Homily
The Holy Angels: Part One
Sunday,
November 1st
Fr. Josiah
Trenham, Pastor
St. Andrew
Orthodox Christian Church;
Introduction:
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, One
God. Amen. This morning I preach the
first of two homilies dedicated to the Holy Angels, and culminating next Sunday
November 8th in the celebration of the Synaxis of the Archangels Michael,
Gabriel, Raphael, and all the Holy Angels. “Angels” are extremely popular in
our culture today. There is much being
said about them. No one knows more about
angels nor takes them more seriously than do Orthodox Christians.
The first
thing that should be said about our belief in and understanding of the Holy
Angels is that this is a confessional or creedal matter for Orthodox
Christians. That is: belief in the angelic orders is a
non-negotiable part of our basic Christian belief. In the Symbol of Faith we confess that we
believe in “One God, the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and of all
things, visible and invisible”. At the heart of the invisible creation that
the Father made are the Holy Angels. The
unseen or invisible is, of course, just as ‘real’ (if not more so) than the
visible and seen material creation, and discussing and relating to the
invisible creation is a matter of great sobriety for Orthodox..
Yesterday
was “Halloween”, a very interesting and syncretistic cultural celebration, that
brings the invisible to the forefront of our society’s vision. I would like to speak about Halloween for a
moment if I may. This secular festival
derives its name from an aspect of the ancient Western liturgical
calendar. On November 1st,
732, while the Bishop of Rome and his flock were still pious Orthodox
believers, Pope St. Gregory III convoked a local council in St. Peter’s
Basilica with 93 bishops, consecrated a Chapel of the Theotokos and All Saints
and Martyrs, hung several icons, and pronounced with his bishops against the
iconoclasts who were raging in the Church, especially in the East. In A.D. 835 Pope Gregory IV ordered that this
Feast of All Saints be kept throughout the West as a universal festival in
response to new persecutions by iconoclast heretics. Thus, this Western Feast of All Saints is
akin to our Sunday of Orthodoxy celebration as a banner against
iconoclasts. All Hallows Eve (Halloween)
or All Saints Eve is the Eve of this feast.
As the celebration of the feast came to the fringes of
Today
Halloween is almost completely devoid of its western liturgical content. It has become a strange amalgamation of
different worldviews containing within itself both pleasant customs and
positively evil practices. Part of the
pleasantness of Halloween is the enjoyment children have in donning costumes
and exercising their creativity and artistic talents. This joy is also partaken of by parents and
neighbors who get to evaluate the efforts of the children each time the
doorbell rings. This leads to another
aspect of Halloween which is wonderful, and that is how it actualizes something
of the neighborhood which is almost lost.
When else do we feel so free to knock on our neighbors’ doors for a
brief exchange? This is something we all
should do a lot more of. Lastly, but
not least, there is the candy, but not much needs to be said about the
pleasantness of this!
At the same
time, however, Halloween manifests some of the most harmful aspects of our
culture’s obsessions and addictions. The
first I would like to mention is the glorification of death and violence. There is nothing Christian about
glorifying blood, delighting in moving tombstones, haunted houses, or dummies
hanging from nooses. This is
perversion. It is demonic, and gives
great pleasure to the demons to watch us praise their work. Secondly, Halloween trivializes the
invisible creation and evil itself.
Someone who believes in evil, in the unseen, and whose life is at heart
a struggle for salvation against the demons could never dress up as Lucifer, a
vampire, or anything evil, or laugh at and congratulate and reward with candy
those who do. There is nothing
whatsoever funny about demons, blood, or the grave, and if we Orthodox are
involved in any way with this cultural festival we cannot involve ourselves in
this sickness. In doing so we open
ourselves to the attack of the demons, and grieve our Guardian Angels. Now let us turn our attention to the Holy
Angels themselves. This week I shall
teach you about the nature and being of the Angels, and next Sunday on the
Synaxis of All the Angels I shall preach to you about their works.
The Nature and Being of the Holy Angels: Our knowledge of the Angelic Orders is quite
vast. The Lord God has revealed a great
amount to mankind concerning the Angels so that we might be benefited and
helped on the road to salvation by this knowledge. Angels are mentioned in almost every book of
Sacred Scripture, but their creation is nowhere detailed. We know from the Holy and Long-Suffering
Prophet Job’s prophecy that the angelic realm was created prior to the creation
of the physical universe for the angels rejoiced when God spoke the visible
creation into being (Job 38:1-7). The
number of angels is immense, and is considerably larger than the number of
humans. Angels are by nature immaterial
or bodiless. For this reason they are
likened to flames, and in icons are often pictured holding round orbs, which
denote the fact that the angels move quickly unencumbered by carnal
bodies. In contrast to the Invisible
Divine Nature, which nothing created can ever see, the angels have material
bodies of sorts, but compared to our flesh they are immaterial and bodiless.
This
immense multitude of angelic hosts are themselves divided into nine ranks. This information we have chiefly from St.
Dionysios the Areopagite, the disciple of
The first and highest of these ranks consist of the
seraphim, cherubim, and thrones.
These are the angels closest to God the Holy Trinity. Because they are so close to Him who is
described by Scripture as “a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12) they are themselves
aflame. They burn with love for God, and
they kindle flames of love for God in the other ranks of angels and in the
universe. It was these angels that the
Holy Prophet Isaiah saw when he had his vision of the Throne of God (Isa.
6). In the Hebrew language “seraphim”
means “burning”. The seraphim are
closest to God using four of their six wings to shelter themselves from the
Divine Presence. The cherubim are next
and shine in the light of God and His Wisdom.
It is they who enlighten the others and all mankind in the knowledge of
God and Wisdom. The thrones are called
“God-bearing” because God is said to “noetically rest” upon them as upon
thrones. They minister God’s righteous
judgements and justice on the earth, and enlighten earthly rulers and
tribunals.
The middle rank of the angelic hosts consists of
dominions, powers, and virtues. Dominions
rule over the other angels, teach all earthly rulers how to govern, and to
teach humans to how to enable their souls to have dominion over their
bodies. The powers work the miracles of
the Lord and impart grace to the saints to work miracles, and especially
strengthren the downtrodden. The virtues
have authority over the devil, subdue demons, and ward off temptations from the faithful.
The lower rank of the angelic hosts consists of
principalities, archangels, and angels.
The principalities rule over the ranks below them, and are assigned as
guardians of the kingdoms and nations of the world, each of which has a
principality assigned to it. The
archangels are the messengers of God’s good and wondrous tidings, deliver
prophecies, and spread the true faith among men on the earth. St. Gregory the Dialogist teaches that these
archangels derive the deeper secrets from the angelic orders above them, and
illumine mankind in the mysteries of the Orthodox Faith. The angels are the order
closest to men. They guard and protect
the faithful and communicate the lesser mysteries of God.
Over all of
the nine ranks of the angelic hosts God has set the Commander and Chief Michael
the