Orthodoxy and New Age Spirituality

From an interview with Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos:

Question: Over the last several decades societies which in the past considered themselves to be Christian are falling victim to the flood of different pseudo-religious cults (represented in numerous Yoga and meditation systems, UFO hysteria, neopagan sects, etc.), all of them under the umbrella of the so-called New Age Movement. What do you think is the reason for the popularity of these movements and how the Orthodox Church should act in the presence of the above-mentioned New Age “spirituality”?

Answer: The reason for the spread of various pseudo-religious heresies, the so-called religious or neopagan sects, which many members of the Church fall victims to, is that a lot of people have separated from the neptic tradition of our Church. As it is known, the neptic/hesychastic tradition of the Church, which constitutes the prophetic, apostolic and martyric spirit of the ancient Church, is the criterion by which it can be discerned whether some action comes from God or from the devil.

Saint Gregory of Nyssa teaches that heresies flourish where prophets are absent. This is so because prophets and apostles know how to distinguish falsehood from truth.

In addition, in our days, people, and mostly the young ones, do not find comfort in conventional manners, in an externally moralistic life. Instead, they search for answers to existential questions, they look for inner peace and existential freedom.

Therefore, what is needed above anything else in our times is the hesychastic tradition, which forms the basis of the Gospel, the context of the Holy Eucharist, the essence of the apostolic and patristic message. This spirit is found abundant in the Philokalia and the Sayings of the Elders (Gerontikon). When these texts are read within the canonical structure of the Orthodox Church, they help us avoid fallacy and everything associated with it.

From Sobornost, September 2006.

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'Vampire' Graves Discovered at Bulgarian Monastery

Archaeologists excavating a monastery near the city of Sozopol, Bulgaria, discovered the 700-year-old remains of two males who had been stabbed through the heart with iron rods — an indication that their 14th century contemporaries believed them to be vampires. The sensational discovery was made during the excavations of St. Nikolai Chudotvoretz Monastery, which was built at the harbor (St. Nicholas is the patron saint of sailors) and existed in the 10th-12th centuries. The find was discovered in a necropolis close to the semicircular building part.

More than 100 such “vampire” graves have been discovered in Bulgaria recently, all of them containing male aristocrats or clerics whose bodies had been repeatedly stabbed or nailed into their coffins after death.

Bojidar Dimitrov, head of the Bulgarian National History Museum, told the Sofia News Agency that ”these people were believed to be evil while they were alive, and it was believed that they would become vampires once they are dead, continuing to torment people.”

“The curious thing is that there are no women among them. They were not afraid of witches,” he added.

Prof. Bojidar Dimitrov supposes that the found skeleton belongs to the legendary pirate Krivich, the superintendent of the Sozopol fortress, or his heir. Nearby is the Church of Sts. Cyril and Methodius, where a woman in fact was found buried in the same manner.

The findings have sparked intense interest among vampire-lovers in Europe, Asia and the United States and could transform Bulgaria into a “tourism gold mine,” according to CNN.

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How Fourth Marriages Became Prohibited

By Milton V. Anastos

Emperor Leo VI's Fourth Marriage

Α short period of tranquillity ended in 912, when Nicholas Mysticos ("confidential adviser"), who was Patriarch of Constantinople from 901 to 907 and from 912 to 925, removed the name of the Pope of Rome from the Constantinopolitan diptychs because the Roman see had sanctioned the fourth marriage of the Emperor Leo VI "the Wise" (886-912). The problem arose because of the singular misfortune of the Emperor Leo, whose first three wives died without providing him with a male heir. About 894, apparently sometime before his second marriage, not realizing what fate had in store for him, Leo had himself sternly forbidden third marriages (Novel 9). Nevertheless, since he still lacked a son after the death of Zoe, his second wife, he felt compelled for dynastic reasons to press on to a third union, and subsequently even to a fourth, when Eudocia, his third wife, died in giving birth to a son who did not survive.

Then, at first, he comforted himself with a mistress named Zoe Carbonopsina ("of the coal-black eyes"). But in 905, when this fourth lady bore him a son (the future Emperor Constantine VII, one of the greatest scholars and historians Byzantium ever produced), Leo resolved that she and their son should be fully legitimated. The Patriarch Nicholas agreed to baptize the young prince (January 6, 906), but only on the condition that Leo separate himself from the child's mother. Three days later, however, Leo got a priest by the name of Thomas to perform the marriage ceremony.

In the midst of the ensuing uproar among the clergy and people of Constantinople, while Nicholas was seeking a formula by which the Byzantine Church could overcome its prohibition of fourth marriages and lend its approval to what Leo had done, Leo decided that appeal should be made to the other four patriarchates for their judgment in the matter. Actually, as it turned out, Leo was unwilling to receive any special dispensation from Nicholas who had once joined in a plot against the throne; and as soon as word arrived from the four foreign patriarchates that they saw no reason to nullify Leo's fourth marriage, Nicholas was forced to abdicate and give place to Euthymius (907-12). Hence, the procedure followed in this case cannot be regarded as an example of an appeal to Rome, as some have supposed, but rather as another instance of Byzantine concern for oecumenical sanction as manifested by the approval of the five patriarchates.

On the death of Leo in 912, his brother, the wastrel Alexander, became emperor (912-13), and recalled Nicholas. Euthymius was immediately deposed and handed over to ecclesiastical ruffians, who beat him unmercifully and tore out his beard. Shortly thereafter, he was excommunicated, along with all who had been in communion with him, including, thus, the successors of Pope Sergius III (904-11) of Rome, until 923, when communion was re-established. But Sergius himself was specifically exempted from anathematisation despite his support of Leo in 907.

Nicholas never succeeded in persuading Rome to condemn fourth marriages, as he attempted to do, and he himself was forced to issue a special posthumous ruling which validated Leo's marriage to Zoe Carbonopsina. He was also compelled to crown Zoe empress, although Euthymius had steadfastly refused to do so. But, within the Byzantine Church, the privilege accorded Leo VI was deemed to have been altogether exceptional, and was so described by the Constantinopolitan Council of 920, which settled this question and reconciled Nicholas and his followers with their opponents, Euthymius and Archbishop Arethas of Caesarea, the latter's staunchest supporter. In the future, this Council ruled, fourth marriages were to be prohibited, and anyone, except a childless widower over 30 and under 40, who contracted a third marriage was, under varying conditions, to be deprived of communion.

Source

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The Enochites: An Early 20th-Century Russian Apocalyptic Cult

In 1902-03 there were reports in The New York Times of a Russian sect emerging that revolved around the veneration of St. John of Kronstadt - while he was still alive. Of course, he condemned this movement, yet this did not stop the fanaticism of the people, who misinterpreted his unique miraculous powers as a sign that the end of the world was near. Below are the articles which describe this movement further:

A NEW RUSSIAN SECT: Rise of the Enochites in Zarizyn -- Inventions Foretell the End of the World (October 26, 1902)

RUSSIAN PEASANTS WORSHIP FATHER JOHN: Sect Has Been Formed Founded on This Veneration (October 28, 1902)

Russian Fanaticism and Ignorance (November 09, 1902)

STILL WORSHIP FATHER JOHN: Many Russian Peasants Believe He Is Christ -- A Scene at a St. Petersburg Station (February 19, 1903)

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Documentary Which Exposes Psychic Abilities

From the feature "Beyond Belief" on ABC's Primetime Nightline. See in one video here.

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Greeks Have the Longest Word, According to Guinness

According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the longest word coined by a major author and the longest word ever to appear in literature comes from a word coined by Aristophanes (c. 392 BC) in his comedy Assemblywomen (line 1169-74), which in Greek contains 173 letters, which far surpasses that of Shakespeare's 27-letter long word, "honorificabilitudinitatibus" in his Love's Labour's Lost (V.I). In Greek it is:

λοπαδοτεμαχοσελαχογαλεοκρανιολειψανοδριμυποτριμματοσιλφιοκαραβομελιτοκατακεχυμενοκιχλεπικοσσυφοφαττοπεριστεραλεκτρυονοπτοκεφαλλιοκιγκλοπελειολαγῳοσιραιοβαφητραγανοπτερύγων

The English transliteration has 182 letters:

lopadotemachoselachogaleokranioleipsanodrimupotrimmatosilphioliparomelitoaktakexhumenokichlepikossuphophattoperisteralektruonoptopiphallidokinklopeleioplagoosiraiobaphetragalopterugon

What it describes is a fictional food dish consisting of 17 ingredients, combining fish, poultry and other meat. It was originally coined by Aristophanes as poking fun at the fact that stringing together words to form compound words was common practice, and wanted to show an extreme version of the lengths that sometimes resulted in doing so.

Liddell and Scott define this as "name of a dish compounded of all kinds of dainties, fish, flesh, fowl, and sauces."

More specifically, the dish is a fricasee, with 17 sweet and sour ingredients, including brains, honey, vinegar, fish, pickles, and the following: fish slices, fish of the Elasmobranchii subclass (a shark or ray), rotted dogfish or small shark’s head, silphion laserwort – a kind of fennel, a kind of crab, beetle, or crayfish, eagle, cheese, honey, wrasse or thrush, topped with a sea fish or blackbird, wood pigeon, domestic pigeon, chicken, roasted headof dabchick, hare (a kind of bird or sea hare – a mollusk), must (wine), dessert, fruit, or other raw food, and wing or fin.

Specifically:

-lopado- from λοπάς (lopas, stem lopad-) “dish, meal”,

-temacho- from τέμαχος (temachos) “fish slice”,

-selacho- from σέλαχος (selachos) “fish of the Elasmobranchii subclass (a shark or ray)

-galeo- from γαλεός (galeos) “dogfish, small shark”

-kranio- from κρανίον (cranion) “head”

-leipsano- from λείψανον (leipsanon) “remnant”

-drimy- from δριμύς (drimys) “sharp, pungent”

-hypotrimmato- from ὑπότριμμα (hypotrimma) “generally sharp-tasting dish of several ingredients grated and pounded together”

-silphio- from σίλφιον (silphion) “laserwort” (apparently a kind of giant fennel

-karabo- from κάραβος (karabos) “a kind of crab, beetle, or crayfish” (the word is related to scarab)

-parao- appears to be from παραός (paraos) “eagle”

-tyro- is clearly just τυρός (tyros) “cheese”

-melito- from μέλι (meli) “honey”

-katakechymeno- is from κατακεχυμένος (catacechymenos), something like “poured down”, past participle of καταχεύω (catacheuō)

-kichl- from κίχλη (cichlē) “wrasse” (or “thrush”)

-epi- from επι (epi) “upon, on top of”

-kossypho- from κόσσυφος (cossyphos) “a kind of sea-fish” (or “blackbird”)

-phatto- from φάττα (phatta) “wood pigeon”

-perister- from περιστερός (peristeros) “domestic pigeon”

-alektryono- from ἀλεκτρυών (alectryōn) “chicken”

-opto-/-opte- from ὀπτός (optos) “roasted, baked”

-kephallio-/-kephalio- from κεφάλιον (cephalion), diminutive of “head”

-kinklo-/kigklo- from κίγκλος (cinclos) “dabchick”

-peleio- from πέλεια (pelīa) “pigeon”

-lagoio- probably from λαγῶς (also accented λαγώς) meaning basically “hare” but also a kind of bird or a kind of sea-hare

-siraio- from σίραιον (siraeon) “new wine boiled down”

-baphe- from βαφή (baphē) “dipping” (also ‘dyeing’, ‘temper (of a blade)’)

-tragano- from τραγανός (traganos) “he-goat” (but if it is really ‘-tragalo-’ as in one variant, then maybe it is really from τραγάλιον “dessert fruit; thing eaten uncooked”)

-pterygon from πτέρυξ (pteryx) “wing, fin”.

There is some disagreement as to the original form of the word and the correct transliteration.

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Analysis of the Prayer "Lord Jesus Christ, Have Mercy On Me, A Sinner"

By Elder Aimilianos of Simonopetra

The prayer of Mount Athos, who does not recognize it? It is comprised of one small phrase, of measured words.

"Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner."

With the loud cry "Lord", we glorify God, His glorious majesty, the King of Israel, the Creator of visible and invisible creation, Whom Seraphim and Cherubim tremble before.

With the sweet invocation and summons "Jesus", we witness that Christ is present, our Savior, and we gratefully thank Him, because He has prepared for us life eternal.

With the third word "Christ", we theologically confess that Christ is the Son of God and God. No man saved us, nor angel, but Jesus Christ, the true God.

There follows the intimate petition "have mercy", and we venerate and entreat that God would be propitious, fulfilling our salvation's demands, the desires and needs of our hearts.

That "on me", what range it has! It is not only myself, it is everyone admitted to citizenship in the state of Christ, in the holy Church; it is all those who are members of the body of the Bridegroom.

And finally, so that our prayer be full of life, we close with the word "a sinner", confessing - since we are all sinners - as all the Saints confess and became through this sound sons of light and of the day.

Through this we understand, that this prayer involves:

Glorification

Thanksgiving

Theology

Supplication

and Confession

Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos

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Asceticism and Ecclesiology

From an interview with Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos:

Question: Now we would like to tackle the sensitive question of the relation between monastic experience and the Catholicity of the Church. Namely, we are witnessing cases when in some circles (especially in our country) opinions are being put forward that assert certain superiority of “asceticism” and “prayer of the heart and mind” even in the respect of the canonical order of the Church and its One Liturgy; and this is going as far as to use such claims often as a justification for seceding from the Church and persisting in schism. In brief, we would like to hear your stance concerning this phenomenon; specifically, whether “asceticism” and “prayer of the heart and mind” have any meaning outside the liturgical and canonical unity of the entire Orthodox Church?

Answer: Ever since Saint Irenaeus, the Fathers of the Church have taught us that the Church is very closely connected with Orthodoxy and the Holy Eucharist. The Church is the “Body of Christ and a communion of deification”, Orthodoxy is the correct teaching and life of the Church and the Holy Eucharist is the true praxis of the Church. All three of them are connected to each other and none is overemphasized or underrated versus the others. A “Church” without Orthodoxy and Holy Eucharist is a conventicle. “Orthodoxy” without Church and the Holy Eucharist is a heretical school, and “Holy Eucharist” without Orthodoxy and Church is a simple religious gathering.

We should view the relationship between asceticism, the noetic prayer of the heart and the Holy Eucharist in this context. The Holy Eucharist is in the center of Church life, because through the Holy Eucharist we receive communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, but the Holy Eucharist presupposes asceticism and the noetic prayer of the heart. Both asceticism and the noetic prayer of the heart refer to the Holy Eucharist. Neither is the Holy Eucharist performed without preconditions nor is the noetic prayer separated from the Holy Eucharist. Both of these extreme autonomous situations cause ecclesiological problems. He who lives ascetically and has noetic prayer of the heart without the Holy Eucharist is influenced by misbegotten and erring conditions. He who lives the Holy Eucharist without the preconditions of asceticism lives in a mechanistic way in the Church.

Furthermore, it is not possible for spiritual gifts to revoke the canonical order of the Church, which is constituted by the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit “constitutes the whole institution of the Church” through the Local and Ecumenical Councils. At the same time, we should not underrate spiritual gifts in the name of canonical order.

In general, a great deal of attention is required regarding autonomous movements and cases of overemphasis on particular aspects of Church life.

From Sobornost, September 2006.

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St. Lazarus' Relics Brought to Moscow from Cyprus

June 13, 2012

Interfax

Patriarch Kirill Gundyaev of Moscow and all the Russias took a reliquary with a relic of St Lazarus the Four-Days-Dead from the Church of St Lazarus in Larnaka to Russia so that believers could venerate it. The solemn transfer of the reliquary marked the end of Patriarch Kirill’s official visit to the Republic of Cyprus, which lasted from 8 to 11 June. Orthodox Tradition relates that the Righteous Lazarus, whom Jesus Christ himself called his friend, was resurrected by the God-man on the fourth day after his death. Sometime after the resurrection of Christ, St Lazarus had to flee from Judea because his resurrection scandalised many Jews. He left in a sailboat, and, after a few days, the wind drove the fugitive to the shores of Cyprus. Whilst on Cyprus, St Lazarus met the Apostles Ss Paul and Barnabas, they ordained him Bishop of Kition, an office he held for the rest of his life. For his true faith and holiness, the Cypriots loved the saint very much. After his death, his followers buried the Righteous Lazarus near the ancient city of Kition, which later became Larnaks, which means “a grave or sarcophagus”, which subsequently became Larnaka in modern times.

His Holiness, when he took the reliquary from the hands of the rector of the Church of St Lazarus in Larnaka, spoke of the value that the relic had for believers, saying, “You can give us no greater gift than this. We’ll take these relics of your heavenly patron to the city of Moscow and put them in a place where many people will be able to bow before them. All those who bow before the saint’s relics will know your generosity. The veneration of this holy object will strengthen the love for Cyprus and the Church of Cyprus in the hearts of our people”.

In 898, Roman Emperor Leo VI the Wise transferred the recently-discovered relics of Righteous Lazarus to Constantinople (now Istanbul), where he placed them in a silver reliquary. Relics have miraculous powers; therefore, the Church of St Lazarus attracts thousands of pilgrims come from all over the world. Archbishop Chrysostomos Dimitriou of Nova Justiniana and All Cyprus emphasised, “The fact that we loaned these relics to Patriarch Kirill signifies the special respect that the Local Church of Cyprus has for the Local Church of Russia and its First Hierarch. Today, our hearts overflow with a sense of the sacred and with sincere joy, because your presence here provides an opportunity for our pious and suffering people to receive a blessing from the distinguished First Hierarch of the Church of Russia, an exemplary man adorned with humility, sobriety, and love. With admiration, we watch your many-fold activities. Your deeds embellish the majesty of Orthodoxy, and they reinforce the hope for a better society in the world, relying on the principles of love and equality, based in the acceptance and recognition of the basic human rights inherent in all mankind”.

The history of warm relations between these two Local Churches spans the centuries. Russian pilgrims, travellers, sailors, diplomats, and merchants, en route to the Holy Land and the Levant always made a detour to the island to pay homage to its holy sites, to rest, and to replenish their supplies. Many left behind writings noting their fond memories of this blessed land. More than once, Russian icon-painters came to Cyprus to help decorate local churches. One could see an example of this at the world-famous Holy, Royal, and Stavropegic Monastery of the Mother of God of Kykkos that the Patriarch visited during his visit. At the monastery, His Holiness said, “When I was Metropolitan of Smolensk, I helped with the decoration of the Monastery of Kykkos. In the economically-hard times of the 1990s, I blessed a talented team of Russian painters and gilders from the Diocese of Smolensk to go to Cyprus in order to contribute to the beautification and restoration of this monastery. I haven’t been here until today, but it seems to me that they made the grade, as I see how well they restored the art here, including the iconostas in the church”.

In 1988, the then-First Hierarch of the Local Church of Cyprus, Archbishop Chrysostomos Arsitodemou, took part in the celebration of the Millennium of the Baptism of Russia. Since the early 1990s, many thousands of our compatriots have moved to Cyprus. In 1997, in Limassol, the Russian-speaking community of the city received a small church, where the clergy serve regularly in Church Slavonic. This helped to alleviate the problems in caring for the spiritual needs of Orthodox Russians living in Cyprus. During his current visit, Patriarch Kirill blessed the hillside site of another Russian church and laid its foundation stone. There are four Russian-language schools on the island and many colleges and secondary schools throughout the country offer courses in Russian as a second language.

The reliquary with the relics of St Lazarus will reside at the Stavropegial Convent of the Conception in Moscow {the convent is accessible by Metro: editor}. For its part, the Church of Russia gave a reliquary with the relics of Russian saints, as well as 19 icons painted recently by Russian icon-painters, as a gift to Cypriot churches and monasteries.

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Turin Shroud One of Forty Fakes, Claims Historian

Matthew Kalman

June 10, 2012

Daily Mail

Not only is the Turin Shroud probably a medieval fake but it is just one of an astonishing 40 so-called burial cloths of Jesus, according to an eminent church historian.

Antonio Lombatti said the false shrouds circulated in the Middle Ages, but most of them were later destroyed.

He said the Turin Shroud itself – showing an image of a bearded man and venerated for centuries as Christ’s burial cloth – appears to have originated in Turkey some 1,300 years after the Crucifixion.

Lombatti, of the Università Popolare in Parma, Italy, cited work by a 19th century French historian who had studied surviving medieval documents. ‘The Turin Shroud is only one of the many burial cloths which were circulating in the Christian world during the Middle Ages. There were at least 40,’ said Lombatti.

‘Most of them were destroyed during the French Revolution. Some had images, others had blood-like stains, and others were completely white.’

The Turin Shroud is a linen cloth, about 14ft by 4ft, bearing a front and back view of the image of a bearded, naked man who appears to have been stabbed or tortured. Ever since the detail on the cloth was revealed by negative photography in the late 19th century it has attracted thousands of pilgrims to the Cathedral of St John the Baptist in Turin.

In a research paper to be published this month in the scholarly journal Studi Medievali, Lombatti says the shroud was most likely given to French knight Geoffroy de Charny as a memento from a crusade to Smyrna, Turkey, in 1346. The de Charny family are the first recorded owners of the shroud.

Lombatti found that Geoffroy was unable to join a pilgrimage to Jerusalem after liberating Smyrna, so he was given the shroud as a symbol of his participation in the crusade to Turkey.

The Catholic Church has never officially commented on the shroud’s authenticity, but has made samples available to scientists for testing.

In 2009 a Vatican researcher said she had found the words ‘Jesus Nazarene’ on the cloth, while two years later Italian government researchers claimed the image of a man had been caused by a supernatural ‘flash of light’.

But carbon tests carried out in Oxford in 1988 firmly dated the material to 1260-1390.

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Movie Trailer: Isän Varjo (Father's Shadow)

This film out of Finland takes place during the Winter War of 1940, when the Soviet Union and Finland fought over territory during World War II, and 150 monks of Valaam Monastery were evacuated and settled in Heinävesi in Finland, in what became New Valamo Monastery.

In the movie, a ten year old Orvo lives with his grandmother, Kaarina, while his father is away at war. Meanwhile a monk from Valaam and the young Orvo become friends, and the story focuses on them and the challenges they face due to the war. The film explores the relationship between the Monastery and a nearby village and how it changed following the war.

Official Website

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New Saints

By Monk Moses the Athonite

Our age is often criticized for many reasons, fairly or unfairly. Yet truly difficult times hide treasures, generating small or great saints. Besides the officially recognized saints, there exist hidden saints throughout the entire twentieth century.

The venerable Methodia of Kimolos (†1908), Saint John of Kronstadt (†1908), the bishop of Zilon Euthymios (†1921), the bishop of Iconium Prokopios (†1922), the bishop of Kydonion Gregory (†1922), the bishop of Moschonision Ambrose (†1922), the bishop of Smyrna Chrysostomos (†1922), the wondrous Elder of Optina Monastery Venerable Anatoly (†1922), and many other venerable ones and new martyrs of Russia, Georgia, Estonia, Poland and other places in Europe, Asia and America.

In the twentieth century we also have the following saints: Arsenios of Cappadocia (†1924), Nicholas Planas of Athens (†1932), Silouan the Athonite (†1938), the venerable Savva of Kalymnos (†1948), the venerable George Karslides of Drama (†1959), the hieromonk Anthimos Vagianos of Chios (†1960), the archbishop of Shanghai John Maximovitch the Wonderworker(†1966), the Serbian hieromonk Justin Popovich (†1979), and the hieromartyr Philoumenos of Jerusalem (†1979).

A reputation of holiness and high virtuous life belongs also to these blessed elders: Archimandrite Ieronymos of Simonopetra (†1957), Joseph the Hesychast and Cave-dweller (†1959), Abbot Amphilochios Makris of Patmos (†1970), the abbot of Longovardos on Paros Philotheos Zervakos (†1980), the abbot of the Monastery of the Venerable David in Evia Iakovos Tsalikes (†1991), the discerning and clairvoyant Elder Porphyrios Kafsokalivites (†1995), the wise Elder Sophrony Sakharov (†1993), the known-to-all and charismatic monk Paisios the Athonite (†1994), the obedient and prayerful Ephraim of Katounakia (†1998), and others.

Holiness-bearing monasticism challenges us and invites us to stand more heroically, to greater frugality, simplicity, modesty and humility. We are obliged to maintain a solid, strong and pure spirit of Orthodox monasticism at all costs. We are called to teach the patience of the Elders of old.

The greatness of our Church is that it generates saints also today. Holiness will be needed much more in the 21st century world. Elder Paisios the Athonite would say that it is impossible to not keep monasticism intact. Holiness is not a forgotten vision or a false hope. Happiness-seeking, secularism, and laziness prevent the emergence of the tree of holiness. The contemporary spirit of having good times, of rushing, of effortless and trouble free work, and superficiality removes holiness.

The purpose of life is holiness. Holiness is the chief issue. Approaching holiness gives peace, joy, gentleness, patience, temperance, and spiritual gifts. The catalogue of new saints is growing also in the 21st century. Sometimes holiness hides itself in places where you would never expect, in cities and villages and not only on Mount Athos. Monasticism is booming today. We all pray that it continues to produce saints who walk the traditional path. Saint Silouan the Athonite would say according to his experience: "The Lord loves us exceedingly and through our unworthy prayers we converse with Him and repent and glorify Him. It is impossible to write how much the Lord loves us."

Through the Holy Spirit you know this love and the soul of one who prays knows the Holy Spirit.

Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos

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On Personal and Collective Repentance

From an interview with Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos:

Question: Furthermore, remembering that the Gospel starts with the message of repentance, a question could be asked whether repentance is only a personal experience or is there such a thing as collective repentance where an internal transformation of entire peoples could take place? Can we find examples of this in the history of the Church?

Answer: Repentance is the basic prerequisite for experiencing the Gospel of the Kingdom of Heaven. Christ began His teaching with repentance, because He continued the dialogue with man which was interrupted in Paradise. There, Adam with his sin discontinued his dialogue with God and now Christ with repentance started the dialogue for the reestablishment of man’s relationship with God.

In Greek the word repentance (“metanoia”) denotes the change of the nous. According to the Orthodox teaching, the nous is the eye of the soul and is not identified with the reasonable faculty. The nous is distinguished from reason. With sin, man’s nous is darkened, so with repentance his illumination begins. This is why the Orthodox neptic teaching of the Church maintains that the road to God is marked by these three words: purification, illumination and deification. The heart is purified from the passions with purification, the nous is illumined and begins to pray unceasingly with illumination, and in deification one beholds the glory of God.

Therefore, in principle, repentance is a personal experience. But it is also a collective experience, because when entire local Churches lose the truth and their pastoral mission they must repent. This is why we talk about theological and ecclesiological sins. This is how we should interpret God’s epistles to the angels of the Church, as described in the first chapters of the Revelation of John.

For this reason we attach great importance to heresy and schism. Because through heresy we are cut off from the truth revealed by Christ and through schism we break apart the Church of Christ, with terrible consequences for our life, because, as Saint John Chrysostom says, not even the martyrdom of blood can save a man who molests the Church of Christ.

Therefore, collective repentance is the return to the doctrinal truth of the Church and our reintegration with the unity of the local Churches.

From Sobornost, September 2006.

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Maurice Banjoko – ‘How I Became Orthodox’

Maurice Banjoko from Nigeria, an Investment Consultant, in his interview with Pemptousia talks about how he became Orthodox.

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Martyrs and Confessors of Orthodoxy in China

The following article was published in the theological periodical Ecclesiastical Truth, Constantinople, March 23, 1901 - less than a year after the incident.

As is well known, a severe persecution broke out in China against all Christians in general, and in particular against those of the Orthodox mission. Sufficient details of this persecution are already known. Let eyewitnesses inform us of the atrocities in China, since the horrors recall those such as suffered under Nero and Diocletian. We learn from a recent letter in the Moscow News of the Archimandrite Innocent, leader of the Russian Orthodox Mission in China (and as is already known for a long time, the Russian Orthodox Mission is active both in China and Japan), that the recently-formed Orthodox community in China now has its martyrs and confessors of the faith, since they recall the martyric sufferings of the ancient Christian Church. A feeling of holy emotion is truly born in the soul of the reader before such exemplars on behalf of Christ's name in the days of their self-sacrifice; let godly zeal and pious inspiration not at all be separated.

June 11, 1900 was, above all, a day of martyrdom for Orthodox Chinese in Beijing. Some of them, at the horrible prospect of such death and suffering, renounced their faith in Christ and sacrificed to idols, so that they might save their lives. Nevertheless, others boldly confessed Christ by undergoing sufferings and death. The end was frightful for such people.

According to the testimony of non-Christian eyewitnesses themselves, some of the Chinese Orthodox faced martyrdom with amazing self-sacrifice. Paul Wang, the Chinese Orthodox catechist, submitted to martyrdom with a prayer on his lips. Ia Wen, the teacher from the Mission School, was tortured twice. At first, the Boxers mutilated her and then threw her on the ground half-dead. When she recovered, a non-Christian watchman heard her groaning and carried her to his station. A short time later, she was subjected again to new tortures that resulted in her death. But in both instances, she rejoiced and confessed the name of Christ in the face of her torturers. After the frightful events of that first night of persecution, peace-loving Chinese citizens found an eight-year-old boy, John Tsi, son of the priest who was likewise murdered,[1] mercilessly mutilated by the Boxers. To their question whether he was suffering much, the boy replied with a smile on his lips: "Suffering on behalf of Christ is no burden."

The blood of the martyrs has always been seed from which flourishing Christian communities have grown again in non-Christian countries. We pray then that this frightful persecution may at length be a cause for encouragement for both like-believing missions and the little Orthodox flock in China and become, on the contrary, a starting point for greater zeal and a broader expansion of the Kingdom of God in those countries, to the glory of the Scriptural saying: "My gospel will be preached in all the world" (Matthew 26:13),[2] and again: "Many will come from East and West and recline with Abraham and Isaac in the kingdom of heaven."[3]

Orthodox in America — The number of Orthodox from different nationalities in America at present amounts to 29,949. To serve their religious needs, there are altogether forty-two churches and fifty-seven chapels.

I. P.

[1] Mitrophan Tsi-Chung (1855-1900).

[2] Cf. Matthew 24:14.

[3] Matthew 8:11.

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The Child Elias Healed By St. Luke of Simferopol

On the afternoon of May 28th in 2012 in the Church of St. Luke the Physician, which is under construction in the Monastery of Panagia Dobra in Beroia, there was celebrated the Hierarchical Vespers for the Feast of the Translation of the Holy Relic from Simferopol in Crimea to the Monastery. It was officiated by the Bishop of Nazianzus Theodoret, who spoke.

The morning of May 29th there was celebrated the Hierarchical Divine Liturgy in which the Metropolitan of Beroia, Naoussa and Campania Panteleimon was attended by His Grace Theodoret bishop of Nazianzus, Demetrios of Thermi, and many priests who came to honor and receive a blessing from St. Luke.

Shortly before the end of the Service, Archimandrite Sosipatros Pitoulias, at the instigation of the Bishop of Beroia, recounted how Saint Luke the Physician healed his little nephew (photo).

Father Sosipatros was visibly touched as he began to narrate the miraculous incident, saying:

"Little Elias was a few months old and the doctors diagnosed him as having leukemia. I along with Father Gregory Maza did shifts in the hospital where he was sick. On the eve of the Dormition of St. Luke, i.e. June 10th, Father Gregory left the hospital late in the evening to rest and left me in his post. After a while he called me with a frightened and yet happy voice, saying: 'Father Sosipatros, St. Luke did his miracle again!' What was done? When he left the hospital he took a taxi to take him to the home where he lived. Just before they reached the house the unknown taxi driver asked Father Gregory: 'Father, are you all right?' Father Gregory replied awkwardly: 'All is well.' But insistent the taxi driver asked again: 'Father, are you all right?'. Father Gregory not wanting to continue the conversation with the unknown taxi driver again replied curtly: 'All is well'. And then the taxi driver said to him: 'Father Gregory, the child you are caring for that is not yours will be fine!'. Father Gregory was in a daze for a moment, and in addressing the stranger asked how did he know about the child? About me? About all of this? And the taxi driver replied: 'Do not ask a lot Father; the child you care for, but that is not yours, will be well!' With these words the taxi stopped and the shocked Fr. Gregory gave the appropriate cash to the stranger who knew everything. The taxi driver took the money, gave the change, and disappeared. I do not know if the taxi driver was St. Luke or another Saint who spoke through this man, what I know is that little Elias became well!"

The reaction of the audience to this story of Fr. Sosipatros was moving. Little Elias was in church with his parents, still alive, by a miracle of St. Luke.

Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos

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St. Theodore the Studite: On Bartholomew the Apostle

By St. Theodore the Studite

The blessed apostle Bartholomew preached first in Lycaonia, and after in India, and at the last in Alban, a city of Great Armenia, and there he was first flayed and afterward his head smitten off, and there he was buried.

And when he was sent by our Lord to preach, as I suppose, he heard how our Lord said to him: "Go, my disciple, to preach, void out of this country, and go fight and be capax of [valiant in] perils. I have first accomplished and finished the works of My Father, and am first witness; fill thou the vessel that is necessary and follow thy Master, love thy Lord, give thy blood for His blood, and thy flesh for His flesh, and suffer that which He had suffered; let thine armor be debonair in thy sweatings, and suffer sweetly among wicked people and be patient among them that perish thee."

And the apostle recoiled not, but as a true servant and obeissant to his master went forth rejoicing, and as a light of God illumining in darkness the work of holy Church, like as the blessed St. Austin witnesseth in his book, that, like a tiller of Jesus Christ, he profiteth in spiritual tilling.

St. Peter the Apostle taught the nations, but St. Bartholomew did great miracles. Peter was crucified the head downward, and Bartholomew was flayed quick, and had his head smitten off. And they twain increased greatly the Church by the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

And right as a harp giveth a right sweet sound of many strings, in like wise all the apostles gave sweet melody of the unity divine, and were established by the King of kings. And they departed among them throughout all the world, and the place of Armenia was the place of Bartholomew, that is from Ejulath unto Gabaoth. There thou mayst see him, with the plough of his tongue, ear [plough] the fields unreasonable, sowing in the deepness of the heart the word of the faith, and in planting the vines of our Lord and trees of paradise. And to everyone each setting medicine for the remedies of the passions, rooting out pernicious thorns, cutting down trees of felony, and setting about hedges of doctrine.

But what reward yielded the tyrants to their curate? They gave to him dishonour for honour, cursing for benediction, pains for gifts, tribulation for rest, and right bitter death for restful life. And since that he had suffered many torments, he was of them discoriate and flayed quick, and died not, and yet for all that he had them not in despite that slew him, but admonished them by miracles, and taught them by demonstrances, that did him harm. But there was nothing that might refrain their bestial thoughts, and withdraw them from harm.

What did they afterwards? They enforced them against the holy body, and the maladied and sick men refused their physician and healer, the city refused him that illumined their blindness, governed them that were in peril, and gave life to them that were dead.

And how cast they him out? Certainly, they threw the body into the sea in a chest of lead, and that chest came from the region of Armenia with the chests of four other martyrs, for they did also miracles and were thrown with him into the sea. And the four went before a great space of the sea, and did service to the apostles like as servants in a manner, so far that they came into the parts of Sicily in an isle that is named Lipari, like as it was showed to a bishop of Ostia which then was present. And these right rich treasures came to a right poor woman. And these right precious margarets [pearls] came to one not noble, the bright shining light came to one right heavy.

And then the other four came in to other lands, and left the holy apostle in that isle, and he left the other behind him.

And that one which was named Papian went into a city of Sicily, and he sent another, named Lucian, into the city of Messina. And the other twain were sent into the land of Calabria, St. Gregory into the city of Columna, and Achate into a city named Chale, where yet at this day they shine by their merits.

And then was the body of the apostle received with hymns, louings, and candles honourably, and there was made and builded a fair church in the honour of him.

And the mountain of Vulcan is nigh to that isle, and was to it much grievous because it received fire, the which mountain was withdrawn by the merits of this holy saint from that isle seven miles, without to be seen of any body, and was suspended toward the sea. And yet appeareth it at this day to them that see it, as it were a figure of fire fleeing away.

Now then, therefore, I salute thee, Bartholomew, blessed of blessed saints, which art the shining light of the holy Church, fisher of fishes reasonable, hurter of the devil which hurted the world by his theft. Enjoy thee, sun of the world, illuminating all earthly things, mouth of God, fiery tongue pronouncing wisdom, fountain springing good things, full of health, which hallowest the sea by thy goings and ways not removable, which makest the earth red with thy blood, which repairest in heaviness, shining in the middle of the divine company clear in the resplendishour of glory. And enjoy thee in the gladness of joy insatiable. Amen.

Source: Englished by William Caxton, 1483

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The Mission of Saints Pantaenus and Bartholomew in India

1. Mission of Pantaenus in India

About a hundred and twenty years (ca.180 or 190) after the traditional date of the martyrdom of Saint Thomas the Apostle, a second Christian mission is reported to have reached India. The great Church in Alexandria, the center of Egyptian Christianity, sent its most famous scholar, Pantaenus, head of the theological School in that city, “to preach Christ to the Brahmans and philosophers there”, wrote Saint Jerome in the fifth century.1

A deputation from India reached Alexandria some time in 179 or 189 AD. Impressed by the erudition of Pantaenus, according to Saint Jerome, they asked Demetrius to send him to India for discussions with their own Hindu philosophers and it is to the credit of the good bishop that he judged the Christian world mission to be no less urgent a priority then the advancement of Christian learning. Without hesitation he took his most famous scholar from the theological school and sent him as a missionary to the East. Eusebius also gives an early account of this mission.

Both Eusebius and Saint Jerome have reported that Pantaenus found the Gospel of Matthew reported to have been left there in India by Saint Bartholomew. Some writers has suggested that having difficulty with the language of Saint Thomas Christians, Pantaenus misinterpreted their reference to Mar Thoma (Bishop Thomas) as Bar Tolmai (the Hebrew name of Bartholomew). Some others say Eusebius and Saint Jerome confused India with Arabia or Persia as was done by some other classical writers.

Interestignly, the pupils and successors of Pantaenus, Clement and Origen, write about India as if they know more of that land than passing myths and in no way confused it with Arabia and Persia. They may have heard this from Pantaenus himself. They speak of “Indian Brahmans” and “gymnosophists” and Clement writes discerningly of the difference between “Sarmanane” and “Brahmans” describing the former in terms that suggest the “hermits” or “holy men of India”.2

2.Mission of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle in India

Two ancient testimonies exist about the mission of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle in India. These are of Eusebius of Caesarea (early fourth century) and of Saint Jerome (late fourth century). Both these refer to this tradition while speaking of the reported visit of Pantaenus to India in the second century.

According to Eusebius, Pantaenus, “is said to have gone among the Indians, where a report is that he discovered the Gospel according to Matthew among some there who knew Christ, which had anticipated his arrival: Bartholomew, one of the Apostles, had preached to them and had left them the writings of Matthew in Hebrew letters, which writing they preserved until the aforesaid time”

Saint Jerome would have that Demetrius, Bishop of Alexandria, sent him to India, at the request of legates of that nation. In India Pantaenus “found that Bartholomew, one of the twelve apostles, had preached the advent of the Lord Jesus according to the Gospel of Matthew, and on his return to Alexandria he brought this with him written in Hebrew characters.”

In these testimonies Eusebius appears to be not quite sure of what’s reported. Saint Jerome, while writing to Marcellus, acknowledges the primacy of Saint Thomas, the Apostle in India.

“He ( Jesus) was present in all places with Thomas in India, with Peter in Rome, with Paul in Illyria, with Titus in Crete, Andrew in Greece, with each apostle and apostolic man in his own separate region.“3

3. Opinion of Authors about Saint Bartholomew the Apostle's Mission in India

Previously the consensus among scholars was against the apostolate of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle in India. The majority of the scholars are skeptical about the mission of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle in India. Stililingus (1703), Neande (1853), Hunter (1886), Rae (1892), Zaleski (1915) are the authors who supported the Apostolate of Saint Bartholomew in India. Scholars such as Sollerius (1669), Carpentier (1822), Harnack (1903), Medlycott (1905), Mingana (1926), Thurston (1933), Attwater (1935) etc. do not support this hypothesis. The main argument is that the India Eusebius and Jerome refer to here should be Ethiopia or Arabia Felix.

4. Kalyan – The Field of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle's Mission

The recent studies of Perumalil and Moraes hold that the Bombay region on the Konkan coast, a region which have been known after the ancient town Kalyan, was the field of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle’s missionary activities and his martyrdom.

The town of Kalyan, was an ancient port and it is supposed to be the Kalliana, the traveler Cosmas Indicopleustes visited in the 6th century as he reports in his “Christian Typography”.

According to Pseudo-Sophronius (7th century) Saint Bartholomew preached to the “Indians who are called Happy” and according to the Greek tradition the Apostle went to ”India Felix”. The word Kalyan means “felix” or “happy” and it is argued that the Kalyna region came to be known to the foreign writers “India Felix” and its inhabitants, the Indians, “called the happy”.

Perumalil interprets the “India Citerior” of the Hieronymian Martyrology as Western India, and the “India” of the Passio Bartholmei as the Maratha Country.4

There are no local traditions about the mission of Pantaenus or the Apostolate of Bartholomew the Apostle in India. According to Moraes this is due to the fact that the history of the Christians of Bartholomew got intermingled with that of the Thomas Christians (the Syriac tradition is that Saint Bartholomew preached in Armenia). According to Perumalil, Bartholomew Christians continued as a separate community till the coming of the Portuguese and got merged with the Christians of Bombay.5

Notes:

1. Jerome - Epistola LXX ad Magnum oratorem urbis Romae

2. Clement - Stromata, 15

3. Jerome – Epistola LIX ad Marcellam

4. Perimalil - The Apostles in India

5. Moraes - A History of Christianity in India AD 52-1542

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On Nominal Orthodox Christians and Clergy

From an interview with Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos:

Question: A key problem faced by the Church in the former communist countries of Eastern Europe is, of course, the question of the so called nominal Christians. Namely, a large proportion of the populace of these countries formally declare themselves Orthodox Christians, but in spite of that they do not confess the Orthodox faith (instead they confess either agnosticism or atheism), and subsequently, they don’t partake in the prayer life and liturgical life of the Church, and the only thing seen by them in Orthodoxy is mere folklore and ethnic mark. What stand should be upheld towards those people, especially if it is taken into consideration that quite often they aspire to influence and control the Church? Finally, in which way should the Church itself approach these nominal Christians in order that they be gathered in its bosom?

Answer: The “nominal Christians” or the “nominal clerics” is a basic problem for the Church, because they cause Church schisms with their various passions. They consider the Church a social institution, a social organization, a religion, even at best, a religious association or a national institution.

It has to become clear, as I said before, that the Church is the “Body of Christ and a communion of deification”, according to the teaching of Saint Gregory Palamas. It is the Body of Christ, because its Head, Christ, is closely tied with its members through the Sacraments and the Doctrines. It is also a communion of deification, because its members participate, in various degrees, to purification, illumination and deification.

Those members of the Church that do not live within this perspective are gradually led to agnosticism and atheism and are secular members, ailing members of the Church, irrespective of whether they pretend to belong to the Church.

We have to realize that the Church is a spiritual hospital and not a competitive field for passions to dominate. The saints are the physicians, and Christ is the physician par excellence and the Shepherds who work in the name of Christ and within the framework of the saints perform a healing function. All Christians must be in the process of being healed.

In this context, the Church cannot be transformed to folklorism and nationalism. St. Paul defines clearly the task of the Christians when he writes: “Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ" (2 Cor. 10:5).

In the end, however, the Church heals Christians with its pastoral care, regardless of their spiritual age. What is required is that clerics know the method of healing.

From Sobornost, September 2006.

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We Are Most Likely To Die On Our Birthday

Be careful blowing out the candles. Scientists have found we are more likely to die on our birthday than any other day.

June 11, 2012

The Telegraph

Researchers who studied more than two million people over 40 years found a rise in deaths from heart attacks, strokes, falls and suicides.

William Shakespeare died on his birthday on April 23 1616. The actress Ingrid Bergman also died on her birthday, in August 1982.

On average, people over the age of 60 were 14 per cent more likely to die on their birthdays.

Heart attacks rose 18.6 per cent on birthdays and were higher for men and women while strokes were up 21.5 per cent - mostly in women.

Dr Vladeta Ajdacic-Gross of the University of Zurich, said: 'Birthdays end lethally more frequently than might be expected.' He added that risk of birthday death rose as people got older.

Canadian data also showed that strokes were more likely on birthdays, especially among patients with high blood pressure.

There was a 34.9 per cent rise in suicides, 28.5 per cent rise in accidental deaths not related to cars, and a 44 per cent rise in deaths from falls on birthdays.

Psychologist prof Richard Wiseman, from the University of Hertfordshire, said: "It seems to be a valid finding.

"There are two camps - one is the camp that suggests you eat too much and your getting on a bit and that causes you to die.

"The other is a placebo effect. You are knife-edged on death. And you kept yourself going until your birthday. You think 'that's it I've had enough I'm out of here'."

Dr Lewis Halsey, of the University of Roehampton, said: 'One interesting finding is that more suicides happen on birthdays, though only in men.

'Perhaps men are more likely to make a statement about their unhappiness when they think people will be taking more notice of them.'

The study is published in the journal Annals of Epidemiology.

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A Meditation for the End of the Pentecostarion

By Sergei V. Bulgakov

With this Sunday, the services according to the Pentecostarion are concluded. The conclusion of the Pentecostarion services with the commemoration in honor of all the Saints, as His Grace Innocent,  Archbishop of Chersonese (refer to the Works of Innocent, Archbishop of Chersonese, Vol. 1, pp. 519-521 [Sochineniia Innokentiia, Archiep. Khersonskago, t. I, str. 519-521]) teaches, is the most suitable conclusion to the celebrations of the Lord. It is the goal for which our Savior left the earth and ascended to heaven and for which the Holy Spirit left heaven and descended to earth, - this high goal consists in nothing else than, as in the sanctification of the sinful human race, in leading all of us to heaven. But the choirs of the Saints of God make up the assembly of indisputable witnesses that this blessed goal be achieved, that the Savior who is ascended from us has definitely prepared a place for all His followers, that the Comforter who is descended to us really combines with the possibility that very carnal people may reside in the mansions of the Heavenly Father. How is it that all who were holy to God, now blessed with us, are not servile to us men? Because their glory is the glory of the Redeemer Son and the Consecrator Spirit: without the merits of the Son heaven would not be opened to any of them, but without the grace of the Spirit not any of them could possibly enter into the opened heaven. Therefore the present festival in honor of all the Saints also consists of the most natural and pleasing conclusion of the festivals of the Lord. Therefore it itself is the direct fruit of events remembered in them. But the marvelous sequence and the divinely-wise order of the festivals of the Holy Church, naturally, motivates us to ask ourselves: is there such a sequence of this kind of holy order even in our celebrations?

We have now passed through the entire cycle of celebrations, we have reached the end of festivals according to the season; but has their end and intention actually been accomplished by this very action? Have we come nearer to what the main end of all festivals and establishments of the Church consists in, all the mysteries and all its services, all our grateful and natural life that is for our sanctification in Christ? Now already completing the memory of all the Saints, can we say about ourselves, that we have become freer of all that is sinful, purer from all that is earthly and corruptible, one in spirit with all that is spiritual and heavenly? This is the natural and necessary fruit which the Church assumed to now see in us after so many celebrations of the light! She expected that the suffering of the Lord would shake the heart most persistent in sin, that with His Resurrection everything that has not yet had time to be completely suppressed by sin would revive in our spirit, that with His ascension to heaven the thought and wish for heaven would arise in the most indifferent soul, that with the descent to earth of the Comforter the weakest would convert and venture to walk the way of faith and love. Were these many expectations fulfilled? Is the harvest in us great after so long a sowing? What does our Lord now see nestling close to us from the height of the glory of His Saints? Although He sees some conformity with that great asceticism, is it He who lifted them up for us, being on earth? What did the Holy Spirit, who descended from the Father for us, find in us? Will they now find much joy in us, not looking at our celebration in their honor and our holy brethren in heaven? When we celebrate in their honor even they undoubtedly do not remain idle. We remember their acts and deeds, and they will examine our morals, paradigm of life and action. Seeing their labors and victories over the enemies of salvation, we should be calmed in spirit. Seeing our falling and changes in truth, they should be distressed about us. What, if they see nothing much in us, except the falling and changes? After this what does our celebration in honor of all the Saints mean for those very saints, if not the day of complaint against all of us sinners? Such are our festivals! The cycle of church festivals is bright and magnificent; the cycle of our festivals occurs in darkness and ugliness. In the church cycle the very laments terminate in the spiritual celebration; in our cycle the very celebrations often lead to spiritual laments. In the same vein, can we be glad when our Lord who ascended up for us sees that His suffering on the cross remains without any fruit for many of us, and that many of His followers live as if He did not also come for their salvation on earth? Can we be comforted when the Spirit Comforter sees how many will not remember anything about His presence among us, constantly breathe the spirit of the world and walk contrary to His inspiration of grace? Can our heavenly brethren accept our magnifications with joy when they find that our earthly brethren madly waste their precious grace inherited generally by all men, do not at all correspond to their heavenly nobility and walk in every evil, contrary to the will of the Heavenly Father? After this one remedy to make the present festival pleasing to our Savior, for the Spirit Comforter, and for all the Saints is to acquire for ourselves their lament for our sins. Repentance suddenly changes everything. When we shall begin to lament before God, then the inhabitants of heaven will be glad again, like they lamented when we are betrayed to temporal and sinful pleasures. But is the lamentation about sins acceptable for the conclusion of the celebration of the Church? For the righteous, certainly, it would not be acceptable; but for the sinners only more acceptable. The sick are also treated in the feasts; and what illness is more dangerous than sin? However, is what began the cycle of the sacred days now concluded? Is it not the memory of the Fall of Adam, and we who are all his descendants in the presence of Adam? Therefore is it not better to conclude it, not by our ascending, but through our repentance from our own fall? Thus the end will return to the beginning, and will return us to that blessed and unoriginate beginning, in which the souls of all the holy brethren are now blessed. "Do not hesitate", the Holy Scripture inspires each of us, "to turn to the Lord, nor postpone it from day to day"; "do not be confident of cleansing that you add sin to sin". "For suddenly the wrath of the Lord will go forth, and during the time of punishment you will perish" (Sir. 5:5-7).

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First Sunday After Pentecost or All Saints Sunday

By Sergei V. Bulgakov

In the services for this Sunday over and above the usual glorifications of the resurrection of Christ, the choirs of all the Saints pleasing to God, who have shone through faith in the coming and the arrival of the promised Redeemer, together with those who exercised asceticism in piety are glorified. In the church hymns we magnify: patriarchs, forefathers, prophets, apostles, martyrs, hieromartyrs, confessors, hierarchs, venerable and righteous fathers and mothers and all the Saints, who from the ages were well pleasing to God, and "above all" "our Sovereign Lady, the Theotokos and Ever-virgin Mary". In glorifying their memory, let us also ask their prayerful petitions before God for us. Since "by the Holy Spirit is every soul enlivened", i.e. is cleansed, renewed and alas settled, and since the divine grace of the Holy Spirit is consecrated, it has made our first-born brethren, written in the heavens, and made them our worthy prayer books before God, that, they have celebrated the most glorious descent of the Holy Spirit on the apostles and who glorified His beneficial power, consecrating the souls of all believers, then to properly glorify also those holy foster children of the grace of God, who were consecrated and perfected by the power of the All-holy and Life-creating Spirit of the Lord. This commemoration also fulfills the honoring and glorifying of those pleasing to God, who, owing to their numbers and their not being known, special commemorations were not established for them. Glorifying the saints and numbering them among the ranks or choirs, the Holy Church points out to us their various virtues for imitation.

The Orthodox Church honors various men pleasing to God who appropriated various names, corresponding to their various ascetic acts of virtuous life on earth. Such names are: patriarchs, forefathers, prophets, apostles, hierarchs, holy equal to the Apostles, Hieromartyrs, Great Martyrs, Venerable martyrs, martyrs, confessors, Venerable ones, Righteous ones, Disinterested ones and Blessed ones.

For Patriarchs, Forefathers and Fathers see under the Sundays before Christmas. 

Prophets are great according to the pious life of the men of the Old Testament who were selected by God Himself and were sent by Him to various places for predicting the future to the people, with regard to the coming of Christ, the Savior of the world, to earth.

Apostles are the great men of the New Testament, the people closest to Christ the Savior, His worthiest disciples and companions, who were sent by Him to various countries for the preaching of the Divine Gospel to the people.

Hierarchs and Fathers ("our Fathers among the saints") are the Eastern Patriarchs, the pious Popes of Rome, the Patriarchs, Archbishops, heirs to the Holy Apostles in the Christian Church and their great co-workers in preaching the Gospel and in their labor of true piety.

Holy Equal to the Apostles and Enlighteners are the men and women of royal or princely origin, but sometimes also of simple calling, who by their own preaching turned entire countries and peoples to Christ. Hieromartyrs are Christian bishops and presbyters who died from torture for their belief in Christ.

Great Martyrs are the pious men and women of various worldly ranks and positions, who courageously and with great patience thoroughly underwent various persecutions, tortures, and torments by their torturers for their holy Christian faith.

Venerable Martyrs are the pious and true ascetic men and women, included in the monastic calling, who suffered from the pagans and heterodox believers for their faith in Christ.

Martyrs are those men and women of various callings and positions, who without confusion, but sometimes even with joy, went one by one or in groups into the presence of their torturers, and there were tortured to death for their firm and unshakable confession of their faith in Christ.

Confessors and Passion-bearers are those great men of virtuous life of the Christian Church, courageously and fearlessly everywhere and always confessed their deep faith in Christ, who openly recognized themselves as true Christians, who endured torments and torture for this, but did not receive a martyr's death; some of them are called branded, because during torture special brands were put on the person.

Venerable Ones are the great, pious and Christ-loving men and women, desert-dwellers, hermits (who separated themselves from the world to the desert and there saved themselves in solitude), recluses (who voluntary enclosed themselves in separate caves and cells for their entire life) and pillar-dwellers (who practiced asceticism under the open sky on pillars, or high towers), silent ones (who voluntarily took up the asceticism of silence), and are all inclusive in the monastic calling.

Righteous Ones are the great men and women, who were glorified for their virtuous and pious life, zealous for the fulfillment of the commandments of God and for their unbowed observance of the truths of the Gospel teaching, not shirking their family or public obligations and living in the world. 

Disinterested Ones or Unmercenaries are men well pleasing to God who through their unmercenary labor for the benefit of their neighbors served the suffering and healed the sick.

Blessed Ones are the men and women of various callings and positions, who in carrying out their mortal life, both in the world and in the desert, with unusual reserve, with extreme deprivation and denial of every possible worldly good, but sometimes even with many varieties of foolishness, all this "for the sake of Christ".

The Holy Church has regularized the remembrance and honor of all righteous men who have moved in eternity because "righteous men", according to the word to God, "live for ever" (Wis. 5:15) not only in heaven, but also on earth; because "their memory" abides from generation to generation "with praises" (Prov. 10:7), and among the blessings before the eyes not only of God but also of the people; because they, being alive even in the Divinely sanctified ark of grace in time, have co-operated for the beloved by the "place where the glory [of God] dwells" (Ps. 25:8) for the entire eternity. We honor and magnify the saints of God and consequently all of them are our fathers and brethren according to the spirit of the Christian faith and according to that love by which they are indissolubly joined to us; wherefore true "love never disappears" (1 Cor. 13:8). Being one with us by nature, the saints pleasing to God also make us one with the Church of the Lord Jesus, who is the one foundation and the one Head, the one God and the one Savior, the one means of salvation and the one hope of the saved. Thus, the glorified Saints have a close and uninterrupted though invisible dialogue with us. We call on them in our prayers, as contributors to our salvation, as protectors and comforters in the afflictions and misfortunes laid on us, as defenders against the invisible powers of Hades, and we do this not in vain. The holy ones of God hear us when we pray, unite our entreaties to their prayers, lifting them up as pure and fragrant incense (Rev. 5:8) to the holy table of the Pantocrator, ask His Goodness for mercy on us, satisfy the justice that is so frequently irritated by our iniquities, and send mercy and the "grace from the One Who is, and Who was, and Who is to come" (Rev. 1:4) to us. Being in the kingdom of God, they "have already received the kingdom, the magnificent and quality crown from the hand of the Lord" (Wis. 5:16), but by the spirit of humility they will not die to compose "crowns" of the kingdom from themselves "and to offer" themselves "before the throne" of the Lamb (Rev. 4:10-11, 5:11-14), petitioning before Him, as "Mediator between God and men" (1 Tim. 2:5), that He be merciful to us sinners, carried away in the abyss of perdition and by the vanities of the world, both the impulses of the passions and temptations of the evil one. If the saints pleasing to God, neither looking at the spiritual height of their perfection and holiness, nor at their visible distance from us, will intercede to gaze upon on us, the proud and vain, with an eye of compassion and to save us by their prayers and mediation, then we all the more should also honor and glorify their memory from generation to generation, that, glorifying them, we glorify "God, Who is wonderful in His Saints" (Ps. 67:36), and, honoring them, we "honor grace with God, residing and acting in them, and the help from God we ask through them" (Orthodox Catechism). Besides, the gathering of most of all those saved, which "God, Who is rich in mercy, made us alive together with Christ", already "made us sit with Him on the heavenly" thrones (Eph. 2:4-6), evidently showing us all immensity of the power of the merits of the Savior and the power of saving grace, serves as vivifying and encouraging for us in the formidable arena of salvation, wherefore "through faith" in the Redeemer even we "have obtained access", to that same "grace", in which stood all those pleasing to God (Rom. 5:2). But, strengthening in us the hope of salvation, the commemoration of the blessed choirs of Saints also serves for us as the encouragement for unrelenting patience and self-denial. The Saints of God are blessed with light in the house of the heavenly Father, but the enjoyment of peace and unearthly joy is the reward and recompense for their labor and asceticism, that, having disdained the world with their good deeds, they steadily flowed "to the honor of the highest calling of God" (Phil. 3:14). Thus if we want to inherit salvation, to settle in heaven and to be blessed among those standing in the choir of the Saints, we should live holily and undefiled according to our "Holy calling" (1 Pet. 1:15). "The grace of God is saving for all men" (Tit. 2:11), but does not save anybody against their will; she is omnipotent, but not violent. "The heavenly Kingdom", even with the assistance of grace, "has suffered violence" (Mt. 11:12), and that only those admire it, who, prevailing completely over any sinful temptation, course their way to the Kingdom with effort and patience. (Sermons and Speeches of Sophronius, Bishop of Turkistan, Vol. 1, pages 90-102 [Slova i rechi Sofroniia, Episcopa Turkestanstskago, t. I, str. 90-102]).

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
As with fine porphyry and royal crimson, having been adorned with the blood of Thy martyrs shed throughout the world, Thy Church cries out to Thee: O Christ God, send down Thy bounties upon Thy people, grant peace to thy habitation and great mercy to our souls.

Kontakion in Plagal of the Fourth Tone
Like the beginning of our existence, the universe offers Thee, O Lord, the God-bearing martyrs as the first fruits of creation: through their prayers establish Thy Church, Thy habitation, in profound peace, and maintain it through the Theotokos, O Thou, Who art Great in mercy.

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