For we are Yours

So much of what passes for inspirational or devotional literature in Orthodoxy is simply sweetly stereotyped platitudes. 'The saints are grieved when we sin, and they rejoice when we are good...' and things like that. Of course, if we source such religious verbiage to a well-known saint, ancient or modern, that makes it authoritative, and we feel pleasantly edified. It doesn't matter if it adds absolutely nothing to our real life, whether in the world or in our inner life—that is, if we have one!

Mutual admiration societies can enslave whole nations for centuries, feeding generations of sleeping souls with the regurgitated porridge of piety. Christ comes into the room saying, 'Behold! I make all things new!' and is met by deaf ears. Having forgotten our first love, we languish in self-pity and paint ourselves poorer than we were yesterday, while pedestalizing the saints as rich and meritorious. We cannot climb up to their level. They've retreated to their pillars and yanked up the ropes!

O Christ, what a wasteland we have made the fertile fields Your blood has watered! You would walk in us, dispensing blessing, loving all comers, healing all and raising every creature to immortality, yet we bind our own feet, we willingly cripple ourselves like vain concubines of a fickle master. But You, O Christ, are the Lord, our God, the Bridegroom of the Bride, the Faithful and True, You who make her, who make us, spotless, secure, radiant, fruitful, who call us, 'Beloved, My one and only.'

O holy, divine Triad, You have said of us, 'We have a little sister, and her breasts are not yet grown. What shall we do for our sister on the day she is spoken for? If she is a wall, we will build towers of silver on her. If she is a door, we will enclose her with panels of cedar' (Song of Songs 8:8-9).

Remove from us our limpid, wavering love, and bestow on us the love that lasts, the faith that moves mountains, for our breasts are not yet grown. Build towers of silver on us, gleaming with the reflection of Your Light, that we no longer hide ourselves, for the City set on a hill cannot be hid. Open our door, that the cedars Your hand has planted may finally flourish, that we may know and be known. Yes, Lord, save us from ourselves, for we are Yours.