Ukrainian Orthodoxy		Orthodoxie ukrainienne

Against All Hope !

Very Reverend Ihor Kutash kutash@unicorne.org

(Twenty-ninth Sunday after Pentecost)

Last night was the longest night of the year. For someone who did not remember how it was in previous years, and who did not have faith, last night would have been an invitation to despair. Why did the sun hide itself away so quickly? Will the days keep on getting shorter and shorter until they disappear altogether? Will winter and cold hold sway over the earth forever?

At this very time arrives the hope which is brought to us by Christ’s Nativity. It is not surprising that Christians readily accepted the tradition of celebrating the victory of the "invincible sun" (Latin: dies soli invicti) celebrated by the pagan Romans. They linked it with the Nativity of the "Sun of righteousness", Jesus, as He is described in the troparion of the Nativity. Thus hope is the victor, not because we have simply ignored despair, but because we have chosen by faith to accept hope even though we have tasted of despair and doubt.

Yet even before this festival of joy over the victory of the sun, the symbol and source of light and warmth, we find another beginning for hope - another festival: that of the conception of the Mother of God, the Theotokos (most Christians call her Mother of God because we believe that Jesus, Who was born of her, is truly God as well as truly human). For the Orthodox it is a humble festival, just as Mary was always humble. It is not the solemn event it is in our sister Church, the Church of Rome, with which we do not yet have full communion. Our sister Church celebrates the day as "The Immaculate Conception" and attaches major importance to it.

Why do the Orthodox not do likewise? Is it because we believe that Mary’s conception was not"immaculate". No, that’s not it. It is because we do not believe that the original sin of Adam and Eve is transmitted by parents to their children through sexual relations. We believe that Mary was conceived in the usual fashion through the love and faith of her parents, Joachim and Anna. Our theology has no need for the concept of a "supernatural grace" which prevented Mary from being touched by original sin. For us, Mary, the most holy of all humans, was fully human like the rest of us, and like all of us, was saved from original sin by the incarnation and the ministry of Jesus, her Son. But God chose her and she chose God in a perfect and complete way.

And so in the midst of the winter of despair, a light shone in the home of the aged couple, Joachim and Anna, beloved by God. They had thought themselves forgotten by God because, until that time , He had not blessed them with a child. Then came Mary, as we sing in the troparion of the Feast,"against all hope". And in the fulness of time she conceived the Messiah, Jesus, Who shines forever with the invincible light of salvation for all the cosmos.

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