UNCLASSIFIED
Dear in Christ! If I have offended anyone, whether it was intentional or not, forgive me, a sinner! A salvic beginning to the Great Lent!
I ask for your holy prayers. Sincerely in our Lord Jesus Christ, unworthy protodeacon Basil from Canberra.
"For if
ye forgive men their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive
you; But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your
Father forgive your trespasses (Matt. 6:14–15).
What a simple and handy means of salvation! Your trespasses are
forgiven under the condition that you forgive the trespasses of your
neighbour against you. This means that you are in your own hands. Force
yourself to pass from agitated feelings toward your
brother to truly peaceful feelings—and that is all. Forgiveness
day—what a great heavenly day of God this is! If all of us used it as
we ought, this day would make Christian societies into heavenly
societies, and the earth would merge with heaven" (St.
Theophan the Recluse, "Thoughts for Each Day of the Year")
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
During the week days of Lent, we say the prayer
of St. Ephriam
O Lord and Master of my life, a
spirit of idleness, despondency, ambition an idle talking give me not. Prostration
But rather a spirit of chastity, humble-mindedness,
patience, and love bestow upon me Thy servant. Prostration
Yea, O Lord and King, grant me
to see my failings and not condemn my brother, for blessed art Thou unto the
ages of ages. Amen. Prostration
Then the prayer once more in full with one
prostration at the end
Fr
Deacon Christopher Henderson, from Holy Cross Australian Orthodox
Mission in Sydney, Australia,... If you would like to contact Fr
Christopher, his email address can be found in any one of the
Newsletters below
The Holy Gospel according to:
Saint Matthew 6:14-21
King James Version (KJV 1611)
14 For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:
15 But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
16 Moreover when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance: for they disfigure their
faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
17 But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face;
18 That thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father, which
seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.
19 Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves
break through and steal:
20 But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where
thieves do not break through nor steal:
21 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
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(When Fr. George read it, he cried, m. Nina.) Homily on the Eve of the Sunday of the Dread Judgment
Metropolitan Philaret of Eastern America and New York (+1985) | 23 February 2014
“We Shall Have to Answer for All Before the Absolute Good”
When
the Son of man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with
Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory: and before Him
shall be gathered all nations, and He shall separate
them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats.
And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left.
Then
shall the King say unto them on His right hand, Come, ye blessed of My
Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the
world. For I was a-hungered, and ye gave Me
meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink: I was a stranger, and ye
took Me in: naked, and ye clothed Me: I was sick, and ye visited Me: I
was in prison, and ye came unto Me. Then shall the righteous answer
Him, saying, Lord, when saw we Thee a-hungered,
and fed Thee? or thirsty, and gave Thee drink?
When
saw we Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? or naked, and clothed Thee?
Or when saw we Thee sick, or in prison, and came unto Thee? And the
King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I
say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of
these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me. Then shall He say also
unto them on the left hand, Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting
fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.
For I
was a-hungered, and ye gave Me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me no
drink. I was a stranger, and ye took Me not in: naked, and ye clothed
Me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited
Me not. Then shall they also answer Him, saying, Lord when saw we Thee
a-hungered, or athirst, or a stranger, or sick, or in prison, and did
not minister unto Thee? Then shall He answer them, saying, Verily I say
unto you, inasmuch as ye did it not to one of
the least of these, ye did it not to
Me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal (Matthew 25:31-46).
As we
gradually approach Great Lent, the Church dedicates tomorrow’s Sunday
to a remembrance of the Dread Judgment of Christ, about which the Lord
Jesus Christ Himself spoke in detail to
His disciples in the relevant discourse that, God willing, we will
hear tomorrow at the Liturgy in the Gospel reading.
The
prayerful preparation for the fast began two weeks ago. The Church
offered us the Gospel of the Publican and the Pharisee, showing us how
we should pray and should not pray to God. For the
fast is the time of prayer par excellence. Then came the next Sunday, of
the Prodigal Son, when the Church – calming and encouraging man
inhibited by the consciousness of his own sinfulness – indicated this
parable, in which we see how merciful the Lord is
when His prodigal son comes to Him in repentance. As it says in the
Church’s prayers, He accepts him with love, without berating him,
without reproaching him for what he had done, but with love and
forgiveness only.
But
there are souls that are hard as rock, which do not soften and are not
tempered by these poignant examples. It is for these that tomorrow the
Church offers the Savior’s discourse on the Dread
Judgment, in order to make even the hardness of sin-loving man to
shudder and tremble.
Today
was the so-called “Ancestral Saturday,” on which the Church prayed for
the repose of all Orthodox Christians throughout the entire universe who
have reposed in all ages. This is only natural:
turning our attention to the Dread Judgment of Christ, the Church
reminds us of those who will stand before the Dread Judgment, as we
will, but who have already departed from this life and its boundaries,
abiding already in the mysterious and otherworldly afterlife.
When one completes one’s earthly path, the moment of death puts an end
to, and terminates, his time for personal repentance. But the Church
tells us that if, for example, someone’s soul departed in sins, without
bearing repentance, and if this heavy and sinful
burden torments it beyond the grave, then it suffers – but not
hopelessly, for its fate is far from hopeless. One can no longer pray
for oneself there – one’s time of repentance has passed – but the Church
does not deprive one of its maternal care and concern,
praying for the soul, that the Lord might forgive its sins and grant it
the portion of the blessed in eternity.
We know
from the Lives of Saints many examples of how the prayer of the Church –
the prayer of neighbors and relatives offered in the depths of the
Church – has shown doubtless and great help
to the souls of men who have departed to that afterlife in poor
condition, but without hopelessness. Thus the Church calls upon us to
pray for those who will stand before the Dread Judgment and who can no
longer change their own portion. Thus does the Church
call upon us to offer our prayers for them, for such prayer is
acceptable to God.
And what of ourselves? Tomorrow is the Sunday of the Dread Judgment. How often do we ourselves remember this last accounting?
When a
student or pupil needs to take a difficult exam, he labors over it,
worrying and fearful, trying to prepare himself as best he can. And here
there will be a terrible and final exam, after
which there will be no retesting in eternity. However, astonishing are
ease and oblivion with which man treats this dread and final moment,
before this opening into eternity, time and again giving almost no
thought to it. It is not superfluous here to recall
the words of an ascetic: “Trembling overcomes me at the thought of the
final judgment; but I think I will be especially surprised by three
conditions: First, that I will not see at the right of the Righteous
Judge many that I thought I would see there;
I will be even more surprised when I see many on His left that I never
thought I would see there; but I will be most surprised if I myself
turn out to be on the right.” Thus spoke a humble ascetic who saw his
sins, but did not notice his virtues, for
the Lord leads His faithful servants so wisely that they see other’s
virtues, but not their own. But they do see their own sins, which they
feel torturously and painfully.
The
Holy Hierarch Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow, said in one of his
inspiring sermons: “Remember, man, that the Lord reveals to you the
picture of His Last Judgment beforehand, that while
it is not yet too late, you might run from the left side to the
right.” If your conscience
is
sensitive, if it accuses you of sins, then surely you cannot but fear
this judgment, for you are threatened with the portion on the left.
But
the Lord does reveal to us what will be, so that you might come around
and, while it is not too late – while your earthly life has not yet
been cut short, while you are still its master
in this regard, for it depends wholly on your freedom how you define
yourself in relation to eternity – you might use this same path of
freedom to serve God and move from the left to the right. It is not
yet too late! For the Church, indicating this,
tells us: It is not yet too late! It is already too late for those of
our brethren who have completed this earthly life, but for us it is
still the time of repentance and correction.
“This
is the time for doing,” as St. Gregory the Theologian says. And may it
not pass by unfruitful for us, but may the Lord help us to bring good
fruit for the Heavenly Kingdom! Amen.
“Whither shall I flee from thy presence?” (Psalms 139:7)
The
question of the eternal suffering of sinners in the afterlife became
one of the liveliest points of discussion in the Protestant world, and
the rejection
of the concept found fervent defenders in some preachers, as reported in
the previous issue of Pravoslavnaya Rus [Orthodox Russia].
Human
nature would rather answer this question in the negative; in the
history of Christianity, there have long been attempts to see in the
words about eternal
Gehenna in the word of God only an allegory or with conditional meaning.
This viewpoint sometimes even creeps into our midst.
Meanwhile,
Meatfare Week is upon us. The Gospel message about the Day of Judgment:
“and these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous
into life eternal” (Matthew 25:46), is a terrible reminder in Orthodox
churches not only on that Sunday, but for the entire week that follows.
The
Savior and the Apostles spoke unambiguously many times of the eternal
condemnation of sinners, which is a fate which could befall each and
every one
of us. The Fifth Ecumenical Council rejected the teaching of the
so-called Origenists about the ultimate salvation of all people and even
of evil spirits. One must subject our thoughts to the voice of the Word
of God with humility and with the knowledge that
Divine determination is higher than our reasoning. “For my thoughts are
not your thoughts,” says the Lord through Prophet Isaiah: “ For as the
heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways,
and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah
55:8-9).
But
man is generous towards himself. He is not inclined to doubt the
promised eternal bliss of the righteous, but he doubts the eternal
condemnation of sinners,
carelessly ignoring the notion that in denying the latter, one must then
deny the former: if one sees the words about eternal suffering as
conditional, then we must view the promise of eternal blessedness as
conditional, too.
Are
we to boldly delude ourselves that the Savior is only frightening us
with “everlasting fire” (Matthew 25:41), that it is only a pedagogical
tool coming
from His lips? Shall we not lead ourselves under His wrath for such a
thought, for such self-consolation? The Psalms say: “ Wherefore doth the
wicked contemn God? he hath said in his heart, Thou wilt not require
it” (Psalms 10:13).
Let
us then not doubt the truth of God’s word. If we are not able to
discover God’s thoughts for ourselves, let us be satisfied that we can
ease our approach
by wisely accepting God’s determinations.
Human thought makes two main errors on the teaching of eternal sufferings.
The first: how can temporary, even singular, actions lead to eternal damnation?
The other: if condemnation is even just, is not the law of fairness defeated by Divine love?
The
first, as we see, touches upon the relationship between the temporal
and the eternal. Yes, our actions can be singular, and one might say
fleeting: time
rushes by, our actions, our words and thoughts are forgotten. But in
some deeper sense, nothing in the world disappears forever: all moves
into eternity. The impetus created by one thought, one word, one action,
leads to further impetuses and movements; it
is simply that we do not notice them or take them into account. The
planted seed gives root and prepares for a future harvest. Time is like a
vessel in the ocean, which is eternity.
Death
will come, and we will be immersed in eternity, where the life of the
soul continues, though there is no longer the cycle of day and night,
there
is no onset of fatigue followed by time of rest, there are no clocks, no
time; and this life of the soul continues with open and widened eyes
directed at ourselves and at all that surrounds us, and also at all the
fruits that we cultivated in earthly life,
and at the consequences of our actions. “A good tree cannot bring forth
evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit” (Matthew
7:18). Our future life is a direct consequence of what we do. Planted
within time, it is harvested in eternity. Good
deeds will not be lost. “ For whosoever shall give you a cup of water to
drink in my name, because ye belong to Christ, verily I say unto you,
he shall not lose his reward” (Mark 9:41), said the Savior as He sent
His disciples to preach. For this cup of water
is the participation in the Good News of faith in Christ, even if the
giver doesn’t recognize it as such. Evil that is done will likewise not
be lost in eternity. “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall
give account thereof in the day of judgment”
(Matthew 12:36). An idle word can serve as a temptation and could spur
another person to sin and even to a crime.
Here
we clearly see the logic of reward and punishment in future life: a
person gathers for himself wealth for the Kingdom of God, and prepares
for himself
reward or punishment. “For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by
thy words thou shalt be condemned” (Matthew 12:37). “Out of thine own
mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant” (Luke 19:22), said the
Lord in His parable on the talents. Such is the
conclusion of pure fairness, this is the logic of justice. This is how
the eternal fate of man is determined after temporary life on earth.
This
fate, determined by justice, would be sorrowful for all of us without
exception, since we are all impure and sinful, for “shall in no wise
enter into
[the Kingdom of God] any thing that defileth” (Revelation 21:27); in the
Kingdom there is only holiness, there is not a spot of sin; meanwhile,
the common state of man is a mix of good and evil. But meeting us
halfway is Divine mercy, the love of God.
Herein lies the answer to the second question: on the meeting and concord of the justice of God with the mercy of God.
God’s
love came to us with the sacrifice of the Cross of the Son of God,
prepared to remove impurity from our soul and to compensate for our lack
of personal
holiness. The Resurrection of Christ opened for us the Kingdom of the
Son of God.
But
in order for the forgiving and all-embracing love of Christ to lead us
into this Kingdom, we must respond to it, we must come to love our
Savior, come
to love His brethren, to enter in the spirit and body into His Church,
which is His Body, to joyfully commune with Him, to weave ourselves into
that prayerful bond, which spread like threads in all directions and
bonds the body of the Church, concentrated in
the middle in God. Here we find cleansing, purification, justification,
sanctification. Here “mercy and truth are met together; righteousness
and peace have kissed each other” (Psalms 85:10). Truth, Christ,
appearing on earth, and the truth of justice bows
down before it: “Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness
shall look down from heaven” (Psalms 85:11).
This
is the foundation for our hope for future life in the Kingdom of God:
only upon the mercy of God. We dare not declare our “rights.” We must
not claim
the “justice” of reward.
The
love of Christ… but what if this love is rejected by mankind? What if
the hand offered to us from above is not taken? What if the offer of
forgiveness
is unheeded? What if the response to this offer is antagonism and proud
refusal?
Is
the refusal of the Divine call possible? Yes, it is possible, reality
demonstrates this. Voltaire expressed this attitude, declaring his
hatred for Christianity.
Nietzsche likewise—at least until his emotional illness overcame
him—sharply despised the teaching of Christianity on humility, patience,
mercy, and he created the prideful cult of the superman who rose above
the concepts of good and evil. Similar is today’s
militant atheism which declared war against all religion, especially the
Christian faith. How are we to consider the afterlife of Nero alongside
that of the Apostles Peter and Paul? Stalin together with the martyrs
of our time? Those killed for the faith, the
truth of God and Church and their executioners?
On
a smaller scale we see how sin distances us from God. The first sin of
Adam led to humanity seeking to hide from God. “Adam… Where art thou?”
“I heard
thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I
hid myself” (Genesis 3:9-10).The desire to hide from God and the
impossibility of doing so is the beginning of suffering for the sinner.
“Whither shall I flee from thy presence?” (Psalms
139:7)
What
are the sufferings of Gehenna: fire, worms, sheer darkness in the
future age? The Fathers of the Church point out that this is not a
place, but a
condition of existence. “Sinners,” writes St John the Damascene, “will
be given to eternal flame, not the physical fire of earth, but of a kind
known only to God.”
Mankind,
to the extent that sin grows in him, departs from God and the Divine
Kingdom, it becomes alien to him. In the words of Dostoevsky, the sinner
“returns the ticket” offered to him. Therefore the sinner scrapes
together upon his own head the burning coals, committing himself to life
without the rays of Divine light, to sheer darkness, where there is the
weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Is
this the torment of the conscience? Not likely. A conscience that gnaws
is the conscience has not yet been extinguished; it is the light of
truth that
has not yet gone out in the soul. The sufferings of the conscience have a
cleansing effect.
Those
other sufferings are probably not the same. There, the loss of life in
God is combined with an impossibility—as horrifying as it is imagine—an
unwillingness
to repent. The fall of the devil shows that the love of God does not
disarm evil. How are pride, envy, jealousy, wrath, hatred to be replaced
with gratitude, meekness, humility and love? What power is able to
extinguish spitefulness against one’s condemnation,
when the state of enmity might even comprise an excruciating passion of
sorts?
“Many
foolish people,” writes St John Chrysostom, “wish only to elude
Gehenna: but I deem far more torturous than Gehenna to be outside of the
glory of the
Kingdom of God; and whosoever is deprived of it, I think, should weep
not so much from the sufferings of Gehenna, as much as the deprivation
of heavenly blessings; for that one thing is the most cruel of all
sufferings.” On the eve of Great Lent, the Holy Church
reminds us of the Dread Judgment and of the punishment of sinners. But
much more often, on a daily basis, she reminds us of the joy of the
Kingdom of God, imparting within us the hope for it with the words of
the Creed which we read every day: “I look for the
resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come, amen.” Let
us take this reminder of Judgment Day with all our hearts, to bring
earnest repentance during Lent and to strengthen in the hope that the
Lord does not deprive us, too, of His Heavenly Kingdom.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
HOW TO KEEP THE FAST
On fasting
“For
this kind is expelled only by prayer and fasting” (Matt. 17:21). With
these words the Lord Himself indicated to us two kinds of weapons in our
combat against our enemy – the dark and evil
spirits. At the same time, He indicated to His disciples the need for
them to fast at a time “when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them”
(Matt. 9:15). The grace of the Holy Spirit is taken away from us through
our sins. And its return to us is achieved primarily
by means of repentance, assisted by prayer and fasting.
However,
if the necessity of prayer for the salvation of the soul is recognized
by all Christians, the necessity of fasting is often inadequately
realized. And that is one of the cunning traps
of the evil spirits into which fall many modern Christians.
In
former not too distant times the confession of Christ was tied in with
the fulfillment of all Church rules. For this reason, in the daily life
of erstwhile Russian families we see a strict
observance of Lenten days – Wednesdays and Fridays, and the four fasts
established by the Church. The pious lay people of ancient Russia were
not far behind the monastics in the sphere of fasting.
The time
of fasting is an especially important time for spiritual life, it is “a
favorable time, it is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2). If the soul
of a Christian pines for purity and seeks
spiritual health, then it must try to make the best possible use of this
time that is so beneficial for the soul. For this reason it has become
the custom among genuinely God-fearing people to congratulate each other
upon the beginning of a fast.
But what
in essence is fasting? And is there not a sense of self-deception among
those who feel obligated to follow the fast to the letter, but who do
not love it and are burdened by it in their
hearts? And can a simple compliance with the rule for eating only Lenten
foods on days of fasting be called a fast? Will the fast truly be a
fast if, except for some alteration in our food intake, we will think
neither of repentance, nor or abstinence, nor
of cleansing our hearts through intensified prayers?
We must
assume that this will not be a fast, even though all the rules and
customs of fast are kept. St. Barsonuphius the Great says: “Physical
fasting has no meaning without the spiritual fasting
of the inner man, which consists of guarding oneself from passions. Such
a fasting of the inner man is pleasing to God and will reward you for
the shortcomings of physical fasting” (if you were unable to keep the
fast properly).
St. John
Chrystostome says the same: “Whoever restricts the fast to a simple
abstinence from food, dishonors it terribly. It is not only the lips
that should fast – no, let the eyes, and the ears,
and the hands, and the feet, and our entire body be engaged in fasting.”
Father
Alexander Elchaninov writes: “Fasting does not equate with hunger. The
fakir, and the yogi, and the prisoner in his prison, and the simple
beggar – all hunger. Nowhere in the services of
the Great Lent does it speak about the fast as an isolated event in our
usual meaning, i.e. as not eating meat and other foods. Everywhere there
is the same appeal: ‘Let us fast, brethren, physically and let us fast
spiritually.’ Consequently, fasting only
then has religious meaning when it is joined with spiritual labors.”
The fast
represents absolute abstinence, in order to restore the lost balance
between body and spirit, in order to give back to our spirit its
authority over the body and its passions. The Lord
Himself showed us an example of Lent by fasting for 40 days in the
wilderness, from whence He “returned in the power of the Spirit” (Luke
4:14).
St.
Isaac the Syrian says: “Lent is a weapon prepared by God. If the
Lawgiver Himself fasted, how can someone who is obligated to follow the
law not fast? Before the fast mankind did not know
victory, and the devil never experienced defeat. Our Lord was the
commander and prime mover of this victory. And as soon as the devil sees
this weapon in the hands of a person, this terrible tormentor
immediately becomes afraid, remembering his defeat by the
Saviour in the wilderness, and his power is destroyed. Whoever remains
fasting is unshakeable in spirit” (Homily 30).
It is
quite obvious that the labor of repentance and prayer during fasting
should be accompanied by thoughts of one’s sinfulness and, naturally, by
abstinence from all amusements – going to the
theater and movies, visiting people, engaging in light reading,
listening to gay music, watching television, etc. If all of this
attracts a Christian’s heart, he should make an effort to tear his heart
away from it, at least during the days of Lent. It should
be remembered, for example, that on Fridays St. Seraphim not only
fasted, but spent the day in absolute silence.
Father
Alexander Elchaninov writes: “The fast is a period of spiritual effort.
If we are unable to give up our entire life to God, let us at least
dedicate to Him utterly the periods of fasting
– let us strengthen our prayer, increase our charity, tame our passions,
make peace with our enemies.”
Besides
expressing repentance and abhorrence of sin, the fast has other aspects,
too. The specific days of fasting are not chosen randomly. Wednesday
symbolizes the betrayal of the Saviour – the
lowest moment of the human soul’s fall and shame, as it goes in the
person of Judas to betray the Son of God for 30 pieces of silver. Friday
symbolizes the endurance of humiliation, of agonizing suffering, and
death on the cross of the Redeemer of mankind.
Remembering all of this, how can a Christian not restrict himself by
means of abstinence?
The
Great Lent is the Son of God’s path towards the sacrifice on Golgotha,
etc. The human soul has no right, cannot – if it is Christian – pass
indifferently by these majestic days – significant
landmarks in time. Afterwards, at the Last Judgment, how will it dare to
stand at the right side of the Lord, if it was indifferent to His
sorrow, blood and suffering on those days when the Universal Church –
both on earth and in heaven – remembers them?
In
essence the fast is a spiritual endeavor and is connected with faith and
daring. The fast is pleasing to the Lord as an impulse of a soul that
is aspiring towards purity, striving to release
itself from the fetters of sin, and free the spirit from servitude to
the body. The Church considers it to be one of the efficacious resources
by means of which one can transmute God’s wrath to mercy or bend God’s
will towards the fulfillment of a prayerful
entreaty. Thus, the Acts of the Apostles describe how the Christians of
Antioch fasted and prayed before sending the holy apostles Paul and
Barnabas out to preach (Acts 13:3). Therefore the fast is also practiced
in the Church as a means for preparing oneself
for some endeavor. When in need of something, individual Christians,
monastics, monasteries or churches in general applied themselves to
fasting and increased prayer.
Abstinence in food
For
physically healthy people the basis of fasting is considered to be
abstinence in food. Here one can distinguish 5 levels of physical
fasting: (1) the giving up of meat, (2) the giving up of
dairy products, (3) the giving up of fish, (4) abstinence from vegetable
oil, (5) complete abstinence from food for a certain period of time.
Naturally the last levels of fasting can be accomplished only by healthy
people. For the sick and the old the first
levels of fasting are more appropriate, of which we will speak in more
detail below.
The
power and efficacy of the fast can be evaluated by the strength of
deprivation and sacrifice. And, naturally, it is not only the formal
replacement of non-Lenten foods with Lenten foods that
makes up the true fast: one can prepare exquisite meals from Lenten
foods as well, and thus satisfy to some degree both one’s voluptuousness
and one’s gluttony.
We
should remember that it is improper for a penitent sorrowing over his
sins to eat deliciously and abundantly during the Lent, even though the
meals be formally Lenten. It may be said that that
is not a fast at all, if a person gets up from a table laden with
delicious Lenten foods and feels a satiation of the stomach. This does
not equate with sacrifice or deprivation, and without the latter there
is no genuine fasting. “Wherefore have we fasted,
and Thou seest not?” – calls out the prophet Isaiah, denouncing the Jews
who hypocritically observed all the rules, yet in their hearts stood
far from God and His commandments (Isaiah 58:3).
In some
cases ailing Christians on their own replace the usual fasting in food
with a “spiritual” fast. The latter usually means paying stricter
attention to oneself: keeping oneself away from
sin – abstaining from irritation, the judging of others, quarreling,
etc. All of this is good and well, but can a Christian in normal times
allow himself to sin, to become irritated, judgmental of others, etc.?
It is obvious that a Christian must always be
sober and attentive, guarding himself from sin and all that which may
offend the Holy Spirit. If, however, he is unable to restrain himself,
then the same thing will probably occur both on regular days and during
the Lent. In such a case the replacement of
fasting in food with a similar “spiritual” fasting is usually a matter
of self-deception.
Thus in
cases where due to illness or a great shortage of foodstuffs the
Christian is unable to keep to the usual norms of fasting, he should do
the best he can. For example, he can give up sweets
and delicacies, keep fast at least on Wednesdays and Fridays, choose
foods in such a manner that delicious foods would only be offered on
holidays, etc. If, due to illness, a Christian cannot totally abstain
from non-Lenten food, he can at least limit it on
days of fasting – for example, abstain from eating meat. In other words,
in one way or another he should do his best to take part in fasting.
Some
people refuse to fast out of fear of weakening their health, at the same
time exhibiting hypochondria and lack of faith, and strive to always
feed themselves abundantly with non-Lenten food,
in order to attain good health and maintain their bodies in a well-fed
state. Yet how often it is these same people who suffer from various
illnesses and malfunctioning of internal organs!
The Lord
commands us to conceal our fasting from those around us. However, it
may not always be possible for a Christian to conceal his fasting from
family members. In such a case it may happen
that his relatives will be up in arms against the keeper of the fast,
and their initially soft arguments may turn into irritation and rebuke.
The evil spirit rebels against keepers of the fast through their family
members, invokes all sorts of arguments against
the fast, and presents all kinds of temptations, just as he once tried
to do with the fasting Lord in the wilderness.
Let the
Christian foresee all this in advance. Let him also not expect that as
soon as he commences fasting, he will straightaway receive the comfort
of grace, warmth in the heart, tears of tenderness,
and ardor in prayer. This does not come immediately, but must be earned
through struggles, labors, and sacrifices. Those who followed the path
of rigorous fasting confirmed that sometimes at the beginning of the
Lent there was even a weakening of desire for
prayer or interest in spiritual reading, etc.
The fast
is a treatment, and this latter is often not easy. And just as one can
expect health only at the end of a course of treatment, so one cannot
expect the fast to produce the fruits of the
Holy Spirit – peace, joy, etc. – right away.
Discernment in fasting
Just as all virtues, fasting likewise requires discernment.
St.
Cassian the Roman writes: “Extremes, as the holy fathers say, are
equally harmful on both sides – both an excess of fasting and a
satiation of the belly. We know some people who, not having
been conquered by gluttony, were vanquished by excessive fasting and
fell into the same vice of gluttony as a result of the weakness that
occurred from excessive fasting. Moreover, immoderate abstention is more
harmful than satiation, because from the latter
one can go back to moderation by means of repentance, while from the
former it is impossible.
The
general rule of moderation in abstention is for each person, in
accordance with his physical strength, state of health, and age, to eat
only as much food as is necessary to support health,
and not as much as one wishes. A monk should conduct the matter of
fasting as wisely as though he would be remaining in his body for a
hundred years, and restrain his inner passions – forget offenses and
disdain sorrows – as one who could die any day.”
At the
same time fasting is not a rite, but a mystery of the human soul, which
the Lord commanded to conceal from others. The Lord says: “When ye fast,
be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance:
for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast.
Verily I say unto you – they have their reward. But thou, when thou
fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face, that thou appear not unto
men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in
secret; and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly”
(Matt. 6:16-18). For this reason a Christian should conceal both his
repentance – his prayers and inner tears – and his fasting and
abstinence in food. Here we should fear to reveal our
difference from those around us and should know how to conceal from them
our labors and sacrifices.
In all
cases where the keeper of the fast must eat together with his frailer
brethren, he should not, according to the holy fathers, rebuke them by
his abstinence. Thus the holy abba Isaiah writes:
“If you absolutely wish to abstain more than others, go off into a
separate cell and do not distress your frailer brother.”
It is
not only for the sake of preserving ourselves from vanity that we should
strive not to show off our fasting. If our fast will for some reason
embarrass those around us, will bring forth
rebukes from them or, perhaps, cause mockery, accusations of hypocrisy,
etc. – in such cases we must likewise guard the secret of fasting,
according to the words of the Lord: “Neither cast ye your pearls before
swine” (Matt. 7:6).
In
general, church rules must not be treated with formality. We should
remember the Lord’s injunction that “the Sabbath was made for man, and
not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27). At the same
time, writes Saint Innocent of Moscow, “it is not wise to transgress the
fast without need, so that the one who is able to keep the fast through
a choice of food – let him keep it. But the one who does not have the
possibility to choose his food, let him use
all that God gives him, but without excess; at the same time, you must
rigorously keep fast with your soul, your mind, and your thoughts, and
then your fast will be as pleasing to God as the fast of the most
abstemious observers of Lent.
The goal
of the fast is to ease and tame the body, restrain desires and disarm
passions. Therefore the Church, asking you about food, does not
primarily wish to know what kind of food you are
using, but rather the reason for which you are using it.”
Saints
Barsonuphius the Great and John say: “What is Lent but punishment of the
body, in order to tame the healthy body and make it frail for passions,
according to the apostle: ‘When I am weak,
then I am strong’ (2 Cor. 12:10). And illness, more than such
punishment, is counted in lieu of the fast and is valued even more
greatly. Whoever suffers it patiently, giving gratitude to God, through
his patience receives the fruit of his salvation. Instead
of the body’s strength being weakened through fasting, it is already
weakened by the illness. Therefore, do not be saddened even if you eat
several times a day: you will not be judged for it, since you are not
doing it to pamper yourself.”
Concerning
the correct norm for fasting, St. Barsonuphius the Great gives the
following instruction: “In regard to fasting I will say the following:
examine your heart to see whether it has not
been robbed by vanity, and if it was not robbed, then examine it a
second time to see whether this fast has not made you weak in performing
your functions, for such weakness should not exist, and if even in this
no harm has come to you, then you are fasting
properly.”
The
desert-dweller Nikiphoros says: “The Lord does not require hunger, but
spiritual labor. Spiritual labor is the utmost a person can do on his
own, and the rest is obtained through grace. We
have little strength now, and so the Lord does not ask any great feats
from us. I tried to fast strictly and saw that I could not. I become
weak and lose strength to pray properly. I once became so weakened by
fasting that I could not even get up to read my
prayers.”
This is
an example of improper fasting. Bishop Herman writes: “Exhaustion is a
sign of improper fasting; it is just as harmful as satiation. Even great
elders ate soup with oil during the first
week of Great Lent. Ailing flesh should not be crucified, but
supported.”
Thus all
weakening of health and the ability to work during Lent speaks of its
incorrectness and the overstepping of its norm. Best of all is for
keepers of the fast to be guided by the instructions
of experienced spiritual instructors. For elderly people, for example,
it can be difficult to change their usual dietary regimen for the sake
of Lent, since this often leads to a loss of working ability. However,
those who transgress the fast because of illness
or old age should still remember that this can also include a certain
amount of lack of faith and incontinence. For this reason, when the
spiritual children of Father Alexis Zosimovsky were forced to transgress
the fast by a doctor’s prescription, the elder
ordered them in such cases to repent and pray thus: “Lord, forgive me
for transgressing the holy fast by order of the doctor and my own
frailty,” and not to think that this is how it must be.
Lent and children
How
early should children begin to keep the fast? According to the teaching
of the Holy Fathers, a healthy infant does not fast only while he is
being nursed by his mother, i.e. approximately
until the age of three.
Together
with the need to keep the fast to some degree, it is also necessary to
ensure that children are prevented from acquiring the habit of satiation
or of eating too frequently and at the
wrong time. In this regard, the holy hierarch Theophanus the Recluse
gives the following advice to parents: “Children must be fed in such a
way that, while expanding the body’s growth and making it strong and
healthy, the soul should not be incited by bodily
indulgence. One should not think of the child as being too small, but
from the earliest years one must teach it to restrain the flesh and
control it, so that both in infancy, and in youth, and even afterwards
the individual could easily and freely cope with
this need.”
When
children grow up and their natures and inclinations become established,
parents should exhibit tactfulness in regard to the degree of their
offspring’s fasting. For example, one cannot deprive
them of dessert against their will, or reduce the content of food to
such an extent on days of fasting that the normal bound of church rules
would be overstepped. And for feeble and ailing children a reduction or
departure from fasting is naturally allowed.
In the
same manner grown children (young men and maidens) cannot be forcibly
held to a strict observance of all the rules of fasting if they feel
burdened by it. In such a case the fasting will
not bring any benefit to the soul, but may even harden it. The Lord
said: “I will have mercy and not sacrifice” (Matt. 9:13). Indeed, the
entire meaning of the Lent lies in a voluntary restraint and limiting of
oneself. Thus, in order for the usual rules of
fasting not to be burdensome for grown children, they should be trained
to keep fast from the earliest age.
Lent and television
Physical
fasting presupposes the following: (1) abstinence in food; (2) the use
of only certain kinds of food; (3) infrequent eating.
Spiritual
fasting must also include: (1) abstinence in acceptance of external
impressions – the food of the soul, i.e. information, which people have
become used to receiving daily in huge amounts;
(2) control over this information, i.e. over the quality of the food
which the soul receives, and the exclusion of everything that incites
the passions; (3) infrequent intake of this food, i.e. periods of
solitude, quiet, silence, time spent on one’s own, in
order to have the opportunity to realize one’s sins and accomplish the
main goal of the Lent, which is repentance…
Our
passions are closely tied in with sensual images. Passion arises in the
consciousness in the form of a sinful image; and, in turn, a sinful
image accepted from the outside incites passion
in our heart.
In
modern times, the stage on which human passions are continuously
demonstrated in all their diversity, effectiveness, and sophistication
is the television. It is similar to a source of constant
radiation that bombards people’s psyches with lethal strontium.
Television
keeps a person in passionate tension, as though the space of its screen
comprises a concentration of all possible emotions, passions, lusts,
cruelty, crimes. All that in previous ages
a person could encounter – and accidentally at that – only a few times
throughout his lifetime (for example, the scene of a murder), he now
sees every single day.
Television
caters to man’s basest passions; even seemingly moral plays include
erotic scenes, perhaps out of fear that the viewer will fall asleep from
excessive moralizing, and sometimes these
scenes constitute the main subject of the entire transmission. In
turning on the television, a person voluntarily places himself within
the sphere of spiritual filth.
In
ancient times the Church barred adulterers from communion for many
years, because this particular sin soaks all the pores of the body and
soul in poison, and a long time is needed for the person
to cleanse himself and sober up, to get back on his feet as though from a
grave and protracted illness. An adulterer is spiritually dead until he
sincerely repents. After viewing erotic images on television, a person
comes to church as one who is dead: his
soul is deaf and blind, it cannot feel grace, cannot pray sincerely.
Repentance presupposes a resolve not to sin any more, while in this case
the person usually returns from church (sometimes even after taking
communion) and spends hours watching television.
He not only becomes spiritually desolate, but gradually grace itself
withers away within him.
Another
evil a person receives from television is becoming inured to killing and
violence. In ancient Rome the battles of gladiators in the circus, the
contests between people and wild animals,
and similar “amusements” attracted tens of thousands of viewers. The
motto of the Roman crowd was “bread and spectacles,” as though these
words comprised their entire life. And the most awesome spectacle for
the crowd was the sight of running blood and the
throes of death.
Under
the influence of television people calmly watch murder scenes. If they
had had any human love or compassion left in them, they would have
turned away in horror from such a nightmare. Television
has made crime and cruelty a routine event. If someone were to say that
he was horrified and disgusted at watching scenes of violence and
murder, he would be considered a neurotic. If he were to say that he
regarded it beneath a Christian’s dignity to watch
erotic pictures, he would be called a hypocrite with outdated
old-fashioned views.
The soul
has three abilities: reason, emotion, and will. From constant communion
with television a person’s will becomes weakened, emotion becomes
blunted and seeks new stimuli, while reason becomes
enslaved by continuously changing images, which cause the person to live
in some kind of fantasy world.
The
reason has two abilities: visual and verbal thinking. An overabundant
and uncontrollable stream of information develops a mechanical memory,
but suppresses the creative force and energy. A
person who continuously takes in an excessive amount of food becomes a
shapeless lump of fat which has a hard time moving and breathing, and
which is barely able to move its legs under its own weight. An excessive
and uncontrollable amount of information is
similar to chronic overeating. The mind becomes feeble and passive and
dependent on alien opinions and ideas. The images which the person has
seen on television revolve in his subconscious, surface in his memory,
flitter in his dreams. Thinking becomes superficial,
while the tongue becomes garrulous. The psyche’s defense mechanisms
become depleted, being unable to cope with the avalanche of impressions
that are received.
Where is
there room for silence, for inner prayer? A person does not see himself
properly; he appears to be living not in a home, but in a theater with
never-ending shows.
The Holy
Fathers say that there are three types of mental activity:
contemplation, which is born in the silence of prayer, reasoning, and
imagination, with imagination being the lowest form of
thinking, connected as it is with sensual passions and fantasy. The Holy
Fathers enjoin us to remain in a state of prayer, to give place to
reasoning whenever necessary in practical life (but at the same time
knowing its measure and limitations), and to combat
imagination as one’s adversary. Television, on the other hand, promotes
the opposite: it develops imagination, suppresses the mind’s creative
force, and brings about an abandonment of prayer. A person who spends
the time of Lent watching television is similar
to a glutton and a drunkard who swallows everything without
discrimination, even without chewing the pieces, and at the same time
believes he is keeping fast according to all the Church rules.
Observing the fast in conjugal life
Spouses
should strictly follow the customs and regulations of the Church in
regard to conjugal abstinence on feast days, Sunday, and Lenten days
(Wednesdays and Fridays and the four fasts), remembering
the words of St. Seraphim and Elder Ambrose that a disregard for these
Church regulations may lead to illness of the spouse and children. At
the same time, one should bear in mind that the church day begins from
6:00 of the evening before and, therefore, one
should abstain from the eve of the feast or Lenten day until the eve of
the following day.
But what
if one of the spouses does not wish to observe the Lenten day or the
feast? Here we come across one of the hazards of a marriage between
people of differing opinions and points of view.
Such a situation inevitably leads to family drama and deep sorrow.
According to St. Paul, a spouse may not be refused, but this will lead
to a violation of the sanctity of the feast or the fast.
At this
point we come to the conclusion that a prudent choice of spouse is of
great importance in ensuring happiness in marriage. The marriage, which
in essence constitutes a voluntary obedience,
will be easy and happy only when the soul submits to a pious and
righteous spouse, and it is impossible to avoid misfortune if the spouse
turns out to be in the grip of passion and sin. It is for this reason
that the Apostle Paul grieves for those who have
entered into marriage: “Such shall have trouble in the flesh; but I pity
you” (1 Cor. 7:28).
Conclusion
A
Christian’s attitude towards fasting is essentially a touchstone for his
soul in gauging his attitude towards the Church of Christ and towards
Christ Himself. A soul which lives with a lively
faith in Christ cannot neglect fasting. Otherwise it will ally itself
with those who are indifferent to Christ and religion. In addressing
Christians, the New Martyr Priest Valentin Sventitsky writes: “Keep and
cherish the fast as one of the greatest sacred
church treasures. Each time you abstain from what is forbidden on the
days of fasting, – you are one with the entire Church. You are doing
with one mind that which the entire Church and all the saints have done
from the very first days of the Church’s existence.
This will give you power and strength in your spiritual life.”
A
certain opponent of Lent once said to the holy Elder Ambrose of Optina:
“What does it matter to God what kind of food we eat?” To this the Elder
replied: “It is not the food that matters, but
the commandment; Adam was expelled from paradise not for gluttony, but
for tasting, just tasting what was forbidden. For this reason even now
you may eat whatever you want on Tuesday and Thursday, and you are not
punished for it, but for Wednesday and Friday
you are punished, because meekness is developed through obedience.”
The Jews
cried out to God: “Wherefore have we fasted, and Thou seest not?” And
the Lord replies to them through the mouth of the prophet: “Behold, in
the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and
exact heavy labors from others… Is it such a fast that I have chosen, a
day for a man to afflict his soul? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an
acceptable day to the Lord? Here is the fast that I have chosen: loose
the bands of wickedness, let the oppressed go
free, and undo the heavy burdens; share thy bread with the hungry and
bring the poor that are cast out into thy house… Then shall thy light
break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth
speedily, and thy righteousness shall go before thee,
and the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward. Then shalt thou call, and
the Lord shall answer; thou shalt cry, and He shall say: ‘Here I am!’”
(Isaiah 58:3-9). This marvelous place from the Book of Isaiah denounces
those who think to be saved only by following
the letter of the fast and forgetting the commandments of charity,
loving one’s neighbors, and serving them.
The
significance and purpose of genuine fasting in the life of a Christian
may be summarized by the following words of St. Isaac the Syrian: “The
fast is the guardian of all virtue, the beginning
of the struggle, the crown of abstinence, the beauty of virginity, the
source of chastity and prudence, the teacher of silence, the forerunner
of all good deeds… Fasting and abstinence produce a wondrous fruit in
the soul – a knowledge of God’s mysteries.”
***********************************************************************************************************************************
Lent
as a Divine Establishment and Spiritual Remedy. Lent, in Church songs
and the writings of the Holy Fathers, is called a spiritual healer.
And so,
what is lent? In accordance with Dal's Tolkovyi slovar' [Explanatory
Dictionary], lent ["post" in Russian] is "the abstinence from non-lenten
food and vain pleasures." The Church of Christ
teaches that lent is religious-moral vigilance and the salvific labor of
piety. Truly Christian fasting is not only abstinence of the body from
the usual food, but the restraint of the soul from all that is sinful.
This latter abstinence must be united with
the efforts of heightened prayer of repentance, moral purity, piety and
good works. "Fast, brethren, bodily, let us fast spiritually as well,"
the Church urges us to be increasingly watchful over both our body and
our soul.
The
history of the development of lent as a religious-moral struggle of
man's obedience to God through abstinence from food reaches back to the
law given by God even in the Garden of Eden to our
ancestor, Adam "And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, of every
tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat but of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it" (Gen 2:16-17). So
lent is as ancient as man himself.
Yet as
we read in the book of Genesis, our ancestor Adam violated this law on
abstinence given by God through the sin of disobedience, which is called
the original sin. Through original sin, the
first man introduced corruption into his divine nature, expressed
through a tendency towards sin rather than towards good.
We find
evidence of the corruption of human nature through Adam's disobedience
which led to the fall, evidence of the constant battle within mankind
between the flesh and the spirit, and of the
psychological duality of our divine-like souls under the influence of
good and evil, all of this in Holy Scripture, which depicts this mighty
struggle between good and evil within mankind. A corrupt nature is not
strong enough to wage this war without the grace-filled
help of God. This kind of aid was and can be received only through the
labors of faith and piety, of which fasting and prayer assume the
primary position. The Holy Fathers depict this as fasting and prayer
being the wings of the human spirit which carry the
soul to the heavens, far from human cares and vanities, from sin and
lawlessness.
In the
Old Testament, the holy Prophets of God Moses and Elias both fasted for
forty days, thereby becoming worthy to converse with Christ on Mount
Tabor (Ex. 34:28; Matth. 17:3). Prophet Daniel
ate no food for 3 weeks (Dan. 10:2-3) and Ezra for 7 days (Ezr.
8:21-23). King David prayed and fasted and received through the Prophet
Nathan forgiveness for his sins from God (2 Sam. 12:16-20). The pious
Judean woman Judith fasted "all the days of her widowhood,"
except on sabbath eves and sabbaths, new moon eves and new moons,
feastdays and holidays (Judith 8:6). Ninevites prayed and fasted "the
greatest of them even to the least of them" and turned away God's wrath
for their great sins (Jonah 3:5-10). The Israelites
fasted by God's will during the terrible desolation from the palmerworm
and the locust (Joel 1:14, 2:12-15). In order to please God, the
Israelites fasted on the 4th, 5th, 7th and 10th months, as we see from
the book of the Prophet Zachariah (Zach. 8:19).
On the
cusp of the Old and New Testaments, we see the example of a great
fasting ascetic in the person of John the Baptist (Mark 1:6), and the
84-year-old Prophetess Anna: "And there was one Anna,
a prophetess, the daughter of Phan'u-el, of the tribe of Asher: she was
of a great age, and had lived with a husband seven years from her
virginity, and she was a widow of about fourscore and four years, which
departed not from the temple, but served God with
fastings and prayers night and day" (Luke 2:36-37). .
In the
New Testament, fasting is established and sanctified by the Head of the
Church Himself, our Lord Jesus Christ, both through His personal example
of fasting, and by His teachings and preaching
on fasting.
After
being baptized, before His emergence to serve mankind, Jesus Christ
spent forty days and nights in the wilderness in a strict fast. Then,
during the Sermon on the Mount, Christ spoke these
words: "Moreover when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad
countenance: for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto
men to fast. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward But thou,
when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy
face that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is
in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee
openly" (Matthew 6:16-18).
Christ
equated fasting with prayer as a weapon in the struggle against the
temptations of the devils, saying "Howbeit this kind goeth not out but
by prayer and fasting" (Matthew 17:21).
Following
the example set by the Savior, the holy apostles and other righteous
persons of the New Testaments sanctified fasting through their own lives
and teachings.
Holy
Apostle Paul wrote of his labors, that he was constantly "in weariness
and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings
often, in cold and nakedness" (II Corinthians
11:27), and, urging others to fast, said of himself: "[I]n stripes, in
imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, in fastings" (II
Corinthians 6:5). We read in Acts on the prophets and teachers of the
Antiochian Church: Now there were in the church
that was at An'ti-och certain prophets and teachers; as Barnabas, and
Simeon that was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyre'ne, and Man'a-en, which
had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. As they
ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost
said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called
them. And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on
them, they sent them away" (Acts 13:1-3).
The
Church instructs those who fast to eat the produce of the earth during
lent and forbids the consumption of meat and other foods taken from the
animal kingdom.
In this
way, the Holy Church during returns those who fast to their original,
normal, Paradisic food, which was decreed by God to the first man.
This was
food taken from the fruits of plants and grasses. God allowed meat to
be eaten by mankind only after the Flood, because of the weakening of
the human organism and the sparse offerings
of the earth. Meat has the properties of fattening a person, making him
heavier, sleepier, overly soft and more sinful.
The
Church of Christ set aside special times of the year for the labors of
fasting and repentant prayer, and all of the faithful, in obligation to
obey the Mother Church, must observe the fasts,
holding to the church rule regarding eating and drinking, devoting
themselves to repentant prayer, labors of mercy and partaking of the
Holy Mysteries.
Despite
all the above instructions for fasting and its positive effect on the
soul of the believer, not one other teaching and tradition of the Church
of Christ is subjected to so many assaults
and distortions as the law of the observation of lent.
There
are entire religions, such as Protestantism and the various sects and
heretical groups that have stemmed from it which reject the fasting
established by the Ecumenical Councils. For example,
the Catholic Church, while recognizing fasts, does not consider it
sinful to ignore them, and violates them with a clear conscience. Both
of these deniers and violators of fasts try to soothe the conscience of
their flocks by finding in Holy Scripture justification
for this sin of resisting the laws of God and His Holy Church. They
usually defend their false teaching by referring to the words of Apostle
Paul: "But meat commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are
we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we
the worse" (1 Corinthians 8:8).
But
these words by the Apostle refer not to fasting, but to food. During the
time of the Apostle, there were arguments about clean and unclean food.
Holy Apostle Paul clarifies that all that God
created is in and of itself clean. "I know, and am persuaded by the Lord
Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that
esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean" (Romans 14:14).
"All things are lawful unto me, but all things
are not expedient" (1 Corinthians, 6:12). "For one believeth that he may
eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs." (Romans 14:20).
"For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and
peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." (Romans 14:17).
So the
texts of Holy Apostle Paul on food teach us that food by itself is
neither a condition nor an obstacle for the achievement of the Kingdom
of Heaven, for food is either lenten (vegetable)
or non-lenten (meat or dairy), not good or evil, it is not the path to
the Kingdom of Heaven, it is not within food and drink that exist
righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, but in the human heart,
in a person's Christian behavior.
Everything
depends on how the person uses food and drink—to the glory of God, for
the health and salvation of the soul and the flesh, or for sin, towards
the temptation of others. Food and drink
are sinful when the person abuses them through non-abstinence, gluttony,
or the disobedience of the laws of God and the Church.
Among
our own Orthodox people who call themselves believers one often hears
such words as "Why was lent established, anyway, does God really need
our physical fasting?" Of course, God does not
need it, just as He does not need anything, but our own soul needs
fasting, and our body. Lent is our time to test ourselves, a time to
make our account of the wrong we have done, to examine those things for
which our conscience does not berate us. The time
of fasting is a time of spiritual sorrow over our sins. He who only
grieves over purely earthly matters or failures, does he not often
refuse food for days at a time, does he not refuse all sorts of
amusements, does he not suffer from sleeplessness, despite
the fact that his loved ones advise him to tend to his health? That is
why fasting has existed always, at all times and among all peoples,
beginning with the Jews, the Assyrians, the Hindus, Chinese, Egyptians,
ancient Greeks and Romans, and finally among Christians.
If by fasting people express their sorrow over earthly misfortune, why
do some then reject the voice of the Church which calls upon us to
express our sorrow over our sinfulness through fasting?
Indeed,
does even the thought of eating non-lenten food occur to someone who is
consumed with feelings of repentance? Would pleasures and amusements
occupy themind of a person whose mind is consumed
by worry over how to earn God's mercy through repentance? Could such a
person exist who, being genuinely immersed in repentant prayers in
church, hearing the Gospel readings on the Passions of the Lord,
venerating the Epitaphion (shroud), then exit the church
and attend a ball or go to the theater, and at the same time say to
others that he is filled with feelings of repentance? No, truly
spiritual sorrow affects our external lives as well.
The
enemies of fasting also object, reasoning that lent ostensibly weakens
the body--but God does not ask us to cause our own death. Unfortunately,
these people either forget or do not know that
the Church releases from fasting the sick, those whose bodies suffer
from consuming only Lenten food. The 69th Rule of the Apostles states:
"If any bishop, presbyter, or deacon, or reader, or singer, does not
fast the holy Quadragesimal fast of Easter, or the
fourth day, or the day of Preparation, let him be deposed, unless he be
hindered by some bodily infirmity. If he be a layman, let him be
excommunicated." The 19th Canon of the Council of Gangra states: "If any
of the ascetics, without bodily necessity disregard
the fasts commonly prescribed and observed by the Church, being in
perfect understanding in the matter, let him be anathema." St Timothy,
Bishop of Alexandria, in his Rule 10 said on this matter: "If a man be
sick and from severe illness is weakened, and Holy
Pascha approaches, is such a man obliged to fast, or for his severe
weakness may the clergyman release from him to eat food and drink what
he may, if oil or wine?" responded: "A sick man must be permitted to
take food and drink dependent upon what he can bear.
For a man completely weakened, by taking oil he does a righteous thing."
In the same saint's 8th rule, the following question is put forth: "If a
woman is in child-bed before Holy Pascha, on the Great Week, must she
fast and not drink of wine, or is she released
from fasting and from wine for giving birth?" His response was: "Fasting
is established for the humbling of our bodies. And so when the body is
humbled and in need, she must then take food and drink if she can and
can endure." And in the Syntagma, the following
is added: "When it, that is, the body, is weak, it needs not burdens,
but succor, to return health and gather its former strength."
Despite
their own very great labors, which are prohibitive for us, the holy
ascetics had mostly achieved a venerable age. This means that strict
fasts and weakening through fasting and labor does
not shorten the life span of a person, and so the non-observance of
fasting under the pretext of preserving ones health is most often an
excuse which conceals the desire to sate ones flesh, and appease ones
spiritual laxity.
Some
also say the following: "Fasting should be in the quantity, not the
quality of the food, since Lenten food is sometimes tastier than meat!"
Of course, one can overeat of Lenten food, for
example, in this country, where there are so many Lenten food products,
and this happens among many who do "observe" lent.
Such
fasting is, of course, condemned by the Church, which calls it
Pharisee-ism, using the words of the Savior Himself. The inconsistency
of such fasting with the teaching of the Church is apparent.
The Church divided food into groupings of Lenten and non-Lenten not so
that people could overeat of the first, and not so that this food could
be used to make gourmet dishes, but so that the measured consumption of
this food would remind us that now is the
time for reflection upon the soul, and not the body.
Of all
the creatures living on earth, only man is granted the ability to
subject himself to self-testing and self-correction. Other creatures do
not test themselves, since they cannot. Only man
can fast in the world, that is, deny himself of one or another thing for
a higher goal. In this case, fasting is a very positive educator of
human will, which is the steering wheel of our life, setting us onto the
path of good or sin.
In
conclusion, I will bring the following deeply-edifying words to attest
to the health benefits of the labor of fasting: "It is a remarkable
thing: no matter how much we bother about our health,
what healthful and pleasant foods we eat, what nutritious beverages we
drink, no matter how many long walks we take in fresh air, still, in the
end, we suffer from sickness and disease. The saints, who despised
their flesh, mortifying their bodies with constant
abstention, fasting, lying on the bare ground, keeping vigil, have
removed death from their souls and their bodies. Our bodies, so well-fed
and pampered, give off a stench after death, and sometimes during life,
while their bodies are aromatic and they blossom
as during life. My brethren! Come to see what you goal is, the aim of
your life. We must mortify our many-passioned body through restraint,
labor, prayer, and not stimulate it with sweets, temptations and sloth."
And so
let us remember that Lenten food serves as a reminder for us on this
period of our self-testing, the time of our repentance and the time of
our self-correction.
"'While
fasting with the body, brethren, let us also fast in spirit! Let us
loose every bond of iniquity; Let us undo the knots of every contract
made by violence ; Let us tear up all unjust
agreements; Let us give bread to the hungry and welcome to our house the
poor who have no roof to cover , them, that we may receive great mercy
from Christ our God. Amen." Protopriest Nikolai Dombrowski (+1979)
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Homily for the second Sunday of the Great Lent
Today’s
Gospel, read during the Divine Liturgy, tells us of the healing of a
person sick of the palsy. Upon coming into the city of Capernaum, the
Lord Jesus Christ stayed in a certain home. News
of this spread throughout the entire city, and the overjoyed inhabitants
began to gather to Him in such great droves, that all the people were
unable to get inside the house. At this time a man was brought up whose
entire body was sick of the palsy. Being unable
to squeeze through to Jesus Christ, the people who brought the sick man
decided to uncover the roof of the courtyard in which Jesus Christ was
sitting and preaching. It should be noted that courtyards in the
Palestine were usually covered to protect them from
the sun, and it was not too hard to uncover such a roof. Thus, having
uncovered the roof, the sick man’s friends let him down on his bed to
lie at Jesus’ feet. This action revealed both in them and in the sick
man a strong faith in the Saviour’s omnipotence
and mercy. Seeing such faith on their part, the Lord said: “Son, thy
sins be forgiven thee.” And then He granted health to the man sick of
the palsy, saying: “Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into
thine house.”
Especially
remarkable in this healing is the fact that the Lord first forgives the
sick man’s sins and only afterwards heals his body. In this manner He
reminds us that the primary cause of all
illness is sin. Thus, in order to be healed of illness, before going to
an earthly physician one must consult the Heavenly One. There are many
examples where the healing of the body is not always needed as long as
the soul is completely healed, since in such
cases physical illness often passes without any treatment, even when
physicians are unable to help a sick person with medications.
The
story of the man sick of the palsy is also instructive in that the Lord
pays attention not only to the faith of the sick man himself, but also
of those who had brought him, because it says
in the Gospel: “when Jesus saw their faith…”. From this we see that when
someone is sick, his family members and close friends should appeal for
his healing with prayers of faith to the Heavenly Physician. For this
purpose the Church has established special
prayers for the sick, and also the sacrament of Holy Unction.
It is
not by chance that the Church has decreed that the Gospel narrative
about the man sick of the palsy be read during the Great Lent. The
Church’s intent is to show all of us during these days
of fasting and communion the image of the man sick of the palsy as a
reflection of our own spiritual state, and in his healing to indicate to
us the means of restoring our own spiritual health.
Repentance
is one of the foundations of our spiritual life, and it is closely tied
in with fasting and abstinence, while fasting in turn is the means to
grace-filled inner enlightenment, when
a person already begins to enter more deeply into spiritual life and
spiritual joy.
The
Orthodox teaching that fasting and repentance constitute a means towards
grace-filled illumination is especially powerfully revealed by Saint
Gregory Palamas, Archbishop and Wonderworker of
Thessalonika, who is commemorated this Sunday (his feast day is November
14th). St. Gregory is known as the denouncer of the heresy, or false
teaching, of Varlaam, a Calabrian monk who rejected the Orthodox
teaching on the grace-filled light which illuminates
a person internally (i.e. fills a person with spiritual joy) and is
sometimes revealed externally, visibly, such as, for example, on Mount
Tabor, on Mount Sinai, or as it happened to St. Seraphim during his
conversation with Motovilov. Varlaam and his disciple
Akindinus taught that it is impossible to achieve this illumination by
means of prayer, fasting, or other spiritual labors of self-sacrifice.
This heresy was rejected by a council in A.D. 1341, at which St. Gregory
zealously fought for Orthodoxy.
On the
first Sunday of the Great Lent the Church commemorated the triumph of
Orthodoxy over all the heresies, while on this Sunday it commemorates
the triumph of Orthodox ascetic teaching. We
thus enter more profoundly into spiritual life than we usually do at
other times.
The Church, as a kind and loving mother, leads us gradually into spiritual life, into a spiritual atmosphere.
During
the preparatory weeks to the Great Lent the Church led us gradually by
means of Gospel narratives, beginning as though with the alphabet of
spiritual life. During the Lent itself the Church
leads us more deeply into an understanding and perception of spiritual
life and offers us examples from life which we should try to follow as
best we can. Thus, each Sunday of the Lent we should immerse ourselves
more deeply into the mysteries of God’s plan
for our salvation, until we hear the deepest and most supreme mystery of
all – the words “Christ is risen!” That is the purpose and the joy of
our entire faith.
Let us
heed the teaching of the Holy Church and cherish it in our hearts, and
let us ascend the spiritual ladder until grace-filled light illuminates
our souls, giving us the peace of spiritual
joy. Amen. Protopriest Igor Hrebinka
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ANNUNCIATION OF THE HOLY VIRGIN
In the
Holy Land, in the city of Nazareth, there is a spring of water which is
called “the spring of the Mother of God.” According to holy tradition,
the young maiden Mary went to this spring
for water, as maidens and young women did in those days. And there, at
this spring, She heard a voice: “Thou wilt give birth to My Son.” She
alone heard this voice, but Her pure soul trembled at the voice of Her
Lord and Creator. Trembling and fearful, She
returned to Her house, and trying to calm Her agitated soul, took up Her
favorite pastime – reading the Holy Scriptures.
And when
She began reading, She chanced upon that part of the Book Isaiah which
talks about the Saviour of the world being born of a Virgin. But so
profound was Her humbleness, that despite the
words which She had just heard at the spring, She did not even think of
applying the prophecy to Herself, but simply thought: “How glad would I
be to become even the lowliest servant of this most blessed Maiden.”
The Annunciation
At this
moment, as the Gospel tells us, the Archangel Gabriel appeared before
Her, and She heard his words: “Hail, Thou that art full of grace, the
Lord is with Thee! Blessed art Thou among women.”
The
appearance of the angel did not itself frighten the Virgin, because it
was not new to Her. Before moving to Nazareth, She lived at the temple
where, according to tradition, the Archangel Gabriel
appeared to Her, brought Her food, and conversed with Her. Thus, She
would not have been particularly agitated by his coming. But She heard
from him an unusual greeting, which no other maiden or woman had ever
heard before, and so She was bewildered by the
angel’s words and began pondering their meaning. The Archangel
continued: “Fear not, Mary, for Thou hast found favour with God; Thou
shalt bring forth a Son and shalt call His name Jesus; He shall be
great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest, and the
Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of His father David, and of His
kingdom there shall be no end.”
When the
Virgin Mary heard the Archangel’s annunciation, She became even more
bewildered: how could She become a mother, when She had vowed to remain a
virgin? And so She humbly asked the angel:
“How shall this be, seeing that I know not a man?”
But when
the Archangel said to Her: “The Holy Spirit shall come upon Thee, and
the power of the Highest shall overshadow Thee,” and ended his
annunciation with the words “for with God nothing
shall be impossible,” She understood that this birth would be
supernatural and, calming down, She said those divine words which the
Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow called “an annunciation from earth to
heaven.”
Let us
note: the Archangel has seemingly done his job, has told Her everything,
has explained everything, – but he is still waiting for something, he
is still not leaving, and finally he hears
Her answer, about which the Metropolitan Philaret said, that if the
angel’s message was an annunciation from heaven to earth, then Her words
were an annunciation from earth to heaven: “Behold the handmaiden of
the Lord – be it unto me according to thy word.”
Excited
by all that had transpired, and having learned from the angel of the
special event that had occurred in the life of her older relative, the
righteous Elizabeth, who, after having lost
all hope of ever having children, was now herself an expectant mother,
the Theotokos hurried over to her. And great was Her joy when She
entered Elizabeth’s house and heard from her the very same words with
which She had been greeted in Nazareth by the angel:
“Blessed art Thou among women!” And at this point from Her pure heart
poured forth the prayer which is so beloved by the Church and which is
sung at every matins: “My soul doth magnify the Lord and My spirit hath
rejoiced in God My Saviour…” And further She
speaks of how the Lord has looked with favor upon Her humility, and that
it has become clear to Her how high now is Her lot: “For, behold, from
henceforth all generations shall call Me blessed, for He that is Mighty
hath done to Me great things.” And She adds,
glorifying God: “…and holy is His name.”
This
entire event clearly showed the basic character traits of the Theotokos:
Her amazing humility, because of which She could not at first encompass
the thought of becoming the Mother of God,
and Her loyalty to God and complete submission to His divine will, in
accordance with which She called Herself the handmaiden of God. The Holy
Virgin gave us the highest and holiest example of how we must always be
primarily concerned with fulfilling the will
of God, especially during important moments of our lives, as She Herself
fulfilled it on the day of Her Annunciation.
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HOMILY FOR PALM SUNDAY
“Much
people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was
coming to Jerusalem, took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet
Him, and cried: Hosanna! blessed is the King of
Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord! And Jesus, when He had found
a young ass, sat thereon, as it is written: fear not, daughter of Sion!
behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an ass’s colt” (John 12:12-15).
Palm Sunday
We
celebrate, dear brethren, the triumphant entry of the Lord Jesus Christ
into Jerusalem. His procession was quite extraordinary: He entered on a
young ass who had never worn a yoke, attended
by a great multitude of people, who walked in front and behind and
cried: Hosanna! blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of
the Lord! The people greeted the Lord triumphantly and joyously for His
having resurrected His friend Lazarus – already
a decomposing dead man – from the dead with solely His word. This great
and fearful miracle was performed by the Lord as an example and portent
of the universal resurrection of the dead that is to take place in its
own time, also by the mighty word of the Lord
Jesus Christ. It is for this reason that He came to Jerusalem, in order
to suffer and die, and – as Life-giver and God – to vanquish by His
death and overcome the universal death of mankind, to arise from the
dead by His own power, and to grant universal resurrection.
Thus, remember that Jesus Christ entered into Jerusalem in order to
suffer for the sins of all mankind, including mine and yours, in order
to vanquish our death, and turn it into a mirage, and resurrect all
humanity from the dead, and after the universal judgment
grant all believers and all genuinely repenting sinners an eternal life
of rapture.
Do not
forget at what terrible and immensely great cost did the Lord gain
victory over this horror of mankind – death, and with what suffering was
lifted from us God’s just condemnation for man’s
damning, incongruous, and pernicious sin, and was granted blissful
immortality and a rapturous life in the celestial dwelling, in the
incorruptible homeland. This victory was gained through the Son of God’s
unimaginable anguish, terrible suffering, and tormenting
death on the cross in His human nature.
Many of
those who do not believe in this righteous, wise, and loving design of
God for salvation express the following query: why and for what reason
was needed such a terrible sacrifice of His
Son on the part of God the Father? Why this voluntary, horrific passion
of the Son of God, His humbleness, descent, humiliation, His surrender
into the hands of His enemies, and the allowance of such horrible
accountability on the part of His disciple Judas
and all Jesus’ enemies: the high priests, the Jewish elders, the people,
the scribes and the Pharisees, Pilate, the Roman soldiers, and all the
participants in the Son of God’s unjust condemnation and suffering? One
must be quite nearsighted and dim-witted
to ask such questions and not see the connection between mankind’s
infinite guilt before God because of its innumerable and heavy sins, its
boundless accountability and liability for punishment on the part of
God’s truth, and sinful mankind’s inaccessibility
to the wrathful God without the intercession of the Mediator between God
and men, Who, solely out of love and compassion for perishing souls,
took upon Himself, as the sole and greatest Righteous One, this
endlessly great responsibility before God’s judgment,
and through His absolute truth, His suffering for the sake of atonement,
and His death redeemed guilty mankind from righteous wrath, damnation,
and eternal condemnation for its sins.
God,
being all-just, could not absolve sinful mankind without the offering of
a sacrifice of truth for it, otherwise He would not have been God, for
what communion is there between truth and iniquity?
What commonality between light and darkness? (2 Cor.6:14). It was
impossible not to justly punish the sins of mankind in the person of the
greatest Righteous One, Jesus Christ, Who voluntarily took upon Himself
the sins of the entire world, so that He could
justly acquire power from the Father to forgive the sins of all those
who believe in Him, have been illuminated by His light of grace, have
become cognizant of their sins and repent of them; He had to taste our
death, combat it, and vanquish it, in order to
deliver all of us from our many centuries’ of enslavement to it and,
finally, to conclude His glorious work of atonement by His resurrection
from the dead, in order to have the power to resurrect all mankind, for
whose sins He had offered His Father full ransom
with His own self; for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is
eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord (Rom. 6:23).
This is
the reason why the Son of God’s sufferings and His death for mankind
were necessary. Without them humanity would have perished forever,
completely, irreversibly, as have perished all the
demons.
As
regards the terrible accountability that exists for Judas’ betrayal, for
the demonic schemes against the Saviour on the part of the high priests
and Jewish elders, the scribes and the Pharisees,
– they sinned against the promised Messiah of their own free will,
through their willful blindness, through their avarice and envy; and
seeing the Saviour’s charity and miracles, and His righteous life, – it
was as though they did not see; and hearing His holy
words, – it was as though they did not hear; and finally, they could
have repented and could have been pardoned, to which they were invited
by the Apostles, – but they did not repent. For this reason they will
answer for all their evil deeds at the Last Judgment:
they shall look upon Him Whom they have pierced (Zach. 12:10).
In
conclusion I would like to say to both you and myself: let us make an
all-out effort to guard ourselves from sin, which had engendered
mankind’s disaffection from God and His life, from His
holiness and truth, which brought upon us a just condemnation, which
prepared for us the fiery, insatiable abyss of hell and all its
fathomless depths. Only by means of a sincere belief in Christ and His
redemptive suffering, death, and resurrection, and through
constant repentance and a virtuous life may we be delivered from hell.
God forbid that any of us be thrown into it amid the general bundle of
tares mentioned by the Saviour to His angels: gather ye together first
the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn
them, but gather the wheat into My barn (Matt. 13:30). Whosoever has
ears to hear, may he hear. Amen. Saint John of Kronstadt
******************************************************************************************
From: John Granger
Subject: My Life in Christ #264 (Part 1 of 4)
Date: 24 February 2016 21:18:21 GMT
If you don't subscribe to this daily email from St John of Kronstadt's Life in Christ, I heartly recommend it!
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Subject: Video of Enthronement of Metropolitan Photiy
Date: 7 March 2016 23:25:19 GMT
A link
to the enthronement ceremony of our beloved Metropolitan Photiy of
Triaditza, so loved and admired by our Metropolitan Chrysostomos and
Bishop Auxentios, as Metropolitan of the Old
Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria. The service took place at the
Cathedral of the Dormition of the Mother of God in Sofia, Bulgaria.
Ἄξιος, Ἄξιος,
Ἄξιος! Достоен, Достоен, Достоен!
Worthy, Worthy, Worthy!
Our ROCA's Bolgorod's diocese website: First click on to this site:
Церковная правда. Click unto this video: ...about the SOVIET CHURCH, the historic VIDEO, under this heading. about the soviet church, a sad video of great Martyrs,
and Big Judases.
It is
all in Russian, both texts and narration. I wish it were in English.
Here in many many historic photos, are some of the terrible days and
persons, victims the bloody communist takeover
of Russia and the mass persecution and murder of so many.This 'Moscow
Patriarchy' still exists, as the communists founded it.
Here
are the photos of many of the New Confessors and Martyrs.In the very
fast speed Russian narration, is a very heart rending
accounting of those terrible events. Also, here are the many photos pf
the big traitors, Sergius Stragorodsky and others with him.Today,
Kyrill Gundayev, is his successor.
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Link forwarded from: Cristian Comanescu Date: 15 February 2016 18:37:57 GMT
Bless!
Recently BBC2 did a TV documentary on Greece, which included a piece
about the plight of the harassed and persecuted monks of the
Traditionalist Monastery of Esphigmenou there. This is,
of course, a view from a non-Orthodox TV journalist, but it is
sympathetic and informative, well worth watching. The link:
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Dear-in-Christ, Everyone, bless!
Sorry we did not inform you earlier, but we had a particularly hectic
time over the weekend and the feast day, but the February issue of
"The Shepherd" and the calendar insert with
the saints of the day, appointed scriptural readings and fasting
guidelines are both now up on our website: www.saintedwardbrotherhood.org
Don't be as tardy as we have been: go to it immediately! Pray for us also, With love in Christ, A, Sinner
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*******************************************************************************************************************************
An
Informative Anti-Ecumenism Sharing-3 Interesting Videos: For those who
understand Russian: Some Solid Critical Remarks About What Kyrill
Gundayev is doing, etc.,. When this internetsobor.org
link opens to this article, then click on to the three VIDEOS:
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Deacon Andrei Psarev: Andrei Borisovich, many thanks for agreeing to talk to us. So, here we are
– the ROCOR (MP) and the Moscow Patriarchate are united, what hopes did you have and how many of them were realized?
A.B. Zubov: You
must understand that the main thing is that we are together. Any
unity is better than being divided. The fact that our Church was broken
up
into various parts is sad, both from the mystical point and on a human,
practical level. Christ’s vesture is torn up – that can only be a bad
thing. Besides, it’s in our human nature to want to bring together
fragmented parts that feature in our daily lives,
not just be united in a exalted and mystical sense. The feature that was
important to us … well, at the time, I believed that the ROCOR
preserved – and had even made it her mission to preserve – that human
and cultural aspect that was largely lost to the Russian
Church here, first because of the Bolshevik terror and then through
serving the state in a way that greatly contributed to Church’s moral
undoing. I believed then the ROCOR could be a small – it’s quite a
small church structure– so a small, but powerful catalyst
for rejuvenation of the Russian Church . Unfortunately, this hasn’t
happened yet and I was disappointed on that score. When I was still
part of the Church establishment, I was able to observe the sessions of
the Inter-Conciliar meetings for myself and gradually
realized that the ROCOR has adopted altogether different position. It
tends to remain either silent or generally supportive of the Moscow
Church leadership and is rewarded with Moscow’s lack of involvement in
its internal affairs. The ROCOR is able to appoint
to its own hierarchs and administer its economic resources as it sees
fit. So, all in all, it has both preserved its own autonomy and kept
out of Moscow’s business….. http://www.rocorstudies.org/interviews/2016/01/25/
ReplyDeleteROCOR Studies = MP pro-unionite propaganda website rewriting history
If you click on the ROCOR Studies link it goes to an article titled:
"The Russian Church Abroad (ROCOR-MP) Should Help Us to Build-up Our Society"
It reminds me of something Fr. Seraphim Rose said:
"The outward Gospel of social idealism is a symptom of loss of faith."
Fr. Seraphim Rose