1 In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Christ is Risen!

Today is the 6th Sunday of Pascha, the Sunday of the Blind Man, and we heard the Gospel of when our Lord healed a man blind since birth a miracle that had never been heard of since the world began. As always the Gospel pertains to all of us, and so we must ask ourselves, who is the blind man? And it is not hard to see that the blind man is each and every one of us. Every one of us, since the fall of Adam and Eve, has been born spiritually blind. Christ offered the blind man physical healing, but the greater miracle is the spiritual healing that he also underwent. After washing in the pool of Siloam and gaining his physical sight, the eyes of his soul were opened as he spoke to Christ in the Temple and professed his belief in Christ as the Son of God and worshipped Him. To open the eyes of a mans heart and to lead him to salvation in the Person of Christ is an incomparably greater work than to give sight to the blind or even to raise the dead.

Before the Fall, Adam and Eve knew what it was to see clearly. They existed in a state of communion with God and walked with Him in the cool of the day. Their lives were full of virtue and the powers of their hearts and minds were unified in

obedience to God, and His grace was the content of their lives. But their virtue was untested and they disobeyed God, and the eyes of their souls were darkened. Now mans mind has left his heart and is scattered throughout all of creation, but amongst the lower things of the earth we only see God with great difficulty. Although we often think of our ability to choose between various options as a sign of our freedom, it is moreso a sign of our bondage. When we have a decision to make we have to deliberate between various alternatives because we cannot clearly see the correct choice that is pleasing to God. A truly free will is that which naturally guides us towards the Lord. But there is One Who is not subjected to this bondage there is One Who sees clearly. Speaking of fallen human powers, St. Nikolai Velimirovich tells us: Understanding is useless where vision is needed. We need a seer, who sees as clearly as the sun to see the whole world, from its beginning to its end, and the beginning and the end themselves. There has only ever been one such: the Lord Jesus Christ. It is because Jesus Christ, the Lord and God of all, knows and sees all perfectly that He is the light of the world, as we heard today, and that He can bestow both physical and spiritual sight on the blind.

The Church presents us this lengthy reading in this Paschal period to highlight its significance and to warn us. Elder Cleopa of Romania tells us: Spiritual blindness is one of the weightiest diseases of the soul created by God for immortality causing its death and eternal condemnation. And so the healing of this illness is of a much greater difficulty and has more importance than the physical blindness. And he goes on to explain that spiritual blindness is the darkness and bondage of the soul brought on by all kinds of sins. With every sin we turn from the light of the Lord and into the darkness and increase our blindness and keep our minds focused on creation which knows no likeness to the Uncreated Creator.

All sins separate us from God, and there is one sin in particular that especially blinds us to the truth of Christ, and that is the sin of heresy, which is caused by pride, obstinacy and delusion. I am not speaking of simple ignorance, but of intentional disobedience to the teachings of the Church, which cut us off from the life-giving grace of God. Today we also remember St. Cyril of Alexandria who is a champion of Orthodox Christology. Against the heresy of Nestorius he articulated the clear vision of Christ as one single Person, and he also confessed that Christ is in two natures both Divine and human. This is the faith proclaimed by the 4th

Ecumenical Council and the entire Orthodox Church and this profession is absolutely essential for Orthodox theology and spirituality. In todays reading the man who was healed confesses Christ as the Son of God, and in another passage where Christ heals a blind man, that man first confesses Him to be the Son of David, and so we see that confession of Who Christ is, is essential for good spiritual health. Christ became truly man in order to Personally heal our blindness and restore our powers of spiritual sight. But pride, and human reasoning which cannot raise itself above creation has led many to believe that Christ is two persons, or that He is one Person but possessing only one nature, or that His two natures became mixed together. All of these distort the Person of Christ and make the theology of our salvation impossible. Only humble submission to the spiritual vision of the Church can restore our vision.

St. Nikolai identifies baptism and chrismation as the eyes of the soul that are given to us by Christ in His Church. The blind man was sent to wash in the pool of Siloam as a figure of baptism. Through baptism and chrismation we are brought into the Church and the vision of our soul is restored to us, as long as we willingly work together with the grace that has been given to us. Everyone of us here who has

entered the Church has regained his spiritual sight. Let us rejoice that Christ has blessed us to once again be able to walk with Him in the cool of the day! But this also brings a heavy responsibility we are called to live as ones truly baptized. St. Nikolai writes: what can be said about those who have received Baptism and Chrismation as the two eyes of the soul and, in spite of that, sin as those who are unbaptized? At the Last Judgment, they will not be treated as those who are born blind, rather they will be treated like transgressors who willfully disfigured and blinded themselves. But may it not be so! We are the blind man who has been healed. Let us rejoice in our sight and confess the Lord Jesus Christ to be true God and true man, and let us live lives worthy of the spiritual vision which we have been granted through baptism. In every situation, in every moment we can ask Christ, Who always sees clearly, to guide us in His perfect will, and in time our virtue will be tested and proved and we will see with ease the higher things of God. And when we fall from this lofty calling, we renew our sight through the mystery of confession and repentance. The Lord has healed human nature in His Person and so we can raise above the blindness of the corruption of sin and death and heresy, and by His grace may we live up to this lofty but glorious calling.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Christ is Risen!