The Ascetic of Boston

Our cities too now have beheld some images of Orthodox witness, at times concealed from the crudeness of worldliness, but strong enough to act as the Gospel leaven.

There lived in Boston in the second decade of the twentieth century a young man by the name of Nikolai Panteleimonov. He was an emigrant from Imperial Russia and possessed the treasure, as he regarded it, of all five volumes of the Philokalia, and many other spiritual books. And he occupied himself in living what these books taught, leading a life of great asceticism as directed by the Orthodox Church. But one day he fell into some grave sin, and upon hearing his confession, the priest put upon him a very severe penance of several hundred, if not thousand, prostrations a day for at least a year. Before this period was over the priest died - and the conscientious young man accepted the uncomplete penance for life.

He worked nights in a factory, and his days he spent locked in his dark attic room in extensive spiritual exercises and long fervent prayer with tears. He would go out for a breath of fresh air only after dusk, roaming the foggy streets. His whole life long he ate nothing but unpeeled boiled potatoes, and salted herring, and he drank nothing but weak tea. Even though his later years were somewhat lax, his whole life was a podvig. In his later years he was made a deacon, but for some reason, despite his absolute devotion to the Church and its every service, he was not in favor. He died a poor man in a city hospital, having himself made all the arrangement for his burial years before.

Saint Seraphim of Sarov

In his earlier years, as he later confessed, when he daily made thousands of prostrations, weeping in repentance and experiencing the power of unseen spirits, he was granted visions of St. Seraphim of Sarov. The first time he saw St. Seraphim was at Harvard Square in Cambridge, when he was coming up from the subway, not knowing which way to go find Russian people. He had taken it upon himself to help the poor monks on Mt. Athos by selling their icons to Orthodox Bostonians. In despair he hesitated, not knowing which street to take, when all of a sudden at some distance from him he saw an old man in full monastic habit, in whom he immediately recognized the dearly-beloved image of St. Seraphim. The Saint was looking at him in a friendly manner and was indicating with his hand the direction to take, even going a little way himself. He followed the Saint along Massachusetts Avenue towards Boston. But soon the figure of the Saint, who several times turned back to see if Fr. Nikolai was following, disappeared. In this miraculous way Fr. Nikolai came to very good and pious people who bought the icons he was carrying to sell. The second time the Saint appeared to him was under circumstances unknown to us. The Saint appeared in an area of crowded Tremont Street downtown, motioning for Fr. Nikolai to follow him. The Saint looked very tall and moved swiftly, walking so fast on the other side of the street that Fr. Nikolai could hardly keep up with him; finally, absolutely exhausted, he lost sight of him.

All his life Fr. Nikolai was preparing himself for a monastic life, but never actually entered a monastery, in obedience to the misleading advice of his lay-priest "staretz" who told him the monastic life was too lax.

(Excerpted from: “A Pilgrimage to the Orthodox Holy Places of America: The Fifth Pilgrimage” Orthodox Word, Apr-June, 1967, p. 31-32.)

Exit of Harvard Square subway today

Tremont Street, Boston, 1910-1920

[Any further information on Nikolai Panteleimonov would be appreciated. Unfortunately he seems to be lost to history as I contacted Saint Herman Monastery in Platina, California who publishes Orthodox Word and no one knew anything about him, including Abbot Herman. The article went on to speak of Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Brookline, Massachusetts, so I contacted them as well and they had never heard of him before either. As the article was written 42 years ago, this does not surprise me. - J.S.]

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Saint Botolph, Patron Saint of Two Boston's

Saint Botolph (Feast Day - June 17th)

Having been born and raised in Boston, there was once a time when I was about twenty years old that I lost my appreciation for this great city. In hindsight I look at that feeling as just an inner need to escape the enclosed environment I was living in and take in a new experience, both physically and intellectually. I was in college at the time and had no chance of physical escape, so I realized I had to make an intellectual transformation of how I perceived Boston. My solution in accomplishing this was to devour Boston that entire summer like a tourist and take in its amazing history through things like books, tours, and excursions. That experience and intellectual broadening has transformed my thinking and to this day I sincerely love Boston and after all my travels think it is the best city of the United States.

Among my many discoveries at that time, and one of the most interesting, happened at Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Brookline when I came across an icon of Saint Botolph for sale that was painted by the monks of the same monastery. I had never heard of Saint Botolph before so it struck my curiosity as to who this was and noticed they also distributed small icon prints with the image of Saint Botolph in front and on the back was his life story. This is what it said:

"Saint Botolph was born in England around 610. In his youth he became a monk in Gaul. By 654 he had returned to England and founded the Monastery of Ikanhoe in East Anglia. Thereafter, the place came to be called "Botolphston" (from either "Botolph's stone" or "Botolph's town"), which was later contracted to "Boston". Having led many in the way of salvation, and renowned for his sanctity and miracles, Saint Botolph reposed around the year 680. He was greatly revered by his Christian countrymen in antiquity, and is commemorated to this day in the name of two cities, both the original Boston in the Lincolnshire fens (about 100 miles north of London), and likewise its namesake in the New World, in Massachusetts. The feast of St. Botolph is celebrated June 17."

I was just about drop-jawed when I found out that the city I was born and raised in was named after an Orthodox Saint, and even more pleased the monks had written hymns for Saint Botolph as well (link below). This was information they certainly did not teach me in school. This was a discovery that literally transformed how I viewed Boston and prompted me to do further research.

One day soon after this discovery while driving through Boston along Massachusetts Avenue I noticed that the street running parallel to Huntington Avenue was named St. Botolph Street. Though there is no church dedicated to Saint Botolph on this street, I did discover later on, besides the fact there is an apartment complex named after Saint Botolph, that on Huntington Avenue itself there is a YMCA with an Anglican chapel inside dedicated to Saint Botolph. Besides this there are few other mentions of Saint Botolph in the city of Boston (there is a club named after him and the house of the president of the Jesuit Boston College is also named after the Saint). Noteworthy is the fact that pieces of the Gothic window tracery of Lincolnshire’s Church of St. Botolph are incorporated into the structure of Trinity Church in Boston’s Copley Square.

One thing I was pleased to discover however was that the Orthodox are slowly laying claim to their Saint in the hopes of sanctifying their city in the New World, as is traditionally done in the more Orthodox countries of the East. Besides the awareness Holy Transfiguration Monastery is promoting through their icon of Saint Botolph, there is also a Russian Orthodox Church Abroad parish in Roslindale named after Holy Epiphany that depicts an icon of Saint Botolph (painted by parishioner Zoya Shcheglov) on its south wall facing towards the city in full stature and giving blessing to the city that bears his name. Unfortunately there is no Orthodox church or chapel dedicated to Saint Botolph in Boston as of yet, but there is an Antiochian Orthodox Church dedicated to Saint Botolph in London.

The meeting between Winthrop and Blackstone and the naming of Boston

In my research regarding the figure of Saint Boltoph and the relationship between the two Boston's, this is what I discovered.

The Rev. William Blackstone was the first settler of the area that would come to be known as Boston. He was an Anglican priest who fled England due to his disagreements with the Church of England and joined the Gorges expedition to the New World in 1623. After most from the expedition returned home, Blackstone decided to live as a recluse in the heavily forested area of what we know today as Boston Common and Beacon Hill in 1625. He is said to have had the largest library in the colonies at that time and just wanted to live alone with his books, his cattle, and his gardens.

In 1629 Puritans arrived in Salem but then travelled to nearby Charlestown from a place in England called Boston in Lincolnshire. The area that Blackstone lived in was originally called Shawmut by the local Indians and Trimountaine by the colonists due to the fact that the area consisted of three hills (this is how Tremont Street got its name). In 1630 Blackstone invited the Puritans to make their settlement across the Charles River on the Shawmut Peninsula with him since they had problems with clean water in Charlestown. On September 17, 1630 their new settlement was renamed Boston with the proclamation of John Winthrop, "that Trimountaine shall be called Boston", after their hometown in England and was designated the capital of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

John Winthrop

These Puritans were an intolerant group in their zeal to have a pure church in the New World. When they settled in Boston they granted Blackstone 50 acres of his own land. However they looked upon him with suspicion since he was an ordained minister of the Church of England and the Puritans feared he would try to establish the Church of England in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The Puritan court thus ordered his house be burned. This display of intolerance forced Blackstone to move 35 miles south and settle in Cumberland, Rhode Island. They also had Anne Hutchinson exiled to Rhode Island in 1638 as well for similar intolerance.

John Winthrop was the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and he is famous for delivering his famous sermon titled "A Model of Christian Charity" in 1630 while still aboard the ship Arbella. This sermon contained the famous phrase "city upon a hill" when Winthrop warned the settlers that they were being watched by the world and needed to be an example of pure Christian conduct. It was his hope to build a model Christian community in the Massachusettss Bay Colony free from the corruption of the Church of England and thus be an example to the Protestants in Europe and reform the Church of England which had corrupted itself with Catholic practices.

Soon after the Puritan settlement in Boston, it became the largest and most influential city in the New World till the mid-18th century. America's first public school, Boston Latin, was founded in 1635 and its first college, Harvard, was established a year later. Boston Latin was modeled after Boston Grammar School in Lincolnshire.

Rev. John Cotton eventually came to Boston with his family in 1633 to serve as the "Teacher" in what is now the old First Church in Boston’s Back Bay. During the remaining 19 years of his life, Cotton was the “senior statesman” of the church as it quickly spread with the Massachusetts colony along the shores of northern New England. He served as an arbiter of theologi­cal controversy and largely defined the characteristics of what became New England Congregationalism. He was also the grandfather of Cotton Mather who would play an important role in the Salem Witch Trials. John Cotton is an under-recognized figure in history. It was he who lit the flame that motivated the colony of Massachusetts Bay, and more than any other single individual defined the society that became New England.

Rev. John Cotton

Back in England John Cotton had served in Boston as the vicar of Saint Botolph's Church from which many of the Puritan settlers had also come and knew of this charismatic minister. He had served at Saint Botolph's from 1612 and was widely regarded as the preeminent Puritan theologian in all of England. Cotton would draw large crowds to Saint Botolph's from throughout all of England to hear him deliver one of his legendary three-hour sermons. In fact, the pulpit raised in the church for John Cotton in 1612 is still in use today. When Archbishop Laud chastised Cotton for serving the sacrament to people standing instead of kneeling, Cotton replied there was no room for people to kneel. He was so popular that people from throughout England moved to Saint Botolph's town just to hear him preach. Soon the influence of the Puritans and Seperatists reached the ear of the King and an effort was made to silence them.

It was during this time that the Puritans decided to move to the Massachusetts Bay Colony to practice their faith freely. With the financial backing of the Earl of Lincoln and the wealthy families of Saint Botolph's parish, in the spring of 1630 a flotilla of seven ships was ready to take the first wave of 1,000 emi­grants to a new colony in the New World. Members of Saint Botolph’s church were prominent among those who set sail for Massachusetts Bay in April 1630, under their chosen leader John Winthrop on the Arbella, named for the daughter of the Earl of Lincoln, who was aboard with her husband. Their pastor, John Cotton, preached a farewell sermon just a few days before the small convoy sailed from Yarmouth. It is said that about 10% of the first settlers in Boston, Massachusetts came from Boston, England.

Saint Botolph's Church in Lincolnshire along with the Boston Stump

Over the years, the old and new Bostons have kept in touch. St. Botolph’s Church was restored in the mid-1800's and again between 1929-33, both times with significant help from the people of Boston, Massachusetts. As it happens, the town offers unique hospitality for Americans as a result. In 1999 the Partnership of the Historic Bostons was formed to re-establish the relationship between Boston, Massachusetts, and its mother town in England, with committees on both sides of the Atlantic working to keep the connections alive. Every year in Boston, Massachusetts, Boston Charter Day celebrates the anniversary of Boston’s naming and creation as a political entity on September 7, 1630. Events are coordinated by the Partnership (www.historicbostons.com).

Saint Botolph's Church began its construction in 1309 and completed in 1390. The church tower, famously known as Boston's Stump or The Stump, was erected in 1425 and took another 90 years to complete. It is the highest tower of any parish church in England at 272 feet built to navigate ships six miles away. It is of this tower with its beacon and its bells that we hear in Jean Ingelow's touching poem, "High Tide On the Coast of Lincoln­shire." Its construction was based on the calendar: 365 steps up the tower for days of the year, 12 stained glass windows for months of the year, 4 large main doors for the seasons, and 7 columns on the chancel roof for days of the week. Today, Boston in Lincolnshire is a bustling market town of 36,000 and throughout the year of 2009 it is celebrating the 700th anniversary of Saint Botolph's Church with many festivities throughout the year.

The people of Lincolnshire modeled many things in new Boston based on old Boston. On March 4, 1634 the Court of Assistants in new Boston, remembering the Stump of Saint Botolph's Church, passed the following resolution: "It is ordered that there shall be forth with a beacon set on the Centry hill at Boston to give notice to the Country of any danger, and that there shall be a ward of one person kept there from the first of April to the last of September; and that upon the discovery of any danger the beacon shall be fired, an alarm given, as also messengers presently sent by that town where the danger is discovered to all other towns within this jurisdiction." This helps us to understand the significance of the light at Boston's Old North Church in today's North End that sparked the Revolutionary War and signaled the famous ride of Paul Revere.

Nathaniel Hawthorne travelled to old Boston in Lincolnshire. He hints that the winding streets of new Boston can be attributed to old St. Botolph's town: "Its crooked streets and narrow lanes reminded me much of Hanover Street, Ann Street, and other portions of our American Boston. It is not unreasonable to suppose that the local habits and recollections of the first settlers may have had some influence on the physical character of the streets and houses in the New England metropolis; at any rate here is a similar intricacy of bewildering lanes and a number of old peaked and projecting storied dwellings, such as I used to see there in my boyish days. It is singular what a home feeling and sense of kindred I derived from this hereditary connection and fancied physiognomical resemblance between the old town and its well-grown daughter."

The relationship between old Boston and new Boston is beautifully expressed by New England poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem, “Boston”:

St. Botolph’s Town! Hither across the plains
And fens of Lincolnshire, in garb austere,
There came a Saxon monk, and founded here
A Priory, pillaged by marauding Danes,
So that thereof no vestige now remains;
Only a name, that, spoken loud and clear,
And echoed in another hemisphere,
Survives the sculptured walls and painted panes.

St. Botolph’s Town! Far over leagues of land
And leagues of sea looks forth its noble tower,
And far around the chiming bells are heard;
So may that sacred name forever stand
A landmark, and a symbol of the power,
That lies concentred in a single word.

The Puritans who named their “city on a hill” Boston likely had no intention of naming the city after a canonized saint, merely naming it after where many of them came from. And while June 17th is a holiday in new Boston, it is not for Saint Botolph but for the battle fought on Bunker Hill on that day in 1775. Coincidentally, the feast day of Saint Patrick, Boston’s other patron saint due to its many Irish immigrants, is also a public holiday but that is due to Evacuation Day and not the saint's day.

Besides the information about Saint Botolph provided by Holy Transfirguration Monastery above, little is known about Saint Botolph. Here are some other facts that we do know:

- He was born into a Christian Saxon family in the early seventh century. Botolph and his brother Adolph were educated by Saint Fursey in Cnobersburg Monastery, located at Burgh Castle near Great Yarmouth.

- When Mercian forces invaded the region, Botolph and Adolph went to Europe and became Benedictine monks in Belgian Gaul. Botolph returned to England in 647 to found a monastery in East Anglia based on the Benedictine Rule. He is credited for first bringing Benedictine monasticim to England. His brother Adolph, also commemorated on June 17th, remained in Germany or Holland and became a bishop.

- On his return, Botolph approached the little known King of the southern Angles, Ethelmund, whose sisters he had known in Germany that were also monastics. The King offered Botolph part of the royal estate upon which to build a monastery. Botolph however had specifically asked for land not already in anyone’s possession so that his gain would not be another person’s loss. Instead he settled for a desolate, barren island, reported to be haunted by demons. We are told that he received threats and horrible apparitions by these marsh-demons and overcame them through prayer, fasting and erecting a large Cross. Thus, land haunted by demons became holy ground.

- With the support of Saint Syre, Saint Aubierge, and their brother, King Anna of East Anglia (who may be the same King Ethelmund), Botolph founded the Monastery of Ikanhoe (Ox-island), which according to the Saxon Chronicle, was established in 654 AD as a Benedictine abbey.

- The site was surrounded by water and endless work was needed to make this austere place viable. But Botolph attracted enough brother monks and hermits and soon, through their hard work and faith, the monastery grew. The monks built several structures, turned large areas of marsh and scrub into productive grazing and farm land, and dispelled the local people's fear of demons.

- No one knows for sure today where Ikanhoe was - the two modern contenders are Iken in Suffolk and Boston in Lincolnshire. For many years local historians believed that the developing area around the monastery came to be called Botolph's Town, then Botolphston, with the name finally contracted to Boston. However, more recent research suggests that the actual spot may be the village of Iken, near Snape in east Suffolk which, centuries ago, was almost encircled by the River Alde. The church there is also dedicated to St. Botolph.

Iken, which may be the true site of Ikenhoe

The village of Iken

- During his time at the monastary, Botolph also worked as a travelling missionary through the rough, bandit-plagued areas of East Anglia, Kent and Sussex. He was known for many wonders and healings and displayed a gift of prophecy. His biographer, the English monk and musician, Folcard, writing in the 11th century, describes him as "distinguished for his sweetness of disposition and affability." Even the prominent Anglo-Saxon monastic, St. Ceolfrid, who later brought to Rome the Codex Amiatinus, a manuscript of the oldest Vulgate text of the Bible, came to Ikenhoe to spend time with this man.

- It is believed he died after a long painful illness while being carried to chapel for a compline service on 17 June 680 – the date his feast is commemorated. He was buried there at Ikanhoe. He was known to be "a man of remarkable life and learning, full of the grace of the Holy Spirit." His relics were later found incorrupt, and giving off a sweet fragrance.

- Botolph is supposed to have been buried at his foundation of Ikanhoe. In 970 King Edgar gave permission for his relics to be transferred to Burgh, near Woodbridge where they remained for some 50 years before being transferred, on the instructions of Cnut, to their own tomb at the Abbey of Bury St Edmunds. His relics were later translated (with those of his brother Adolph) to Thorney Abbey, although his head was transferred to Ely and other portions to Westminster Abbey and other houses. December 1 is the Feast of the Translation of his relics.

- Burgh is an ancient site, a hill top iron age settlement with signs of later Roman occupation. We know that in 970 the relics of Saint Botolph were housed in a chapel here and that he had a reputation for casting out demons. Burgh was known at that time as also being haunted by marsh-demons. There seems to be evidence that the hill in Beowulf, which was written in Suffolk in the 7th century, where Grendl was supposed to have lived, was this one. Was the story based on an older folk memory? The neighboring village is called Grundisburgh, consonant with the demon Grendl.

Burgh church from the air looking northeast. The church overlooks the haunted marshes. It is thought that Saint Botolph's relics were brought here so the locals could overcome their fear of the demons inhabited in the marshes.

- Many churches between Yorkshire and Sussex are dedicated to Saint Botolph, with a heavy concentration in East Anglia. It is said there are 71 churches in total. They bear witness to his untiring missionary work which strengthened the Benedictine movement for many centuries after his lifetime.

- Because he is considered the patron saint of travellers, four City of London churches, near gates in the City walls, were dedicated to him - St Botolph Billingsgate (destroyed in the Great Fire and never rebuilt), St Botolph Aldersgate, St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate (where the poet Keats was baptized) and St Botolph's Aldgate. This is attributed to providing places for incoming travellers to give thanks to him for safe arrival and for outgoing travellers to pray to him for a safe journey, and/or to relics of him coming through these four gates when King Edgar moved them from Iken to Westminster Abbey.

- Since old Boston in Lincolnshire had originally been haunted by demons which were exorcised by Saint Botolph, this also became the model for Puritans in new Boston as well that unfortunately went too far in purifying the Massachusetts Bay Colony with their heresy and witch trials that resulted in many executions.

For hymns in English to Saint Botolph written by Holy Transfiguration Monastery, see here.

Apolytikion in the Plagal of the First Tone
Neither the desolation of the fens, nor the depth of thy humility could hide the light of thy virtues, whereby thou becamest a lamp unto the faithful, O Botolph our righteous Father. Wherefore, we entreat thee: do thou also enlighten us who venerate thy blessed memory.

Kontakion in the First Tone
The glory of the just, the protector of Boston, the man of mighty prayer, our belov'd Father Botolph, entreateth the Saviour that He show mercy to all of us. Let us honour him with thankful praise, O ye faithful; let us imitate his conversation and virtues, that God hear his prayers for us.

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More Proof Against the Myth That Hitler Was A Devout Catholic

[Atheists often try to deflect arguments against the fact that atheistic ideologies made it possible for the 20th century to be the bloodiest century in history by citing the myth that Hitler committed all his atrocities as a devout Catholic. Though before 1933 we do hear of Hitler making affirmative Catholic statements hoping to win over the support of German Catholics and their conservative values, after 1933 he seems to grow silent on the subject. In 1999 this became the subject of a popular yet controversial book, Hitler's Pope, in which it was claimed that Pope Pius XII was an anti-Semite and helped to legitimize Hitler's Nazi regime. In 2005 this thesis was refuted by Rabbi David Dalin in his book The Myth of Hitler's Pope. Below is presented another study released today which shows that Hitler was far from a devout Catholic, proved by the fact that he planned an assasination attack against Pope Pius. - J.S.]

More Proof of Hitler's Plan to Kill Pius XII

Son of German Intelligence Officer Comes Forward

ROME, JUNE 16, 2009 (Zenit.org)- New evidence published today by the newspaper of the Italian bishops gives more credence to the belief that Adolf Hitler had planned to either kidnap or kill Pope Pius XII.

It has long been conjectured that Hitler had ordered the SS commander in Italy, General Karl Wolf, to seize the Vatican and take the Pope.

Dan Kurzman wrote about it in his 1997 book A Special Mission: Hitler's Secret Plot to Seize the Vatican and Kidnap Pope Pius the XII, which is based on interviews with Wolf himself. Wolf's accounts, however, could never be verified.

New evidence published today by Avvenire now points to the role of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (the Third Reich's main security office) in devising a plot to take out the Pope.

The newspaper cited the testimony of Niki Freytag Loringhoven, 72, the son of Wessel Freytag von Loringhoven, who during World War II was a colonel in the High Command of the German Armed Forces.

According to the son, days after Hitler's Italian ally, Benito Mussolini, had been arrested at the orders of King Victor Emmanuel III, Hitler ordered the Reichssicherheitshauptamt to devise a plot to punish the Italian people by kidnapping or murdering Pius XII and the king of Italy.

Hearing of the project, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, head of the German counterintelligence service, informed his Italian counterpart, General Cesare Amè, during a secret meeting in Venice from July 29-30, 1943.

Also present at the meeting were colonels Erwin von Lahousen and Wessel Freytag von Loringhoven, who both worked in Section II of German counterintelligence, which dealt primarily with sabotage.

Canaris, Von Lahousen and Freytag von Loringhoven had all been part of the German resistance against the Nazis.

Amè, upon returning to Rome, spread news of the plans against Hitler in order to block them, which proved successful. The plan was quickly dropped.

According to Avvenire, this testimony coincides with the deposition given by Von Lahousen during the Nuremberg war crimes trials on Feb. 1,1946 (Warnreise Testimony 1330-1430).

Canaris was later dismissed as the head of German intelligence in February 1944, put under house arrest, and then executed in 1945.

The two colonels participated with Claus Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg in the failed July 20 Plot to assassinate Hitler in 1944.

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A Guide to Russian Sects and Fringe Beliefs - Part 3 of 6

Russian Sects Part Three: Vissarion, the Siberian Messiah

(RIA Novosti continues its six-part series on Russian sects and fringe beliefs with an account of Scottish author Daniel Kalder's visit to the Siberian hideaway of an ex-traffic cop and self-proclaimed messiah.)

Austin, Texas
June 16, 2009
Daniel Kalder
RIA Novosti

In the early 1990s Russia was awash with mystics, fortune tellers and messiahs as the collapse of the Soviet Union had opened up a Pandora's Box of hitherto forbidden beliefs.

After seven decades of state-supported atheism, all the world's religious possibilities flooded the country at once, and in the ensuing chaos thousands of men and women claimed to hear messages from spiritual realms. Many of these seers simply faded away, while a few such as the Ukrainian prophetess Maria Devi Christos ended up engulfed in scandal, and then locked up in jail.

One Messiah however has shown real staying power, and is surely the most successful of the many Christs that were wandering around Russia 18 years ago. He is the ex-traffic policeman Sergei Torop, better known to his followers as Vissarion Christ, who lives on top of a mountain in the southern Krasnoyarsk region of Siberia. It is reported that between 4000 and 5000 followers live in villages scattered around the mountain, while a further 50,000 follow his teachings in the world beyond.

Born on January 14th 1961 in Krasnodar in Russia's south, Torop's parents divorced when he was young. His mother took him to the industrial town of Minussinsk in Siberia where he grew up, and after completing his military service he became a traffic policeman. However Torop was also a talented artist and while painting an icon for a local church he experienced a mystical vision which lasted for several months, after which he realised that he was the Son of God. Donning red robes and assuming the name Vissarion, he preached his first sermon on the 18th August 1991. The charismatic Vissarion soon attracted followers and led them to the mountain he now calls home. There, equipped only with handheld saws and axes, they cut a path to the top and erected a home for 'the Teacher'. A community began to grow in the villages around the mountain. Soon afterwards Vissarion spoke at a press conference revealing to the world that he was the Messiah, come to reveal the Last Testament to mankind.


About three years ago I travelled to Siberia to meet Vissarion for a book I was writing. I was driven mainly by curiosity: I had never met a Messiah before, and I also wanted to talk to the people who had given up everything to follow him, to try and understand their motivations. After a 2000 mile flight from Moscow that passed through 4 time zones I arrived in Abakan, a bleak industrial town close to Mongolia, and from there travelled for hours through the flat, snow-covered Siberian landscape to Petropavlovka, the 'capital village' of the Vissarionites. Immediately I was in a different world, as Petropavlovka was clean, orderly and contained lots of new buildings - unlike most of the depressed and run down settlements I had passed through en route. After some initial confusion (my contact had left the village and so nobody knew I was coming) I was ushered into the home of Tatiana Denisova, formerly the editor of a soviet newspaper, now one of Vissarion's most devoted followers.

Tatiana explained to me that she had built her house, a dance hall, and a girl's school with the proceeds from the sale of her apartment in Moscow. Everybody who came to live in Petropavlovka had to sell his house in order to pay for a home in the new world: thus although money was banned in the community, those who had been richest in their old life managed to maintain some of their prosperity in their new life - and it also makes it harder to leave, of course. The atmosphere was friendly and open, though the portrait of a smiling Vissarion hanging on the wall was a little unnerving.

Tatiana and her friend Rashid, an ex-Muslim from Tatarstan stressed Vissarion's environmentalism. His teachings were about living in harmony with nature, they said, and anyone was free to live in the community so long as he agreed to respect the community's rules, which included adherence to a strict vegan diet, and a prohibition on alcohol and drugs. Most of the people in the community came from the former Soviet Union, but there were also some Bulgarians, Germans and a lone Belgian among them. Contrary to the popular belief that sects appeal mainly to the weak-willed and stupid, many of the people I met were highly educated members of the professional classes: teachers, scientists and artists, an astrophysicist from Cuba and there was even a former deputy minister in the Belarussian government living in the village. Tatiana's next door neighbour was Svetlana Vladimirskaya, an extremely famous pop star from the mid-1990s who had abandoned the world of fame and glamour to follow Vissarion. All of them spoke in glowing terms about 'the Teacher'. Once you heard the wisdom of his teachings, once you met him, you just knew that he was the Son of God.

I spent a few days in Petropavlovka, speaking to people, and marvelling at the smoothness of the operation - it was especially surprising to find a state of the art media studio located inside a traditional wooden Russian house. This was where the group produced videos and DVD's that they used to proselytise throughout Russia. These frequently depicted images of beautiful Siberian meadows that looked like something out of a Tolkien fantasy. They didn't show much of the snow and the backbreaking toil required to live in isolation in Siberia however.

The most interesting person I met was 'Sergei' the village priest, who in an earlier life had been a rocket scientist, officer in the Red Army, and also one of the men who sat in a remote station in the Far East waiting for the phone call from the Kremlin instructing him to press the button that would start a nuclear holocaust. Sergei saw the Vissarionites as continuing the Russian tradition of religious non-conformism which had begun with the schism of 1666. Since then the remote regions of the country have always been home to a bewildering mix of apocalyptic Old Believers, self- castrating Skopts, self-flagellating Khlysts and many other movements which rejected the state and the official church.

Sergei explained Vissarion's theology, assuring me that it contained no contradictions and was completely reconciled with science. It seemed to include a bit of everything - which is appropriate as Vissarion claims to have come to unite all religions. Here are just a few of the Teacher's ideas, which are accepted as truth by his thousands of followers:

1) There are two Gods. The first created the universe and then withdrew, leaving us to cause chaos. The second came into being later and wants to help us.

2) Satan is created by our own negative energy. He and his demons manipulate us into committing sinful deeds.

3) The earth is in the process of eradicating us for our wickedness.

4) Moral perfection is possible and necessary. This can be attained by studying and internalising Vissarion's Last Testament, now incorporating ten fat volumes of moral and metaphysical instruction.

5) If we do not perfect ourselves, then after the earth annihilates us there will be no bodies left for us to reincarnate into; thus our souls will whirl around the cosmos in torment forever. Vissarion's community is ensuring that a small quantity of 'good flesh' will survive the apocalypse so that the souls will have somewhere to go.

Want to know more? Well, the sect's site has information in English, and Sergei also recommended The Matrix as a good illustration of their world view.

Nightline report on Vissarion of Siberia

Finally I received clearance to visit the Messiah. And so early one morning I left Petropavlovka and travelled 40km offroad, before trekking a further four kilometres on foot through the taiga to the entrance of the 'Abode of Dawn'. This was the village where 250 of Vissarion's most devoted followers lived, working to build a perfect 'city' of fourteen streets, radiating outwards from a central point like a star. The Messiah lived above it all in a wooden house at the highest stage of the mountain, with only his family, secretary and a few servants to attend to his needs. A guide met me at the entrance to the village and very soon I was ascending the path for my audience with the Son of God.

Vissarion was standing when I entered the room, dressed in white, nodding and smiling beatifically. He was tall and imposing and looked a lot like pictures of Jesus Christ. His personal secretary Vadim was at his side: in an earlier life, he had been a member of the Russian rock band Integral, which had performed at the groundbreaking Tbilisi Rock Festival 1980, regarded as the 'Soviet Woodstock'. Now he attended to the Messiah's every needs, and recorded his every public utterance for possible inclusion in the Last Testament - which is why it's ten volumes long and still growing.

I had read other interviews and knew that Vissarion got bored easily. So I decided to speak to him as if he was who he claimed to be: the Son of God. My first question was very open: 'What is the most important thing for people who don't know what you are doing here to understand?'

Vissarion paused, formulating his answer precisely. Then, eyelids half-closed as if hypnotized, he replied in a soft, sing - song voice that they should come and follow him if they hoped to survive the coming global catastrophe.

'But it's difficult,' I said. 'You live so far away and hardly anyone knows about your revelation. Why don't you come to the people as Jesus did, and preach?'

'I have visited many places,' he said wearily. 'I have seen enough. They will find me, if their souls are ready.'

'And the others?'

He shrugged, apparently unconcerned. Then he started explaining parts of his theology but I already knew it all from the priest. I then tried to find out if there was there any trace of Sergei Torop, the ex- traffic policeman left in him, but those questions led to a dead end. It was as if Torop was somebody else he had known a long time ago. The only continuity was the easel by the window: the Messiah was still an enthusiastic artist. The question that really set him on fire was this: 'Is it a joy or a burden to be the Christ?' I asked.

Vissarion paused, and then laughed. Instantly, the atmosphere changed and he began to elaborate upon how difficult it was to be the Messiah, but at the same time, he had no choice. It was necessary to suffer so that he could understand the pain in the hearts of men. And now, the Son of God could not be stopped: thirty minutes later he was still talking, totally energized, speaking of the events that would follow the Apocalypse when the survivors would cast off their bodies and colonize new planets as spirit beings. Finally I called a halt to the interview: listening to all that talk about cosmic energy and reincarnation had left me exhausted.

Dreamland - the Community of Vissarion (1)

Vissarion was unlike anybody I had ever met. He was very charismatic, and I didn't doubt that he was sincere. It was also impossible to deny that he and his devotees had achieved impressive things, whether it be building a town on top of a mountain or growing bananas in Siberia.

The next day however I attended an open air meeting between Vissarion and the villagers and was shocked by what I heard. They wanted to know what brands of washing powder were acceptable to God, and whether it was okay to laugh at dirty jokes. There was nothing dangerous or surprising in his answers, but that was the problem. His followers were highly intelligent people, indeed probably more intelligent than their Saviour. They should have known the answers already. His divine plan to make his followers morally perfect was failing: the vast list of rules in the Last Testament was actually making them infantile, terrified they weren't fulfilling God's commands accurately. It was as if having escaped one totalitarian system, they had decided to embrace another, different one, under the Teacher's watchful eye.

I left shortly afterwards. And while I never came close to believing, and it remained a mystery to me why so many intelligent and capable people accepted Sergei Torop as their Saviour, I must admit that I am haunted by memories of the time I spent among the Vissarionites. I often think about the people I met out there, and wonder how they're doing. I would like to go back - not to live, just to spend a little more time on the edge of the End of the World. I hear the mountain calling. Thus far I have been able to resist.

Daniel Kalder is the author of Strange Telescopes and Lost Cosmonaut. Visit his website at http://www.danielkalder.com/

Dreamland - the Community of Vissarion (2)

Here also is another good article.

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Concerning the Book "Beloved Sufferer - The Life and Mystical Revelations of a Russian Eldress: Schemanun Macaria" Published By St. Xenia Skete

Blessed Schemanun Macaria (May 29, 1926 - June 6, 1993)

On June 6th I noticed in my calendar of Saints and Feast Days published by Saint Herman Monastery that we celebrate the memory of a crippled woman who lived in extreme suffering yet endured her suffering with great patience and humility and in return bore great spiritual powers in our days - Blessed Schemanun Macaria of Russia (+1993). I first came across her life story through the book published by St. Xenia Skete titled Beloved Sufferer - The Life and Mystical Revelations of a Russian Eldress: Schemanun Macaria. This biography was first written in Russian by one of her spiritual children, Gennady Durasov. Soon after her death in 1993, in the Christmas issue of the Russian magazine Russky Palomnik (Russian Pilgrim), her story was first made public to the world. It was this original manuscript that was sent to Saint Herman Brotherhood in California and distributed by them in Russian until an expanded copy was sent by Durasov to be translated into English. It is this expanded copy that was published by St. Xenia Skete which is affiliated with Saint Herman Monastery.

It is significant to note the introductory remarks to the Russian edition published in 1993 by Abbot Herman of St. Herman Monastery:

In the vicinity of Novodevichy Monastery, while in Moscow this early spring, literally on the threshold of the bookstore 'Radonezh', I happened to meet the author of these notes - Gennady Durasov. Almost the first words of his were about Eldress Macaria whom he highly revered. At that time she was alive and he had already completed her biography, her Life. Hearing this, I hesitated for a minute; but, being convinced of the sincerity of this good man, I began to implore the Lord to grant me the possibility of getting acquainted with the life of this living saint.

Soon after Pentecost she died, and he at once sent me this Life, wonderful in its content, which we here are offering to our good reader.

So far, from what we read in the introductory notes of Beloved Sufferer, we find a few disturbing things. First, we read that two manuscripts are given to Saint Herman Monastery for publishing - a short version for a Russian magazine and a longer version for an English book. Second, we read in the Russian edition that the author of these notes, Gennady Durasov, had already written the life of this holy woman while she was alive yet only passed it on for publication after the death of Mother Macaria. Essentially there is nothing wrong with this, but it plays a significant role as to why this book is no longer distributed.

I first acquired this book in 1995, being struck with great curiosity over the shocking cover photo of the book and the intriguing title. I didn't read it at this time. I acquired a second copy of this book in 1998 from my wife who had received this book as a gift a few years earlier from her godmother upon her conversion to Orthodoxy from Catholicism. It would be ten years later however, in 2008, that I would finally pick up this book to read it. I found it to be an amazing and emotional read filled with wonderful spiritual instruction.

Upon completing the book I searched the internet for any further information on Mother Macaria, but it was in vain. In fact, I was surprised that there was absolutely no further information on her life, at least in English. What further surprised me was that St. Xenia Skete no longer distributed this book and it was completely off the catalogue of Saint Herman's Bookstore. Because the book was no longer being sold, it suddenly became a rare item to own and booksellers on the internet were selling it as high as nearly $200 a copy and as low as $65 on Amazon.com for a used copy. This disturbed me because such an inspiring tale was almost impossible to be acquired for less than a hefty price, so I figured since I possessed two copies I would offer to copy one of my books for anyone that was interested.

It was while I made this offer over the internet that someone contacted me to tell me that the book Beloved Sufferer was no longer distributed by the fathers of Saint Herman's because it was discovered that Schemanun Macaria had fallen into prelest (Russian for "spiritual deception"). This news blew me away and I could hardly believe that such an inspiring tale of a suffering bed-ridden woman who displayed such amazing spiritual gifts could be the victim of demonic forces. I was so disturbed that I sent an email to the fathers at Saint Herman Monastery asking if this accusation is true and if this was the reason why the book was no longer distributed.

On December 26, 2008 I received the following reply to my email:

Dear John,

To answer your question, no, she did not fall into prelest. What happened was this. When the text was first submitted to us, it was fairly short. Fr. Herman asked the auther if he could find more about her. He later sent what we published as the book. We later learned that he made up a lot of what he sent the second time, just to make us happy. We can no longer separate fact from fiction.

In Christ,
St. Herman Monastery

In one sense, I was relieved to find out that Schemanun Macaria had not become a victim of prelest. At the same time, I was extremely saddened over the fact that sections of this book I had read and been inspired by were fiction. I'm not a big fan of Oprah, but I honestly kind of felt like she did when she discovered James Frey's memoir was fiction. I requested further details of the kind father who responded to me, but I received no reply. Therefore, it is hard to confirm how true this information I received is. I can only take them at their word.

All this does not take away the fact that Schemanun Macaria was a grace-filled woman of our times. What it does take away however is an accurate account of her life. Therefore I appeal to my Russian brethren to separate fact from fiction regarding the life of Mother Macaria and make this available to the English speaking world. Let us pray that the Most Holy Theotokos reveal the truth about this saintly woman who was so dearly beloved by her.

Blessed Mother Macaria, pray to God for us.

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Orthodox Bishops Gather to Discuss the Diaspora

Orthodox bishops gathered in Chambesy, Switzerland to discuss the Orthodox diaspora

[The Fourth Pre-Conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference met June 6-12 in Chambesy, Switzerland to discuss the problem of the Orthodox diaspora. This is the first of two meetings to be held in 2009. The official language of the communiqué is in French and the English translation is below. It should be noted these are preparatory meetings for a future Pan-Orthodox Synod. However there has been a significant change reported that could reflect the future resolution for the unity of the jurisdictions of the Orthodox diaspora.

As we know, currently the bishops of certain areas of the diaspora (America and France) meet to discuss issues within their jurisdiction which are lead by a representative of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of that region (ex. SCOBA). At this first preparatory meeting it has been decided to extend this practice to all regions of the diaspora. This decision is logical since it would be difficult to resolve the issues of the diaspora if the regions of the diaspora are unaware of their issues. Of course, this means little to America and France who have this practice established already. It does, however, mean much to the Ecumenical Patriarchate to which the power to convene these meetings has been unanimously confirmed, even by the Russian Patriarchate. Could this delegation of a representative of the Ecumenical Patriarchate as the president of episcopal meetings in the diaspora foreshadow things to come in the diaspora? Only time will tell. - J.S.]

Full text of the Chambesy communiqué follows:

Fourth Pre-Conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference
Orthodox Centre of the Ecumenical Patriarchate
Chambésy, 6th – 12th June 2009

At the invitation of His Holiness the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, following the consensus of their Beatitudes the Primates of the most holy local Orthodox Churches, as expressed during their meeting held in the Phanar from 10th to 12th October 2008, the Fourth Pre-conciliar Pan-orthodox Conference met at the Orthodox Centre of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Chambésy, Geneva, from 6th to 12th June 2009.

The work of the Conference began with the pan-orthodox con-celebration of the Divine Liturgy, on the day of Pentecost. They were held under the chairmanship of His Eminence Metropolitan John of Pergamon, delegate of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, with the contribution of the secretary for preparation of the Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church, His Eminence Metropolitan Jeremias of Switzerland. The Conference was attended by delegates of the autocephalous Orthodox Churches, at the invitation of His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew.

The Primates of Local Orthodox Churches greeted the participants at the Conference by messages sent or forwarded by their delegates. The members of the Conference have sent letters to all the Primates of the local Churches, asking their prayers and their blessings for the accomplishment of their task.

In accordance with the wishes of the Primates and representatives of the local Orthodox Churches expressed in the message published at the end of their meeting at the Phanar (October 2008), the Fourth Pre-conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference was charged to examine the question of the canonical organization of the Diaspora Orthodox. The Conference decided its agenda at the opening meeting of its work.

The Conference reviewed the documents prepared by the preparatory inter-orthodox commission at its two meetings in Chambésy, i.e. that of 10th to 17th November 1990 and 7th to 13th November 1993 and the document prepared by the Canonists’ Congress meeting at Chambésy from 9th to 14th April 1995. These documents, specified, corrected and supplemented, have been approved unanimously.

The Conference expressed the willingness of Orthodox Churches to solve the problem of the canonical organisation of the Orthodox Diaspora, conforming to ecclesiology, tradition and canonical practice of the Orthodox Church. The Conference decided to create new episcopal assemblies in some regions of the world to order the question of the Diaspora, i.e. the Orthodox faithful installed in areas beyond the traditional boundaries of the local Orthodox Churches. The presidents of the Assemblies are bishops of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in the given region, and in their absence, the bishops in accordance with the order of the Diptichs of the Churches. All the bishops of the Orthodox Churches who exercise their pastoral ministry in the communities existing in each of these regions are members of these Assemblies. The Episcopal Assemblies are for the mission to manifest and promote the unity of the Orthodox Church, to exercise pastoral diakonia to the faithful of the region and to render to the world their common witness. The decisions of the Episcopal Assemblies are taken in accordance with the principle of unanimity of the Churches represented within these Assemblies by bishops.

After amended and supplemented, the Conference also approved the Proposed Regulations of Episcopal Assemblies by defining the fundamental principles of organization and operation thereof.

The remaining topics of the holy and great Council, i.e. the method of proclaiming of autocephaly and autonomy, and the order of Diptichs, will be discussed in future meetings of the preparatory inter-orthodox commission and will be submitted for approval to the following Pre-conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conferences.

Chambésy on 12th June 2009.

The President of the Conference
†John of Pergamon

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A Response To Errors About Fr. John Romanides in the Book "Orthodox Readings of Augustine"

In the book Orthodox Readings of Augustine there is an essay titled "Augustine and the Orthodox: 'The West' in the East" by George E. Demacopoulos and Aristotle Papanikolaou of Fordham University. It is a helpful essay that traces the place of Blessed Augustine in the Orthodox Church from the patristic period into contemporary times. Though it is an overview of this history, they do go into some detail in areas such as the section they title 'Theology in Greece: The 1960s Generation'. In this section the authors critique the views of Fr. John Romanides regarding Augustine, though they provide what seems to be a biased misrepresentation of his thesis regarding the person and work of Augustine.

I will reference the following points from page 32 of Orthodox Readings of Augustine. On this page the authors critique Romanides' doctoral thesis The Ancestral Sin saying that by todays academic standards it "is somewhat superficial and anachronistic". To support their claim they accuse Romanides of "very little" engagement with the "actual writings" of Augustine, and in the few references provided "there are frequent mistakes and/or false attributions". Furthermore, they accuse Romanides of unfairly reading Augustine's teachings of grace and free will through the lens of the "Palamite" distinction between essence and energy almost a thousand years later.

It is disappointing that Romanides' influential and misunderstood views of Augustine are critiqued here merely on the basis of his doctoral thesis. This is especially disappointing when one considers the fact that his doctoral thesis was not meant to be a critique of Augustine either as a person or as a theologian, which may account for the fact that Romanides does not engage the writings of Augustine with much depth. Just because the thesis is titled The Ancestral Sin does not mean Romanides intended to solely take on Augustine on this issue. If the authors had understood the purpose of Romanides' thesis they would have offered a less "superficial and anachronistic" critique.

Regarding the purpose of The Ancestral Sin, Romanides makes it clear in his Epilogue:

"This study has undertaken to demonstrate as erroneous the idea that prior to Tertullian and Augustine no one had seriously dealt with the problem of the ancestral sin and that prior to Augustine no one had understood St. Paul in depth. Students of this subject make the fundamental error of assuming that the only possible solutions to the problems of the ancestral sin are those offered by Augustine and Pelagius." (The Ancestral Sin, p. 171)

The reader with presuppositions reads the name of Augustine three times here and immediately assumes the thesis is about Augustine. Romanides however makes it clear that the purpose of his thesis isn't to critique Augustine, but those who falsely assume that Augustine was the first person to deal with the doctrine of original sin as understood by the Apostle Paul. Who are these people? In the same paragraph he mentions one by the name of F.R. Tennant, "who is regarded as the leading authority in the study of original sin, [and] examines the concepts of the fall according to various denominations and passes over the Orthodox teaching on the ancestral sin without offering any information about it". An examination of the Bibliography of Romanides' thesis reveals that it was the theologians of the past two hundred years or so that he was critiquing and referencing. It was the hope of Romanides to demonstrate that Augustine was not the first to deal with the issue of the ancestral sin, but that there was a clear patristic synthesis on this issue from post-apostolic times among all the Greek-speaking Fathers and this was opposed to the Augustinian interpretation of Saint Paul. Though Romanides traces scholastic thought as the source of modern errors regarding the interpretation of the doctrine of original sin in the West, he makes no effort to hide the fact that Augustine is indeed the source from which scholastic thought was born. However, as Romanides points out in the Introduction to his thesis, the vastness of the subject made it impossible to enter into certain details due to his limited space.

It would be in Fr. Romanides' later writings that he would actually take on Augustine and when needed he gave the appropriate citations. One place he does this is in his paper titled, "Augustine Unknowingly Rejects the Doctrine of the Ecumenical Councils Concerning the Old Testament Lord of Glory Incarnate and His Vatican and Protestant Followers Do the Same". Further critiques of Augustine are found throughout many other of his writings as well. Which leaves one wondering, if you are going to examine an authors views on someone, would you skip over the writings of that author that specifically address the subject? Why don't the authors examine what Romanides says about the "silent" condemnations of Augustinian teachings by the Fathers of the Second Synod of Orange or the Eighth and Ninth Ecumenical Synods for example? And what about the positive words Romanides had to say about Augustine? Surely a treatment of Romanides' views on Augustine would include some of these positive elements as well.

Having accused Romanides of not properly citing his sources, the authors make a point to apparently discredit Romanides as a scholar by pointing out that he provided false or mistaken attributions. The error they make however is by not referencing even one of these false or mistaken attributions. Instead they merely acknowledge a doctoral student at Fordham for pointing this out to them. One is only left to wonder what these false and mistaken attributions are. Were they just told these existed or did they substantiate this research themselves with their own research? With their lack of evidence, I am amazed that they have fallen into the same trap which they are criticizing.

Lastly, both Demacopoulos and Papanikolaou make a grave error in their understanding of Orthodox theology regarding the doctrine of the supposed "Palamite" distinction of the essence and energies of God and hesychastic theology. They should know better as Orthodox theologians that this distinction of essence and energies and the spirituality of hesychasm was not created by Gregory Palamas in the fourteenth century, but is a distinction and practice that Orthodox theology and also Gregory Palamas trace to the Prophets and Apostles as well as all the Greek-speaking Fathers of the Church. Romanides cites proof of this in the second chapter of his thesis "God's Relations With the World" and elsewhere throughout his writings. In fact, Romanides criticizes Fr. Theodore Stylianopoulos for "casting aspersion on this tradition" by calling it "Palamism" when in fact "it is generally accepted that this was the practice of such earlier Fathers as St. Symeon the New Theologian, St. Macarius of Egypt, St. John Cassian, St. Patrick of Ireland and all writers whose works on the subject are to found in the Philokalia" (From the lecture "The Theologian In the Service of the Church"). By calling the traditional teachings of the Orthodox Church "Palamite", it seems they presuppose a bias against the experience of the Saints through which their theology originated as opposed to the philosophical speculations of Augustine. Ambrose of Milan knew to distinguish the essence and energy of God, so why didn't his pupil Augustine?

It should be emphasized that Romanides acknowledged the sincerity of Augustine. He acknowledged Augustine's humility in admitting that his theology on the Trinity was indeed speculation and possibly contained errors. And nowhere does he speak against the positive remarks in reference to Augustine by such Fathers as Photios the Great, Mark of Ephesus and Nikodemos the Hagiorite who based their positive remarks on the supposition that the works of Augustine were tampered by the Franks. Romanides, as opposed to these Fathers, actually studied Augustine and formulated that this tampering probably never took place (though no one can really tell since, for example, the minutes of the Fourth Ecumenical Synod show proof of tampering when they list Augustine among "the holy fathers of the Third Ecumenical Synod" even though he died ten months before this synod). It was not Romanides' intention to condemn Augustine, because he understood Augustine was a victim of circumstance by being the father of zealous scholastics and this merely shined a light on his many errors. In light of this Romanides would probably agree that had Augustine been brought before a synod for his errors, he would surely have repented as he did later in life of other speculations in his Retractions.

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Saint Leo the Great on the Apostles Fast and its Significance

Saint Leo the Great (Sermon 78 - On the Whidsuntide or Pentecost Fast)

I. Since the Apostles' Day Till Now Self-Restraint is the Best Defence Against the Devil's Assaults.

Today's festival, dearly-beloved, hallowed by the descent of the Holy Spirit, is followed, as you know by a solemn fast, which being a salutary institution for the healing of soul and body, we must keep with devout observance. For when the Apostles had been filled with the promised power, and the Spirit of Truth had entered their hearts, we doubt not that among the other mysteries of heavenly doctrine this discipline of spiritual self-restraint was first thought of at the prompting of the Paraclete in order that minds sanctified by fasting might be fitter for the chrism to be bestowed on them. The disciples of Christ had the protection of the Almighty aid, and the chiefs of the infant Church were guarded by the whole Godhead of the Father and the Son through the presence of the Holy Spirit. But against the threatened attacks of persecutors, against the terrifying shouts of the ungodly, they could not fight with bodily strength or pampered flesh, since that which delights the outer does most harm to the inner man, and the more one's fleshly substance is kept in subjection, the more purified is the reasoning soul.

II. The Templer is Foiled in Attacks Upon Those Who Have Learnt These Tactics.

And so those teachers, who have instructed all the Church's sons by their examples and their traditions, began the rudiments of the Christian warfare with holy fasts, that, having to fight against spiritual wickednesses, they might take the armour of abstinence, wherewith to slay the incentives to vice. For invisible foes and incorporeal enemies will have no strength against us, if we be not entangled in any lusts of the flesh. The desire to hurt us is indeed ever active in the tempter, but he will be disarmed and powerless, if he find no vantage around within us from which to attack us. But who, encompassed with this frail flesh, and placed in this body of death, even one who has made much decided progress, can be so sure of his safety now, as to believe himself free from the peril of all allurements? Although Divine Grace gives daily victory to His saints, yet He does not remove the occasion for fighting, because this very fact is part of our Protector's Mercy, Who has always designed that something should remain for our ever-changing nature to win, lest it should boast itself on the ending of the battle.

III. And So This Fast Comes Very Opportunely After the Feast of Whitsuntide.

Therefore, after the days of holy gladness, which we have devoted to the honour of the Lord rising from the dead and then ascending into heaven, and after receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit, a fast is ordained as a wholesome and needful practice, so that, if perchance through neglect or disorder even amid the joys of the festival any undue licence has broken out, it may be corrected by the remedy of strict abstinence, which must be the more scrupulously carried out in order that what was on this day Divinely bestowed on the Church may abide in us. For being made the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and watered with a greater supply than ever of the Divine Stream, we ought not to be conquered by any lusts nor held in possession by any vices in order that the habitation of Divine power may be stained with no pollution.

IV. And by Proper Use of It We Shall Win God's Favour.

And this assuredly it is possible for all to obtain, God helping and guiding us, if by the purification of fasting and by merciful liberality, we take pains to be set free from the filth of sins, and to be rich in the fruits of love. For whatever is spent in feeling the poor, in healing the sick, in ransoming prisoners, or in any other deeds of piety, is not lessened but increased, nor will that ever be lost in the sight of God which the loving-kindness of the faithful has expended, seeing that whatever a man gives in relief, he lays up for his own reward. For "blessed are the merciful, since God shall have mercy on them;" nor wilt shortcomings be remembered, where the presence of true religion has been attested. On Wednesday and Friday, therefore, let us fast, and on Saturday let us keep vigil in the presence of the most blessed Apostle Peter, by whose prayers we surely trust to be set free both from spiritual foes and bodily enemies; through our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Ghost, lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

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Weeping Icon of Saint Nicholas in Hempstead, New York

This amazing video (probably the best I've ever seen of a weeping icon) was taken by Bishop Savas while he was chancellor of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America almost a year ago. He sent it to me with the following note:

"Long story short: I took this video in the sanctuary of the Cathedral of St Paul in Hempstead, New York, around 3:15 p.m. on June 22, 2008, Sunday of All Saints. This icon of St Nicholas the Wonderworker began to stream a clear, sweet-smelling liquid during the celebration of the Divine Liturgy in the morning. I don't know what to make of it. It smells of myrrh. I don't know if I would have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, handled it with my own hands, inhaled the aroma for myself. Take a look and see for yourselves. +S"

Apparently it began gushing myrrh on Pentecost Sunday and it was examined by the Greek Archdiocese a week later on the Sunday of All Saints when this video was taken.

I also had the opportunity to visit this parish and venerate this icon in July 2008, a month or so after the miracle, but it had stopped weeping by that time. What surprised me most was that this was not the first weeping icon of this parish. More can be read about these other weeping icons here and the parish website is here.

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What To Do If You Have A "Bad" Priest

From the letters of Saint Theophan the Recluse

Question: “We had a good priest; but he was transferred to another parish. In his place came another, who is a grief to the soul. In his serving the services, he is careless and hurried; when conversations occur, he talks only about trivial things; if he starts to talk about the things of God, then it is all with a kind of limitation and truncation of the strict truth. How is one to escape from such a temptation?”

Answer: You yourselves are at fault. You made poor use of the good priest, and the Lord took him away. Tell me, did you become better from your previous good priest? Here you falter to say, “Yes.” But I from a distance shall say that you did not become better, judging by the fact that you are judging the new priest, not knowing how to control your feelings in relation to him as you should. Indeed, you had a good priest even before this good priest who has now departed from you, and the one before him was good too. You see how many good priests the Lord has sent you; but you all have not become any better for it. And here He has decided: why waste good priests on these people? I’ll send them one not so good. And He did. Seeing this, you should have at once paid attention to yourself, to repent and improve, but you just judge and keep judging over and over again. Improve yourselves, and then the priest will at once be changed. He will think: “With these people I cannot carry out my holy work carelessly; I must serve reverently and conduct edifying conversations.” And he will mend his ways. If priests are negligent and hurried in serving the services and are trivial in conversations, then most of the time it comes from conforming to the parishioners.

Saying this, I am not justifying the priest. He has no excuse, if he tempts the souls entrusted to him not only with action against the ustav but even unwise action according to the ustav. But I say only what is more useful for you to do in the given case. And the most important thing I have already said: do not judge, but pay attention to yourselves and improve yourself both in prayer and in conversation, and in all your behavior. Pray for this with all your heart, that the Lord will correct the priest. And He will correct him. Only pray properly. The Lord said, that if two agree about anything and will begin to pray, then they will have their request (Matt. 18:19). So all you right-thinking parishioners gather together and decide to pray for the priest; join fasting to your prayer and redouble your almsgiving; and do this not just for a day or two, but for weeks, months, a year. Labor and afflict yourself with brokenness so long as the priest has not changed. And he will change; be certain that he will.

I recently heard about a similar podvig and its fruit. One old woman, a simple peasant, a deeply pious woman, noticed that someone she respected had begun to depart some from his customary strictness of life, and she began to be sick at heart for him. She came home, locked herself in her hut, and began to pray after she had said to the Lord: “I will not leave this place, or taste a crumb of bread, or drink a drop of water, or give my eyes a minute of sleep until Thou hearest me, O Lord, and hast turned this person back to his former ways.” She did just as she had decided: she labored in prayer and afflicted her-self with broken-hearted tears importuning the Lord to hear her. Already she had become fatigued, already her strength had begun to leave her; but she all over again prayed: “Though I die, I will not give this up until the Lord hears me.” And He did. The confirmation came to her that this man for whom she was praying had again begun to keep himself as of old. She ran to have a look, saw that it was so, and broke into rejoicing. Her grateful tears had no end. And so this is the kind of prayer you are to establish—although not such in form, because, perhaps, for you it would not be suitable to do as she did—but such in zeal, self-sacrifice, and persistence. And undoubtedly you will receive what you desire. If you will some-times say, “Grant, Lord, that He may become good” only in passing, whether at home, or in church, or during conversations, then what sort of fruit is to be expected from such prayer? For this is not prayer, but words only.

I have said the main thing to you. I should add still one thing more; but it is the sort thing that is most difficult to carry out in such a way that it achieves its aim. Here is what I think! It may be possible for you who are right-thinking and respected to come to the priest and ask him to change in his actions that which incites you and leads you into temptation. To do this—there is nothing simpler; but to do it in such a way that it bears fruit is difficult in the extreme. Every-thing must breathe with the most sincere and zealous love—not only the content of what you say, but even your glance, and expression, and tone of voice. Then it may be hoped that this will achieve its aim. But without this love, it is better not to undertake such a step: it will come out worse, produce the most sorrowful discord. One could, perhaps, write everything to him in like manner, but, again, the whole matter must be carried off in the spirit of all-conquering love. It is also as possible to spoil the whole matter by this means just as it is by personally appearing to the priest. This is why I am not unconditionally decided to recommend this approach. I know, that it may be crowned with success, but the main thing is proper execution. Many good people will be found to come to the priest or to write him without seeing him and to express everything in the most polite manner, but for success, something other than gentleness is needed. Gentleness without love is a wounding sting. I know that in other places they act in this way and then boast: “We have done our part!” But I shall say, that it had been better had they not done it.

I shall not say anything more to you about this—maybe just one thing more: be patient. There are still other legal means; but they are not my field, and I shall be silent about them.

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A Video of Two Angels Taking A Soul?

This video of a sunset, taken in the city of Semipalatinsk (Kazakhstan), has been circulating among Orthodox. It claims to depict the soul of a child who had just died being taken by two angels. You can see a light descend into the building in front of the sun to the place the child died in the building and ascend through the building and up above in front of the sun.

It could possibly be a reflection, though it would be very odd since it does not seem possible to reflect into a building (wouldn't the reflection overshadow the building?), and likely does not prove anything. If indeed a child did die there as is claimed, it is an interesting video. I'll let the viewer draw their own conclusions.

The video can be better viewed here as well.

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The Apostle Barnabas and the Church of Cyprus

Saint Barnabas the Apostle (Feast Day - June 11)

Barnabas was born in Salamis, Cyprus and joined the Apostle Paul to spread the Gospel throughout Cyprus and Asia Minor. However, the two men split up over the objection to Barnabas' cousin John Mark coming along too. John Mark and Barnabas thus went on their own missionary journey throughout Cyprus without Paul.

In 57 A.D., the Jewish community in Salamis objected to his preaching in the synogogue, and had Barnabas dragged out, tortured and stoned to death. The Jews then had his remains wrapped in a sheet and hid them in some marshland, prior to being disposed at sea. The Apostle John Mark, who was a witness of this barbarous action, together with some converted slaves rescued the body of Saint Barnabas and buried it in an old tomb under a carob (some say cherry) tree to the west of Salamis. On the chest of Saint Barnabas his cousin placed a Gospel book of Matthew written by Barnabas. Hotly pursued by the Jews, who had discovered their plan, they escaped to Nicosia, where they managed to elude their pursuers and escaped to Egypt. The relics of Saint Barnabas, one of the first christian martyrs, remained hidden in this tomb for the next four hundred years unknown to anyone.

Saints Paul and Barnabas the Apostles

In 115 one of the most terrible events in the history of Cyprus occurred. A revolt arose by the Jews throughout the Roman Empire. In Cyprus, under the leadership of Artemion, the Jews slaughtered over 240,000 fellow-citizens. This revolt caused such prejudice against the Jews to spread, that it took centuries before another Jew was allowed to step on the island of Cyprus without being severely punished. The one positive outcome of this atrocity was that since the Jews were expelled from Cyprus, Christianity could flourish among the pagans.

A few of the Bishops who helped spread Christianity on the island were Lazarus the bishop of Kition (whom Jesus rose from the dead), Herakleidios the bishop of Tamasos, Avxivios the bishop of Soloi, and Theodotos the bishop of Kyrenia. Saint Spyridon the Wonderworker was bishop of Tremithous and represented Cyprus during the First Ecumenical Synod along with two other bishops of Cyprus (one historian says there were twelve bishops from Cyprus). Towards the end of the fourth century, Christianity had spread throughout the island. During this time Saint Epiphanius, the great defender of Orthodoxy, was Metropolitan. His seat was in Salamis, which was renamed Constantia.

The island of Cyprus had been part of the civil diocese of the East and administered by an official sent from Antioch. Since the jurisdiction of Cyprus was under Antioch on the civil and political level, it was believed by the Patriarch of Antioch that this jurisdiction should also be extended ecclesiastically as well. To gain the support of Pope Innocent I of Rome, a letter was written by Patriarch Alexander I of Antioch in which he made the unwarranted claim that his predecessors laid claim over Cyprus until things lapsed during the Arian schism of Eustathios. Without questioning the intentions of his fellow bishop, Innocent supported Antioch in its claim over Cyprus and ordered Cyprus to submit under Antioch. The Christians of Cyprus refused.

In 431 at the Third Ecumenical Synod of Ephesus, the Church of Antioch represented by Patriarch John tried to prevent the Church of Cyprus from gaining autocephaly, insisting it be under the jurisdiction of Antioch. The Church of Cyprus, represented by Metropolitan Rheginos, insisted on independence by claiming "ancient custom" be upheld in which Cyprus always ordained its own bishops and never was under the jurisdiction of Antioch. The same metropolitan also listed a series of grievances against Antioch for interfering in its election processes of bishops in the past and even harassing visiting Cypriot bishops to Antioch. The bishops of Antioch had no evidence to support their claims. The Fathers of the Synod ratified the autocephalous status of the Church of Cyprus in its seventh session on August 31st (some say July 31) with the third canon and prevented any further molestation by the Patriarchs of Antioch.

In c. 488 Peter the Fuller, the famous Monophysite patriarch of Antioch, appeared in Constantinople to renew the old claims for jurisdiction in Cyprus from Emperor Zeno. Peter, unlike John, asserted his rights to supremacy not on ancient custom, but on the belief that christianity originally spread from the apostolic foundations of Antioch to Cyprus. Antioch claimed as its first bishop the Apostle Peter. Bishop Anthemios of Salamis (Constantia) and Metropolitan of all Cyprus was summoned to the capital to give an answer. They knew they also had apostolic foundations in the person of Saint Barnabas, but the problem was that there was no proof to back up the claims of the Cypriot christians.

There is no doubt the claims of Peter the Fuller would have succeeded had not divine authority intervened. After Anthemios was called to Constantinople he began having dreams over a period of three nights. Saint Barnabas started appearing in the dreams of Bishop Anthemios directing him to his long forgotten tomb under a carob (some say cherry) tree. The bishop found the tomb exactly where the vision had indicated, complete with a skeleton clutching a copy of the Gospel of Saint Matthew written by the hand of the Apostle Barnabas. Theodoros Lector, a Church historian of those days, reports that both the relics and the gospel book were presented by Anthemios to Emperor Zeno who received them with great joy and had the gospel book covered in gold and jewels. Peter the Fuller was immediately dismissed after a synod was called by Patriarch Akakios of Constantinople confirming the independent status of the Church of Cyprus. Zeno also granted its bishop, Anthemios of Salamis, the status of Archbishop and ranked after the five ancient patriarchates, along with the so-called "three privileges" which have been zealously guarded ever since: namely 1. to sign his name in cinnabar, a red ink made vermilion by the addition of the mineral cinnabar which was only used by the emperor (this red ink was used when Archbishop Makarios signed the document granting Cyprus independence from Britain in 1959); 2. to wear imperial purple instead of black robes under his vestments; and 3. to hold an imperial sceptre instead of the regular episcopal pastoral staff.

The discovery of the relics of Saint Barnabas by Bishop Anthemios

Severus of Antioch mentions in his letter to Bishop Thomas of Germanicea that sometime between 496 and 511 he visited Constantinople and examined the Gospel of Matthew discovered in the tomb of the Apostle Barnabas, and mentioned it "was written in large letters, and was preserved with great honor in the royal palace". Severus also noted that it was free of certain falsifications that existed in the Gospel of Matthew commentaries of Saints John Chrysostom and Cyril of Alexandria regarding a purported passage that Jesus was pierced with a spear at the crucifixion (these two Saints confused the lectionary of the Church which interpolated various accounts of the Gospels, in this case the Gospel of John, with the singular Gospel of Matthew). The eleventh century Roman historian Georgios Kedrenos mentions that an uncial manuscript of Matthews Gospel, believed to be found by Anthemios, was then still preserved in the Chapel of Saint Stephen in the imperial palace. We are informed also that every Good Friday the reading from the Gospel of Matthew was done from this gospel book in the Chapel of Saint Stephen.

The tomb of Saint Barnabas

Saint Barnabas is considered the patron Saint of Cyprus. The fact that he appeared to Archbishop Anthemios at that particular time was seen as a divine intervention to halt the spread of the monophysite heresy into Cyprus. A monastery was established on the site of Saint Barnabas' tomb in Salamis in c. 488 with funds provided by the Roman Emperor Zeno and the rich members of the imperial court. Though the gospel book remained in Constantinople, Anthemios was able to bring the relics of Saint Barnabas back to Cyprus. However, the church was destroyed by Arab raiders in the seventh century, but it was rebuilt. The present church and cloisters at the monastery of Saint Barnabas date from 1756, and parts of the building reused columns from the ancient site at Salamis.

The Monastery of Saint Barnabas in Cyprus

The independence of the Church of Cyprus was confirmed by the Trullan Synod in Constantinople in 692. Attempts were made subsequently by the patriarchs of Antioch to claim authority over the Cypriot Church, the last as recently as 1600, but in vain.

Cyprus was saved in many ways by the discovery of the relics of Saint Barnabas. One historian, Kyprianos, remembering all these benefits, writes:

"I doubt whether any other Apostle so defended his native land and proved himself such a patriot as our Barnabas, who during his life freed his fellow countrymen from the abominable worship of idols by teaching them the true faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, and after his death delivered the holy Church of his native land from the oppression of the ambitious and grasping clergy of Antioch, and raised it to such an eminence that it was the envy even of those of the highest rank in the hierarchy. Truly and without doubt the veritable Son of Consolation he, I mean Barnabas, fulfilled in all respects the injunction: 'Fight for faith and fatherland'. Under what an obligation then are we Cypriots to the deliverer of our souls, to the benefactor and originator of our Church's renown, let each decide for himself; and let us celebrate the patron and protector of his native land both in the present life and in the one to come."

The mausoleum of Saint Barnabas

A video of the Monastery of Saint Barnabas can be seen here.

Aerial-veiw of the Monastery of Saint Barnabas

A Parapalegic Walks to the Tomb of Saint Barnabas

A Miracle of the Apostle Barnabas in Recent Times That Left Muslims, Atheists and Doctors in Amazement

March 15, 2005

Two months after highly reported clerical scandals in Greece, on 15 March 2005, the following miracle occurred at the Monastery of the Apostle Barnabas in Cyprus.

The man himself, the Church, and even his doctors attribute his cure to a miracle.

All hopes had vanished for the parapalegic Mario and his doctors in Cyprus and Germany that he would never walk again. But a miracle happened after he venerated the tomb of the Apostle Barnabas.

Marios Stylianos, forty years old, from the Turkish occupied Ammochosto and who currently lives in Lefkosia, was left a parapalegic after surgery on his neck, for which he traveled abroad. He related himself that he had seen in a dream the Apostle Barnabas, who told him to write a book about his life and as soon as it was finished to go to his tomb and he would walk. Marios, following his dream, went to the tomb of the Apostle Barnabas in the occupied Monastery of the same name near Ammochosto, and after the Liturgy was finished at the tomb said that he saw the Apostle Barnabas approach him holding the Gospel and extending him his right hand. Then he made a cry and felt something like an electric current flowing through him, and he continued to get up from his wheelchair and walked, though supported.

Neurologist Michael Protopapas, who was caring for the parapalegic, related that both he and the German doctors who referred him to surgery believed with certainty the clinical picture which Marios Stylianos presented, and that he would not walk again. To the question if Marios Stylianos' paralysis could be attributed to psychosomatic causes, he said that all of the specific tests had showed that the spinal cord did not send any "signal" to Marios' foot. Having been asked whether he believes that his is a miracle, he replied: "Above everything is God. This I believe personally."

Marios Stylianos with Elder Gabriel, the last monk of the Monastery of Saint Barnabas

Moreover, the Church spokesman related that there was great concern whether the event should be disclosed. Eventually, he said, the view prevailed that this fact should be the property of the people.

Of course it is always important to approach these situations with caution.

However, the Church is being cautious about proclaiming the case a miracle. The Bishop of Arsinoe said the Church did not rule out miracles but would not jump to any immediate conclusions. Echoing his comments, Bishop Chrysostomos of Paphos, who is acting head of the Church, told the Cyprus Mail yesterday he would prefer not to make any judgments, saying it had not happened on his “territory”. If he had, he said he would be more than willing to give a lengthy statement. “I believe in miracles but we should not accept them at a glance,” he said. “It needs analysis.”

Marios Stylianos taking his first steps after the miracle.

Translated from: http://www.apostolosvarnavas.org/Miracle.htm

Procession with the icon of Saint Barnabas in Cyprus on June 11, 2009

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