Metropolitan Luke: Church and family are last outpost of purity on earth
Even though Christians can fast and pray, they can bear all kinds of evil in their hearts, which can only be avoided thanks to the fear of God, the UOC hierarch said.
The modern world like the Titanic is plunged into abysses of filth, and only the Church and the family remain the last outpost of purity on earth, said Metropolitan Luke (Kovalenko) of Zaporozhye and Melitopol in his Telegram channel.
“The today’s world, like the Titanic, is plunged into abysses of filth, this being done so that those passengers who are drowning with it do not even know about it. The public opinion, the media refer to filth (for example, sexual perversions) as ‘purity”, whereas purity (for example, the biblical attitude to perversions) is called ‘filth’, and promote a violent, intolerant attitude towards people who preserve and advocate for God’s natural, established relationship between the sexes,” said His Eminence.
He drew the attention of the flock that in modern feature films and cartoons they always try to portray at least one character with a non-traditional orientation as a positive hero.
"The Prophet Isaiah long ago sent a message from God to these builders of a new world order: ‘Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!’ (Isaiah 5:20),” the UOC hierarch recalled.
He urged people to live soberly and focused on the fact that the Orthodox Church and the "small churches" (families) are the last stronghold of purity on earth.
“Nowhere else, in any other place, our children and grandchildren will be able to find out what the sin is and what the virtue is; what is the value of good and how dangerous is evil; what God expects of us, and where the devil leads us. Therefore, it is so important to maintain the purity of marriage ties and family relationships to ensure that even the smallest desecration of our home churches does not occur,” said Metropolitan Luka.
According to him, it is even more important to keep the temple of your body pure so that the Holy Spirit can live there.
“But the most important task is to preserve the purity of our soul, which is the basis of the foundations of all purity. In pre-revolutionary times, there was such an expression "stinker girl". So they talked about those virgins who did not seem to have violated their virginity and were not convicted of some obvious sins, but demons lived inside their hearts. As soon as such a girl opened her mouth, said a word, one could feel how deeply she was corrupted by evil," said Met. Luke.
In fact, some Christians can fast and pray and seem to not commit any grievous sins, but inside their hearts they can be carriers of all kinds of evil, he added.
“To prevent this from happening, we need the fear of God. Monk Macarius of Egypt compared it to the border, which is hemmed into a fiber-made article. The fiber is a virtue, but if it is not bordered by the fear of God, it will get loose and soon there will be nothing left of it,” Metropolitan Luke concluded and wished believers to grow in faith, piety and good deeds.
Earlier, the UOC hierarch emphasized that Love is more valuable than life and health.
