We are Still on the Way

The question of Saint John Climacus: “Why in the case of every other sin do we usually say that people have slipped, and simply that; but when we hear that someone has committed fornication, we say sorrowfully: So and so has fallen?” (15:44), confirms my conviction that the entire Great Lent is a call to the acquisition of the virtue of chastity. Go back with me to the story of the Prodigal Son. Listen carefully to Paul's cry on the same Sunday: “flee sexual immorality”. Contemplate Climacus’ seriousness and the repentance of our holy mother Mary of Egypt… This is what the Church says during Lent: “on your way to Pascha, manifest that you do not belong to this world, to the perversions of the world and its sick justifications”. We are still on the way. The persistence of the call will remain during the Great and Holy Week in which the Lord destroys Hades, as we commemorate Joseph the all-comely, the Ten Virgins, and the woman who had wiped Jesus with myrrh. The lasting Pascha is for him who accepts to be of one spirit with the Lord (1 Corinthians 6:17).