+BARTHOLOMEW
By God’s Mercy Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome, and Ecumenical
Patriarch
To the Plenitude of the Church
Grace and Peace be to you from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ
Together with our Prayer, Blessing, and Forgiveness
Beloved brothers and sisters, children in the Lord,
Tomorrow, we enter the period of Holy and Great Lent. In the Lenten vespers
of Forgiveness chanted this evening, we shall hear the sacred hymnographer
urging us to “begin the time of fasting with joy, submitting ourselves to
spiritual struggle” in preparing to welcome the great Passion and joyful
Resurrection of our divine-human Lord.
Therefore, what is demanded is a joyful disposition in order to embrace
fervently the spiritual struggle of this period of contrition in purification
and prayerfulness. Fasting, abstinence, frugality, restriction of personal
desires, intense prayer, confession, and similar ascetic elements are
essential to the period of Great Lent and should not be considered burdensome
obligations or unbearable duties that result in despondency or dejection.
When doctors recommend diet or exercise as necessary prerequisites for
psychosomatic health and vigor, the first advice they offer by way of a mandatory
condition of success is a pleasant mental disposition, which includes
smiling and positive thinking. The same also applies to the spiritual period of
fasting that opens before us. Great Lent should be regarded as an
invaluable divine gift. It is a sacred time of divine grace, which seeks to detach
us from things material, lowly and corrupt in order to attract us toward
things superior, wholesome and spiritual. It is a unique opportunity to
remove from the soul every passion, to rid the body of everything superfluous,
harmful and mortal. Accordingly, then, it is a time of immense rejoicing and
gladness. A genuine feast and exhilaration!
Nevertheless, my beloved children, the fasting expected of us by the
Church, as well as the abstinence, frugality, restriction of personal desires
and unnecessary pleasures or expenses, literally constitute a prescription for
salvation. This is especially true this year, when our world has
experienced a global economic crisis, filled with imminent danger of bankruptcy not
only for individuals and companies, but also for entire nations throughout
the planet, with destructive consequences in skyrocketing unemployment, the
creation of entire hosts of people plagued by poverty, depression, social
turmoil, increase in crime, and other such tragedies. Great Lent instructs
us to journey daily with a little less, without the arrogance of
extravagance, waste and display. It encourages us to surrender all forms of greed and
ignore the challenges of commercial advertising, which constantly promotes
new and false necessities. It incites us to limit ourselves to what is
absolutely essential and necessary in an attitude of dignified, deliberate
simplicity. We are not to be a consuming or compulsive herd of thoughtless and
heartless individuals, but a society of sensitive and caring persons,
sharing with and supporting our “neighbor” that is in poverty or recession.
Finally, Great Lent informs us about patience and tolerance in moments of
smaller or larger deprivation, while simultaneously emphasizing the need to
seek God’s assistance and mercy, placing our complete trust in His
affectionate providence. That is how Christ envisions Great Lent. That is how the
Saints lived Great Lent. That is how the Church Fathers undertook the struggle
of Great Lent. That is how our faith has traditionally understood Great
Lent. That is how the Church of Constantinople, in its wide experience and
unceasing vigilance, has always projected and proclaimed Great Lent, and
particularly in the current global circumstances.
In sharing these pastoral thoughts and words from the historical and holy
Phanar, we extend to all of you our paternal prayer and spiritual blessing
for a fruitful journey through the period of Great Lent.
Holy and Great Lent 2010
+ Bartholomew,
Fervent supplicant before God
