Orthodox Monastery of Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk
South Canaan, PA
September 10, 2021
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
My beloved children,
We gather in this holy temple to offer hymns of falling asleep to the newly departed servant of God, Archpriest Sergei, whose voice we hear echoed in the words offered at the beginning of this evening’s service, words of the Holy Prophet David in his 118th Psalm: “With my whole heart I seek Thee, let me not wander from Thy commandments. I have laid up Thy word in my heart that I might not sin against Thee” (Ps 118[119]:10–11).
If we picked any verse from the Psalms, we might find that that particular verse applies exactly and fittingly to the faithful servant of Jesus Christ and minister at the altar who now lies before us. The reality of our common human condition has placed Father Sergei before us, bereft of glory and form, as we sing. And yet, his face still radiates with life and with hope, as if he were speaking to the Lord: “Deal bountifully with Thy servant, that I may live and observe Thy word. Open my eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy law” (Ps 118[119]:17–18). Such words guided Father Sergei in his earthly life, and I am confident that, just as he beheld wondrous things through his earthly eyes, he is now experiencing the fullness of the heavenly glory that is welcoming him in the Kingdom.
The Orthodox Church in America has lost a great number of venerable clergy over the past year. Each of them offered his particular gifts and talents to the Lord and to the Church, for which all of us are grateful. Father Sergei’s gift to the Church was his heart: he sought the Lord with his whole heart, and his heart was open to his brothers and sisters with an overflowing of love, compassion, and kindness. He both lived and conveyed to others the words of the Psalmist: “Let Thy steadfast love be ready to comfort me according to Thy promise to Thy servant. Let Thy mercy come to me, that I may live, for Thy law is my delight” (Ps 118[119]:76–77). Father Sergei was ready both to receive and give the steadfast love of God, and there is no doubt that he delighted not only in the law but in all those gifts which come to us human beings from our bountiful and merciful Lord.
The Psalms that Father Sergei loved so much are given to us as a means of responding to all the conditions of our human existence: despair and hope, sorrow and joy, despondency and faith, emptiness and glorious worship. Most of us turn to the Psalms—as we turn to the Scriptures in general, or to the writings of the Fathers—when the occasion presents itself, or when circumstances force us to seek out those sources of consolation and hope. Father Sergei was one of those rare persons who needed no external incentive to turn to the Psalms or to the other liturgical hymns of the Church. His very being seemed to pulse with the exclamations of David: “Oh, how I love Thy law! It is my meditation all the day. Thy commandment makes me wiser than my enemies, for it is ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers, for Thy testimonies are my meditation” (Ps 118[119]:97–99).
Father Sergei would, of course, never utter such words himself. But those who had occasion to encounter him could sense immediately that the very same heart that uttered those words was found in this man, this priest of God, this friend of the Bridegroom. If there is one foundational element that defined Father Sergei, it was that he was our friend. It did not matter where he was, or what he was doing, or with whom he was conversing—in all those situations, even the most casual encounter would become the warm embrace of a true friend.
Father Sergei was, of course, very accomplished in many fields, particularly the field of music and liturgy, to which he devoted all of his life. He was the first in many of those accomplishments: the first to establish an all-English Liturgy, the first to serve as Director of the Fellowship of Orthodox Stewards, one of the first to receive the recently established Order of Saint Romanos the Melodist. In his humility, Father Sergei would never dwell on such accomplishments but would rather devote his energy to a more difficult task, one which very few of us can accomplish: that is, the difficult and Christ-like effort to place the other in the first place, rather than oneself. In this, he provides us with the model of true friendship.
The world we live in is broken and fragmented. We all know this and each of us, perhaps, believes that we have the solution to this brokenness and fragmentation; or if we don’t have a solution, we lament and complain about the sorry state of affairs of the world. In either case, we tend to search for healing in the very brokenness itself: getting caught up in political opinions, being spell-bound by the ephemeral relations found on social media, or simply becoming trapped in the web of our own addictions and fantasies.
It was not so with Father Sergei. He was one who could pierce through the fog of our mental delusion and heart’s confusion by reminding us of the reality of true friendship and the power of love. He did this not with his words or by exhortation but by his very life. He did, of course, speak very eloquently, as he did to his brother clergy at the 12th All-American Council in Pittsburgh, when he reminded us of the ascetical nature of love. He said: “Yet love—more especially Christian brotherly love—is always a risky business. Love (and this ‘knowing each other’ is akin to love) makes us vulnerable. Love leads us to the Cross. There is no other way to pastor, let alone live, the Christian life.”
In the few days since his passing from this earthly life, I have received many testimonials about the grace-filled effect that Father Sergei had on those who encountered him, even if that encounter was very brief. I heard from the man who, as a youth, participated in a service during the Paschal season at Saint Tikhon’s Monastery, and there beheld the light of the Resurrection in Father Sergei’s face as he sang at the kliros. I heard from a former member of the Metropolitan Council who, at the outdoor Liturgy at Saint Sergius Chapel, when Father Sergei was to receive the Saint Romanos award, assisted him from the car to the walled garden where the service was being held; she was overwhelmed by the radiance of love, peace, and joy that radiated from the frail priest she was escorting. Each of these, among many other examples that each of us may have experienced ourselves, give expression to the love of God that was transmitted to us through Father Sergei’s very presence.
In this, he reveals that he was a true follower of the commandment of our Lord, who says to all of us:
This is My commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of My Father I have made known unto you. Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My name, He may give it you. These things I command you, that ye love one another. (Jn 15:12–17)
Father Sergei followed this commandment, and he did so even more clearly as a priest of 70 years. This is powerfully revealed in his answer to a fellow priest who asked Father Sergei what had made him decide to become a priest. Father Sergei related that his father was the priest at Saints Peter and Paul in Lorain, OH. And one day in his youth, after Liturgy, he and the other kids all went out to play while the adults held their annual parish meeting inside the church. Father Sergei, however, was interested to see what was going on inside the church. So he pulled up a garbage can, climbed on top of it, and peered through the window. There he beheld all the parishioners, seated in the pews, with his father at a small table in front of the iconostasis. The young Sergei was shocked to see all these people who were yelling at and complaining to his father—ranting and having what they saw as their chance to be heard. As he looked in horror at his father just sitting there, taking all that abuse and not saying a single word, Father Sergei said, “That was the moment I knew I wanted to be a priest. Because if my father, who was a good man and a good priest, could sit and endure all the abuse and accusations railed against him, there really must be something to the Holy Priesthood.”
The priest who related this story to me referred to Father Sergei a “dear friend, a mentor, and a priestly archetype.” He was indeed an archetype, and not only for this priest. He shared his Christ-like love with his beloved wife, Matushka Genevieve, for over 70 years; she was his co-laborer and co-sufferer in his pastoral ministry, but shared as well in the joys of that ministry, together with their children and the entire extended family.
And so, on behalf of the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America, represented this evening by His Eminence Archbishop Michael of New York and the Diocese of New York and New Jersey, and on behalf of all the clergy, represented this evening by so many of Father Sergei’s brothers and concelebrants, I offer my sincere condolences to Matushka Genevieve and the family. But I also offer our gratitude for the life and example offered to us in Father Sergei.
May his memory be eternal, and may he now experience the divine reality of the words that were offered on his behalf at the burial service this evening:
In faith and hope and love,
In meekness and purity and priestly worth,
Uprightly you discharged your sacred functions, O memorable one.
Therefore the eternal God whom you served
Shall Himself establish your spirit
In a place of brightness and beauty, where the righteous rest,
And you will receive pardon and great mercy at the judgment seat of Christ. (Troparion, Tone 2)
May his memory be eternal!