The Morning Offering

The Good Samaritan

Bill Buchanan, Chief Hank Lipe and Abbot Tryphon (police and fire chaplain)

Human Kindness comes from Love of God

There was a recent report of a man who collapsed in a Walmart store during a Black Friday shopping frenzy, while other shoppers walked around him, some even stepping over him, rather than attempt to help him. The news story is like today's Gospel of the Good Samaritan who, unlike the others who'd passed by the man who'd been attacked by thieves and left badly injured beside the road, stopped to help.

This latest tragedy, in which a man died of a heart attack, we can see an even more inhuman response than in today's Gospel reading. These people were putting a good bargain before a human life. What is happening to our civilization? It is bad enough that companies like Walmart and Target are forcing their employees to report to work on the one day our nation has set aside as a time to give thanks to God, and be together with family, but to witness such evil in this holy season is just unbelievable.

When I was a child I remember being able to sing Christmas carols in public schools and seeing Nativity Scenes displayed in public places, including department store windows. Now Christmas is referred to as the "holiday season", and all references to Christ have been banished from our public places.

Is it any wonder we read about such scenes as was witnessed in the Walmart, when we as a nation have pushed God out and replaced Him with the worship of material acquisition and greed? The incident in Walmart would never have taken place in a Christian nation.

Love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon

Correction concerning the Nativity Fast:  
Fish is allowed on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.

Sunday November 27, 2011 / November 14, 2011

24^th Sunday after Pentecost. Tone seven.
Eve of the Nativity Fast.

Holy and All-praised Apostle Philip (1st c.).
New Hieromartyrs Demetrius, Alexander, Victor, Alexis, Michael, Michael, Theodore, Peter, Alexis, Sergius, Nicholas, Basil, Alexander, Nicholas, Demetrius, Demetrius, Porphirius, Basil, George, Basil, Sergius priests, Nicholas deacon, New Hieromartyr Aristrah, Martyr Gabriel and Virgin-martyr Anna (1937).
New Hieromartyr Theodore priest (1940).
New Hieromartyr Sergius priest (1941).
Venerable Philip, abbot of Irap near Novgorod (1527).
St. Justinian the Emperor of Byzantium (565) and his wife St. Theodora (548).
St. Gregory Palamas, archbishop of Thessalonica (1360).
New Martyr Constantine of Hydra (Mt. Athos) (1800) (Greek).
St. Dyfrig (Dubricius), bishop in Hereford and Gwent, hermit of Bardsey Island (ca. 550) (Celtic & British).
St. Malo (Machulus) of Brittany (7th c.) (Celtic & British).
New Martyr Panteleimon the Youth of Asia Minor (Greek).
St. Alberik, bishop of Utrecht (784) (Neth.).
Repose of St. Alexander Nevsky (Alexis in monasticism) (1263).


Thank you for your prayerful and financial support of the Monastery. 

For those of you who live locally, we have a wonderful bookstore and gift shop (likely the best Orthodox store in the region). Please consider purchasing your Christmas gifts with a visit to Way of a Pilgrim Bookstore here at the monastery on Vashon Island (please call the monastery (206.463-5918) before taking the ferry, just to make sure your visit is a convenient time for the monastic community). 

For those who do not live in the region, you can support the monastery through PayPal. Again, we thank you for remembering the holy work of the monastery during this season of the Nativity Fast.

Ephesians 2:14-22

 

Christ Our Peace


¹⁴ For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, ¹⁵ having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, ¹⁶ and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. ¹⁷ And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near. ¹⁸ For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.

Christ Our Cornerstone

¹⁹ Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, ²⁰ having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, ²¹ in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, ²² in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

Luke 10:25-37

 

The Parable of the Good Samaritan


²⁵ And behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested Him, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”

²⁶ He said to him, “What is written in the law? What is your reading of it?”
²⁷ So he answered and said, “ ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind,’ and ‘your neighbor as yourself.’”
²⁸ And He said to him, “You have answered rightly; do this and you will live.”
²⁹ But he, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
³⁰ Then Jesus answered and said: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. ³¹ Now by chance a certain priest came down that road. And when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. ³² Likewise a Levite, when he arrived at the place, came and looked, and passed by on the other side. ³³ But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was. And when he saw him, he had compassion. ³⁴ So he went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; and he set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. ³⁵ On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said to him, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I come again, I will repay you.’ ³⁶ So which of these three do you think was neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?”
³⁷ And he said, “He who showed mercy on him.”
Then Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”