Sermon on The Twelfth Sunday of Saint Matthew, 2026

In The Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen!

My Dear Family in the Lord,

Today I am not going to talk about, like I did in many other occasions, about richness or poverty, about being greedy or generous, or content, about being hungry for money or not! Today I am going to talk about our children, grandchildren and our youth, teenagers and young adults, in general!

Our Gospel Lesson today probably suggests that it will be appropriate, to approach one of the subjects that I enumerated above, since it talks about a young man who comes to Jesus and asks Him this question:” At that time, a young man came up to Jesus, kneeling and saying, “Good Teacher, what good deed must I do, to have eternal life?” (Matthew 19:16)

And then the dialog continues:” And he said to him, “Why do you call me good? One there is who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” He said to him, “Which?”  And Jesus said, “You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The young man said to him, “All these I have observed; what do I still lack?” Jesus said to him, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” When the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions. And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, it will be hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said to them, “With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:17-26)

You have noticed in the beginning, that The Gospel talks about a young man, who was preoccupied about his salvation and wanted to see, where he stands at that time and what else he needed to do, in order to inherit the eternal life! The young man was sincere and full of hope, that he will find the right answer with Jesus. Fortunately, he asked the Right Person, whom he was asking, but when he tried to justify himself a little more and received “more homework” from The Lord to do, he left very disappointed!] Anyway, this covers The Gospel Lesson, but now, let’s see what message we can send to our Teens and to their parents as well, because many of them are still under the care and “the payroll” of their parents.

We all know that we live in a very confusing world and many of our children and grandchildren are affected and even influenced by it. It is hard being a teenager and not having enough guidance to be able to successfully make it in today’s society. And that is so, because of various reasons, like too many temptations, too many options to choose from, that may influence their decisions and not knowing which are the correct ones and probably, way too many influences from friends, acquaintances and even parents and relatives. More than that, there’s high probability, God forbid, that our teenagers, can abandon The Church in college, national statistics show that 70% of them, do that!

Then, the question stays on, “What to do?” How to respond and resolve their problems?

Well, let’s start with the beginning, going all the way down to “the root” of these problems! Our family, starting with our family, we go to Church every Sunday, receive Holy Communion as a family, send out kids to Sunday and involve them in all The Church activities. We think that we did our part, but there’s more to do! Driving home from Church, do we ask our kids what they’ve learned in Sunday School? When we go home, before we share a meal together, did we say a prayer before the meal? On Sunday afternoon, did we take half an hour to do a little religious talk, from The Holy Scriptures, Prayer Books or other religious sources? During the week, do we pray as a family in the evening and the morning? And the list can continue! If the answer to all these questions is NO, then we have a problem! Please, don’t take me wrong, this is not criticism, it represents a reality! Why? Because all the members of our family need to see that, they need to be exposed to that every day! We need to show that Jesus Christ Is present and lives, abides in our home on a daily basis! Two hours on Sunday, is something, but it’s not enough to live a life in Christ! Christ needs to be The Center of our life and needs to be The Pilar of our home. He needs to be seen by all of us, as a family, all the time, with no exception!

Only then, we can say that we did something for the solid foundation of our Christian family and that we helped it grow in Christ! We need to put the bases, to lay the foundation and then later on, our children and grandchildren can build on it and carry on “the torch”,” the flame” of our Faith and The Light of Christ, that illumines all, as it is so beautiful described, in The Divine Liturgy of Saint Gregory Palamas, or The Liturgy of The Presanctified Gifts!

My Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

Let us abide in Christ and let us Christ abide in us, so that this Ancient Faith of ours, be carried

through The Light of Christ, to the next generations to come to the End of Time, AMEN!!!

“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16)

I cannot wait to see you and your families in Church!

+Fr. Catalin