Holy Metropolis of Kythera - The message of Sunday 13-8-2023

SUNDAY 1ST OF MATTHEW
(13-8-2023)

WRITTEN TH. KIRYGMA

The man of today's Gospel, my Christians, believed that his son would find his salvation close to Christ. He took his child and started from the disciples, believing that they too, being close to Jesus, would have the power to heal. But they could not and finally the solution-healing was again given by Christ.

To the disciples' question why He and not they, He answered them with frankness: «You have no faith». And indeed they still could not discern the divinity in the person of their Master. And he spoke to them of the power of faith: «I assure you that if you have faith, even as a grain of mustard seed you will tell this mountain to go this way and that way; and nothing will be impossible for you.’, as well as for the way of faith.

In order for someone to be established in the faith and to be able to fight the devil, the practice of prayer and fasting is necessary.

A painful road but a profitable one. Praying, man may be weary, but he calls upon God himself for help. Prayer means nightly invoking the name of God in every possible activity, but also participation in the events of our Church and above all in the sacramental life.

Fasting means abstinence, that is, sacrifice. But when a man learns to abstain, beginning with food, he tames his tongue, restrains his anger, conquers his flesh with its sinful desires, and thus his soul is at peace.

Finally, this difficult road consolidates man in his faith and he now trusts his life to Christ. St. Simeon the New Theologian states «Tell me, vain men, if you know this. Who, having obtained Christ, needs anything else? Which therefore of the goods of this present age?». And Saint Cyril of Jerusalem interpreting the passage wrote: «just as the grain of mustard seed is small in size but full of energy, so faith in the soul achieves the greatest things at great times».

When they asked an old man what faith meant, he said: «If God told me to go through a wall, I would do it. My job would be to get through. God's job would be to bring down the wall.». AMEN.

Prot. p.p.m. Major.