Homily at St. John’s Russian Orthodox Mission Church in Winfield, PA, by Priest Paul Siewers, for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, 7533/2025.

Today we commemorate the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God, named for an ancient city in Russia where it used to reside, and one of the great icons of old Russia. In fact it is called a national palladium or standard. That’s like a battle standard spiritually. The icon is said originally to have been made by the hand of the Holy Evangelist Luke with the blessing of the Theotokos herself, and is part of the treasure trove of traditions handed down to us in the Orthodox Church.

We may wonder at the practice of having a national spiritual palladium or standard. In the secular world, the U.S. Constitution actually is sometimes referenced as the American palladium guaranteeing liberty. That’s a time-appropriate example given that this is the Fourth of July weekend in America.

But the Vladimir icon serves as a standard of guaranteeing liberty in even a much deeper spiritual sense. As St. John of Damascus put it, the honor we give to an icon is transferred to the spiritual reality symbolized, in this case the Mother of God beautifully caring for our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ, and He for her, indicating how she also is the Mother of His Church, to which we belong in the Body of Christ today.

We honor this icon in our tradition asking for the continued prayers of our Lady for our liberty in the deepest sense, freedom from sin and from demonic oppression, and help in spiritual warfare.

Indeed, we commemorate the Vladimir Icon today because of how under the protection of the Mother of God, as the faithful venerated the icon, an attack on Moscow by Khan Ahmet and an army of Tartars was turned back in 1480 on the civil calendar. This marked according to tradition the official end of the Tartar Yoke, or the domination of Russia by Turkic peoples absorbed into the Mongol Empire and influenced by Islam. That’s why a Matins Canons verse refers to them as “sons of Hagar.” This was one of two great periods of spiritual exile and disturbance in the history of the Russian Orthodox Church, the second having been the so-called Bolshevik yoke of Communism within living memory, which some would say extends worldwide into the effort by Global Western techno-pantheism to subsume Orthodoxy today.

The Orthodox ruler at the time of Khan Ahmet’s invasion, Ivan III of Moscow, had begun using the title Tsar, as successor to the fallen empire of Christian Rome after the defeat of Constantinople. Tsar Ivan the Great, as he was known was married to the princess Sophia of the defeated Byzantine dynasty. Moscow then became known in tradition as the Third Rome, as a protector of Orthodoxy. This was a significant milestone in Orthodox Church history, when Orthodox Russia emerged from the centuries-old Tartar domination to flourish.

In 1480 Khan Ahmet had advanced upon Moscow and arrived at the Ugra River in the Kaluga region, while John III, Grand Duke of Moscow, was waiting on the other side. The leaders and people had venerated and prayed before the icon for intercession by the Mother of God on their behalf with our Lord Jesus Christ. Suddenly a strong and unreasonable fear came upon the Tartars; Ahmet did not dare to fight the Russians and retreated to the steppe. In honor of this event, an annual Cross procession was instituted, and to this day the Ugra River is called the “Cincture or belt of Theotokos.”

This unreasonable fear and confusion produced by intercessory prayers, by the way, is similar to that reported in two turning points in World War II, in Greece as immortalized in Greek traditions of the Feast of Holy Protection of the Theotokos, and in El-Amein in North Africa, associated with the eponymous Saint of that locality, the Holy Minas.

Despite all historical reasons, there are deeper spiritual reasons why this icon is important. We see this in the icon herself as described in an online calendar pst by St. Elisabeth’s Convent in Minsk: “The Virgin’s expression shows quiet sorrow, her brows slightly drawn together and the corners of her mouth gently turned downward. While the Christ Child gazes up at His Mother, her eyes meet those of the viewer. This beautiful composition connects the tender love between Mother and Son with Christ’s coming sacrifice – the Theotokos looks not at her Child, but at us, the people He came to save.”

There is so much about life that we don’t know and don’t see, how God and His saints and angels move in the spiritual realm, and how demonic influences also work. This morning we had a great sign of God’s protection in the mystery of the Church of baptism and chrismation, with the entry of baby Augustine into the Church, glory to God! This included both exorcism prayers and also the prayers establishing the purification and enlightenment of him in the Holy Spirit within the Church, the Body of Christ.

In all our activities in the Church, the Theotokos remains the highest of the saints and the model of theosis or oneness with God’s grace for us, as well as our special intercessor and mother in the Church. We see this in traditions of the Vladimir Icon of God also.

As mentioned, the U.S. Constitution is sometimes referred to as the palladium of the republic or guarantor of liberty. That’s again different from the Vladimir icon as a Palladion for Russian Orthodox Christians, but in this July 4 weekend it’s worth considering a few connections and coincidences of note to Orthodox Christians.

(1) The famous underlying principle of the American republic, in the U.S. Declaration of Independence that is the founding document of the country, is based in biblical Christianity. Declaring that “all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,” it references God as Creator, Supreme Judge, Nature’s God, and Divine Providence (the latter term Providence goes beyond the popular Enlightenment Deism of the era).

(2) The meaningful coincidence that on July 4 of the Church calendar in 1917 the Holy Royal Martyrs of Russia were killed by the God-hating Bolsheviks, marking the end to the millennia-old tradition of Orthodox Christian monarchy. Historian Antony Kaldellis called it the continuing Roman res publica or republic. The pious faith of the Royal Martyrs in that sign of the latter days reminds us as Orthodox Christians that our true freedom lies with God..

In the Vladimir icon we have a true Orthodox lady liberty. As the troparian for the feast puts it (in Tone 4):

“Today the city of Moscow is radiant for it receives the sunbeam of thy wonderworking icon, O Lady. As we greet it we pray to thee and cry: O wonderful Mother of God, pray to Christ our God Who was incarnate of thee that this city and all cities and countries be kept safe from all enemy assaults and that our souls may be saw q wwved, for He is merciful.”

The people’s prayers before the Vladimir Icon have saved the Russian land many times. Such prayer before the icon can save also our land, our region here, and the little churches and kingdoms of our families. I keep a copy of the Vladimir icon, the one before us today in Church, where I can see her when I go to bed at night, and no matter how tiring or stressful the day, or how heavy my sin, seeing her caring glance is a reminder of the peace Christ leaves with us.

In the icon, as mentioned, the Theotokos looks not at her Child, but at us, the people He came to save. This is a reminder too that our salvation as Orthodox Christians is not only personal but in community, in the Body of Christ, in the Church as an organic family in Christ.

For as Dostoevsky’s Elder Zosimas reminds us, we are all at least a little responsible for one other’s sins. We need to be imitating her from the icon today. in looking out, for one another, too.

Glory to God for all things!