On February 28, 2021, Sunday of the Prodigal Son, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia officiated the Divine Liturgy at St. Alexander Nevsky Monastery near Peredelkino. At the end of the service, the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church delivered a sermon.
In his sermon, he mentioned that very often people stray away from the right path, “When people deny God, refuse to recognize the only correct path in life which the Lord has laid out, they wander through life. And we know that this wandering is often accompanied by very painful blows of obstacles that a person involuntarily encounters on their way.”
“Today’s Gospel reading helps us understand that in order not to stray from the path of life, in order not to fall into difficulties and temptations, which a person who has lost their life guidelines encounter, one needs to have a guide to life, a very powerful guide, a kind of compass that really helps a person not to get lost. This compass, this reference point is the Lord Himself, and if we live according to His commandments, if we accept His word, if we are guided by His teaching to the extent of our abilities, then, undoubtedly, we gain the opportunity, even if we go astray, to follow the only saving path in life,” His Holiness Patriarch Kirill stressed.
“But how can we get back on track? What must we go through in order to find salvation, in order to get out of a certain delusion in our life? Today’s Gospel reading tells us that by sincere and heartfelt repentance before God, we can find the right path again, even if we had lost it. And this Gospel reading, which is offered to us ahead of Great Lent, should set all of us in the right spiritual mood. Everyone goes through temptations. May God grant it that through the repentance given to us by the Lord Himself, especially during the Holy Lent, we could overcome temptations and return again to our father’s house, to the place where salvation is found through communication with the Lord Himself. Amen,” concluded the Patriarch.
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