A Sermon on the Sunday of Saint Gregory Palamas

By Metropolitan Moses of Toronto

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Brothers and Sisters in Christ, the Holy Fast is an archetype of the life of spiritual progress.

We crossed over into the arena of fasting by seeking mutual forgiveness, the first Sunday of the fast, we celebrated the triumph of Orthodoxy, that is, the triumph of true glory, true worship and the conciliar Tradition of the Church and the principle of the consensus of the Holy God-Bearing Fathers that enlightens our path to salvation. Without the true faith, our labors are in vain.

In fitting manner we progress to this Sunday wherein we celebrate the feast of our Holy Father among the saints, Gregory Palamas, who expounded the workings of Grace more than any other Church Father. Saint Gregory was a great man of prayer and was made manifest as a wonder-worker while still in his late twenties. This great saint of our Church was given a special grace to articulate his mystical experiences.

From the life of Saint Gregory:

Another time, in a state of noetic prayer, Gregory fell into a light sleep. It appeared to him that in his hands was there was a vessel of pure milk, so full that it was flowing over the brim. Then this milk took the form of wine, which flowed over the brim of the vessel onto his hands and clothes, spreading abroad a wonderful fragrance. As soon as Gregory perceived it, he was filled with holy joy. There appeared to him a radiant youth who said, “Why do you not pass on this wonderful drink, left by you without due attention. This is the ever-inexhaustible gift from God.”

“To whom should I pass on this drink when there is no on in need of it?” asked Saint Gregory.

“Even if at the present moment there is no one actually thirsting for the drink,” answered the youth, “yet, nevertheless, you should do your duty and not neglect this gift of God. With the proper use of which, you will have to answer before God.” With these words the wondrous vision came to an end.

Saint Gregory interpreted it in this way: The milk meant the ordinary gift of the word, understandable to very simple hearts looking for spiritual instruction The turning of milk in to wine meant that when the time comes, the Supreme-Will will ask him for deeper instructions of the sublime Christian Faith.

Thus, things that are beyond the limits of the minds of men, beyond the grasp of philosophical inquiry are imparted to us not by rational speculation, but by men of spiritual experience. The Holy Apostles and saints were taught by direct experience of God’s revelation. It is important to note the distinction between the Holy Scriptures and the direct revelation of God. The saints of God received direct revelation from God and brought this revelation down to us through words and writings. These words and writings are not the direct revelation, but rather about the revelation. Holy Scripture is the map, but the experience of revelation is the actual territory itself. A man can read and misinterpret the map, that is, Holy Scripture. That is why Saint Peter wrote:

Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2Peter 1:20-21)

Saint Gregory strove to preserve Holy Tradition and he also participated in this direct experience of God. Because of this he was chosen by God during this important time in Church history to defend the Orthodox doctrine on how we participate in God, how we become partakers of God’s uncreated energies, i.e., the holy truths of our Church regarding Theosis, or deification.

In the days of Saint Gregory one Barlaam of Calabria arrived in the parts of the east and spread his false teaching that God Himself does not unite with man or enter into man’s heart, but that God creates a grace that He imparts to man. This is because in the parts of the west they were immersed more in the Greek philosophers than the Gospel. They tried to force Christian revelation into Pagan Greek philosophical constructs.

Consistent with the God bearing Fathers, Saint Gregory explained for us that only non-being is without operation. All creatures have operation and activity. If one were to say that the operation or energy of the Holy Trinity was created then the logical conclusion is that the Holy Trinity is created (which is blasphemy). Uncreated nature has an uncreated energy.

Thus, Essence is cause and Energy is effect. This revealed Spiritual Truth, affects our world-view and gives us a precise perspective on spiritual reality. God is completely distinct from His creation, there is no similarity between our Uncreated, Beginningless, incomprehensible God and His creation. We partake of life, He is the Source of life. He brought all things into being from nothing and is Beyond Being. The Church teaches that God is completely transcendent and unapproachable in His essence, but we partake of His uncreated energies. The correct understanding of the distinction between the essence of God and His uncreated energies, given unto us by the God-bearing Fathers, is one of the greatest gifts of Orthodox theology. This spiritual insight is the only way to properly understand the words of Saint Peter when he says that we are called upon to, “be partakers of the Divine Nature.” In this context the words ‘to partake of Divine Nature’ means to partake of God’s uncreated energies, that is, Divine Grace. The Church has its own vocabulary and understanding, without which it is impossible to grasp the meaning of the Holy Scriptures.

When we read in scripture of the glory of God, His illumination, a Divine light, etc. this refers to the uncreated grace of God that we are called to participate in. As our Savior said, “For whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when He shall come in His own glory, and in His Father's, and of the holy angels” (Luke 9: 26). This glory is the uncreated Energy of God (Divine Grace) that emanates from the Holy Trinity, and, according to the teachings of the Church, both angels and men participate in this glory, if God so chooses.

Saint Basil the Great expressed this quest to participate in the Grace of God thus, “The contest for virtue is the struggle for one to become God and a son by the illumination of the most pure light of that day which is uninterrupted by darkness. He that shines forth with the true light has made virtue as another sun, which having once shined upon us no longer hides itself in the west; but having clothed all things with its illuminating power, it grants an unceasing and perpetual light unto the worthy and makes into other suns those who partake of that light.”

Saint Gregory also taught that we participate in the uncreated grace of God in both soul and body, thus overturning all of the spiritual error of the dualists who taught the false notion that matter is evil and only the spirit and things spiritual are good.

The Church teaches that when God made man He made “all things very good.” It is sin, man’s misuse of free will, that is the cause of everything wrong in creation. Thus Christ became the New Adam that we might be made new, body and soul, and become temples of the Holy Spirit. What is the significance of this spiritual truth?

Your body belongs to God.

The only variation on this is in Christian marriage, when the two become one flesh. The husband’s body belongs to the wife and the wife’s body belongs to the husband. For a man, every woman in the world is his sister, unless he gets married, then he has one wife. For a woman, every man in the world is a brother, unless she gets married, then she has one husband. God Himself has implanted the law of attraction and He has ordained that marriage has certain consolations that are to be reserved for marriage between one man and one woman. The two thousand year history of the Church is a witness to the fact that this is the order given to us by God for chaste Christian marriage.

There are those who, for one reason or another, do not live up to this God given order. The Church is a spiritual hospital and has always offered the therapy of repentance to those who have departed from God’s will. Our contemporary problem is that there are many who, with malicious intent, wish to change the law of God. They trivialize the body and the Christian concept of purity and want to remove sex from the proper context. For this reason we need to repeat to our youth again and again that popular hedonistic culture has it all wrong. We are called to become temples of the living God and how we choose to live is very important. The current modern attitude towards promiscuity is a great spiritual error.

Beloved Christians, teach your children that they are the children of God. They need to be told that they have a great purpose in life and a great eternal value. Those outside of the Church will live as they live. We are the people of the Messiah, the tribe of the God-Man Who died and rose again in order to sanctify us and grant us eternal life.

Chastity in Christian marriage is bodily purity and godliness. One who lives in chastity has good hopes to become a temple of the Living God, in Christ Jesus.

As Saint Peter so wisely put it in his introduction to his Second Catholic (universal) Epistle:

Grace and peace be multiplied unto you in the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, according as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him Who hath called us by glory and virtue; by which are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, so that through these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And for this cause, by applying all diligence, add virtue to your faith, and to virtue, knowledge, and to knowledge, continence, and to continence, patience, and to patience, godliness, and to godliness, brotherly affection, and to brother affection, love. For if these things be in you, and abound, they render you neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 1:2-8)

May we pay heed to these words and come to the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ by participation in His Grace, to Whom be all glory, honor and worship, with His Unoriginate Father and All Holy Life Creating Spirit. So be it. Amen.