Last week, I ended my words to you by quoting Isaiah saying: “The people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light; and those who dwelt in the valley of the shadow of death, a light has shined.”
For the ancestors of Christ who lived in a period of history where darkness was prevalent and where human life meant nothing, the promise of the Great Light of Christ coming to illumine the world was something that they could only dream about! But what do these words mean to those who are living in a time after the Incarnation of Christ? Does this promise carry as much meaning for us as it did them?
I want to share an incredible, personal, and recent story that will stick with me for a very long time. It is the story of a young woman who personified what it meant to be in darkness, and at the very end of her earthly life, find a light and life that goes beyond human comprehension.
Back on a Saturday in mid-August, I received a phone call after Great Vespers from a Greek woman living in Canada. She had been desperately searching for an Orthodox Priest in our area to go and meet with a dear friend of hers who had been suffering from severe demonic attacks.
This suffering handmaiden had spent a portion of her life exposing herself to practices of witchcraft, playing with Ouija boards, and experimenting with spiritual mediums…all of which began to affect not only her spiritual but also her physical wellbeing. For years, she would have horrible hallucinations, random screams of terror, nightmarish visions in her sleep, and a presence around her that was described by a friend as “dark and demonic”.
I was put in touch with the young woman’s mother, and a meeting was set up for the following day after the Divine Liturgy. I took my matushka with me to the home, and we met this suffering young woman for the first time.
In our brief conversations, she expressed a sincere desire to be forgiven all that she had done, and to abide in the unity of the Orthodox Faith. After speaking about the situation with the Archbishop, I was given a blessing to perform the exorcism prayers, to Christmate and to Commune her with the Precious Body and Blood of God. On that fateful day, she was given the name Mary Magdalene, after our patroness who also suffered from demonic attacks.
I brought with me the reliquary holding the relics of St. Mary Magdalene, which I calmly placed in her hand. I remember her falling forward over them in a tremendous feeling of unworthiness. Throughout the entire service, it was evident that the demonic presences were grasping at Mary…creating doubts about Christ’s Love and causing her to rock in her place back and forth.
Through tears of repentance, Mary offered her first confession, and after quite some time was able to receive the Eucharist. This brought a sense of calm within the room to which she began to doze off to sleep. Matushka and I departed, promising to visit again soon.
Throughout the following few weeks of visits, Mary seemed to be improving. She still, however, had a difficult time accepting the forgiveness of God for all that she had done. I continued to do what I could to assure God’s love for her, and prayed that perhaps one day, she would be physically able to come to the Church to pray amidst the relics of the Saints that we have in our little Church in the Woods.
A day after one of my visits, I received a text message from her that she had a dream. In that dream, her Greek friend was telling her to write the name of her patron saint above an Icon. Mary woke up and began to pray. She kept hearing a small voice saying to her: “there will be instructions.”
Within moments, Mary’s mother came into the room and said: “I know it would be extreme for you in your physical condition, and it does seem entirely out of the question, but if you wanted to try and get to the Church like Fr. Gabriel offered, I know we can get the people to carry you and lay you down in there.”
At first, this sounded absurd to Mary. She had not left her home in over 4 years! Yet, despite the impossibility, she managed to look at the website of our Church to gauge from photos whether it would be a possibility. When she clicked one of the links on the website, a photo of our street sign came into view, with the name of her patroness printed above an icon of St. Mary Magdalene, just as in her dream. She took this all as a sign that she needed to visit the Church at all costs, so she gathered the support of her friends and family and was able to arrange a ride to the Church.
When Mary came into the Church, we laid down couch cushions in front of the icon of St. Mary Magdalene. Like the friends carrying the helpless paralytic to the feet of Christ, her old brother brought the feeble body of his sister into the Church and laid her down on the pillows facing the altar table. I lit the censer, and we began to sing the Akathist to St. Mary Magdalene.
The Akathist for St. Mary is extremely potent, as it describes the narrative of Christ’s Crucifixion, and the undying love that He has for all of His creation. Mary listened intently to the entire service, clutching the reliquary that held the relics of her patroness.
After the service, everyone was excused from the Church, and Mary gave an hour-long life confession with tremendous repentance. The words of remorse were truly something that could rival St. Ephraim the Syrian (and I’m not just saying that, because those words were THAT grace filled...leaving me in my own pool of tears.)
After the confession, I invited her family to come back into the Church, where Mary had asked if we could just sit in silence to see what the Holy Spirit willed for us to do next. In silence lasted for a few moments, and then was broken by the voice of little Ileana in my office, who was bringing a book to my pastoral assistant Rebekah and my wife Laura to read to her. Even though they had no desire to do story time in that moment, we could hear Ileana insisting that they read it to her saying: “No, you need to read this to me right now!” In the Church, we heard a reluctant Rebekah begin reading a children’s story to Ileana. It was that of Jonah and the Whale.
After the children’s story was over, I commented that perhaps listening to that story of Jonah and the repentance that he found while in the midst of the darkness of the belly of the whale, is a wonderful image for what was happening in that moment.
Mary’s friend stood up in awe as well, commenting how just earlier that day, he had been reading a reflection on Jonah, and in particular, from Jonah 1:17 which describes the very moment that he was swallowed in the body of the whale. While inside, this is what he prayed:
In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me.
From deep in the realm of the dead I called for help, and you listened to my cry.
You hurled me into the depths, into the very heart of the seas and the currents swirled about me.
All your waves and breakers swept over me.
I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’
The engulfing waters threatened me.
The deep surrounded me.
Seaweed was wrapped around my head.
To the roots of the mountains I sank down.
The earth beneath barred me in forever.
But you, Lord my God brought my life up from the pit.
When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, Lord, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple.
Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God’s love for them.
But I, with shouts of grateful praise will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
I will say, “Salvation comes from the Lord.”
One of the tremendous blessings of being a priest, is that it so often happens that we get to be present when the Holy Spirit so clearly speaks to people, leaving absolutely no doubt of His reality and His Love for all of us. These verses so clearly defined the journey that Mary had been through…being swallowed up in darkness and in the shadow of death. When her life was ebbing away, she remembered God, and her prayers rose up to Him. Towards the end of her life, after so many mistakes, she finally realized that Salvation comes from the Lord.
This past Monday, around 9:00 AM, Mary lay in her bed with her devoted mother by her side. After years of pain, agony, and darkness, her eyes opened wide as her gaze was transfixed on the ceiling above her. Her expression changed from distress to a sense of peace, awe, and wonder as she no doubt began to have one foot inside this world and one foot inside the next. Her eyes glowed with wonder and amazement…giving off the sense of “awe”. With a smile on her face, she left this earthly life and entered the arms of salvation that she had been so desperately searching for.
“The people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light…and those who dwelt in the valley of the shadow of death, a light has shined.”
The newly departed handmaiden of God Mary stands as the latest in a long line of examples of how the Nativity of Christ means EVERYTHING for us.
