Ξένες γλώσσες

Warm and balmy weather is followed by thunderstorms and rain. A soul which finds relief from sorrow in mourning and which has been cooled by tears enjoys a special calmness and serenity which, like the scent of perfumes, emerge from and are released by pure prayer.

The Elder often advised us to have spiritual dignity and generous pride. These were the virtues that distinguished him, too, as everybody knew who met him. I once went to visit him in his old kelli of the Precious Cross and after our chat I said goodbye to him, but he accompanied me for quite a way. As soon as I told him not to tire himself out and to go back to his kelli, he said goodbye and went back. If I hadn’t said anything he’d have gone with me as far as our representative’s house in Karyes. I should also say that he rarely showed his gift of foresight and never to show off, but only for the benefit of ...

«One evening in a not so fashionable taverna, a young Chinaman came in with his merchandise displayed on a wooden tray hanging from a strap round his neck. A host of trinkety things were glinting on there, both weird and not so strange. My eye was caught by some cheap-looking little red plaster birds. Each of them was standing on a plastic tree trunk, without even a dry leaf to indicate that there were better times. At the end of the trunk there was a little button, like a protruding knot. You pressed it and the bird sang. I quickly grabbed three, as if there was a fear they’d fly away. I didn’t ask how much each cost, and didn’t ask for ...

The Gospel for the fourth Sunday in Lent, Mark 9, 17-31), presents Jesus as coming face to face with an ancient problem which affects the whole of humanity: the ability of people to overcome evil. For as long as there have been people on earth, evil in its thousand and one forms- poverty, hunger, wars, refugee crises, sicknesses and death- has held sway over their lives, suffocated their hopes and, often enough, driven them to despair. Philosophers, economists, politicians, scientists, religious leaders and even soothsayers have, for centuries, struggled against it on a daily basis. Sometimes more successfully, at other times less so, the human race has managed to make some progress towards the improvement of the quality of life, ...

Just as a healthy eye desires the light, so, if fasting's undertaken with discretion, it's followed by a desire for prayer.

Who is able to act as confessor depends on the bishop’s discernment. In many places in Greece, the bishop selects certain priests and appoints them as confessors through a special prayer and the ‘laying on of hands’. Archbishop Gregorios of Thyateira and Great Britain allows all priests to act as confessors without any particular prayer of appointment. Regardless, no one can act as a confessor without the blessing of the bishop, for he is the spiritual father par excellence of all those under his jurisdiction, clergy and laity alike.  The ideal is that the confessor/spiritual father should be a priest with whom the spiritual child can easily have regular contact - if not the local parish priest, then at least a ...

People who are overcome by the desires and pleasures and spend their lives out in this world will quickly fall into the snares of sin. And once sin's occurred, it's fire on dry grass, a stone rolling down a steep slope, a gully channeling rushing streams. And it plots people's perdition in all manner of ways.

Elder Païsios has no need of any praise or introduction from us. With his imitation of Christ’s love, he satisfied both God and other people and this is why he’s widely praised in the Church of God. He had the rare gift of being able to bring solace to people of all works of life, irrespective of their level of education or their spiritual state. I remember the case of a psychiatrist/psychoanalyst who came to visit out monastery after an encounter with the Elder. Not only had he found peace, but he also told me that what the Elder had said to him was the last word in modern psychiatry. It’s well known that the Elder didn’t read books, other than ...

All the evil you'll ever come across is the offshoot of the love of money. Wherever you find it growing: in the home, in the market-place, in the courts, in the legislatures or in the highest places in the land.

Let's not expect spiritual understanding from people who don't believe in God. Let's pray that God will forgive them and show them His light. And don't tire yourself out trying to talk about the truth to people who are full of selfishness and wickedness (even if they do call themselves Christians), because they've got no room for it.

Few would argue against the statement that the Sacrament of Confession is on the decline in the Greek Orthodox Church. While it is not my intention here to explain the reasons for it, one could speculate that this decline is due to the morally and spiritually lax standards of our modern society to which we have become accustomed. Perhaps sins which in the past would have given rise to a sense of regret and a desire to be forgiven now seem to us to be normal. This decline may also be due to the individualistic attitude of modern society which has influenced Christians also, and which extends even into the area of religion. What I mean by this is that ...

Without Christ, it's impossible to set ourselves straight and to free ourselves from the passions. We can't become good on our own. Love for Christ's the only remedy for the passions.

Monks and nuns aren’t weird people who, out of some sort of personal whim, have left the cities to go and lived in some monastery or other. They are, in fact, ‘angels of God’ according to Saint John Chrysostom; ‘those who live in accordance with the Gospel’, as Evagrios Pontikos calls them; ‘witnesses to free will’ according to Athanasios the Great, ‘the heirs to the suffering Church’ as Saint Symeon the New Theologian puts it; ‘the adornment of the head of the Church’, to quote Saint Gregory of Nyssa, since they have become dead to the world and bedeck the head of the Church. There should be no distinction between the monastic and the married life, because, if there is, ...

They say that these are fugitives, foreigners and wretches. That they’ve left their homelands in order to gather in our city. So tell me, is this why you’re distressed and want to destroy the glory of our city, because everybody considers it their own haven and they prefer it to their own land. This is precisely why you should rejoice and be exceeding glad, because just as people hurry to you to buy goods from your hands, so all the nations see our city as their own mother. So don’t destroy the honor they’re paying it and don’t cut short the praise they’ve given it even from ancient times. There was once a famine and the citizens of this town ...

‘Father’ said someone, ‘Holy Scripture advises us to be “wise as serpents”. Explain to us the meaning of the phrase’. ‘When the time comes for the snake to change its skin’, he answered, it goes through a narrow place. In this way, it gets rid of its old skin easily. The same with us. To get rid of our former self, we have to pass along the narrow path of the Gospel. But there’s something else, as well. When it’s in danger, a snake is interested in protecting only its head. We should imitate it. Our first concern should be protection of our faith. As long as we keep the faith, everything else is fixable. Somebody else asked: ‘Father, when, without me ...