Diocese of Eastern Pennsylvania

prays and speaks, lives and dies in an
Orthodox manner, the Church is
missionary. St. Alexis knew this and
practiced this with his people. He did
not simply travel from place to place,
but established himself and left only
when there were competent priests
capable of carrying on the mission of
spiritual formation that follows upon
the initial contact.
We, his spiritual descendants,
need to follow his example and be
missionaries to our own people – the
American people. There is no better
place to begin this than in our own
families, whether they are 10 th
generation Orthodox or recent
converts, reaching out from there to
neighbors, coworkers and friends.
Doing this, we should not be afraid to
imitate the strong stand taken by St.
Alexis in his public discourse. This is
not to say we should engage in the
strident polemics with Roman
Catholics as he did, or with
Protestants or any others as such. The
content of his polemics was dictated
by place and time. But, we should be
as fearless as he was in confessing and
defending the Orthodox faith before
others not simply as one choice among
many at the American religious buffet.
Orthodoxy cannot be limited to the
richest, intellectually deepest, most
exotic, most traditional, most
liturgical, aesthetic, or even most
ancient faith on offer. If we really
believe what we pray at the Divine
Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom: We
have seen the true Light! We have
received the Heavenly Spirit! We have
found the True Faith, worshipping the
undivided Trinity Who has saved us,
then we should not be afraid to
declare it as such, not just as the oldest
form, but as the fullness of the
Christian Faith. Indeed, such a
position does not require our isolation
from others, but our active
engagement with them to show them
by our worship and our lives,
enlightened by our teaching, that this
is the Faith of the Fathers.
Part of that witness, so clearly
evident in St. Alexis’ life, is suffering
borne with patience and
perseverance. In his life, he suffered
great loss: of a wife and child, of
homeland, of the Church of his youth
and the opportunities for
advancement and security it offered,
of the support of some of those who
asked him to help them enter
Orthodoxy and then turned on him,
bringing him into court and public
shame. Through all of this he
persevered. He preached, taught,
pastored the sheep the Lord gave him,
without complaint or bitterness. Some
might cite his polemics as evidence of
bitterness, but they would be wrong.
We live in an age that no longer
understands the forms of
communication of times gone by, and
we certainly have forgotten that truth
matters more than niceness. St. Alexis
did not avoid suffering, but he wanted
to make it clear he was suffering for
truth. It would have been easier for
him, earned him greater reward, to
renounce the Orthodox Church and
return to the Roman Catholic Church.
He did not. He could have left Wilkes-
Barre after losing the court case, but he
did not. Hirelings abandon the sheep
when they are threatened, true
shepherds stay with their sheep. He
kept his eyes on the prize, salvation in
Jesus Christ, for himself and for all
people.
Here he offers his spiritual
descendants an incarnation of the
Lord’s teaching “In the world you will
have tribulation, let not your hearts be
troubled but behold, I have overcome
the world.” And “He who perseveres to
the end will be saved.” We need to
incarnate this in our lives as he did in
his. To follow his missionary example
is to encounter opposition, rejection,
betrayal, trial and humiliation. But
this should not deter us. The mission
matters because it is the Master’s
mission and we are privileged to serve
Him, all of us, clergy and laity together.
To us this saint is given as an icon of
dedication and perseverance, a model
of contemporary mission to one’s
own. Moreover, we are given him
as our heavenly intercessor.
Perhaps the most fitting
testimony to our local saint on the
one hundredth anniversary of his
repose is the liturgical renewal of
our relationship with him through
prayer, not just once a year, but once
a week. Many of us literally walk in
his earthly footsteps, all of us in his
spiritual footsteps. Should we not
actively, regularly seek his guidance
through intercession? The church
has glorified him, but how well is
that reflected in our parish life,
beginning with our liturgical life?
Undoubtedly, there is room for
improvement. The Church in North
America has been blessed with a
group of wonderful saints each of
whom uniquely witness to Jesus
Christ and together are a compelling
testimony to the presence of
Orthodox Christianity in North
America. We need to pay more
attention to all of them, in every way,
than we do at present, including St.
Alexis of Wilkes-Barre. This
centennial provides an opportunity to
begin, again, an ongoing encounter
with our North American saints,
starting with St. Alexis of Wilkes-
Barre, Confessor and Defender of
Orthodoxy in America. Holy Father
Alexis, pray to God for us!
Fr. Martin Browne
St. John the Baptist Church
Edwardsville
Featur
eature e Article
1
In response to St. Alexis’ declaration that
“I am a Uniate, and I was ordained by a
lawful Catholic bishop.” Abp. Ireland said
“I do not consider that either you nor that
bishop are Catholic…” St. Alexis Toth,
The Archpriest John Naumovich as Viewed
by the Uniate Viestnik in THE WRITINGS OF
ST. ALEXIS TOTH: CONFESSOR AND DEFENDER OF
O RTHODOXY IN AMERICA. Edited and
Translated by George Soladatow. AARD
Press. Minneapolis, 1994. 66,67.
www.doepa.org
Alive in Christ
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