heard something, we begin to argue when someone stops us, we begin to wound one another, and we do, as the Holy Fathers say, the work of scorpions and serpents with our tongue.
In the days of fasting and repentance we must watch our tongue more than ever. Ascetics truly grieve in soul for the one who speaks evil about his neighbor. But we, in the name of what seems to us truth, constantly do evil. Every community suffers most from evil speaking and judgment that is passed along in every possible way.
Therefore, when we repent, let us, my dear ones, take up our tongue and begin a real struggle with it, and this will give us very much. If we do not speak evil about another, but instead pray for him; if we remember that by a single word we can undermine the entire structure of relationships between people — then we will understand why Ephraim the Syrian in his prayer asks the Lord not to give him idle talk. Yet we even in church, before the beginning of the service, organize — if not “wall newspapers,” then “oral newspapers,” and by this we begin the most vile work in the very temple.
By this, my dear ones, we corrupt the Church; we become its real destroyers, as well as destroyers of our own order and that of others. Let this disciple be an example for us. He proved to be a great guide of elders into the Kingdom of God.
Let us therefore strive in every way to rid ourselves of evil speaking, slander, and condemnation. Then it will be easier for us to live, and we will gain far more friends — not friends through slander and malicious speech, but friends in God, in the struggle against sin — and this will unite us into one flock of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.