27 June 2023 - Tuesday of the 12th week in Ordinary Time - St Cyril of Alexandria - Genesis 13:2, 5-18

     For the last couple of weeks, we had been hearing from St Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians in our first readings at  daily mass, in which he gives advice for their day-to-day struggles and challenges. This week we hear from the book of Genesis, about God’s relationship with Abraham. In the days when the Early Church was growing and developing, particularly in the second century, the philosophy of Gnosticism was gaining in popularity. Gnosticism, which was declared a heresy, claimed that salvation could be gained through secret knowledge. Gnostics believed that the material world was evil, being inferior to the spiritual world. The Gnostics regarded the Old Testament as a embarrassment to the Christian faith, as a record of a nation bound to superstitious beliefs about God and creation. In hearing the details about the story of Abraham, I thought about how our Christian faith sees the continuity of God’s activity and interaction with humanity and with creation, how God’s redemptive action is at work in the history of the nation of Israel, of how God was at work in the prophets and patriarchs of Israel, laying a foundation for Jesus and his ministry. In God’s covenant with Abraham, he reveals himself in the midst of human history, a process that continues today. Even in the midst of Abraham’s disagreements with Lot and in his decision to move, he gave thanks to God in the midst of this reality, building a temple to the Lord, displaying the faith and trust he has in God.  As God kept his promises to Abraham and his descendants, God remains faithful to us.  

      In speaking about the Early Church, I want to mention the saint we celebrate today: Cyril, the Bishop of Alexandria, Egypt, one of the great centers of learning in the ancient world.  He was involved in fighting many of the heresies in the Early Church. One of those heresies was Nestorianism; part of the teaching of that heresy was that Mary was not the Mother of God, because Jesus was fully divine but not human.  Pope Celestine appointed Cyril to preside at the Council of Ephesus in 431, which declared Mary to be the God-bearer – the theotokos. Cyril was one of the greatest theological minds in the early 5th century.  He spent the latter part of his life writing treatises that clarified the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation and that helped prevent certain heresies from taking long-term deep root in the Christianity. For the importance of his voice in fighting those heresies, Cyril is was declared a Doctor of the Church in 1882.  We honor and remember Cyril of Alexandria today.