October: Day 15: Holy Hieromartyr Lucian

October: Day 15:
Holy Hieromartyr Lucian

(On the Mystery of Holy Communion and our Duty to Partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. The Holy Hieromartyr Lucian, glorified today by the Church, having become an orphan at the age of twelve, distributed his property to the poor, and began to study the Holy Scriptures under the guidance of Saint Makarios the Confessor. For his strict life and the spread of Christian enlightenment, Saint Lucian was ordained a priest. In this holy rank, Lucian redoubled his labors. He rendered a special service by correcting the text of the Holy Scriptures, having set out the Greek, Syriac, and Hebrew texts in three columns for comparison. Saint Lucian ended his difficult life with a martyr's death. By order of the Emperor Maximian, he was cruelly tortured, and then chained, imprisoned, and starved. Saint Lucian was unable to move from exhaustion, but nevertheless, wishing to be worthy of partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ, he lay with his back on the sharp stones of the prison and performed a bloodless sacrifice on the feast of the Theophany on his chest, to prepare himself and other Christian prisoners for death; after which he died.

II. Today there are no persecutions or harassment, but some, through their negligence, deprive themselves of the great happiness of partaking of the Holy Mysteries of Christ at least once a year. Such careless Christians do not know, or rather, do not want to know “either the essence of the mystery” of communion, “nor their direct duty to partake” of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. To enlighten such people, let us talk about both.

a) The bread and wine consecrated during the Divine Liturgy are transformed: the bread into the Body, and the wine into the Blood of Christ. This miracle is accomplished by the power of heavenly grace. The same Christ, Who once transformed water into wine at the wedding in Cana of Galilee, the same Christ, by His omnipotence, now mysteriously transforms bread on the altars into His holy Body, and wine into His most pure Blood. The same Infant – God, Who lay in the manger of Bethlehem, the same Divine Infant now lies on the sacred altars, under the form of bread and wine. Some saints, namely: Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom and others saw this great mystery in its present form. They saw, under the cover of bread and wine, the Eternal Child, the Lord Jesus Christ. But not only the saints, but also sinners, by God's providence, saw this mystery, without cover. Anyone who has read the ecclesiastical books of the Fathers can recall many examples that confirm the truth of what we have said. A certain Jew, as it is written in the Life of Basil the Great, having entered the church during the Divine Liturgy celebrated by Basil the Great, saw that this Saint was holding a child in his hands, breaking him up and then distributing him to the people who communed. He approached the reception of the Holy Mysteries and the Jew took a portion of the Holy Mysteries, according to the custom of the time, in his hand, brought them into the house, and saw that what he had brought was the true Body. This amazed the Jew, and he became a zealous Christian. Again, a certain Mohammedan, a resident of Arabia, who was in a Christian church, saw that the priest during the Liturgy had stabbed the infant, poured his blood into a chalice, and crushed the body on a platter. Then the Christians standing by ate the baby's body and drank the blood. The unbelieving Saracen looked upon this as a cruel deed, and after the Liturgy he greatly reviled the priest. But when the priest with humility and respect for the witness explained the mystery, the Mohammedan, astonished by this thing, became a follower of the Gospel and a martyr for Christ. There are other examples similar to these, but we, for the sake of shortening the time, leave them aside.

After this, you may ask: why does God hide from us the appearance of the Body and Blood in the Mystery of Holy Communion? The God-bearing Fathers of the Church answer this: “Human nature is repelled by the use of raw flesh (meat), and cannot drink blood without disgust. Therefore, in the Mystery of Communion, God covers the Body with the appearance of bread, and the Blood with the appearance of wine.” Let us say, this is true; but is it not possible, for the sake of assurance, in our times, for us to see in the Mystery of Communion, instead of bread, the Body of the Lord, and instead of wine, the Blood of Christ? Oh, without a doubt, it is possible! But we must consider what we want. We must remember the words of Christ: “Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet believed.” God allows such a vision, for the most part, for unbelievers, but for us, believers and not doubting the sanctity of the Mystery of Communion, to desire this vision is unnecessary and sinful. According to this, the canons of the Church command that if any of the priests performing the Liturgy, were to see the sacred bread presented in the form of a body and a baby, and the wine in the form of blood, such a priest should not commune of it, but should fall down in humility of spirit before the omnipresent God, blame himself for his lack of faith and ask the Lord to reveal to him the Mystery of Communion in the usual form in which it is given to truly believing Christians.

b) Having said what the Church, among other things, offers as proof of the reality of the Body and Blood of Christ, let us speak about our duty to partake of this mystery. All of us Christians, among other things, read in the Creed thus: "I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church." By this we are obligated, from the very font of Holy Baptism, to fulfill all the canons of the Holy Ecumenical and Local Synods.

1) What do the synods command regarding the reception of the Holy Mysteries? “Let those who do not partake be excommunicated,” says the 9th canon of the Holy Apostles.

"Whoever turns away from Holy Communion, let him be rejected," says the 2nd canon of the Holy Synod held in Antioch. It is obvious that the Church has always made and makes it obligatory for all who confess the Orthodox faith to partake of the Holy Mysteries; it is also obvious that she has not recognized and does not recognize as her faithful sons those who willfully withdraw and continue to withdraw from receiving the Body and Blood of Christ.

So, whoever wants to be a executor of the commandments of his Mother – the Church, whoever wants to be her true son, whoever values his soul, he must receive the Holy Mysteries. But if the Holy Synods did not say anything about our duty to partake of the Holy Mysteries, then the will of our Lord Jesus Christ must induce us to fulfill this sacred duty.

2) The Savior, departing from this world, commanded, in the person of the Apostles, all Orthodox Christians to eat His Body, offered on the holy altars under the guise of bread, and to drink His Blood, given under the guise of wine. Jesus Christ, pointing to the bread offered at the Secret Supper, said: "Take, eat, this is My body," and giving the cup of wine, which He blessed, He said: "Drink of it, all of you, for this is My blood; do this in remembrance of Me." This is what our sacred duty to partake of the Holy Mysteries is based on - the commandment of the Lord Jesus.

III. Let us not shrink from this sacred duty if we wish to be Christians not only in name but also in life. Let us imitate the holy zeal to be deemed worthy of partaking of the holy, immortal and life-giving Mysteries of Christ by the now glorified Holy Martyr Lucian, who, lying with his back on the sharp stones of the dungeon, bound in iron chains, made a bloodless sacrifice to prepare himself and other prisoners for death.

Source: A Complete Annual Cycle of Short Teachings, Composed for Each Day of the Year. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.