Oct 03 2024 15 mins 1
Therefore be compassionate, just as your Father also is compassionate!" (Luke 6:36). Our Lord’s command in the Gospel of Luke offers a more concrete counterpart to the command, in the Gospel of Matthew, to be perfect as our Father in heaven (Mat 5:48). If the Lord is "compassionate and merciful, long-suffering and most merciful," as we read in Scriptures (Exod 34:6; Ps 102/103:8), then "becoming sons of the Most High" or, as our theology calls it, "deification" is also about becoming merciful. The Very Rev. Dr Bogdan Bucur exhorts the faithful to strive to follow Christ’s commandment, not just for the sake of keeping the commandments, but because by becoming compassionate we participate increasingly in a living relationship with the Lord. Ultimately, says Fr Bogdan, there is no way to salvation and deification except together with our brothers and sisters, who are given to us by God Himself.
