Homily

Today as we continue to celebrate the feast of Holy Theophany I would like to point out an image that is used a great deal in our services. In the tropar for Theophany we sing, “O Christ God, Who appeared and enlightened the world, glory be to you.” And the kontakion, “You have come and revealed yourself, O inaccessible Light!” when I bless with the candle at Presanctified Liturgy I say, “The Light of Christ enlightens every man coming into the world.” At baptisms and weddings candles are given to the ones being baptized or married to remind them that they carry the Light of Christ. Today we hear in the Gospel that

“The people who sit in darkness have seen a great light;
and upon those who sat in the region and the shadow of death, a light has arisen.”

The theme of light, and Christ as our Light, was one of the favorite themes of the Fathers.

Especially for those of us who live in the city it is dark at night, but not so very dark because there are usually a lot of lights we can use to see by, lights from streetlamps and houses and buildings. Light from a full moon when the sky is clear, light that is reflected back to earth when low clouds cover the sky. We usually have enough light to see by at night and if we don’t, we can use our car headlights or carry a flashlight. So the image of the prophet Isaiah, who St. Matthew quotes in the Gospel today, may not strike us much as it should. It is a very rare time when we are forced to sit in total darkness, but in the ancient world it was much more common. They had no streetlights, no 100-watt bulbs, no flashlights. Fire was their only source of light at night, and fire needs fuel and it can be dangerous. So people back then had a better understanding than we do of what it means to sit in the darkness.

In the Gospel today the people who sit in darkness are the Gentiles. But I think it can also apply to all who do not carry the Light of Christ, and even to Christians who have received His Light but do not live by it or in it. People sitting in darkness. It seems to me that as we have conquered the darkness of night through technology and science, we have opened the door to temptation. The temptation is to forget God. There’s no doubt that science and technology have contributed a great deal to making our lives better in many, many ways. The temptation is in thinking that just because science and technology provide us with new information or new procedures, or new gadgets that we automatically know how to use them for good.

What can we say when we find some parents today giving artificial hormones to their own children in order to alter their bodies, while they themselves will only eat organically grown food? Or what about people who use social media to bully, denigrate, harass or lie to other people? The temptation is to believe that because we can do something or create something that we automatically know if it’s good or bad—and so very often the only criteria we use to determine whether or not some new technology is good is our desire to use it. If it’s there and we want to use it, it must be good. We become more and more convinced that science and technology and the material comforts and pleasures they can provide are, in fact, sources of enlightenment, products of the creative genius of humanity. It is so very easy to become so engaged with them that we can neglect or even forget God. In Psalm 104 we sing, “You made the moon to mark the seasons, the sun knows the time of its setting. How great are your works O Lord, in wisdom You have made them all.” But if the Internet can tell us all about the seasons and what time the sun will set, why should we seek the wisdom of God?

Adam and Eve walked in the Garden of Paradise which was all natural and pesticide free. But they turned away from the wisdom of God, breaking His one and only commandment because they thought they could do better on their own. And so do many people today think the same way. Turning in to themselves they too will decide what is right and wrong, what is good and what is evil. They will walk by their own light, and you may not cast your shadow over it. People talk about freedom, but do they really understand what freedom is? People talk about rights, but how can you have rights without obligations? When we close in ourselves, when we deny or neglect Christ, our society starts to fail. Is this not happening today? When Christ is not important, when His light no longer leads us, then church is not important, country is not important, neighbor is not important, marriage is not that important, family is not that important and even children are not necessarily important—not as important as me. And then, no matter how many LED bulbs we may have in the house, we are sitting in darkness.

Just one example: People say it is too expensive to raise children, so it's better and easier to have just one or two. The technology of artificial contraception and legal abortion have helped to bring our birth rate down to 1.6 children per couple. But we need a birth rate of 2.1 just to maintain the current population. Currently we are at an all-time low for our birth rate. A poll taken by Newsweek this past summer showed that 42% of American do not care about the falling birth rate, and yet they are likely to suffer the consequences when a smaller workforce cannot support their Social Security retirement payments or provide adequate care for the elderly. The number of people aged 65 and older is projected to increase by almost 50% in the next 25 years. Where is the wisdom in the current thinking about family life and children, when it is not based on Gospel values?

Let’s not allow ourselves to be tempted, even in the smallest of ways, to accept the idea that we can walk by our own light and expect something good to come from it. Sin, human weakness and our limited ability to grasp the true meaning of life in this world work against that. But how glad we should be, how grateful we should be that we do not have to walk in darkness, we do not have to struggle to find the truth and hope we get it right. Instead, we sing today,

“You have revealed yourself to the world today
and your light O Lord has shined upon us.
O Christ God Who appeared and enlightened the world,
glory be to you!”

Let us continue to strive to walk only by that light of Christ!