November: Day 24: Teaching 2: Holy Hieromartyr Clement, Bishop of Rome

November: Day 24:* Teaching 2:
Holy Hieromartyr Clement, Bishop of Rome
 
(It Is Not Chance, But God’s Providence That Governs Human Life)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. Now the Holy Church commemorates the Holy Hieromartyr Clement, Bishop of Rome. Saint Clement lived in the first century of Christianity. His father, Faustinianus, and his mother, Matthidia, were pagans and, in addition to Clement, had older sons, Faustinus and Faustus. At first, this family lived in complete peace and happiness; but then the malice of one man upset everything. Faustinianus's own brother settled in his house and began to seek the love of Matthidia. The latter did not want to reveal to her husband the immorality of his brother, so as not to be the cause of discord between them, but decided to leave Rome. She referred to a dream she allegedly saw, which commanded her to leave; Faustinianus, seeing her persistent desire, agreed to leave, but on the condition that Matthidia take her older sons with her and go to Athens, where the sons could receive an education in the schools there.

The ship, richly laden with everything necessary for the journey, carried off Matthidia, Faustinus and Faustus. But after several days at sea, a storm arose; the ship was tossed about by the waves for a long time and finally smashed against a rock. Matthidia was carried far away on the wreckage of the ship and was finally thrown onto an island. There the inhabitants found her, gave her help and consoled her as best they could; Matthidia, however, was not happy about her own salvation and grieved for her lost children. A widow, whose husband had died in a shipwreck, invited Matthidia to live in her house, so that they could grieve, work and feed themselves together. Matthidia agreed to this offer, and the two women settled together. Thus Matthidia lived on the island for 24 years, grieving for the death of her children and mourning them.

Meanwhile, Faustinus and Faustus were alive; they, like Matthidia, were saved on the wreckage of the ship. The pirates took them aboard their ship and sold them into slavery to a woman named Justa. Justa had no children and was very glad to give the boys shelter; when they were old enough, Justa sent them to school. When they came of age, Faustinus and Faustus were baptized and followed the Apostle Peter, who preached the gospel in that country.

Their father remained in Rome and did not know the fate of his wife and children. A year after they had sailed, he sent his slaves to Athens to find out how those who had left were faring, but the slaves did not return. In the third year, Faustinianus sent again to Athens; the messengers returned with the news that nothing was known in Athens about Matthidia or her children. Faustinianus sent to other cities, but also received no news. At last, having personally visited all the ports and vainly questioned the sailors, Faustinianus  decided to go in search of his family himself, entrusting Clement to reliable tutors. He visited everywhere where he supposed Matthidia and his sons might be, but all searches were in vain.

Clement, meanwhile, was being brought up in Rome and had reached adulthood. Often it occurred to him where his father, mother, and brothers were; often he mourned them as if they were dead. Amusements and recreations ceased to interest him; he became serious and concentrated. In such circumstances he met a Christian and learned from him the main truths of Christian teaching. Then Clement decided to visit the places of Jesus Christ's earthly life and sailed to Judea, leaving his house and all his property in Rome. A storm that arose during the voyage brought the ship to Alexandria, where at that time the Apostle Barnabas was preaching. Clement listened to his teaching for some time, then went to Caesarea, and there received baptism from the Apostle Peter, among whose disciples he saw his brothers, but did not recognize them, nor they him, for the brothers had parted while still in infancy. The Apostle Peter was heading for Syria; Clement followed him, and Faustinus and Faustus were sent there before. On the way, the Apostle questioned his new disciple about his former life; Clement told him everything that had happened to him and his family, and this story deeply touched the Apostle Peter.

On the way, the ship in which they were sailing landed at the island where Clement's mother, Matthidia, lived. The Apostle Peter disembarked; not far from the shore, in a nearby village, he saw a woman begging for alms, entered into conversation with her and from her story learned the sad story of her life. He asked her name: it was Matthidia. "I know your younger son Clement," the Apostle said to her; "he is now with me," and he led her to the ship. Clement, meeting his mother, did not recognize her: she had changed so much during their separation. Matthidia, however, looking more closely at Clement, soon recognized her son in him, for Clement bore a great resemblance to his father Faustinianus. Great was the joy of mother and son, who so unexpectedly met after many years of separation. Matthidia got on board the ship and continued on their way together with the Apostle Peter and Clement. She asked her son about his father and learned that there had been no news of him for twenty years.

In Laodicea the travelers met Faustinus and Faustus; the latter asked Clement who was accompanying him. Clement answered that this was his mother, whom he had found in a foreign land, and then he told her the whole story of his mother, how long he had not seen her, and how she had left Rome with her two sons. Then Faustinus and Faustus recognized him as their brother, and Matthidia as their mother. Thanking God for saving her children, Matthidia wished to become a Christian like them, and was baptized by the Apostle Peter.

Soon Faustinianus also had to see his family. In his wanderings, Faustinianus, who had already lost hope of finding his wife and children, reached Laodicea and there met the Apostle Peter. Faustinianus, driven to despair, lost faith in the pagan gods, to whom he had fervently prayed all the time for the return of his wife and children. “How many tears I shed, praying to the gods,” he said to the Apostle Peter, telling the story of his life, “how many sacrifices I brought to them; how many prayers! But there is no one to listen to my prayers; the gods have not heard me, for they do not exist." "You are not heard because," the Apostle replied, "you have prayed to false gods, and not to the one true God, Whom we should worship and pray to. Believe in Him, and then you will see your wife and children healthy and unharmed." Peter, who learned from Faustinianus' story that he was the husband of Matthidia, took him to where she was with her children. Despite the long separation, the spouses soon recognized each other, and the father recognized the children. All previous misfortunes were forgotten. Faustinianus believed in the true God and was baptized by the Apostle Peter.

Faustinianus and Matthidia spent the rest of their lives in Rome, lived piously and died in old age. After their death, their children continued to preach the word of God. Clement, the constant companion of the Apostle Peter, was especially zealous in the work of preaching, sharing with his great teacher the labors and deprivations. Before his death, the Apostle Peter ordained Clement as Bishop of Rome. But difficult times were already approaching for Christianity. The pagans began to complain to the civil authorities that Clement was eradicating the worship of gods, censuring paganism and not respecting the temples of the gods. By order of Emperor Trajan, Clement was exiled to Chersonesos, where he was drowned in the sea.

II. Having heard the life of the Holy Hieromartyr Clement, let us, brethren, revere the incomprehensible Providence of God, which at first separated the entire family of the Saint, in order to later reunite it and enlighten it with the light of the true faith.

In truth, brethren, reverent thought, united with faith and hope, about God, the all-wise and all-good Provider of all, and about the beneficence of His providence for us, is as much a duty of justice in relation to Him as it is our own need for our good and peace.

a) Out of laziness to think thoroughly and deeply, out of habit to judge superficially, we often say that this or that person, in this or that case, was lucky or unlucky. These are words without thought. If I were to tell you that you were “lucky” to come to church today: you would of course say that this word here does not give any thought and is inappropriate; that you came not because you were lucky, but because you used will, strength and movement. In exactly the same way, and in any case, the same word does not give any true thought, and is inappropriate before a thorough reasoning. And meanwhile this mental idol of favorable or unfavorable happiness deceives many with deceptive hopes, hinders them with vain fear; it shields them from God the Provider, and makes them guilty of forgetting Him.

b) On the other hand, pride and self-confidence inspire a person with the thought: I have done this, or will do it with my talent, with my strength, with my art, with my means. A person wants to be a sufficient provider for himself. This means relying on brittle reeds, building a house on a loose foundation. There is no dispute that talent, art, strength, and means mean a lot for important matters: but how many times have we seen that a brilliant talent, like a will-o'-the-wisp at night, died out in a swamp, that strength was crushed before weakness, that apparently excellent art overreached or underreached, and did not achieve success! Pharaoh pursued the Israelites with an army, with cavalry, with war chariots, which were excellent instruments of military art and strength in ancient times; the Israelites fled, finding no way to resist the Egyptians: and who remained the winner? The Israelites. Why? Because Pharaoh thought he was his own providence; but the Israelites were devoted to God, the All-Provider.

c) There is another view of events in the world and among men which was invented by wisdom, but not by wisdom wise in God, but by wisdom wise in accordance with the elements of the world. It believes that everything in the world, from the great to the small, is precisely determined by the laws of things and the action of causes, and therefore it is useless to think about any extraordinary orders of Providence, which would only disturb the order and harmonious movement of the world and its parts. O mechanical sages! You want to turn the universe, full of life, with its free beings, into a dead machine, all of whose parts would be involuntarily moved by one another, and which the great Artist who arranged it, on the prohibition of your wisdom, would not dare to touch for the correction or improvement of any part, which may be especially necessary, given the disturbance of order by the abuse of the freedom of moral beings! You freely dispose of things in your house which you could not only not create out of nothing, but even produce out of ready-made matter: and you dream of hindering Him who created out of nothing and adorned the universe from disposing of all that is in it, with His unlimited freedom and wisdom! –Can natural causes hinder the action of a cause of causes supernatural? On the contrary, do they not need its action, assistance, direction for their continuation, just as for their beginning? Does not the natural order in experience itself sometimes clearly reveal above itself an order supernatural? For example, rain and hail are in the natural order: but is hailstones in the natural order? And if we grant that this too can be natural: is the hailstones in the natural order which struck the army of the five pagan kings with whom Joshua of Nun fought? Why did this hail fall at this time and not at another? Why the pagan army and not the Israelite one? Natural causes and order do not provide an answer to this. Only the word of the Lord can provide an answer. "The Lord said to Joshua: Do not fear them, for into your hands I have delivered them. And the Lord cast upon the city great stones from heaven" (Joshua 10:8, 11).

III. Oh, how - above all earthly wisdom - convincing, reassuring, beneficial is the heavenly teaching about the Creator of the world, who watches over everything and provides for everything!

"Are not two sparrows sold for a copper coin? And not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father’s will" (Matt. 10:29-31). What personal security!

"Behold, he that keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep" (Ps. 20:4). What public security!

The Lord said: “I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal” (Deut. 32:39). What a strong fear for those who anger God, and at the same time what a strong protection from the audacity to anger God! And on the other hand, what a life-giving hope for those in distress and in danger!

"God is our refuge and strength" (Ps. 45:2). Often, often, let us lift up our eyes to Him who lives in heaven – the eyes of a heart that reveres, believes, loves, repents, prays, hopes, and gives thanks. "Behold, as the eyes of a servant look to the hand of his master, as the eyes of a handmaiden to the hand of her mistress: so let our eyes be toward the Lord our God, until He have mercy on us" (Ps. 122:2). And as He has shown mercy in many ways, so surely He will also show mercy, if we guard or cleanse ourselves from the untruths and impurities from which He turns away His most pure eye. Amen.

Source: A Complete Annual Cycle of Short Teachings, Composed for Each Day of the Year. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
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* Because in the Slavic calendar St. Clement is commemorated on November 25th, I switched the date from the original text to conform to the Greek calendar where St. Clement is commemorated on November 24th.