The Mother of God was the purest being created as all the holy fathers confess together. Her basic virtue was and is virginity, the gift of shyness – the full purity of her entire existence, not only from the bodily but also from spiritual (mental) point of view.
Many times I regretted that I spoke; I have never regretted keeping silent. Enjoy the Silence!
One of the most delicate—yet important—issues in the Church is the distinction between the essence of God and His energies.
As we have already frequently said, this—we mean despondency—is very often one of the branches of talkativeness, and its first child.
My child, always be careful, both when you are happy and when you are sad. When you are happy you should not lose control through vivacity and laughter, nor when you are sad should you be so gloomy that it shows.
Loneliness – voluntarily or not – is your time for prayer and knowing God better. This knowledge comes mainly via prayer because prayer is the union of the mind with God.
If God sees that the intellect has entirely submitted to Him and puts its hope in Him alone, He strengthens it, saying: ‘Have no fear Jacob my son, my little Israel’ (Isa. 41:14), and: ‘Have no fear: for I have delivered you, I have called you by My name; you are Mine. If you pass through water, I shall be with you, and the rivers will not drown you. If you go through fire, you will not be burnt, and the flames will not consume you. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, who saves […]
The whole planet wants the freedom of eternal happiness, but most people seek it where it is not and seek it in an inappropriate way.
If a man has some spiritual gift and feels compassion for those who do not have it, he preserves the gift because of his compassion. But a boastful man will lose it through succumbing to temptations of boastfulness.
We must know that the divine light is not a natural phenomenon, like when we hit our head or other causes which generate electrical signals through the nervous system which our brain (more exactly our visual cortex) interprets as light.
So he who desires to come to the rest of the Lord and not be defeated by the evil one, lovingly withdraws from people in all things, so as not to criticize them or praise or justify, or bless another or to upset someone else in any respect, or to observe his downfall, and to leave no needle of enmity in his heart against him, and to submit to those who are demented.
There are some people who impress us more and help us more than others do, even if they say almost the same things as the others.
Every created nature is far removed from and completely foreign to the divine nature.
There is among the passions an anger of the intellect (mind), and this anger is in accordance with nature – that is courage . Without this anger a person cannot attain purity: we have to feel angry with all that is sown in us by the enemy. When Job felt this anger he reviled his enemies, calling them ‘dishonorable men of no repute, lacking everything good, whom I would not consider fit to live with the dogs that guard my flocks’ (cf. Job 30:1, 4). If we wish to acquire the anger that is in accordance with nature we must […]
In the Christian context: by “mystery,” we do not mean merely that which is baffling and mysterious, an enigma or insoluble problem.
There are two basic ways of a cure. The first is for a person to abandon “wealth” of the mind. In speaking of poverty, Saint Niketas Stethatos maintains that poverty is not only the renunciation of material goods, but is also the denial of the “wealth” of the mind.
The Mother of God died, as all people die by the necessity of their mortal human nature which is indivisibly bound up with the corruption of this world as the result of Adam’s fall.
There are three ways that we can please God:
Many are interested in solving “hot” topics in their minds. We are interested in how Elijah was lifted up to heaven with the chariot of fire, how is the vision of paradise, the angels, the creation of the world, and other things like this.
There is a lot of anxiety and distress about the famous 666 in some circles, which most of the time (if not always) distracts us from our main aim in life – the salvation of our eternal soul.
What we know as the inflammatory faculty of our soul is a non-rational aspect of our soul which is responsible to avoid or attack, that is a flight or fight response.
Even if the rules of iconography insist that the holy image depicted (the saints) should be with black hair and black eyes, however, from tradition and from visions, we are informed from the saints which saw the Mother of God that her hair texture resembles that of ripe wheat with blue eyes.
The devil uses a similar technique with us when we want to attack something. So, we must know how to defend. It depends on us to do it.
We struggle to learn various things and slowly try to understand their meanings in order to gain knowledge.
The position in which man was created by God is the standing position. This is our natural position, the position in which our person is fulfilled and behaves as it should. That’s why we see the saints in most icons standing.
Do not fall into despair because of stumbling. I do not mean that you should not feel contrition for them, but that you should not think them incurable. For it is more expedient to be bruised than dead. There is, indeed, a Healer for the man who has stumbled, even He Who on the Cross asked that mercy be shown to His crucifiers, He Who pardoned His murders while He hung on the Cross. ‘All manner of sin,’ He said, ‘and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men,’ that is, through repentance.”
The demons cannot know our thoughts but they conclude on what we think. They have a lot of experience and they can sense the presence God’s grace. In fact this is what burns them.
Great Schema Monks on Mount Athos have learnt a great deal from the Holy Fathers and their experiences. Likewise, they have learnt a lot from the humble mules which are used to carry loads of wood from the forests.
The question of forgiveness is not a moral issue. We do not forgive because it is the “correct” thing to do. We forgive because it is the true nature of the life in Christ.
Elder Joseph of Vatopaidi (+2009) was a very pious monk and we honor his memory each year with much devotion and dedication. His holiness was acquired through his great ascetical feats along with good deeds which he performed throughout his entire life, and in most cases in discretion, just like any other spiritual person.