This address was translated by Maxim, who kindly asks all Orthodox Christians to keep him in their prayers for his repentance. See bottom for original source in Romanian.
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Christmas is upon us once again.
Have we drawn closer to it in our hearts?
Such measurements of spiritual distance cannot leave us indifferent, if we have even the slightest faith in God and in the truth that the purposes and joys of life can be truly fulfilled only to the extent that the process of heavenly assimilation has made some progress within our human being.
Let us ask ourselves, as the rich man in the Gospel asked the Savior: what must we have done to be able to say today that this Christmas we have drawn near not only by turning the pages of this year’s calendar and through the culinary feasts we are preparing, but also through a new order of the soul, of our true life?
And the answer cannot be merely an interrogation about observed forms and laws, a technical examination of conformity to what is largely the external aspect of Christian doctrine: have you stolen, have you wronged others, have you observed the commandments insofar as they are somewhat formal, normative, and regulatory of relationships with your fellow human beings? But we will be asked if there was anything spiritually alive within us; we will be asked what profound spiritual transformations took place within us and what inner reconstructions occurred on another level—one of sacrifice, of living transformation. Someone who were to examine our spiritual closeness to the Savior would lead us down into those depths of living wound into which the rich man was led, from whom the Savior demanded a total dissolution of his inner structure, the sale of all his riches, showing him that mere, somewhat contractual compliance with the commandments, a mere attitude that is apparently correct but lacking in living inner transformation, cannot bring man closer to heaven and salvation.
Alive, spiritually alive—what has been cultivated within our inner lives? What victories over human burdens have we achieved, so that we may feel closer today to the Savior who is being born?
I do not know what theologians will say, for I have little knowledge of their science, but the measure of our inner resurrection, the measure of our living Christianity, I see it above all in the measure of sacrifice for the good of others; a personal sacrifice, freely, lovingly, and enthusiastically consented to, without thought of formally observing some bilateral regulations between us and God.
That sacrifice which is unleashed within us out of love, out of a love for something other than our own being, that sacrifice which overwhelms us by uprooting the human order of our lives, yet at the same time warms us with satisfactions that human speech cannot encompass, this sacrifice is what tears from our being the shell of indifference toward the divine and, transforming us into a living wound of “sun and blood,” as Radu Gyr would say, places us in direct communion with the Divinity that rushes in and takes hold of our soul. And thus we become spiritually alive, more alive, more Christian.
Sacrifice is thus the measure of our Christianity.
Whoever has sacrificed something in this way understands and sees the Savior, Who is born, more clearly, and rejoices more, for they feel a closeness, a communion between a part of their being and the living God Who descends among us and into us.
Are those who, throughout their lives, have merely observed the boundaries of the commandments—willingly or unwillingly—without, however, being enlightened in their depths by the living power of love that leads to sacrifice, any closer to the mystery of Christmas?
No! If our eyes could comprehend the heavenly horizons amidst which the Savior will soon descend upon Romanian soil, they would see, alongside the Savior and the saints of the Church, all the souls of the brave who joyfully and consciously sacrificed themselves to help their neighbors: neither Horia, nor Tudor, nor Avram Iancu, nor Brâncoveanu, nor the multitude of those who truly sacrificed themselves, from the very depths of their souls, would be missing. For in them, more than in others, Christianity was alive; they, more than others, integrated themselves into the community of the Christian Church, forming its living, fulfilled body.
Today’s youth, who are also fighting for the good of the Romanian people and for future generations, this youth who are disrupting the selfish routines of their personal lives in order to heed the vibrant call from their souls urging them to struggle and make sacrifices for their nation and for Christianity, —this youth has the right to rejoice in the approaching feasts of the Nativity: they have drawn near to them in spirit as well.
And those who teach these young people and rebuke them precisely for what is alive in their souls, those who, whoever they may be, insult them by claiming that no work of education or moral uplift has been accomplished by post-war Romanian youth and that therefore their formal education must now be organized with a new approach, —let all of them examine, now at Christmas, the distance that separates them from the miracle of the Holy Nativity and realize that they understand nothing of the true joys of Christmas. And seeing the deadness in their souls, they should step aside from the path of the sacrificial youth, if they cannot understand it, cherish it, and rejoice with it.
Source: https://ortodoxinfo.ro/2014/12/24/mucenicul-ion-mota-masura-crestinatatii-noastre/
