The monastic life is nothing other than one soul bringing respite to another, without thought for itself. This is also pleasing to God. In the monastery, a nun should efface herself. Her life should be her cross, she shouldn’t consider herself at all. She should die so that she will live eternally.
The Expulsion of Adam and Eve You’ve got to get out of your head and into your heart. Right now your thoughts are in your head, and God seems to be outside you. Your prayer and all your spiritual exercises also remain exterior. As long as you are in your head, you will never master your thoughts, which continue to whirl around your head like snow in a winter’s storm or like mosquitoes in the summer’s heat. If you descend into your heart, you will have no more difficulty. Your mind will empty out and your thoughts will dissipate. Thoughts are always in your mind chasing one another about, and you will never manage to get them under control. But if ...
In the Western world there’s a continuing tradition of making resolutions at the turn of each year. In a sense, people want to commit to resolutions that’ll help them become ‘better’. We can see two aspects to this attractive custom: 1) the intention and the opportunity for people to keep their resolutions; and 2) the content of the resolutions and commitments. Both of these factors are of great importance. If you can’t keep to what you’ve promised yourself, then setting even the most noble ideal as a goal is pointless. And if the resolution’s something that, in the end, doesn’t make you any better, then committing to it might actually work against you rather than for you. But there’s also ...
Do Christians really disobey Christ’s command to “turn the other cheek” and “resist not evil” when they participate in or watch fistfights and returning blow for blow with a consenting partner for the purposes of play or show? What come first to mind are “extreme” or “ultimate” fighting, and brawls in the course of an ice hockey game. All Christians abide by moral standards when interacting with family, co-workers, friends, and the general public. Does God permit us to suspend interpersonal ethics for sports? The actions remain sinful, according to three Christian sources close in time, culture, and spirit to Jesus. What is a sin when done against a person’s will remains a sin when done for the amusement of an ...
Since everybody has some faith, even if it’s not always right, we have to accept that it’s a natural characteristic in people. People who haven’t got faith aren’t whole, and so they’re unbelievers.
My recent post on the One God has shown me that there is much more to say on the subject. "We believe in One God..." but do we? In a recent conversation, someone said to me that they had difficulty believing in "one supreme being who created everything...etc." Christians don't actually believe in one supreme being. If this startles you, then read further. Christians do not believe in "one supreme being," first because we do not believe in one of anything (or one of something). There is not a class called "supreme beings" to which the God who created everything belongs. There is no class of anything to which He belongs. The God of the Christians is in no way similar to ...
The Arab Conquest According to tradition, the brotherhood of the monastery sent a delegation to Medina in 625 A.D. to ask Mohammad for political protection. Mohammad approved the request and wrote the famous achtiname, which bears a representation of his palm, in which he declared that Muslims should protect monks. A copy of the achtiname is on display today in the monastery’s gallery. It is reported that Mohammad visited the monastery in the course of his commercial activities, which is probably why the Koran mentions the sacred sites of Sinai. So when the Sinai peninsula came under Arab rule in 641 A.D., the monastery continued its normal life without disturbance, though the number of monks began to drop and, at ...
When you walk the path of Christ, many people- perhaps even your closest relatives- will mock you. Don’t let it bother you. Don’t let it worry you. Remember they mocked Christ as well. But he didn’t make enemies of them. He held his tongue. You do the same.
To a person who had to choose between suicide and begging You write that all your worldly goods were sold off to a third party. When you found yourself out on the street with nothing and nobody, you headed to the cemetery, bent on killing yourself. You had no doubts or second thoughts about this. Exhausted by the vexations, you lay down on your parents’ grave and fell asleep. Your mother appeared to you in your sleep and berated you, saying that in the Kingdom of God there were plenty of people who had been beggars, but not a single one of those who had done away with themselves. That dream saved you from suicide. Your beloved mother really did save ...
When God, the Son of God, entered the womb of All-Holy Virgin and took flesh from her, He was born a perfect person and perfect God, without confusion. When has anything more important ever happened for us? We all believe in this Son of God and Son of the ever-virgin Mother of God, Mary, which is why we confidently accept this information about Him and this event. If we confess Him and repent from the bottom of our heart then the word of devotion is born within us like a seed, in exactly the same way as the Word of the Father entered the womb of the Virgin. Marvel at this great and astonishing miracle and accept it in ...
In recent years, there has been much discussion of the difference which exists between the notions of “person” and “individual”. It may be that the progress of the social and anthropological sciences has provided the spark for this discussion, the starting-point for which is to be found in the well-known philosophical trends of our day. In particular, we see the supporters of Christian personalism and those of existentialism wrestling in particular with the notion of “person”, in an attempt to define its role and spheres of influence and existence. We need to make a clarification at this point. The recent commotion around the person doesn’t mean that it’s only recently that people have begun thinking about concerning themselves with its role ...
Be careful not to praise one another face to face because praise harms even the perfect, not to mention you who are still weak. Only mockery and humiliations benefit people spiritually. Because they beget humility. They win crowns. If you bear them patiently, they snuff out egotism and vainglory.
Sinai is the meeting point of two continents and the dividing line between two seas. The peninsula, which is often described as “24,000 square metres of useless land”, is the gateway between Africa and Asia and the bridge between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, i.e. the shortest route from Europe to the Indian Ocean and the Far East. At first sight, Sinai seems inaccessible, being full of barren, rocky mountains. The earth is unsuitable for cultivation and there’s not much rain; it’s very hot during the day and cold at night. And yet, Sinai isn’t monotonous and all of a piece. The northern part, from Al Arish to the Suez Canal consists of large expanses of sand, which, in ...
The people today who are not themselves close to Christianity claim vehemently that the Christian Church should consist of perfect and saintly people. They are the same ones who condemn the Church for granting a haven to sinners, imperfect souls and pseudo-Christians. This is one of the commonest arguments against Christianity. But this reasoning does not understand the nature of the Church and, in the end, forgets its whole purpose, because the Church exists, above all, for the sinners, the imperfect and the despicable. It goes out into the world and labours among people who are floundering in sin. Celestial in origin and eternal in its inception, it works in time and space without having recourse to extremes, away from ...
The Vasilopita (VasilOpita) is the main custom in Greece for New year. It’s one which we encounter throughout Greece, though naturally with local variations. These are mostly to do with the ingredients of the cake. In some places it’s a cake, though there are also parts where it’s a savory or sweet pie, made with phyllo pastry. There even places where it’s a bread. There are also differences in the way the Vasilopita’s decorated. One common feature, though is that there’s always a cross and a reference to the year. And in all cases, the cake or pie is round and has a coin hidden inside it. Most Greeks cut the Vasilopita immediately after the turn of the year. In some ...
Let’s not seek Elders who have foresight or far-sight, but, above all, let them be humble and capable of the cure of our infirmities. This will appear from the manner of their life and the place and condition of their asceticism.
Recently, the industrial company ‘World Ltd’ bought from the Japanese firm ‘Sora’, the latest electronic machinery, ‘with cutting-edge technology’. Japanese engineers assembled it and gave it a test work-out. At the same time, they trained the operator. The inauguration of the new machine started with a formal ceremony. The whole of the Board of Management of the company was present. ‘We must be very proud’, said the CEO with great satisfaction, ‘of the company’s new acquisition’. ‘We have nothing like it in our factory’, the Managing Director hastened to add. ‘Sora, which means ‘heaven’ in Japanese, has given us the best it has’. The CEO wasn’t paying attention and stood up to meet the priest who was coming in, cutting off the Managing ...
Once, when a discussion was taking place between Jewish Sadducees, Pharisees and Hellenists on the subject of Our Lord Jesus Christ, some saying He was a prophet, others that He was deluded, and yet others that He was the Son of God, the blessed First Martyr and Archdeacon Stephen went and stood on a high place and preached to everyone concerning Our Lord Jesus Christ. “My brethren, why have your evils increased so greatly that the whole of Jerusalem is in uproar? Blessed are the people who have never felt any hesitation in their hearts concerning Jesus Christ. For it was He Who bent the heavens and came down for our sins and was born from the Holy Virgin, the ...
The Bible and early post-Biblical Christian literature opposes slaveholding by Christians in the 21st-century world, although for a reason you probably did not expect. This article reconciles Biblical acceptance of slavery with modern-day Christian opposition to it. As you are aware, the Bible does not condemn slavery. In fact, there are passages that condone it: Exodus 21.2-4, Exodus 21.6f, Exodus 21.32, 1 Corinthians 7.21, Colossians 3.22f, Colossians 4.1, 1 Peter 2.18, and the Epistle to Philemon. Colossians 3.22 even instructs slaves to work diligently for their Christian masters. Much of the material on employer-employee relations in the Bible pertains to owners and slaves. In the post-Biblical literature we have the Epistle to Polycarp 4.3 (ca AD 107) by Bishop Ignatius of Antioch, ...
