Ascension and the Ecumenical Fathers
7th Sunday after Pascha June 5, 2022 “That we may be One”
Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council Gospel: John 17: 1 -13,
This is the Sunday we celebrate the great and venerable Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council. These 318 bishops from every part of the Christian world gathered in the first large universal meeting since the earliest days of the Church.They came to faithfully pass on the fullness of agreed tradition. The very tradition with which they had been entrusted by those who went before them – all the way back to the apostles. We see echoes of the creed they formulated at Nicaea in Clement of Rome and Ignatius of Antioch in the first century. They learned directly from the Apostles. The apostles teaching was passed down to Polycarp who learned directly from the apostle John. To Irenaeus, Polycarp’s disciple and to Melito of Sardis in the second century. Origen, Athanasius, more Gregory’s than you can follow, and many more in the 3rd and early 4th centuries. This particular council established for all time that Christ is fully human and fully God, and that any other definition is describing a different God and not Christ. It set the boundaries of the faith. This council did not come to invent theology, but to faithfully pass on and record that which had been given to us, the Church, from the beginning. That which has been taught and believed always and everywhere by the entire Orthodox Church. Setting down our guiding principles and boundaries, which will remain unchanged until the second coming of Christ, established for all eternity.
In today’s gospel we hear Christ pray to his Father, (John 17: 11) “that they may be one as We are.” Here at St. Aidan’s in 2021, we continue to understand our very existence as continuing in this same Apostolic tradition as we seek to ever more completely understand that our entire life is truly hidden in Christ. This prayer in John Chapter 17 is known as the “High Priestly Prayer” and is worth spending much time reading and meditating upon. It is the last prayer before “He was given up – or rather gave Himself up – for the life of the world”. A few verses later in this prayer we hear, (John 17: 21-23) “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word. That they may be one, as You Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they may also be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. ‘And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.” He is praying for us!
This is mind blowing stuff! Christ is saying that He will be present and united with us, His followers here at St. Aidan’s– “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word.” – That’s us! As much as we are in Christ, allowing our wills to be united with His, receiving His very body and blood in communion, we are all one with Christ and His Father. As St. Gregory Nazianzus put it in the 4th century, “Let us become like Christ, since Christ became like us. Let us become gods because of Him, since He for us became a man.” Christ is much more available and visible to the world now than when He physically walked among us, as He is present in each of us Who follow Him. When He was present physically with His Apostles and the people around Jerusalem for the 3 years of His ministry, did they really understand who He was? Sometimes we are tempted to think when we read the synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, “O those dummies, if only I could have been there I would have known He was the Christ.” I’m not just talking about the Pharisees who took up stones to stone Him and told Him he must have a demon. The Apostles followed Him for three years, they saw the miracles, they saw the storms obey him and the 5000 were fed from 5 loaves. They even saw Him raise the dead, but did they understand? Peter finally seems to get it and says, (Matt. 16: 16) “You are the Christ the Son of the living God.” Christ says that His Father has revealed this to Peter and upon this knowledge will He build His Church. Christ then tells His disciples how this all works, that the Christ must suffer and die and be raised again on the third day, that for this very reason He came. Peter tells Him, “Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You!” and Christ immediately tells Peter, (Matt 16:23) “Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offence to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.” Clearly anyone who tries to understand Christ apart from the cross represents Satan. When Christ resurrects from the dead He shows them that all O.T. scriptures can only be understood in the light of His death on the cross for the life of the world. He came to free us from death’s grasp through His sacrificial death on the cross. The apostles did not understand the central significance that all of history revolves around the cross. They fled when Christ gave Himself up to complete His mission to die on the cross for our sake. After Pentecost their entire perspective was illuminated, they finally understood, and they died as Martyrs.
In the Gospel of John we have the perspective that all things are understood only in light of the passion of Christ, in the light of the cross. God’s plan, begun in Genesis with Adam and completed on the cross with Christ, the first true fully human being. Christ tramples down our death by His death, and we experience true life at our death. Death has been defeated and turned into a victory! Our death becomes our birth into true life. (1 Cor. 15:55) (Hos. 13:14) “O death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?” We see in the resurrection icon, Christ is pulling up man into life, grabbing Adam and Eve and dragging them up from death to life. We are resurrected. The icon shows Christ, whose divinity could never experience death, resurrecting us in the icon. As St. Athanasius said, “Christ put on a body that He might find death in the body and blot it out.” The icon shows the resurrection of the human race as we join Christ.
This is the secret of the courage of the Martyrs. They knew their death in Christ was their true birth. We celebrate their death date as their saint’s day or birthday into true life. All must be seen through the victory of the cross which completed man’s formation, and the taking up of our cross, allowing us to enter into the fullness of true life. This is God’s original purpose and plan, as He created us to dwell with Him, and it was never lost or in question. Through the cross, death becomes life! Everything is as usual a paradox. If we find our life and live only for ourselves we lose it. But if we lose our life, laying it down serving Christ, serving others, and not living for our own passions and selfishness, living in Christ, denying ourselves and taking up our on cross, we find true and everlasting life.
This is the gospel; this is the teaching of the fathers of the 1st ecumenical council, and this is the great mystery of life and death itself as understood in the Church. Christ tells us in His last prayer for us before voluntarily going to His death on the cross, (John 17:4) I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do.” (11) “Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are.” Christ is Ascended! He is ascended in glory! He has seated our very humanity at the right hand of God the Father, to the astonishment of the angels and all the heavenly hosts! The mystery of all eternity is now revealed!
With the Feast!