“Let us turn our strength to love”, said Archbishop Makarios of Australia to the faithful, at St. Spyridon Parish in Kingsford, Sydney.
The Archbishop of Australia went to the temple of St. Spyridon on the afternoon of Holy Tuesday, April 27, and presided over the Service of the Bridegroom (Orthros of Holy Wednesday), during which we commemorate the anointing of the Lord with myrrh by a prostitute, as well as the convening of the conference of Judea for condemning Christ and Judas’ departure to the High Priests with whom he had agreed on the betrayal.
In his sermon, the Archbishop of Australia focused on the paradoxical fact that a disciple of Christ became a traitor and a prostitute became a saint. What differentiates the attitude of these two people is the love they had for Christ. Judas, who did not have love in him, but passively followed Christ, in the end, betrayed Him. And the prostitute, without asking for anything, wanted to show her love for the Lord, and for this very reason her many sins were forgiven and she was saved.
“Man’s ontological problem is not sinning, but the fact that he does not love God,” said the Archbishop of Australia, citing these events. “There is no human being who will live in this world and will not sin,” he remarked but emphasized that the problem is that we do not focus our strength, our vitality, our energy, our whole existence on cultivating our love for God ”.
The great challenge, then, as we prepare for the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ, is to turn our power to love. “Not in hatred, not in ourselves, not in our selfishness. Only in the love for Christ and the Church “, stressed the Archbishop Makarios. “And so we will really experience an absolute freedom”, he added, “because the person who loves is liberated and lives in Paradise from this world”.