Our life and death is with our neighbor
“He also said, ‘Our life and our death is with our neighbor. If we gain our brother, we have gained God, but if we scandalize our brother, we have sinned against Christ.’” -The Sayings of the Desert Fathers (Abba Anthony the Great, paragraph 9)
It can seem a little bit odd that a monastic (and one who spent many years in complete solitude) would say this. Many people falsely assume that monks do not care about their neighbor, and so think that is why they have left the world in search of solitude.
Abba Anthony puts this false assumption to rest. He boldly claims that “Our life and death is with our neighbor.”
First, he says that “If we gain our brother, we have gained God.” This goes against everything our modern individualistic society pushes at us. With the help of technology, we are ever turning inwards and away from our neighbors. We may say we care about them and their souls, but we do not act like it. I know Abba Anthony here is using the term neighbor loosely, but let us think for a moment about our physical neighbors. You know, the ones who live the next house or apartment over from us. How well do we know them? Do they know Christ? And if not, have we tried sharing Christ’s Love with them? Let us work to gain our brother, and in this way, we will gain God.
Secondly, he claims that “… but if we scandalize our brother, we have sinned against Christ.” As followers of Christ, we are called to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. This is why Abba Anthony makes such a strong point here. Scandalizing our brothers or neighbors is no small matter. How would they come to know Christ if they do not come to know Him in us? Would they even recognize that there was something different about us, if we didn’t outright tell them that we are Christians? We are meant to be set apart and to transform the world by our witness of Christ’s Love.
Let us ask Christ how we can gain our brother, and let us pray that we do not scandalize our neighbor.
Saint Abba Anthony the Great, pray for us!