Letter of love to a newly tonsured monk

 

Dearest N…,

Christ is among us.

Your blessing.

I received your card and I thank you in everything and for everything. I humbly wish that you become an earthly angel and a heavenly man. Axios.

Your life should not be like a firework cracker which vanishes after the first burst, but should be like an inextinguishable oil lamp just like those of the wise virgins. Your life should be a fire of Christ. It should not be a boastful display but a humble one. Not a false earthly joy but a heavenly intoxication, divine love, holy bliss, resurrection following a grief and a cross.

Enjoy then the OBEDIENCE – LACK OF POSSESSIONS – VIRGINITY.

1. OBEDIENCE means that your actions will not have YOU as the centre, but something or someone beyond YOU.

OBEDIENCE is freedom from self-declared godliness, and from glory seeking.

2. LACK OF POSSESSIONS means to have but not to own. Freedom from ownership. Common life, common property.

3. VIRGINITY means to be involved and at the same time to remain intact. To give yourself but not to be consumed. It is deeper than just the abstinence from a sexual relationship.

Respectable Fr N…, I wish that you become a genuine monk, the reshaping back to the “ancient beauty”, the nostalgia of life in paradise before the fall, put in practice. The image of God, cleansed and redrawn in a world which is mostly under demonic influence. A living lightning rod of the divine wrath. A living sacrificial altar of God Sabaoth from which the offerings of your burning heart will rise – unceasing day and night prayers – for us, your brothers. Tireless intercessor to the Heavenly Father.

With deepest respect, Least of all,

  † Fr. N.M.