Until we receive the grace of the Comforter, we have to study the sacred scriptures, so that the recollection of good is imprinted within us and that, through continuous reading, the motion of the soul towards the good is renewed. This is a way of protecting our soul from the dangerous paths of sin.
We humans find ourselves on the road between paradise and hell, between God and the devil. All our thoughts and reflections, and every one of our feelings, bring the soul a little closer to paradise or hell. If a thought or reflection is rational (that is Godly) and brings us to the Divine Word, Who is beyond comprehension and conception, then that is already paradise for us. But if the thought lacks the Divine Word and is not in accord with Him, it inevitably brings us to absurdity and folly, to the devil, and this is already hell. What is true of thought also holds good for feelings. So, for us, everything begins here on earth, paradise or hell. Our ...
We need to think constantly about the fact that this life, this mortal life in which all of us have different plans, different concerns and different dreams, one day will pass away and depart. We’re all witnesses to the fact that our life is passing so imperceptibly. Each of us will wonder about the years of our life, will see from the experience we have, from getting to grips with the whole situation, that our life flies by so quickly.
1. What are the talents? ‘Talents’ are the various qualities, gifts and endowments which we have received from God. All kinds of things. Different in quality and in quantity. One person receives a lot, another receives less. One spiritually and intellectually, another materially. A talent is wealth, an ecclesiastical or civil office, social position, the various spiritual and intellectual abilities, the gift of speaking, academic accomplishment, literary technique, every kind of art, health, youth, a melodic voice, an attractive appearance and innate politeness. As we’ve said, we don’t all have the same gifts. What’s important, though is that nobody is without any ‘talent’. Even if it’s only one, they still have it. If they’ve got nothing else, they’ve still got their soul, ...
Saint John Chrysostom is commemorated twice in January: on 27th, the translation of his relics, and 30th, as one of the Three Hierarchs. When he was nominated, without his knowledge, to become Patriarch of Constantinople, he had to be smuggled out of Antioch under armed guard, because he was so popular that the authorities feared civil unrest over his removal. Constantinople was a different matter. The clergy had quickly become accustomed to the prominent role the Church now played in public affairs and lived in inappropriate luxury. Saint John’s efforts to curb their lavish lifestyle were not welcomed. As an ascetic, he didn’t attend entertainments and didn’t throw sumptuous feasts, which was another way of commenting on the state of ...
We shouldn’t be like flies, but like bees, flitting from flower to flower, collecting honey. We, too, should collect honey, paying attention only to what’s good in other people. Concerning those who condemn and criticise others, the psalmist and prophet, David, declared: ‘Their throat is an open sepulchre’ (Ps. 5, 10). Open a grave and you’ll see what rottenness and stench there is in there. The same reek, a spiritual stench, comes from our mouth when we condemn other people.
In today’s passage from his Second Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul the Apostle reminds the people of Corinth of the abundant Grace that they have received from God. Such great blessings they had been granted since the time they received baptism, which include: being cleansed from all sins they had committed personally, and of Original Sin itself; becoming united with Christ and having received the Holy Spirit inside them; and they are born again spiritually! Furthermore, he urges the Christians of Corinth to earnestly retain this beneficial grace they have received from Christ, which they are enjoying infinitely as members of the Church. The God-inspired Apostle knows that various temptations, both external and internal ones, can lead faithful people ...
‘You sanctified the virgin womb by Your birth’… The Holy Church celebrates the Reception of the Lord in the Temple of Solomon, a feast of the Lord and of His mother. It’s a feast of the Lord because the person being honoured is Jesus Christ, Who, as a forty-day old infant manifests His utter humility and total obedience to the will of God in order to achieve the salvation of the human race. It’s a feast of His mother because it’s she, Mary, the Mother of God, who presents the infant Christ to the venerable Symeon. It’s a feast with a long pre-history, beginning in the time of Moses and the Pharaoh of Egypt. ‘Ypapanti’, the Greek name of ...
Why are you mistrustful when there’s no grounds for suspicion? What wickedness could you ever find by studying or listening to the word of God; when you read or sing in church; or when you pray? God is truth, the devil is a liar, a slanderer and a disputant. That’s all you need to know.
We should feel that Christ’s our friend. He Himself confirms this when He says: ‘You’re my friends…’ (Jn. 15, 14). We should look on Him and approach Him as a friend. Have we fallen? Have we sinned? We should run to Him with love, familiarity and confidence. Not with fear that He’ll punish us, but with the courage that comes from the feeling of being His friend.
In the good old days, our children were raised by their parents who also educated them along with the teachers. Furthermore, a significant role in our children’s education was played by the wise philosophers of ancient Greece, the Fathers of the Church, the Three Hierarchs, and society at large. Unfortunately, our children today are being raised by contemporary society with all its problems. The mother works. The father works. The children grow up at home with a maid or are confined to a daycare facility. Today’s society does not help to raise and educate children. Today’s society does not promote the values that it should. The family is mostly facing extinction. According to statistics, more than fifty percent (50%) of children grow ...
Atheists Today I’m addressing you. Don’t your realize that you’re being fed garbage? Have you ever looked to see what atheist literature consists of? *** It’s not the last word in science. It’s a distortion of the facts. An aberration of thought. A perversion of who we are. Take a look at the boundless Russian steppes. Once there were wonderful churches on them. Today only ruins. Don’t these holy ruins tell you anything? The monuments of the past have now been destroyed. What our fathers built has been razed by godless hands. Take a look at your homes. The family is in ruins, the children know nothing: neither the worth of their mother nor the manly courage of their father. Education in schools is utterly useless. Teachers spout ...
All our knowledge is useless, unless we know Christ. The soul which is a stranger to God, far away from Him Who is the Source of Life, the Author of all good things, dreams in vain that it’s making progress and going forward.
It seemed to me that nothing was worth so much as the mortification of my feelings, distancing myself from a carnal and worldly view. Then, when I’d turned in on myself, not allowing anything human to touch me. Talking only to God, I wanted to live beyond the goings-on of the world, to experience divine revelations, to really become an untarnished mirror of God, taking light from the Light and being illumined in my darkness. Even in this life, I wanted to harvest the fruits of the hoped-for, future blessings, leaving behind the earth and consorting with the angels.
Christians who are striving aren’t feather-brained dupes, nor are they naïve, simplistic, superficial, shallow, gloomy, weird or abstracted. If they are, they’re not real Christians. Striving Christians are hopeful, joyful, sincere, honourable, whole and humble. The starting-point for self-improvement isn’t at all self-centred. The sense of my sinfulness makes me contrite, not afraid or upset. The belief that I can change, that I’m a great sinner, shouldn’t be wishful thinking or false modesty, but sure, precise and unflinching words and action. May the discovery of the good God’s infinite love, and of my own rebellion, apostasy and estrangement from Him give me hot tears of genuine repentance. May God’s love for us move me, bring me to contrition, stir me and restore me. The starting-point, ...
As regards the love of God, we say that He loves us or that we love Him, when we feel love for God within ourselves. This is nothing, tiny, compared with that feeling of love for God you have when He visits you, when He gives you His love. Then you melt. If this love, this sense of the love of God, were to last a few minutes, you wouldn’t be able to stand it. You’d expire.
The mouth of a humble-minded person always speaks the truth. Those who contradict the truth are like the servant who struck the Lord.
Lazarus didn’t play a part in his resurrection. How could he have done, since he was already in the grave? Christ raised Him because that is what He Himself wished. Zacchaeus, however, worked hard for his resurrection. It started with an intense desire to encounter Christ, having first heard that, at least, He was somebody who wasn’t prejudiced against sinners. He cared nothing for the comments- perhaps the mockery- of the crowd when, because of the crush and because he was short of stature, he climbed up into a sycamore to see Christ. And something even more costly to himself: he imposed upon himself what are perhaps the harshest conditions in the history of human economics, when he saw the ...
‘A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe”. Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed”’ . This passage from the New Testament is very well known to Christians everywhere, referring, as it does to Doubting Thomas, Christ’s disciple. He believed in Christ, but, in order to ...
When the burning love of devoutness occupies your soul, you then rejoice and make your way along your path, be it easy or difficult. When divine love flourishes in a faithful soul, it leaves no room or margin for passions.
