The Descending Ascent of Pride & the Simplicity of Humility - Sermon for the Synaxis of the Glinsk Elders (2024)

Today we celebrate a great synaxis of Holy Elders, Elders who are, with the Optina Elders, spiritual children of the great St. Paisy Velichkovsky. I want to focus on one word of one of these Elders. Of course, it comes from my patron saint, St. Makary of Glinsk. It is the only direct piece of advice you hear from him in the short life contained within the Glinsk Patericon. There are many more in the longer version of his life. Yet, of all of them, these are the words the compiler of the Patericon chose:

“Don’t be proud! Don’t condemn others! Be humble! And you will be a good monk.” These are simple words, simple like our Lord’s words in the Gospel. Yet, when spoken from a person of spiritual experience and depth, they contain a profound well of salvific wisdom worthy to be plumbed. They were spoken to a monk but pertain just as much to the laity: “Don’t be proud! Don’t condemn others! Be humble!”

Pride! Turn your eyes everywhere in this world and there it is. Turn on the TV; see pride incarnate. Hear secular music being forcibly blasted into your ears in every store and restaurant; learn pride’s doctrine. Read the news; mourn over pride’s tyranny over every human soul. What politician is—forgive me!—free of pride? What actor or actress is not motivated by it? What famous secular musician is not infected with it? What hero of our age is not driven by it?

But we do not need to travel far in thought or technology to see it. It dwells within each one of us. Wait! Did we subtly—or not so subtly—recoil in our soul at this word? Did we immediately say within ourselves: “I’m not proud!” or at least, “I’m not very proud”?

Then we have ironically repeated the story of the ancient desert within ourselves, the story of the young monk who told his elder that he was not proud. The elder simply stated, “My child, don’t you see that by your very words, ‘I’m not proud,’ you have revealed how proud you are?” Our world is crumbling because of the disease of pride. But if we do not change ourselves we may superficially gain control as imaginary judge over the whole world but lose our own soul.

Let us look at some forms of pride. Let’s take the monastery as our example. We have many ranks and ministrations here which are externally obvious and distinguished. Let’s take the mind of a novice as our example. After all, it’s easy to pick on novices. Or rather, let’s start by painting a caricature of a novice, and then paint more caricatures which pertain to all of us, to demonstrate our point; caricatures which will smack each one’s pride in the face, whether novice or priest, monastic or layman.

So, this novice might start to think, “Hey, I’m not doing so bad, maybe they’ll tonsure me early for my great spirituality and piety. They had to have noticed it by now. I clearly don’t see anyone else as spiritual as I am. Look at that brother for instance—he’s lazy. Look at that one—he’s impatient.” Look at this one. Look at that one. Look at everyone else but myself. That’s pride, and it goes hand in hand with condemning others. Both cut one off from humility. Both cut one off from Christ.

If we do not cut off prideful ambition at the root, we will ascend—or rather, descend—into ever greater pride. So, our novice ambitiously grasps at being tonsured a monk, understanding neither its grace nor its power nor its greatness because of immaturity and lack of patience.

Now, with our novice, who is a tonsured monk in his imagination, let us continue our journey with a tonsured monk in reality. They may both begin to think, “I’m worthy of ordination. Surely others notice this.” Then they begin to be passed by. Meanwhile others are ordained. They begin to get wounded, envious, furious: “Why was I passed by? I’ve been here much longer than him! What does he know? He’s a kid. And that one—he’s a useless bum!”

These monks—one imaginary and the other real—now wear imaginary priestly garments in their mind. That is, by thinking themselves worthy, they think they know what the priesthood is, whereas only those who are ordained can comprehend this grace given to them, and even then, many do not.

What if such a monk was ordained priest? What if his ambition went unnoticed by the abbot and bishop? Where would he end up? Our journey does not end with ordination. Let us now join a real priest to our imaginary one. Now ambition grasps at awards—nabedraniks, gold crosses, jeweled crosses, the rank of igumen, the rank of archimandrite.

Where does this end up? Proud and impure desire to be abbot. Then the desire to be bishop, then archbishop, then metropolitan, then patriarch, then patriarch over all the world, the pope, then…! We should stop here lest we start to wander off from our purpose and our thoughts travel outside our own souls. Let us return to our purpose lest our thoughts travel into secular and ecclesiastical politics and we begin condemning others, the opposite of what we are trying to achieve.

Do we find such ridiculous prideful ambition within ourselves? Maybe it is not for external rank, ministration, authority, or awards. Maybe it is more subtle. Maybe it deludes us into thinking that we are more spiritual or knowledgeable than everyone else and it will not let go of our mind that we might see the abyss it has plummeted us into.

Maybe our hard-to-see pride makes us revolt from the simple advice of our not-so-amazing parish priest or monastic spiritual father. Maybe it causes us to look down on our brothers, constantly judging them, mistaking its demonic judgmentalism as spiritual vision. For those of us who have heard Abba Dorotheos, and moreover, who actually heed his teaching, we will see that this type of pride is directly linked with our novice, monk, and priest who ascended into the patriarchal throne.

We begin by spurning our spiritual father because he is not God-bearing or clairvoyant. We begin to think we know more. We then do not listen to him. We listen only to our own thoughts. No! This is not true! We begin to mentally dialogue with the demons, and delusively think we are Spirit-guided. If we have any humility left, we then seek out other priests or spiritual fathers. But soon we get disappointed with them.

We think ourselves worthy of a clairvoyant elder—ah yes, one from Mt. Athos perhaps—and by this alone we spurn St. John Climacus who directly commands us not to seek a prophet for a spiritual father, but one who is simple and devout, even if he is flawed. But what is surprising about this? If we spurn our humble fathers who love us and seek to guide us towards God as best as they can, we will end up spurning the ancient saints, even ones so renowned as St. John Climacus.

He who disdains his spiritual father, his priests, his brothers, will go on to spurn the saint he thinks he has found, and then the Saints of old. This is the all-too-classic progression of pride painted by Abba Dorotheos.

In short, we then spurn the ancient saints, then the apostles, then…what? Are we ascending above them to the angelic ranks? Do we become a spiritual dominion, a cherub, a seraph, an Archangel? Lucifer wasn’t content with this. Would we, starting out as a humble little angel at the lowest part of the heavenly hierarchy, join him, only to fall with others from such glorious ranks as the cherubim and seraphim who fell with Satan into hell?

Where will pride stop? Will we seek to ascend to the throne of God? Will we then spurn God Himself? Will we seek to ascend beyond His throne? Maybe, as we were ascending into the highest heavens beyond all the angels, we passed by and failed to notice the Son of God and God Himself descending from the throne of His Father below every angelic rank, becoming a lowly Babe on earth, allowing Himself to be trampled under the feet of sinners, and even descending through the Cross into the deepest parts of the earth into dark Hades.

But wait! Before we realize this truth, who stands there above all angelic and human ranks, the highest one after God? The Most Glorious, Most Humble Queen of heaven and earth, the Mother of God. Could it be that gazing at her we desire to also spurn her and transcend her and come directly to God? Who can shamelessly spurn such a comely and compassionate face? Who can be so shamelessly proud to spurn such a tender and maternal heart?

May it not be! Let her humility and lowliness at last humble us. She alone of all Israelite women thought herself unworthy to be the mother of the long-sought Messiah. While all women in her time were greedily hoping and preparing to become such, she alone gave up such a dream because of her humility. She then sealed this thought with deed. She was the first to vow a life-long vow of virginity, forever renouncing the thought of motherhood. Others before her lived as such. But she alone chose it freely out of her humility. And what?! She is now and forever she whom she thought herself unworthy to be, the Mother of God Himself. Let this at least humble our pride.

But let us back up a bit. Maybe in our imaginary ascent through all the earthly and heavenly ranks, we have missed the simple, humble, and obscure Saints and Elders of Glinsk whom we commemorate today.

If we look at their choir, we will see every rank and manner of life. We will see zealous laymen serving the monastery and greater community. We will see novices glorified by their humble obedience. We will see hierarchs glorified by their sacrificial service to the Church of Christ. We will see everyone else in between. We will see the humble Archippus, the baker who was bossed around by gruff worldly men and arrogant monks many years junior to himself. He was once found on the floor of the bakery knocked out and bleeding profusely from the head. Yet he was completely without malice for his injurers and continued to live the rest of his life in such humility. Now, he is a Saint, forever enjoying the glory of God.

If we look at the Saints of Glinsk and the choir of all the Saints, we will see catechumens, laity, novices, rassa-monks, mantia-monks, schema-monks, singers, readers, servers, subdeacons, deacons, priests, archimandrites, abbots, and hierarchs. Did they attain sanctity because of their rank and position? No! They attained sanctity within it! No one is barred from God’s grace—neither novice nor layman nor un-tonsured monk nor non-cleric.

This is not to hinder those who are seeking such things with good intention, with a heart ready to fully sacrifice itself to God and the Church. But this is said that none of us will grasp at dreams and imaginations while missing what is right in front of our face! Look! Grace fills this church right now! Look! God’s grace is here and ready to be received if only we humble ourselves and become real, that is, become honest with ourselves, confess our state of soul with transparency to God, and beg His grace. No Orthodox Christian here is barred from the Holy Deifying Sacrament!

What led to the fall of Lucifer and leads to the fall of every proud person? Ingratitude. Lack of thanksgiving. Literally, lack of Eucharist. Thus, lack of Communion with God. Spiritual blindness to what is right in front of our faces. The spurning of lowly tasks. The dismissal of simple service. Wanting to be someone else. Wanting to be something else. Wanting to do something else. Wanting to deal with different circumstances and persons other than those put right in front of us by God.

The novice who cleans toilets with humility, service to his brothers, and mindfulness of God can receive more grace than the hieromonk who serves the liturgy inattentively and insensibly. The parents who change the diapers of their children and instruct them in piety partake of a measure of the office of the bishop who nourishes and guides the flock of Christ.

The mantia-monk can live as a schema-monk. The rassa-monk can live as a mantia-monk. The novice can live as a rassa-monk. The laity can live as monastics. The non-clerics can live as the clergy. Obedience, service, humility, love—this is not restricted to the clergy, to the full monk, nor to monks in general, but is open to all Christians. This is the Gospel of Christ.

Let us all strive to realize the task at hand put before us. All of us here can enter the Kingdom of heaven even now—right now! Its entryway is whole-hearted repentance. Its blossoming consists of joy, peace, and righteousness in the Holy Spirit. This is obtained by constant prayer, simple child-like gratitude, loving service, not thinking ourselves as greater than we are, not ambitiously grasping at unreal dreams of lives we will never know. Let us leave Hollywood in Hollywood. Let us be humble and do the lowly task given to us here and now, whatever it may be!

We have diagnosed pride and provided just a few medicines for it. But I think that those who are suffering from other passions—such as despair, envy, discontent, self-pity, and a host of others—can also find a remedy in these words. May the Mother of God, together with her beloved Elders of Glinsk and all the Saints, hear us, pray for us, help us, and enlighten us, to the glory of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen!