Feast of St John Chrysostom Fr. James Jorgenson

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and

of the Holy Spirit, amen. Glory be to Jesus Christ.

Today we celebrate the feast day of one of the

most prominent saints of the early church, particularly

dear to Eastern Christians, Eastern Orthodox

Christians, St. John Chrysostom. St. John was

born about the year 349 in Antioch. Antioch was

one of the major cities in the Roman world at

that time. Actually, you had Rome, Alexandria

in Egypt, and then Antioch. If you picture the

Mediterranean Sea, Antioch is on the coast of

the far northeast part. of the Mediterranean

Sea. Very prominent city. Cosmopolitan. Probably,

they guesstimate, half a million people lived

there, which was quite significant in ancient

times. People from all different nationalities.

Different religions, too. The most prevalent

one, of course, was paganism, but that was at

the time of John Chrysostom on... in the decline

because the Christian church was growing but

you also had in addition to pagans there is a

very large colony of Jews and then also the growing

Christian church and you had the Orthodox and

then you had a group of Christians that were

still hanging on to Arianism even though Arianism

had been defeated at the First and Second Ecumenical

Council. And then you had a few, the disputes

about who Jesus Christ is were just in their

first phases. So it was in the quiet between

two storms. The storm over the Trinity. How can

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three persons,

be one God? Then, of course, we have as a result

of that the Nicene Creed. Then there's sort of

a quiet and a lull, and the next thing that erupts

is, okay, who is Jesus Christ? Is he God or man

or somehow both? Those were the two theological

issues which confronted the early church, and

you know about them. because they're referred

to frequently by Orthodox preachers. But St.

John, his legacy for us, he grew up, he studied

rhetoric, which was the art of public speaking,

in addition to philosophy and the classical Greek

literature. So he had a very excellent... liberal

arts education, so to speak. In fact, his teacher,

one of the most prominent of the pagan teachers,

his name was Labanius, and Labanius on his deathbed

said, oh, that John, he would have taken my place

if the Christians hadn't stolen from us. And

so John... And he became Christian, of course,

and so he was very much indebted to this excellent

education he received. And then as a Christian,

he went on to study under one of the prominent

Christian theologians in Antioch at that time,

whose name was Diodor. He came from the city

of Tarsus, which is the same city that St. Paul

came from. And his fellow student was another

prominent preacher turned out to be Theodore,

Theodore Bishop of Mopsuestia. And both of them

are significant as commentators on the scriptures.

They gave us a wealth of information. Theodore

got into disfavor in later church history because

he was the teacher of Nestorius. the bad guy

who was condemned at the Council of Ephesus in

431. So he got a bad rap from church history.

But Theodore himself was not really heretical.

He might have said a few things which by later

standards were less accurate than they should

be. But John and Theodore studied under Theodore

two prominent exegetes. Exegetes meaning explainers

of the scriptures. They gave homilies on the

scriptures. To see how much of a legacy we have

from St. John Chrysostom, he and St. Augustine

are the ones, the most prolific writers, the

wealth of information we have on fathers' thinking

and teaching and commentaries on the scripture.

come from John Chrysostom in the East and Augustine,

who lived about a generation after John Chrysostom

in the West, in North Africa. And just to show

you how much we have, this is a collection of

writings in the early church. You have them in

your parish library. But seven of these are the

writings of St. John Chrysostom. Small print,

two columns, so it is magnificent collection

of commentaries on scripture, the Old Testament

and the New Testament. How did they come down

to us? That might be curious because you read

these and you wonder, wow, it would probably

take an hour to preach this sermon. Maybe they

were that long. But most of us think that John,

when he was preaching, it's typical of what happened.

John, and of course he was such a good preacher.

He knew the language. He explained it beautifully,

understandably, but remarkable in his use of

the Greek language. That's how he earned the

nickname John the Golden Mouth, Chrysostom. That's

what Chrysostom means, the golden mouth. What

would happen is that you had in the congregation

people that were called tachygraphers. Well,

tachygraphers is a Greek word for quickly. So

they were stenographers. They wrote down quickly.

And then presumably what they would do would

bring these notes to John Chrysostom Monday or

Tuesday, who knows, and then give them, this

is what you said. And John would, of course,

take this and perhaps modify it, expand it. But

the question is, I don't know how much he really

needed to modify because people were amazed that

he could speak so long. Quote the New Testament

and the Old Testament by heart. They say he probably

had the whole Bible memorized because between

his baptism... He went off for about five or

six years and lived as a hermit in the desert.

Came back to Antioch, and he was ordained a deacon

and then soon a priest. And much of these sermons

that we have were preached by him when he was

in Antioch, commentaries on the scriptures. he

would, again, rework these and show us this legacy

that has come down to us. Again, most of them

were on commentaries on scripture, but also he

wrote on numerous different topics. One that

was very prominent, and before a priest is ordained,

he's supposed to either read or reread. John

Chrysostom's treatise on the priesthood, which

is a pastoral theology handbook, how to be a

good priest, how to be a good bishop. He also

had a very famous, his catechetical lectures,

because he was put in charge of the instruction

of catechumens in Antioch. And we have there

again a wealth of information about catechetical

lectures from John Chrysostom, earlier from Cyril

of Jerusalem, and Theodore Mopsuestia also wrote

catechetical lectures, and then St. Augustine.

So those are the four prominent ones on how pastors

trained Christians. adults who were becoming

Christians and preparing them for baptism. To

make a very long story short, he gained such

a reputation as this golden -mouthed preacher

that he was called to be the Bishop of Constantinople,

the new capital of the Roman Empire. And when

he went there, this was a new... growing city,

this capital. He brought with him not only his

legacy of preaching, but also the liturgy, which

was the form of the liturgy which was used in

the church in Antioch. Because you had different

families of liturgies and how the Christians

celebrated the liturgy and the services. And

so he brought those, and we have the liturgy.

that's called the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.

Because what he did, he didn't sit down one Saturday

and compose the liturgy that we are celebrating

today. No, he revised and standardized this liturgy.

So it has come down to us as one of his legacies,

the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom. We mention

his name. at the conclusion of every one of the

liturgies that we celebrate. His legacy. He reformed

many of the practices among the clergy and the

people when he got to Constantinople. And he

made a number of enemies among the clergy, as

well as among the nobility, because at that time

it was prominent the nobility, the high -ranking

clergy, and then the big shots in the government

would get together periodically in other people's

homes and have banquets. Nothing immoral, of

course. They would just get together for a nice

meal and a party. And, of course, the bishop

of Constantinople would be one of these that

would throw parties. John Chrysostom comes along

because of his monastic background, says, nope,

those days are over. So a lot of the clergy,

the people thought, boy, he's really a party

pooper. So that was one thing. Then he preached

against ostentatiousness on the part of clergy

and people. You know, use your money appropriately.

Instead of buying all kinds of clothes and rich

things, give your money to the poor to build

hospitals. So that was one of the things. And,

of course, that kind of reforming resulted in

him not being popular in some quarters. Most

of the people loved him, no question about it.

But the powers that be drove him into exile in

wintertime. and he's trudging his way to Armenia

in exile, middle of winter, frost, rain, cold.

He died on his way into exile. So what's the

legacy of all this? Number one, I, and probably

most of the priests that preach sermons to you,

will look up in a book, like this, what did John

Chrysostom have to say about today's gospel?

So indirectly, John Chrysostom talks to each

and every one of you nowadays. This wealth of

explanation of the scriptures, that's his legacy

to us. Plus the love and enthusiasm that he showed

for God in his treatise on how to be a good priest.

how to be a good bishop, and also his legacy,

the divine liturgy which we celebrate. So this

man is without a doubt, we can say he was one

of the greatest saints of the early church. So

we who are the heirs of his wisdom and eloquence

and love for God celebrate his feast today. and

we ask him to intercede for his children, his

descendants in the church, us, now and throughout

our life. Amen.