On Saturday, August 29, a day when the Church commemorates the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, the Protosyncellus of the Holy Archdiocese of Australia, Bishop Emilianos of Meloa, officiated at the Church of St. John in Parramatta, Sydney, and spoke to the congregation.
First, he reminded the faithful that Herod had ordered the beheading of St. John the Baptist, even though he himself respected and loved him. This happened after a series of events, as he explained, with the first being that Herod, although not legal under the Mosaic Law, married his brother’s wife, Herodias.
Herodias also had to choose between God’s love, which would prompt her not to harm St. John the Baptist, and her hatred, which was motivated by her self-love.
Her daughter, Salome, also had to choose between two things: God’s love and her mother’s love. And she chose to obey her mother and ask for the head of the holy Forerunner.”
“Saint John the Baptist symbolizes our conscience, he is the voice of God within us,” the Bishop of Meloa emphasized and urged the faithful to follow this voice: “So if we have to choose between love and lust, love and self-love, God’s love and human’s love, we must follow our conscience. We must follow the Holy Forerunner within us.”
