HOMILY OF BISHOP IRINEJ UPON HIS EPISCOPAL CONSECRATION
Feast of the Deposition of the Robe of the Most Holy Theotokos
July 15, 2006
Belgrade
IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER, AND OF THE SON, AND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT!
YOUR EMINENCES,
YOUR GRACES,
YOUR ROYAL HIGHNESSES,
YOUR EXCELLENCIES, HONORABLE MINISTERS,
DISTINGUISHED MEMBERS OF THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS,
MOST VENERABLE AND VERY REVEREND FATHERS,
MOST VENERABLE MOTHERS AND SISTERS,
RESPECTED LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,
BELOVED BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN CHRIST OUR LORD!
Today, as I stand in this historic Cathedral Church dedicated to the Holy Archangel Michael, which for centuries has gathered the faithful and borne witness to the consecration of many bishops, I sense the presence of and behold before me all my most God-loving and most worthy predecessors. Today, as at every Divine Liturgy, time itself has stood still; the very walls of this holy temple have vanished, and heaven has been opened from above, revealing to us that transfigured Kingdom—that blessed Kingdom of all ages—the Kingdom of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit: the All-Holy, Consubstantial, Life-Giving, and Undivided Trinity, whom today I have confessed with fear, trembling, and love, before you, gathered here from every corner of the world as the royal priesthood and the People of God, as we together constitute His Holy Church, the Body of Christ.
Your Eminence (Metropolitan Amphilohije), beloved brother Hierarchs, Christ-loving assembly!
On this holy day, my thoughts turn to the words of the ever-memorable Archbishop Iakovos, Primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America—who, by God’s providence, was himself consecrated to the episcopacy of the Great Church of Christ in Constantinople on the very day that I was born. Upon first setting foot on American soil, he declared: “I stand firmly, though with trembling knees.” Today I stand in that same spirit upon this sacred place where generations of bishops before me have received the holy Mystery of episcopal consecration, surrounded by your prayerful support and by the presence of you, my brother hierarchs, pastors, monks and nuns, well-wishers, and the faithful people of our Holy Church.
Yet, though this path has already been well trodden by those who have gone before me, the knees of my soul nevertheless tremble, Your Eminence, knowing that I have received this episcopal consecration from your own hands, and that His Holiness has always been my supreme example in all things, is for me an unwavering source of joy and my strength. Consciously and unconsciously alike, he has exercised the greatest influence upon me and upon the course of my life—leading me to dedicate myself to the Lord through the monastic tonsure, spiritually and prayerfully taking my uncertain hand, he has guided me safely to the firm cornerstone upon which the ministry I now receive has been established.
My soul trembles as did the whole world on that day of the chrismation of the entire universe—the Holy Feast of Pentecost—when the Holy Spirit descended upon the Holy Apostles in the form of tongues of fire, and they were clothed with power from on high. Yet, I have found consolation in the prayer of consecration, which proclaims that the Lord will heal all my infirmities and supply what is lacking in me through the divine grace by which I have been appointed Bishop of the God-protected Diocese of Australia and New Zealand. In my apostolic ministry I have been sent forth into the world by the Risen Lord, entrusted with the authority that I too, together with all who have been sent, should make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19).
Today my heart finds its strength, sustained by your fatherly prayers and by the prayers of our entire Holy Church gathered in this sacred temple, so that it may answer the Lord with the timeless words of the Prophets: “Behold, Your servant; let it be unto me according to Your word.”
Therefore, at the beginning of my hierarchical ministry, to Him Who was born of the Ever-Virgin Mary, Who conquered death and brought us into the First Day of the New Creation, I offer my boundless thanksgiving to the Risen Lord. For behold, on this feast of the Deposition of the Robe of His Most Holy Mother, I too have received upon myself a new robe of salvation, in which my soul rejoices in the Lord my Savior; for He has clothed me with the garments of gladness, crowned me as a bridegroom, and adorned me as a bride. Thus, has the Lord adorned me with the vestment embroidered by my mother’s own hands—not only for me, but, through me, for the salvation of the flock now entrusted to my care—knowing that, as a bishop standing alone, I am all but powerless.
Therefore, O Mother of God, Mother of our universal salvation—you who have overshadowed us with your Holy Robe, more spacious than the heavens—grant me the strength to shepherd the devout flock of your Son and our God in Australia and New Zealand, lands far in distance yet ever nearer to my heart, as together we journey toward the Kingdom of Heaven.
His Holiness has always taught us that it is not for us to choose the age into which we are born, nor the nation in which we are born; what belongs to us is how we shall live. Since every nation is blessed by the Lord, I rejoice sincerely, take great pride, and give thanks to God for this holy and noble people of God—our Serbian people—in whom I was born, by whom I was nurtured, and in whose holy Orthodox Faith I was baptized. As a child of the Serbian Diaspora, I stand before you today, before the new generations of our Serbian homeland, as one among my own, united in the pure confession of the Orthodox Christian faith as expressed in our local Church, the Serbian Orthodox Church. Through our saint and enlightener, our archpastor and peacemaker, Holy Father Sava, we together build up and enrich one another as the living and unceasing expression of the Incarnation of Orthodox Christianity within the one Serbian Church, while remaining in perfect communion with the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
Therefore, in our wholehearted efforts to find our place beneath this New Sun, alongside our glorious past, we must also set before ourselves the radiant future of the New Day in Christ, embracing the liberating words of Him Who declared: “Behold, I make all things new” (Revelation 21:5). This is our common and living Orthodox Christian inheritance—not a sealed, isolated, and lifeless legacy, but a living tradition. This is our Serbian and Orthodox ethos: our creative capacity to engage the world in communion, and our unique contribution to the contemporary world, especially on the Fifth Continent, which is neither East nor West, yet which, in the words of the Holy Bishop Nicholai—whose blessing I received while still in my mother’s womb, and whose holy presence I continually feel beside me—must, as he once wrote of America, “unite within itself noble sentiments, intellectual vigor, and strength of will.”
Finally, having come from the West to the East, and now setting forth on my journey toward the South, permit me to express my heartfelt gratitude—while sincerely fearing that I may unintentionally omit someone—to all those who, at every step of my life’s journey, bestowed upon me their support, that is, the boundless love of Christ, which has nourished me and brought me to the fullness of this day.
I offer my deepest gratitude to my honorable and now departed parents: to my father, Djuro, from whose noble family priests and teachers have served the Serbian people for more than two centuries, and from whom I also received liturgical inheritance; and to my mother, Milica, who most profoundly shaped my artistic soul and my very being. I thank my brother Djordje and his family; my late sister Dragica and her children, Nikola and Andjelka, for whom I have the privilege of serving as guardian; my godparents and my extended family; my teachers, especially those from my childhood in the Serbian parish and church schools of Cleveland; the ever-memorable Protopresbyter-Stavrophor Branko Kusonjić, who baptized me and through whom I first experienced the beauty of the Divine Services and came to love them; Protopresbyter-Stavrophor Djuro Majerle, who sent me to Saint Tikhon’s Seminary, where our own Serbian and universal Orthodox saint, Bishop Nicholai, lived, taught, and reposed in the Lord as Dean; and Protopresbyter-Stavrophor Vladimir Berzonsky, who encouraged and sent me to Saint Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary.
I likewise give thanks to all those who helped shape my liturgical life and my Eucharistic and ecclesiological consciousness, in accordance with the words of Saint Irenaeus of Lyons—after whom I received my monastic name: “Our teaching is in harmony with the Eucharist, and the Eucharist confirms our teaching” (Against Heresies, IV.18.5).
I am deeply grateful to my confessor and spiritual father, the unforgettable and ever-memorable Protopresbyter-Stavrophor Alexander Schmemann, the “father of liturgical theology”, from whom I learned to love and cherish the beauty of this created world, which is transfigured in the Divine Liturgy, and in which, according to the teaching of Saint Athanasius the Great, the human person is deified by God. I also give thanks to Protopresbyter-Stavrophor John Meyendorff, who brought the history of the Church and the Holy Fathers to life for me; to Professor Veselin Kesich, through whom I came to love the Holy Scriptures and the history of the Serbian Church; and to all the distinguished professors who have served, and continue to serve, as examples and inspirations throughout my life.
With all my heart I thank Metropolitan Amfilohije and Bishop Atanasije, who, while still theologians and hieromonks visiting America, profoundly influenced my entire spiritual and intellectual formation. I also thank the spiritual son of Tvrdoš, Bishop Grigorije, and all our hierarchs, through whom I have beheld the dawn of a bright future for the Serbian Orthodox Church.
My sincere gratitude is likewise extended to Metropolitan Christopher, who ordained me to the holy orders of deacon and presbyter and from whom I received the monastic tonsure; to His Eminence Metropolitan Nikitas of Hong Kong, present among us today, who heard my confession and prepared me for ordination; to Bishop Justin, who elevated me to the rank of Archimandrite; to the clergy and faithful of Cleveland, Chicago, New York, and Washington; to the nuns and faithful of the Monastery of the Entrance of the Most Holy Theotokos in Belgrade, especially its ever-memorable Abbess Agnija; to my spiritual family, the faithful of the Monastery of the Holy Archangel Gabriel in Zemun; and to my beloved concelebrant in Christ and dear brother, Father Radovan Bigović.
I also extend my heartfelt gratitude to the professors, colleagues, and students of Loyola University Chicago and of the Faculty of Orthodox Theology of the University of Belgrade; to my co-workers in the Washington Office for External Affairs of the Serbian Orthodox Church, the International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC), and the Office of the Holy Assembly of Bishops, under the leadership of its Chief Secretary, Protopresbyter-Stavrophor Savo Jović; to the Office of the Kosovo and Metohija Committee; and to all who labor faithfully in service to our Holy Patriarchate.
From this holy place, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to all the hierarchs who today have laid their hands upon me, bestowing upon me apostolic succession: first and foremost to Your Eminence, and, in addition to those whom I have already mentioned, to my dear brother with whom I shared the life and experience of the Diaspora, Bishop Nikolai of Alaska.
To all of you gathered here today, and to my beloved flock in Australia and New Zealand, I offer my heartfelt thanks and humbly ask for your holy prayers. Forgive all my shortcomings, and may you be blessed from this day unto the Kingdom of Heaven!
And to God, worshipped in the Holy Trinity, be glory and thanksgiving for all things, unto the ages of ages.
AMEN! AMEN! AMEN!
The newly-consecrated Bishop Irinej received congratulations from Father Vitaly Tarasyev, on behalf of His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow and All Russia; Archbishop Demetrios, Primate of the Greek Orthodox Church in America; Bishop Athanasios of Achaea, Head of the Mission of the Church of Greece to Brussels; Metropolitan Christopher of Midwestern America; numerous metropolitans and bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church and the other sister Orthodox Churches, together with many clergy from America and Australia; the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Belgrade, Stanislav HoÄevar; His Royal Highness Crown Prince Alexander, who was on an official visit abroad; Senator George Voinovich; and Mr. Andreas Athenopoulos, President of the International Association of Hellenes. His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople also sent a message of congratulations on the occasion of Bishop Irinej’s episcopal consecration, in which he wrote, among other things: “Every election of a new Orthodox Bishop is a cause of joy and good hope for the Holy Great Mother Church of Christ. The consecration of a new Bishop signifies the abiding and active presence of the sanctifying grace of the All-Holy Spirit within the Body of the Church.”
Bishop Irinej became the fourth Diaspora-born hierarch to be elected Bishop of the Serbian Orthodox Church. With this act, the Serbian Church has confirmed that She is the Mother of all her children, wherever they may be in the world.
|  |
| ||||||||||
