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A Homily on the Synaxis of the Archangel Michael and the Other Bodiless Powers, according to the Teaching of the Holy Fathers.
On this day we turn our hearts toward that invisible creation which glorifies God unceasingly—those radiant beings who are pure light, immaterial, fiery with love, and ministers of the divine will.
Their voices ceaselessly proclaim: “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord of Sabaoth, Heaven and Earth are full of Your glory.”
The Holy Fathers teach that this feast was appointed so that we might remember that the world is not merely flesh and dust.
It is filled with unseen life—spirits who serve the living God in obedience and humility.
At the Council of Laodicea, held before the First Ecumenical Council, the Church condemned those who worshiped angels as gods or cosmic powers, yet she affirmed the right and holy veneration of the angels as servants of the one Creator.
For, as the Apostle Paul writes, all things in Heaven and on Earth were created by the Logos, whether thrones or dominions or powers or authorities.
They exist not as rivals to God, but as His living ministers, bearing His will to all creation.
Before the creation of the material world, God brought forth the immaterial world of the angels.
Saint Gregory the Theologian, in his orations on the divine mysteries, tells us that the angels were among the first works of God’s goodness—no longer within time as we know it, yet not outside creation.
They were brought into being by the divine will, luminous and pure, to serve as witnesses to the infinite glory of the Trinity.
Saint Basil the Great, in his work on the six days of creation, teaches that the word “Heaven” in the opening verse of Genesis refers first to the invisible Heaven—the angelic hosts.
He writes that before the sun, before the firmament, before the light of stars, there existed that spiritual firmament filled with understanding, with knowledge, with the worship of God.
Thus, before the physical world unfolded, the heavenly one was already singing praise.
Saint John of Damascus teaches that the angels were created “by the divine command, not of the divine essence, but by His goodness, to participate in His light and joy.”
They are not eternal by nature, yet they never die; they are not flesh, yet they are alive in personal being, possessing reason and will.
They move swiftly as thought, for they are not bound by space, though they can appear in bodily form when sent by God.

They are bodiless not in the sense of nothingness, but in the sense of spiritual refinement, free from corruption and material need.

Saint Maximus the Confessor writes that the angelic world is the bridge between the uncreated and the created.

He says that through the angels God extends His providence to the world, and through them man learns the divine will.
They are intermediaries not because God is far, but because God in His loving care allows His love to flow through many ranks of light.
In their obedience and their song we see what humanity was created to become: worshippers who reflect divine glory.
Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, in his treatise on the celestial hierarchy, describes nine orders of angels arranged in three triads.
The first hierarchy—the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones—stands nearest to the uncreated Light.
The second hierarchy—the Dominions, Powers, and Authorities—mediates divine illumination to the lower ranks.

And the third hierarchy—the Principalities, Archangels, and Angels—communicates God’s will directly to the visible world.

Saint Dionysius says that each order reflects a different aspect of God’s energy: wisdom, power, and love.

The higher enlighten the lower, not by human words, but by the radiant transmission of divine grace.

Saint Gregory Palamas explains that this illumination is not a created light, but the uncreated energy of God Himself, by which angels and saints alike are deified.
The angels, he says, live eternally in the participation of divine light; they behold God not in His essence, but in the brilliance of His glory.

Thus the celestial hierarchy is not a chain of domination but of communion.
Every angel rejoices in the brightness of those above and shares that brightness with those below.
Their order is love itself—pure harmony, perfect obedience, radiant humility.
The Seraphim are described by the Prophet Isaiah as six-winged flames, standing above the throne of God.
Their name means “burning,” for they are consumed with love and set others aflame with the same fire.
The Cherubim are “fullness of knowledge,” radiant with divine wisdom; they reveal the mysteries of God to the faithful.
The Thrones bear God’s righteous judgments, not as inanimate seats beneath Him, but as living reflections of His impartial truth.