A The publican beautifully applied to himself this saying of Wisdom: *There is a shame that bringeth sin* (Eccli. 4:25). This shame he accepted while he lived wickedly. And there is a shame that is glory and grace; this he embraced through his manner of repentance, healing contrary things with contrary things through faith. Imitating a physician, he applied to his body a plaster which, though it might lacerate the flesh, yet cleansed the ulcer, so that when the living body was revealed, he might know the method of cure. He obstructed the channels of his passions by using, as it were, the cauterizing iron of groaning, and he soothed and healed his swollen ulcer with tears; he repressed the wound of the ulcer through the beating of his breast, dried up the fluid flowing from his body into his soul, and offered it to the Creator, cleansed by repentance. But let us hear the rest of the Pharisee’s words: *I fast twice in the sabbath.* He declares his abstinence on the second and sixth days of the week. For the sabbaths are a rest for the Hebrews. *I abstain from luxurious foods, I do not defile my lips with impure eating; I am clothed all around with temperance; I am covered all over with holiness; furthermore, I bring to God the tithes of what I possess.* O tumor breathing insensibility! Was he not acting as if he were bestowing his own food upon God? *I fast twice in the sabbath.* "Lord," he says, "does not fasting commend the precepts of the Law to God? And what men accomplish with labor, I do by design." What, then, does the benevolent Judge, the generous gamester B who crowns the course of repentance, do? He both tolerated the Pharisee vaunting himself and was delighted with the repenting publican. For because the one, with words as if with a violent wind, shook off the fruit of his soul, while the other, crushing himself, did not wait for another accuser, He distributed to each according to his merit: for he dismissed the publican as the accuser of his own crime and free from condemnation; but the Pharisee, who had brought his good deeds into the open, He declared poorer than the publican. To each the measure was appropriate: for the one, his riches were the cause of poverty; to the other, from his riches, poverty was eliminated. For what does the Lord say: *Amen I say to you, this man went down to his house justified rather than that one* (Luc. 18:14). The Pharisee, as if flowering with blossoms, crowned with good deeds, came with the publican, who was bare of all self-defense. The one, humbling himself, was easily exalted; the other, however, lifting himself on high intemperately, underwent a ridiculous nakedness. Would it not have been better to use lowered voices? Would it not have been better to hear the prophetic voice saying: *Be humbled before the Lord, and he will exalt you* (Jac. 4:10)? Would it not have been more useful to restrain the tongue and preserve the riches which he had acquired with much labor? For the virtues which he had collected over time, he dissipated with a word. The Pharisee had not, perhaps, heard that which is written: *Every proud man is impure in the sight of the Lord* (Prov. 16:5); he had not learned that beautifully spoken: *Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth* (Matth. 6:3). Perhaps he knew both, but he was overcome by vainglory. Let us, therefore, acquire the humility of the publican and lay down the burden of our sins; but let us hold in hatred the pride through which the Pharisee lost the riches of his virtues. For *God resisteth the proud, but to the humble he giveth grace* (Prov. 3:34). To Him be glory and power, now and always, and for ages C of ages. Amen.
UPON THE ENTRY OF THE HOLY FASTS
There has arisen for us today, beloved, the joyful spring of the holy fasts, and it prepares us to run alacritously into this paradise worthy of God, so that we may reap the fruits of temperance and, plucking the flowers of chastity, weave a crown of continence. Again the angelic life calls us to the ancient pleasure, and opens the gates for us to that divine and blessed usufruct. Voluntary fasting offers great confidence before God, which cleanses the body through temperance, but sanctifies the soul through confidence toward God, and through the forgetfulness of all earthly things which it induces, and through the love of celestial things which it brings. Fasting leads its lovers to heaven; it brings it about that we stand near to Christ and have fellowship with the saints. The father of fasting, beloved, is the Law of God; its mother is temperance, patience, virtue; its daughters are exercise, chastity, continence; its sons are Moses, Elijah, Daniel, John the Baptist, and the chorus of the saints, especially those who withdrew into the desert, and the ascetics; its friends are faith, hope, charity; its companions are peace, meekness, concord; its handmaid is the glorification of God, perpetual psalmody, pure prayer; its housemate is the fear of God; the fruits of those who fast assiduously are holiness, incorruption, confidence toward God, the kingdom of heaven, eternal life. Therefore, beloved, those who love fasting, having the Law of God in their hearts, fast sincerely; but the wicked do not fast. And the just indeed fast always, acting piously and meditating upon and fulfilling the Law of God, loving chastity and embracing continence, by which they are rendered free and adhere to Christ. The wicked, however, not only do not fast, but are even filled with every wickedness and satanic operation. Every lasciviousness, impiety, and iniquity is practiced among them; among them are obscene words, immoderate laughter, diabolical modes and habits; among them will be gluttony, drunkenness, and the disturbance of order. For many evils arise indeed from drunkenness. For those who are drunk with wine are darkened in mind, like madmen and those bereft of sense, who are carried hither and thither: they strike from wall to wall, are pushed indecently against those they meet, and fall shamefully to the ground. Therefore, beloved, let us flee this turpitude, and let us fast alacritously with the fear of God, firm in faith, supported by the Law, adorned with temperance, decorated with chastity, tempering our eyes, sanctifying our mind, praying with much patience and a pure heart, laying aside temporal things and attaining the eternal. For whoever fasts sincerely, he imitates Christ; dwelling on earth, he is like the angels, rivals the prophets, is a partaker with the apostles, and is altogether transformed in nature through fasting, becoming just from unjust, good from evil, pious from impious, and thus receives Christ into his inheritance and the treasure of life: which may it be granted to us all to attain, through the grace and benevolence of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and power together with the Father, who is without beginning, and the life-quickening Spirit, now and always, and for the ages of ages. Amen.
UPON THE HOLY ASCENSION OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST
Still contemplating in my soul the profit produced for men from the cross, and weighing with an equal balance of mind the utility of the resurrection, the inexhaustible riches of the divine Ascension rush in; and I see my Lord and God ascending into the heavens, where D He was before; so that, placing me, who am clay, upon the throne of the unblemished Father, He might seal in fact and deed the words of Paul: *He hath raised us up together, and hath made us sit together in the heavenly places* (Ephes. 2:6). As many of us, therefore, as have laid aside both the garment and the mind of the first Adam, and bear the second Adam, who is Christ,