Timmins Community

celebrated 102 years of continuing prayer since its establishment

On the 10th Sunday after Pentecost, His Grace Bishop Ioan Casian was present at the parish feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God Parish in Timmins. The hierarch celebrated the Divine Liturgy having beside Rev. Fr. Stelian Orlando Geonea, the parish priest of this community, and Rev. Fr. Iulian Stoica, who came especially from St. Peter and Paul Parish of in Kitchener together with presbytera Raluca. The community of Timmins enjoyed the virtual participation of Archdeacon Mihail Bucă, the Protopsaltis of the Patriarchal Cathedral in Bucharest. The young Alexandra Geonea read the Apostle and Our Father was recited in several languages.

In his sermon at the end of the religious service, the hierarch said:

“Today's Gospel speaks of three important things in a Christian's life: faith, prayer, and fasting. First, the father of the lunatic child asks for help from our Savior Jesus Christ. The father's request is painful because he had found no help and no solution to his son's suffering. Especially since he had asked for help from the disciples of the Savior, that is, the Holy Apostles, but they did not succeed. ‘Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, Why could we not cast it out?’ (Matthew 17:19). We must think that the disciples were probably dismayed at their helplessness because they had already been sent on a mission, and when they returned, they rejoiced, saying, ‘Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name’ (Luke 10:17). How is it that they felt the power of God and His work then and in the case of this child they could do nothing? Christ the Savior shows the cause of this even to those closest to Him, that is, to the Holy Apostles, saying, ‘So Jesus said to them, Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, Move from here to there, and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you’ (Matthew 17:20). Without the power of faith, nothing can be accomplished. If we think of the example of the Mother of God, because we are the day after the feast of her Dormition, we can say that she was the perfect example of the person having full faith in the word of God beyond the apparent human impossibility or limitation. Faith is what keeps the mind and heart open to the action of divine grace. But it has two wings that make it 'effective' in everyday life in the fight against evil - prayer and fasting. For Christ says to the disciples, ‘However, this kind (of demon) does not go out except by prayer and fasting’ (Matthew 17:21). St. John Cassian, mentioning one of his discussions with the fathers of the desert of Egypt, says that demons cannot enter the mind or the body of the Christian and have no means to penetrate deep into anyone's soul unless they have first pulled him away from the holy thoughts and alienate him from spiritual contemplation (Spiritual Conversations). St. John Cassian shows that temptation succeeds in overcoming where man no longer remains close to God. Like Adam and Eve, the penetration of the doubt and the distancing from God in the mind affects the state of man’s permanent contemplation of Him, bringing with it the alteration of man's ability to really know God and the world created by Him. He begins to see God as an equal adversary and the surrounding creation as a reality in itself non-transparent as it is truly due to the presence of divine light. Man moves away from the source of all by falling away from the knowledge as a gift of God to base it on his only limited and opaque capacity of knowing.

Faith reconnects man with God on the model of his primary paradisiacal condition. And one of the essential elements of the first people in heaven was the dialogue with God. This actually means prayer - talking to God the maker of all. St. John Cassian also says that the tension of the heart must be towards God. The thought brings separation and death. Prayer maintains this immediate presence and intimacy with God. Fasting - continues St. John Cassian - is the discipline that opposes the gluttony (desire to eat and drink excessively) and worldly thoughts. He also says that everything which one uses beyond the necessities of human nature is to be considered mundane or secular. Fasting is therefore the discipline that opposes the ‘secularization of man’. He opposes the material hardship of man who no longer has the discernment and the right measure between God's help and the synergistic measure of his personal participation. He buries himself in responsibilities and imaginary plans that then sink him into the impossibilities of their fulfillment. That is why faith, prayer and fasting lift man from the secularizing immanence redirecting his view towards heaven and towards the perspective of eternity.”

Afterwards, on the occasion of Sunday of the Romanian migrants, the message of His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel was read.

At the end of reading, the hierarch thanked Rev. Fr. Stelian Geonea and his family for their tireless efforts to restore and beautify both the church and the parish house and social hall.

Rev. Fr. Geonea in turn thanked the hierarch and Rev. Fr. Stoica for their effort and care. He also thanked the parishioners, priests and believers throughout the Romanian Orthodox Diocese of Canada who have shown their generosity so far through human, financial or material help.

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