The Lives of the Saints
1. THE HOLY APOSTLE AND EVANGELIST JOHN
The commemoration of this great Apostle and Evangelist is celebrated on September 26. But on May 8 is remembered the miracle manifested from his grave. When John was more than one hundred years old, he took seven of his disciples, went out of Ephesus, and commanded the disciples to dig a grave in the form of a cross. Then the elder descended alive into that grave and was buried. When the faithful later opened John's grave, they did not find the body in the tomb. And on May 8 of every year a certain dust would rise from his grave, by which the sick were healed of various diseases.
2. THE VENERABLE ARSENIUS THE GREAT
This renowned saint was born of a patrician family in Rome and was well educated, both in secular learning and philosophy and in spiritual wisdom. Leaving behind all worldly vanity, he gave himself to the service of the Church and became a deacon of the great church in Rome. Unmarried, withdrawn, taciturn, and prayerful, Arsenius thought to spend his entire life in this way. But the Providence of God directed the course of his life otherwise. Emperor Theodosius took him as tutor and teacher of his sons Arcadius and Honorius, and made him a senator, surrounding him with great wealth, honors, and luxury. But all of this oppressed the heart of Arsenius more than it satisfied him. It once happened that Arcadius committed some offense, and Arsenius punished him for it. The offended Arcadius plotted severe revenge against his teacher, and when Arsenius learned of it, he changed into beggar's clothing, went to the seashore, boarded a ship, and sailed to Egypt. When he arrived at the renowned Scetis, he became a disciple of the famous John Colobos and gave himself to ascetical struggle. He considered himself dead; and when someone informed him that a wealthy relative had died and bequeathed all his property to him, he replied: "I died before him — how then can I be his heir?" Withdrawn into a desert cell as into a tomb, he wove baskets from palm leaves all day long and prayed to God through the night. He avoided people and every conversation with them. Only on feast days did he leave his cell and come to the church for Holy Communion. Lest he grow lazy, he often posed to himself the question: "Arsenius, why have you come to the desert?" He spent fifty-five years as a desert dweller, and throughout all that time he was a model for monks and the glory of monasticism in general. He lived in all one hundred years, and reposed peacefully after long labor and voluntarily imposed martyrdom upon himself in the year 448. He departed to the kingdom of Christ the Lord, Whom he loved with all his heart and all his soul.
3. SAINT EMILIA
The mother of Saint Basil the Great. In her youth she wished to remain a lifelong virgin, but was compelled into marriage. She bore nine children and so inspired them with the spirit of Christ that five of them became Christian saints: Basil the Great, Gregory Bishop of Nyssa, Peter Bishop of Sebastea, Macrina, and Theosebia. In old age she established a monastery where she lived with her daughter Macrina, and where she reposed in the Lord on May 8, 375.
4. THE VENERABLE ARSENIUS THE HARD-WORKING
A monk of Kiev. He never gave himself rest but labored unceasingly. He took food only once a day, after sunset. He struggled ascetically and reposed in the fourteenth century.
“I died before him — how then can I be his heir?”
Hymn of Praise
Arsenius is not one whom the world made famous.
Fleeing from glory, he would say to himself:
— Consider thyself dead to the world and to men.
Speak no words, neither wise nor foolish.
For words I have sometimes repented in my life,
For silence I have never repented.
If I do not bind my heart to God,
I cannot shake off the passionate life.
If my thoughts glorify God alone,
External passions will leave me.
Fill thy time with prayer and labor,
Labor as much as possible and sleep as little.
Sinful Arsenius, why hast thou stopped?
Why, I ask thee, hast thou come to the desert?
For the salvation of the soul, not for idleness,
For repentance, and not for sleeping.
Hasten to heal thyself, and revive thy soul:
Lord, have mercy! Forgive and have mercy!
“For words I have sometimes repented in my life, for silence I have never repented.”
Reflection
A certain monk complained to Saint Arsenius that while reading Holy Scripture he felt neither the power of the words he read nor compunction in his heart. To this the great saint replied: "Child, just read! I have heard that the snake charmers, when they charm serpents, utter words that they themselves do not understand; yet the serpents, hearing the words spoken, feel their power and are tamed. So also when we continually hold in our mouths the words of Holy Scripture, even though we ourselves may not feel their power, the evil spirits hear and are terrified and flee, for they cannot endure the words of the Holy Spirit." Child, just read! The Holy Spirit, Who through inspired men wrote the divine words, will hear and understand and hasten to thy aid; and the demons will understand and feel it, and will flee from thee. That is, He Whom thou callest to thy aid will understand, and those whom thou wishest to drive away from thee will understand. And both aims will be achieved.
“Child, just read! The evil spirits hear and are terrified and flee, for they cannot endure the words of the Holy Spirit.”
Contemplation
Contemplate the descent of God the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles, namely:
1. How tongues of fire appeared above the Apostles, one upon each of them,
2. How the Apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in various tongues, as the Spirit Himself gave them utterance.
Homily
On Evil as the Fruit of Human Thoughts
Hear, O earth: behold, I will bring evil upon this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not hearkened unto My words, nor to My law, but rejected it (Jer. 6:19)
Do you see, brethren, where evil grows and where it ripens? Not in the bosom of God but in the thoughts of men. Into the thoughts of men evil is sown by demonic power or by bodily passions. In human thoughts evil grows and branches out and multiplies and blossoms and puts forth leaves and at last bears fruit. In due time God admonishes men to rouse themselves from their evil thoughts, lest evil ripen in the human soul and bring forth its bitter and deadly fruit. In due time God admonished Cain, but Cain would not hear the admonition; instead he let the evil thought against his brother bring forth its evil fruit — fratricide.
What thoughts are evil? All those that go against the law of God, the word of God. Evil thoughts are the self-willed law of man, which man prescribes for himself apart from and contrary to the law of God. But if a man is firmly resolved to keep the law of God, then evil thoughts are powerless as shadows that quickly appear but just as quickly vanish. Then man is master over his thoughts, for he feels God as master over himself. Then the law of God is the law, and the evil thoughts of men are nothing.
Behold, I will bring evil upon this people, saith the Lord. What evil? The fruit of their thoughts. That is: I will simply permit them to reap what they have sown and cultivated; for evil is neither My seed nor My harvest. The evil that I will bring upon lawless men is the fruit of their own thoughts. By their thoughts they ought to have estimated what evil would befall them, just as a sower estimates by the seed what he will have to reap.
O meek and guileless Lord, save us from our own evil, which we ourselves have cultivated within ourselves. Remove the evil fruits of the evil sowing, we pray Thee. And help us to uproot the evil seed from our souls. To Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.
“Evil thoughts are the self-willed law of man, which man prescribes for himself apart from and contrary to the law of God.”