Maximus the Confessor

On Confession:

“Every genuine Confession humbles the soul. When it takes the form of thanksgiving, it teaches the soul that it has been delivered by the grace of God.” –Liber Asceticus (On the Ascetic Life).  Sherwood, Polycarp, trans. The Ascetic Life; The Four Centuries on Charity. Ancient Christian Writers, No. 21. New York: Newman Press, 1955.

On the Papacy & Primacy of Rome:

“If the Roman See recognizes Pyrrhus to be not only a reprobate but a heretic, it is certainly plain that everyone who rejects those who rejected Pyrrhus, rejects the See of Rome itself -that is, he rejects the Catholic Church. I need hardly add that he excommunicates himself as well, if indeed he is in communion with the Roman See and the Church of God.” –Disputations with Pyrrhus. Farrell, Joseph P., trans.  South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1990.

“Let him first hasten to satisfy the See of Rome… It is futile to try and persuade one like me without instead trying to satisfy and implore the blessed Pope of the holy Church of Rome. For that is the Apostolic See, which has received from the Incarnate Son of God Himself, universal and supreme dominion, authority, and the power of binding and loosing over all the holy churches. This is confirmed by all holy synods, according to the holy canons in the whole world.” –Disputations with Pyrrhus. Farrell, Joseph P., trans.  South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1990.

“It is not right that one who has been condemned and cast out by the Apostolic See of Rome for his wrong opinions should be named with any kind of honor, until he is received by her, having returned to her -no, to the Lord- by a pious confession and orthodox faith.” –Disputations with Pyrrhus. Farrell, Joseph P., trans.  South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1990.

“Anasatios ordered me to transcribe these things and to make them known to you most holy people, in order that, when you have found out about the trial from these, you might all bring a common prayer to the Lord on behalf of our common mother, that is the Catholic church, and on behalf of us your unworthy servants, for strengthening everyone and us also, persevering with you in it, according to the orthodox faith rightly preached in it by the holy fathers. For there is great fear in the whole world because this [Church] endures persecution by everyone at the same time, unless He [God] offers aid by his customary grace, He who always comes to aid, leaving the seed of piety at least in older Rome, confirming His promise he made to the prince of the Apostles, which does not deceive us.” -Letter of Maximos to Anastasius his disciple – CPG 7701, Clauis Patrum Graecorum, vols. 1-5, Corpus Christainorum. Gerhard, M.

“The extremities of the earth, and everyone in every part of it who purely and rightly confess the Lord, look directly towards the Most Holy Roman Church and her confession and faith, as to a sun of unfailing light awaiting from her the brilliant radiance of the sacred dogmas of our Fathers, according to that which the inspired and holy Councils have stainlessly and piously decreed. For, from the descent of the Incarnate Word amongst us, all the churches in every part of the world have held the greatest Church alone to be their base and foundation, seeing that, according to the promise of Christ Our Savior, the gates of hell will never prevail against her, that she has the keys of the orthodox confession and right faith in Him, that she opens the true and exclusive religion to such men as approach with piety, and she shuts up and locks every heretical mouth which speaks against the Most High.” -Maximus, Opuscula theologica et polemica, Migne, Patr. Graec. vol. 90

“How much more in the case of the clergy and Church of the Romans, which from old until now presides over all the churches which are under the sun? Having surely received this canonically, as well as from councils and the apostles, as from the princes of the latter (Peter and Paul), and being numbered in their company, she is subject to no writings or issues in synodical documents, on account of the eminence of her pontificate …..even as in all these things all are equally subject to her (the Church of Rome) according to sacerodotal law. And so when, without fear, but with all holy and becoming confidence, those ministers (the popes) are of the truly firm and immovable rock, that is of the most great and Apostolic Church of Rome.” -Maximus, in J.B. Mansi, ed. Amplissima Collectio Conciliorum, vol. 10

On the Liturgy of the Mass:

“After the divine reading of the holy Gospel the bishop descends from his throne and there takes place the dismissal and sending away of the catechumens and of others unworthy of the divine vision of the mysteries to be displayed.” –Mystagogy: Chapter 14.  Berthold, George C., trans. Maximus the Confessor: Selected Writings. The Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press, 1985.

On the Sacrifice of the Mass:

“This, indeed, is why [Dionysius the Areopagite] believed that every Christian should frequent God’s holy church and never to abandon the holy synaxis accomplished therein because of the holy angels who remain there and who take note each time people enter and present themselves to God, and they make supplications for them; likewise because of the grace of the Holy Spirit which is always invisibly present, but in a special way at the time of the holy synaxis. This grace transforms and changes each person who is found there and in fact remolds him in proportion to what is more divine in him and leads him to what is revealed through the mysteries which are celebrated. . .” –Mystagogy: Chapter 24.  Berthold, George C., trans. Maximus the Confessor: Selected Writings. The Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press, 1985.

“By holy communion of the spotless and life-giving mysteries we are given fellowship and identity with him by participation in likeness, by which man is deemed worthy from man to become God. For we believe that in this present life we already have a share in these gifts of the Holy Spirit through the love that is in faith, and in the future age after we have kept the commandments to the best of our ability we believe that we shall have a share in them in very truth in their concrete reality according to the steadfast hope of our faith and the solid and unchangeable promise to which God has committed himself.” –Mystagogy: Chapter 24.  Berthold, George C., trans. Maximus the Confessor: Selected Writings. The Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press, 1985.

On the Real Presence:

“The Logos enables us to participate in divine life by making Himself our food, in a manner understood by Himself and by those who have received from Him a noetic perception of this kind. It is by tasting this food that they become truly aware that the Lord is full of virtue (cf. Ps. 34:8). For He transmutes with divinity those who eat it, bringing about their deification, since He is the bread of life and of power in both name and reality.” -On the Lord’s Prayer.  The Philokalia: The Complete Text, edited by G.E.H. Palmer, P.N. Gregory, and K. Ware. Published by Faber and Faber, 1995

“If we live in the way we have promised, we will receive, as daily and life-giving bread for the nourishment of our souls and the maintenance of the good state with which we have been blessed, the Logos Himself; for it was He who said, ‘I am the bread that came down from heaven and gives life to the world’, (cf. John 6:33-35).” -On the Lord’s Prayer.  The Philokalia: The Complete Text, edited by G.E.H. Palmer, P.N. Gregory, and K. Ware. Published by Faber and Faber, 1995

On Mary’s Perpetual Virginity:

“The Logos purifies human nature from the law of sin by not permitting His incarnation for our sake to be preceded by sensual pleasure. For His conception took place miraculously without seed, and His birth supranaturally without the loss of His Mother’s virginity. That is to say, when God was born from His Mother, through His birth He tightened the bonds of her virginity in a manner surpassing nature; and in those that are willing He frees the whole of human nature from the oppressive rule of the law which dominates it, in so far as they imitate His self-chosen death by mortifying the earthly aspects of themselves (cf. Col. 3:5).” -On the Lord’s Prayer.  The Philokalia: The Complete Text, edited by G.E.H. Palmer, P.N. Gregory, and K. Ware. Published by Faber and Faber, 1995

On Mary, Mother of God & Ever-Virgin:

“[T]he truth of his humanity has been revealed to all, and carried to the ends of the world (Rom. 10:18) by the mighty voice of the holy Fathers preaching it. For everywhere, and by all, under their guidance —for they were teachers, who were sound judges in divine matters—it has been confessed and believed in an orthodox manner that the only begotten Son, one of the holy and consubstantial Trinity, being perfect God by nature, has become a perfect human being in accordance with his will, assuming in truth flesh, consubstantial with us and endowed with a rational soul and mind, from the holy Mother of God and ever-Virgin, and united it properly and inseparably to himself in accordance with the hypostasis, being one with it right from the beginning.” -Opuscule 7.  Louth, Andrew. Maximus the Confessor. The Early Church Fathers Series. London: Routledge, 1996.

“Hear this, all you nations, and take heed, all you inhabitants of the earth (cf. Isa 34.1)! Come all believers and gather all lovers of God, kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all judges of the earth, boys and girls, the old with the young, every tongue and every soul, let us hymn, praise, and glorify the all-holy, immaculate, and most blessed Theotokos and ever-virgin Mary, the throne of the king more exalted than the cherubim and seraphim, the mother of Christ our God.” –The Life of the Virgin: Maximus the Confessor, Chapter 1, translation by Stephen J. Shoemaker

On Apostolic Tradition & Excommunication:

“We are to accept the reverent meaning of dogma drawn from the expressions of the holy Fathers—and any other expressions we may find—that indicate unity as in no way contradictory of other statements of the holy Fathers that indicate duality. We know that the latter are mighty for the difference and against confusion, and the former are steadfast for the union and against division, but both, the former and the latter, we welcome exceeding gladly with soul and voice, as we confess the orthodox faith. And we wisely turn away those expressions that seem somehow contrary, the meanings of which are equally opposed to themselves and to one another and to the truth, and we boldly expel them from our home, that is from the Catholic and Apostolic Church of God.” -Opuscule 7.  Louth, Andrew. Maximus the Confessor. The Early Church Fathers Series. London: Routledge, 1996.

On Faith Alone:

“Do not say that you are the temple of the Lord, writes Jeremiah (cf. Jer. 7:4); nor should you say that faith alone in our Lord Jesus Christ can save you, for this is impossible unless you also acquire love for Him through your works.  As for faith by itself, the devils also believe, and tremble (Jas. 2:19).”  –The Philokalia: The Complete Text compiled by St Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain and St Makarios of Corinth

On the Dormition of Immaculate Mary:

“Now by her grace let us speak about her Dormition and removal from the world to the eternal kingdom, for it is the joy and the light of pious souls to hear such a story. When Christ our God wanted to bring his all-holy and immaculate mother forth from the world and lead her into the kingdom of heaven so that she would receive the eternal crown of virtues and supernatural labors, and so that he could place her at his right hand beautifully adorned with golden tassels in many colors (cf. Ps 44.10, 14) and proclaim her queen…” –The Life of the Virgin: Maximus the Confessor, Chapter 8, translation by Stephen J. Shoemaker

On the Intercession of Mary:

“She is the ardent intercessor with her son, Christ God, for all those who entreat her.  She is the calm harbor of all those buffeted by waves, who rescues them from spiritual and fleshly waves.  She is the guide on the way of life for all who have gone astray.” –The Life of the Virgin: Maximus the Confessor, Chapter 9, translation by Stephen J. Shoemaker