Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Congratulations with the feasts of the Resurrection of the Lord and St. Mary of Egypt, as well as with the final Sunday of Great Lent!

In today’s Epistle reading we heard that our High Priest, Christ, came to us here on earth not into the Old Testament Temple in Jerusalem, but into a different temple or tabernacle, one not made by hands; that is, the Word of God, the second person of the Holy Trinity, joined Himself with a human body. God became a man. The physical body of Christ is here called a tabernacle not made by hands. Our High Priest entered into the temple not with the blood of sacrificial animals, as was the case with the Jews in past times, but with His very own blood. He died on the cross for our sakes and obtained eternal redemption for us. Our sins are decisively blotted out by His sacrifice. The Holy Apostle Paul closes today’s short excerpt with the thought that if the Old Testament sacrifices and rituals (sprinkling with the blood or ashes of sacrificial animals) could purify men from bodily uncleanliness, even more so can the blood of our Saviour purify us from sin.

Seeing our own sinful and fault-filled lives, it’s not surprising that we sometimes lose heart. Often we don’t see any spiritual growth. Sometimes it may even seem that our own salvation is in doubt, for it seems that we aren’t progressing. Those words that we read today seem to not be reflected in our own lives. To turn aside such thoughts, the Church offers us today the memory of St. Mary of Egypt. This sinful woman, through repentance and communion of Christ’s Holy Mysteries, the Lord’s Body and Blood, changed her life completely. Where earlier there was sin, grace shined forth. Where there used to be a regular body, enslaved by passions, an angelic one appeared. In her life we are convinced that truly the Blood of our Saviour can purify and enlighten any person, even that most awful sinner.

Today the clear and expressive words of the Apostle Paul about the salvific power of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ earnestly prepare us for the coming Holy Week. Together with the Gospel reading, today’s epistle is as if saying: “Soon the holy days of our Saviour’s death and resurrection will be upon us; therefore, don’t be distracted from this goal, keep it constantly in your minds and hearts, so as not to go astray.”

priest Alexis