Holy Angels Byzantine Catholic Church

October 6, 2019

17th Sunday after Pentecost; The Holy and GloriousApostle Thomas

We welcome all visitors and guests.Please join us in our hall for refreshments and fellowship after the Divine Liturgy!

October 6, 2019Schedule of services for the week of October 7 - October 13

Wednesday, October 96PM – Reader Service

Saturday, October 12 The Holy Martyrs Probus, Tarachus and Andronicus; Our Holy Father Cosmasof Jerusalem, bishop of Maiuma and Hymnographer; St. Martin the Merciful,bishop of Tours. 1 Cor 15:39-45; Lk 6:1-10

9AM – Divine Liturgy5PM – Great Vespers

Sunday, October 13 Sunday of the Fathers of the 7th Ecumenical Council; The Holy Martyrs Carpus, bishop ofThyatira;Papylas, hisdeacon;Agathonica, sisterofPapylas; andAgathodorus, their servant2 Cor 9:6-22; Luke 8:5-15; (For the Fathers: Hebrews 13:7-16; John 17:1-13)

8:40 AM – Third Hour9AM – Divine Liturgy For all parishioners

Parish online communityOver the last week, all of you who haveregistered in the parish and given youremail should should have received aninvitation to join the parish onlinecommunity hosted by “Realm” software. Itallows communication between membersof the parish and the various groups (e.g.choir, altar servers, etc...) Be on thelookout for the invitation and please join. Ifyou don’t receive an invitation, please letFr. James know.

Special Collection:Priests’ Medical Insurance

On Sunday October 13th, our Eparchy willonce again take a special collection to helpsubsidize the medical insurance premiumsof our pastors. Medical insurance premiumsare out of sight and still on the rise. Howdoes our little Eparchy manage to pay thismonthly premium? The parishes pay a largeportion of the premium for their priest whilethe Eparchy picks up the difference. Everyparish feels the pinch. Your generousresponse to the two special medicalinsurance collections raised over $71,000and is deeply appreciated. Once again weask your generous assistance as we take upthis special collection on Sunday, October13th. Our goal is $50 per household orapproximately $45,000. Your continuedgenerosity is a blessing both for our Eparchyand her priest who serve you in so manyways!. God bless your continued supportand generosity!

Those who engage in debates on a regularbasis know that the argument itself can easilyshape the points involved. This is another wayof saying that some debates should be avoidedentirely since merely getting involved in themcan be the road to ruin. There are a number ofChristian scholars (particularly among theOrthodox) who think that the classical debatesbetween Christians and Muslims during theMiddle Ages had just such disastrous resultsfor Christian thinking.Now when engaging in religious debates it isall too easy to agree to things that might makefor later problems. It is possible, for example,to agree to a comparison of the Scriptures ofthe Old and New Testament and the Book ofthe Quran. After all, Muslims have a holybook – Christians have a holy book. Whyshould we not debate whose holy book isbetter?It is even possible to agree with the Muslimcontention that Christians (and Jews) are“People of the Book.” Of course Muslimsmeant that Christians and Jews were people ofan inferior book, but were somehow betterthan pagans. Again, it is possible,nevertheless, to let the matter ride and agreethat Christians are “People of the Book.”And it is also possible to give wide latitude tothe Muslim claim that the most essentialmatter with regard to God is “Islam,” that is“submission.” After all, if God is the Lord ofall creation, then how is submitting to Him,recognizing and accepting that He is God, notthe most important thing?But each of these proposals had disastrousresults in the history of Christianity and mayvery well be the source of a number ofmodern distortions within the Christian faith.

Thus, at the outset I will state:1. The Bible is not the Christian Holy Book.2. Christians (and Jews) are not People of theBook.

3. Submission to God is not a proper way todescribe the Christian faith

Further, any and all of these claims, onceaccepted, lead to fundamental distortions ofChristianity. An extreme way of saying this isthat much of modern Christianity has been“Islamified.” Thinking critically about this isimportant – particularly in an era of renewedcontact with Islam.The Historical DebatesMost modern Christians are unaware of thecontacts and debates between Christianity(particularly in the West) and Islam(particularly in Spain) during the MiddleAges. A great deal of the learning in earlyEuropean Universities, especially in themodel of scholasticism, owed much to theencounter with Islam scholasticism – this wasespecially so for the work with Aristoteleanphilosophy. Christian, Jewish and Muslimscholars, such as Thomas Aquinas, MosesMaimonides, and Ibn Rushd (Averroes), arefoundational for Medieval thought. (Averroesis sometimes called the “Founding Father ofWestern secularism“). But the rationalistmovement represented by these schools hadlasting effects in the Christian West – not allfor the best.The notion of the Scripture as the Book whoseplace and authority in Christian life aresimilar to the Quran in Islamic life is one suchidea. Islam has no Church – no one standsbetween the believer and Allah. There arecommunities, to be sure, but not in thenecessary form of classical Christianity. The

Has Your Bible Become A Quran?Fr. Stephen Freeman

http://blogs.ancientfaith.com/glory2godforallthings/2014/10/01/bible-become-quran/

exaltation of the sovereignty of God and theworking of the Divine Will (predestination)are hallmarks of Muslim thought. Theyeventually become hallmarks within certainforms of Christian scholasticism.The Protestant Reformation is rightlydescribed as a product of Christianscholasticism. Other historical forces shapedit, but it is worth noting that Luther, Calvinand their like were all “schoolmen.” Theirideas, particularly in Calvin, were largelyabsent prior to the Medieval dialogs withIslamic scholasticism. It is not that theReformers borrowed directly from Islam – butthat Islam contributed certain key notions thathave, in time, become foundational for certainsegments of contemporary Christianity.The Bible is not the Christian Holy BookAs I have recently written, the Bible isproperly seen as the Holy Scriptures, acollection of writings that span some 1500years or more. They represent a variety ofgenres, address very different situations andunderstandings of God, and lastly (in the caseof the New Testament) represent the internaldocuments of the primitive Christiancommunity. Christians treat these books asinspired, though there are some books notincluded, or only included by someChristians, that are also recognized as havinga case for inspiration.The Christian Scriptures are books(particularly in the Old Testament) that havea unique history of interpretation. Christiansand Jews, traditionally, do not read thesebooks in the same manner. In such a sense,they do not possess an “objective” meaning.Indeed, Christian Fathers have recognizedmore than one meaning being present in thetext.The Christian community predates its owntexts (the New Testament) and is notdescribed as in any way having a foundationon the Scriptures – the Apostles and Prophets

are described as the foundation of the Church.And though the Tradition does not describethe Scriptures as somehow inferior to theChurch, neither do they consider theScriptures to exist apart from the Church.They are the Church’s book.In short, the place of the Scriptures withinChristianity are utterly unlike the place of theQuran in Islam. Any confusion on this point isa distortion of the Scriptures.We are not People of the BookChristians are not baptized into the Bible.Jews were circumcised and made part of theCovenant people before ever a word ofScripture was written. God revealed Himselfas the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob somehundreds of years before Moses ever wrote aline.Christians may rightly see Islam as an ersatzversion of Christianity – an attempt to createa rival to meet the peculiar needs and desiresof the man, Muhammed. The Quran isMuhammed’s distorted idea of the role playedby a “book” in the life of Christianity andJudaism. It is his attempt to create a rival. Butthis book, unlike any writing or utterance of aBiblical prophet, came with new claims. TheQuran is what a misinformed desert preacherthought the Christian and Jewish holy bookslooked like. It is a poor substitute and acaricature of those writings. In this sense, theQuran is more akin to the Book of Mormon, afabrication that tells what Upstate New Yorkcon-men thought an ancient religious bookshould look like. It tells us much about themind of 19th century Upstate New York, butnothing about God. The Quran tells us aboutthe perception of a 7th century Arabianmerchant, but nothing about God.It is thus a supreme religious irony that such amisperception should have changed howChristians saw their own sacred texts. But, itcan be argued, this is indeed the case. Themovement from authoritative Church to

authoritative book that occurs over the 15thand 16th centuries (the ProtestantReformation), should not be considered apartfrom the dialog with Islam in the two or threecenturies that preceded it. It is worth notingthat scholasticism in the West was largelybegun in Andalusian Islam. It was not anatural development from within.Scholasticism was ultimately rejected in theChristian East.Martin Luther’s, “Hier, stehe ich!”(demanding that only a Scriptural argumentwould be an acceptable response to hisposition) would have been unimaginable fouror five hundred years before. The “Bible” hadnot yet become a Christian Quran. Today,however, many Christians are indeed, “Peopleof the Book.”Christianity is not submission to GodOn the face of it, denying that Christianity issubmission to God seems ludicrous. Surely,if God is truly God, then submission to Him isthe only proper response. But submission isnot a word that passes the lips of Christ. Hisinvitation to become a child of the Father isnot a demand to submit to the Supreme Being.It is why there can be no conversion at thepoint of a sword in Christianity, and whyconversions at the point of a sword have neverceased in Islam. (Such conversions haveindeed occurred in Christian history – buthave been later subjected to deep criticismand condemnation).The question placed in Christian Baptism(Orthodox) is: “Do you unite yourself toChrist?” This is the language of union,reflecting St. Paul’s teaching that Baptism isunion with the death and resurrection ofChrist. The modern Evangelical phrase, “Doyou accept Jesus Christ as your Lord andSavior?” has more in common with Muslimsubmission. For there need be no unionimplied in the question – many who havebecome Christians under the guise of this

question have no perception of unionwhatsoever.Obedience to the gospel is, in criticallyimportant ways, not at all the same thing assubmission. In proper Christianunderstanding, obedience is a cooperativeaction, a synergy between God and believer.As such, it is part of the eternal dance of unionbetween Creator and created. Submission(particularly as taught in Islam) contains nosynergy – it is the recognition of a force thatcan only move in one direction. It is thediminution of the human person, even itsobliteration. Obedience, rightly understood, isan invitation into true Personhood – and,strangely, the beginning of true freedom.Classical Christianity exalts the dignity of thehuman person and proclaims a gospel thatunites humankind to God. The proclamationof Christ’s Lordship, though derived fromChristian teaching, can easily become adistortion that takes on the submissiondemands of classical Islam. I have seen sucha Christianity. It is not a pleasant place todwell.Contemporary Christianity needs to come toits historic senses and reexamine its variousdistortions of the gospel. Christ is not acypher for Allah – they are nothing alike. Thefullness of Christian distinctives is required inour present confrontation with Islam. TheBible is not the Christian Quran. It is nothinglike it. Being able to articulate this is essential.Christians are the Body of Christ and notPeople of the Book. The absence of a trueecclesiology in contemporary Christianity is ahallmark of its Islamification. The call torelationship with God in Christ, true union inthe Divine Life of the Triune God, must berightly proclaimed and taught amongChristians. We have centuries of unthinkingto do if we are to reclaim the wholeness of theChristian faith and speak truth to error.

Every Sunday, feastday and other holy day, when wego into our parish temple, we see the heart of theparish which is the sanctuary, where the Holy Tableis. When we go into an Orthodox home, we hope tosee the heart of the family, which is the icon corner.Just like the sanctuary is the heart of the parishchurch, the icon corner is the heart of the familychurch. In the parish church, the parish family praystogether before the sanctuary and the iconostas; in thefamily church, the family prays together before theicon corner.What is an icon corner? An icon corner is a shelf ortable or cabinet, where icons are placed and where alamp is kept burning. Many people have icons ofJesus Christ, the Theotokos and icons of the patronsaints of the family members. There are many ways toset up the icons and the important thing is just to do it.The icon corner doesn't have to be a corner, it can bea wall or other place in the house where the family cango to pray. It is best if the icon corner faces the east,to remind us of the second coming of Jesus Christ.Besides the icons and the lamp, it is traditional forpious Orthodox people to keep a Bible and prayerbook, holy water, and blessed bread from church.Many people also have holy oil, the palms or willowsfrom Palm Sunday, and other holy things from the

services of the churchyear. The icon corner canbe very simple or veryfancy but the main thingis that the icon corner isnot just a decoration forthe house but that it is theheart of the family andthat the family uses it. Inmany pious Orthodox

homes, the iconcorner is arranged sothat it can actually beused for celebratingthe Divine Liturgy, ifthe priest needs to dothis. This reminds usof the history of ourOrthodox Faith andthat we must alwaysbe ready for timeswhen the churches

suffer from those who are not believers.If you do not have an icon comer, ask your priest tohelp you start one in your home. Members of thefamily can use it at any time. If you are not able toread the prayers from the prayer book because there isnot enough time, then, at least go to the icon cornerand ask for God's blessing before beginning whateverit is that you are doing.Try to begin each day by going to the icon corner andreading the prayers from the prayer book for themorning, take some, holy bread and holy water. Inthis way, you are getting God's blessing for the newday. If you cannot read the prayers for some reason,still go to the icon corner, make the sign of the crossand take the holy bread and holy water, still askingGod to bless the new day.You will see that the icon corner makes a bigdifference in your home. When you see the lampburning, you will remember that God is always nearand that the saints are always praying for your family.When you use the icon corner every day, you will seethat God is kept close to your heart and mind and thiswill help you to be closer to Him and His OrthodoxFaith.

THE ICON CORNER – THE HEART OF THE FAMILY CHURCH

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MOVING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTIONby Metropolitan Anthony (Bloom)

We cannot partake deeply of the life of Godunless we change profoundly. It is thereforeessential that we should go to God in orderthat He should transform and change us, andthat is why, to begin with, we must allbecome converts. Conversion in Latin andHebrew means a turn, a change in thedirection of things.Conversion means that instead of spendingour lives in looking in all directions, weshould follow one direction only. It is aturning away from a great many things thatwe know are ultimately not good for us. Thefirst impact of conversion is to modify oursense of values: God being at the center ofall, everything acquires a new position anda new depth. All that is God’s, all thatbelongs to Him, is positive and real.Everything that is outside of Him ultimatelyhas no value or meaning.But it is not a change of mind alone that wecan call conversion. We can change ourminds and go no further; what must followis an act of will and unless our will comesinto motion and is redirected God-wards,there is no conversion; at most there is onlyan incipient, still dormant and inactivechange in us.Repentance must not be mistaken for

remorse, it does not consist in feelingterribly sorry that things went wrong in thepast; it is an active, positive attitude, whichconsists in moving in the right direction.It is made very clear in the parable of thetwo sons (Mt. 21 :28) who werecommanded by their father to go to work inthe vineyard. The one said, “I am going,”but did not go. The other said, “I am notgoing,” and then felt ashamed and went towork.This was real repentance, and we shouldnever lure ourselves into imagining that tolament one’s past is an act of repentance. Itis part of it, of course, but repentanceremains unreal and barren as long as it hasnot led us to doing the will of the Father. Wehave a tendency to think that it should resultin fine emotions and we are quite oftensatisfied with emotions instead of real, deepchanges.

Holy Angels Byzantine Catholic Church2235 Galahad Road

San Diego, CA 92123-3931Fr. James Bankston, AdministratorSubdeacon Jonathan A. Deane

Rectory/Office: 858-277-2511 Social Hall/Ethnic Foods: 858-268-3458Email: PastorHASD@gmail.com (please note change to gmail!)Website: www.HolyAngelsSanDiego.comFacebook: Holy Angels Byzantine Catholic Church

All those requesting Holy Mysteries must be parishioners for at least six months.

Mysteries of Initiation: Requires Pre-Baptismal instruction. The Mysteries of Initiation arecelebrated on Saturdays or Sundays within the Divine Liturgy. At least one sponsor must be aCatholic and the other a practicing Christian. Both sponsors must present documentation thatthey are in good standing with their church.

Mystery of Crowning: Requires Pre-Marriage instruction. Consult Fr. James at least six monthsprior to making wedding plans. Marriages cannot be celebrated during the fasting seasons of theChurch.

Funerals: Contact Fr. James.

Liturgy, Panachyda and Eternal Lamp Intentions: Schedule with Fr. James. It is “holy andwholesome thought to pray for the dead” (2 Maccabees 12:46) especially on the 9th and 40th days,and on the anniversary of their falling asleep in the Lord.

Holy Mystery of Confession: First Wednesday of the month from 7PM - 8PM. Also availablebefore all services or by appointment. Confessions end 15 minutes prior to services.

Sick calls / Holy Anointing / Hospital Visits: Requested by parishioner, friend, or family.

Please submit all Bulletin announcements to Fr. James for approval by Wednesday of eachweek.

Office Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday from 10:AM - 5PM. Please call ahead to make sureFr. James is on-site. Call anytime in case of an emergency.

Bless, O Lord, the worship and Stewardship of your faithful servants:September 29 – attendance: 76; Adult Tithes: $890.00; Loose change: $114.00;Non-parishioner donations: $125.00; Total: $1129.00.

Vocation Icon: This week (October 6): Deane FamilyNext week (October 13): Chase FamilyPlease sign up in the narthex to host the vocation icon.