Please read the Scripture passage before the homily.
The human race has a long memory of its history. The Jewish people at the time of St Matthew had to live without their beloved Jerusalem, which the Romans had conquered and destroyed in 70 A.D. They had not forgotten that the Jewish believers in Jesus had not supported them in their side against the Romans.
After this the Jewish leaders started putting pressure on the Iesus people to expel them from the synagogues. This memory and its bitterness is recorded in the Gospel not as persecution of the Jesus present in the Christian community, but as persecution of the historical Jesus.
In the year 1054 the Eastern Catholic Churches split from the Western Catholic Church. It was the break in communion between what came to known as the astern (Greek) Orthodox with headquarters at Constantinople and the Western Church, which came to be known as the (Roman) Catholic Church with headquarters in Rome. Differences in culture and mode of governing the Christian Church as well as a controversy over whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father or from the Father and Son in the Creed used at Mass.
In April of 1204, the Crusaders detoured from fighting the Saracens to capture Constantinople. The Crusaders killed both Muslims and the Christian people, the Orthodox Christians who had the same priests, bishops and faith as the catholic Crusaders. The Eastern Churches, including the Russian Orthodox, still remember this betrayal and slaughter of these innocent Christians.
In this respect, Vladimir Putin may have some reason to look upon his invasion of Ukraine as an Eastern-Western conflict. For the reunion of the Christian East and West, both sides have to repent of offenses committed and injuries suffered so that each side through repentance and God’s mercy may welcome each other to the unity of the sacraments.
We must recognize the histories we have shared with our Jewish brothers and sisters and with our Orthodox sisters and brothers. We have not always been right and we have not always been innocent.