Metropolitan Onufriy: For society to change, each individual must change

Metropolitan Onufriy. Photo: uoc-news.church

On the day of the Synaxis of the Venerable Fathers of the Near Caves of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, His Beatitude Metropolitan Onufriy, stated in his sermon that society can only change if each of its members changes.

“God revealed Himself to people on earth through His Son to lift humanity to heaven and call it to holiness. The Lord has given people the Holy Law, which shows a person the way to heaven, to the Kingdom of Heaven,” said the Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

According to him, “the person who follows the path of the Holy Law changes, becoming holy, sacred, and similar to their Creator-Father.”

For many centuries, people have strived to reach the heights of spiritual perfection. This ascent is aided by the Christian life itself, which serves as a school where a person learns how to become better, His Beatitude noted.

He reminded that on this path to perfection, each person needs to learn and teach themselves, to change, straighten, and correct themselves.

“And when each person corrects themselves, the whole society will be corrected. If no one corrects themselves, then the whole society will descend into decay,” His Beatitude continued.

Metropolitan Onufriy noted that a certain trend has emerged in the modern world—a “fashion” of instructing one another: “You should be like this, and you like that, but I won't touch or change myself.”

“If we keep pointing out the speck in each other's eye, but do not notice the log in our own eye,” said His Beatitude, “then there can be no talk of any corrections, and as a result, society will degrade both morally and spiritually.”

Earlier, the UOJ reported that His Beatitude spoke about the main condition that keeps a monk in a monastery.

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