Let unbelievers go their way

November 14, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Thurs­day. [Col. 4:2-9; Luke 9:49-56] How should one re­late to un­be­liev­ers who do not con­fess the Lord? The same way as the Lord re­lated to the vil­lage that did not re­ceive Him. Youth­ful zeal, full of heat, would want to send down fire from heav­en on them; but the Lord Him­self re­strains it: Ye know not what man­ner of spir­it ye are of… The Lord and Sav­iour did not do any­thing to those who did not re­ceive Him, though re­ceiv­ing Him is what sal­va­tion it­self con­sists of; but pass­ing them by, He went to an­oth­er vil­lage, leav­ing them to them­selves. The same ap­plies now: let un­be­liev­ers go their way, and be­liev­ers go theirs. God ex­ists, Who will sort ev­ery­one out in good time. It is nec­es­sary to pit­y and pray for them; one must de­sire that they know the truth and try to find op­por­tu­ni­ties to hint to them a­bout it; but when they o­pen­ly start at­tack­ing the truth, give them a re­buff which is lov­ing and yet brings them to their sens­es — and that is e­nough.

Special Concert of the Jubilee Celebration

November 9, 2013 | News & Events, Uncategorized

When: November 9, 2013
Where: Saint Wilfrid of York Episcopal Church, Huntington Beach, CA

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The Martyr Aretha and with him 4299 Martyrs

November 7, 2013 | Saints & Martyrs, Uncategorized

Commemorated on October 24

The Martyr Aretha and with him 4299 Martyrs suffered for the Lord Jesus Christ in the VI Century. Aretha was governor of the city of Negran in Arabia, the inhabitants of which were Christian. The Arabian (or Omirite) king, Dunaan, who was Jewish, decided to extirpate Christianity from the land, and he issued an edict that all followers of Christ were to be put to death. The inhabitants of Negran remained faithful to the Lord, and Dunaan came with a large army to destroy the city. At the city-walls of Negran the king’s heralds announced, that Dunaan would let live only those who renounced the Crucified Galileian and His Cross, as a “sign of malediction”. Not daring to assault the Christian city by force, Dunaan resorted to a ruse, swearing an oath that he would not force the Christians into Judaism, but would merely impose a tribute-tax on Negran. The inhabitants of the city would not heed the advice of Saint Aretha [his name in Greek means “virtue”, as if here literally to suggest that the people “would not heed the voice of virtue”], and putting their trust in Dunaan, they opened wide the city-gates.

The very next day Dunaan gave orders to start up an immense bon-fire and throw in it all the clergy of the Church of the city, so as to frighten all the rest of the Christians. Thus were burnt 427 men. The governor Aretha and the other chief men were thrown into prison. Then the oppressor sent out through the city his messengers, to convert the Christians to Judaism. And Dunaan himself conversed with those inhabitants brought forth from the prisons, saying: “I do not demand of you that ye should renounce the God of heaven and earth, nor do I want that ye should worship idols, but I want merely that ye do not believe in Jesus Christ, since the Crucified One was a man, and not God”. The holy martyrs replied to this, that Jesus – is God the Word, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, Who for the salvation of mankind had become flesh from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary. “We shalt not abjure Christ, since that He is for us – Life, and death for Him – is the finding of Life”, – declared the sufferers to Dunaan. And more than four thousand Christians – men, women, both the aged and children – from the city of Negran and surrounding villages accepted a martyr’s death for Christ.

© 1996-2001 by translator Fr. S. Janos.

Serving the Lord

November 5, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Tues­day. [Col. 1:1-2, 7-11; Luke 8:1-3] The Lord preach­es, the wo­men serve Him from their sub­stance, and are thus as par­tic­i­pants in his very preach­ing. It is not giv­en to ev­ery­one to preach the Gos­pels, but ev­ery­one can help spread them, and be par­tic­i­pants in this most im­por­tant mat­ter on the earth. There were man­y such par­tic­i­pants, both men and wo­men, at the time the ho­ly a­pos­tles preach­ed; and then at the time of their suc­ces­sors, and fi­nal­ly, through­out the en­tire his­to­ry of the Church. Such par­tic­i­pants ex­ist to this day. Our a­pos­tles in the Cau­ca­sus and in var­i­ous ar­eas of Si­be­ria la­bour zeal­ous­ly, suf­fer­ing ev­ery need and dep­ri­va­tion. They con­tin­ue the work of the Lord and the ho­ly A­pos­tles. Those men and wo­men who send them help join the ranks of the wo­men who served the Lord, and be­come wor­thy of e­qual rec­om­pense. The Lord said: He that re­ceiv­eth whom­so­ev­er I send re­ceiv­eth Me (John 13:20). This means that He e­quates Him­self with the one who is sent to preach; it would fol­low that He e­quates the ser­vice ren­der­ed to his mes­sen­gers with serv­ing Him. Ac­cord­ing to the law of His good­ness and truth, the way a per­son re­ceives one de­ter­mines the re­ward he will re­ceive (Matt. 10:41). This would seem to be suf­fi­cient in­cen­tive to keep giv­ing alms to help in the great work of preach­ing of the Gos­pels.

Should we look for another?

October 31, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Thurs­day. [Phil. 3:1-8; Luke 7:17-30] Saint John the Fore­run­ner sends his dis­ci­ples to ask the Lord: is He the One That should come? Or should they look for an­oth­er? He did not ask this for him­self but for his dis­ci­ples, for he knew pre­cise­ly who Je­sus Christ was, be­ing in­formed a­bout this from heav­en. The dis­ci­ples sought an an­swer to this ques­tion not out of emp­ty in­quis­i­tive­ness, but out of a sin­cere de­sire to know the truth. To such as these there is no need to say much; the Lord does not speak, on­ly in­di­cates what had been ac­com­plished by Him at that time. Di­vine deeds witn­essed to His di­vin­i­ty. It was so ob­vi­ous, that the ques­ti­on­ers no long­er ques­tioned. This is the way it al­ways is. The pow­er of God lives in the Church; a sin­cere seek­er of the truth im­me­di­ate­ly feels it and is sure of this truth. This sure­ness through ex­pe­ri­ence puts an end to all ques­tions and com­plete­ly sooth­es. He who does not want to be­lieve, and, hav­ing lost his faith, be­gins to seek in the Church and Chris­tian­i­ty not the foun­da­tions of faith, but grounds to jus­ti­fy his un­be­lief, will find no in­di­ca­tions sat­is­fac­to­ry. He con­sid­ers his un­be­lief well-ground­ed, al­though its foun­da­tions are pet­ty and in­sig­nif­i­cant. His heart wants this — that is why it is all tol­er­a­ble.

Lord! Lord!

October 30, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Wednes­day. [Phil. 2:24-30; Luke 6:46-7:1] And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? Why do they call Him Lord, but do not do the Lord’s will; that is, why do they not ac­knowl­edge His lord­ship in their deeds? Be­cause they on­ly call with their tongue, and not with their heart. If their heart were to ut­ter: “Lord, Thou art my Lord,” then com­plete read­i­ness would a­bide in it to sub­mit to the one whom they con­fess as their Lord. But since they do not have this, their deeds do not match their tongue; where­as deeds al­ways match the heart. All right, so there is no point in call­ing: “Lord, Lord”? No, not so. But it is nec­es­sary to make the ex­ter­nal word match the in­ner word, which is the feel­ing and dis­po­si­tion of the heart. Sit and re­flect up­on the Lord and your­self: what is the Lord and what are you? Think a­bout what the Lord has done and still does for you, why you live and how it will end. You im­me­di­ate­ly will come to the con­vic­tion that there is no oth­er way than to stead­fast­ly ful­fil the Lord’s en­tire will; there is no oth­er path for us. This con­vic­tion gives birth to a read­i­ness to ful­fil in deed what is ex­pressed by the word “Lord.” With such read­i­ness a need for help from a­bove will be awak­en­ed, and from it the prayer: “Lord, Lord! Help me and give me strength to walk in Thy will.” And this call will be pleas­ing to the Lord.

All-night Vigils

October 24, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Thurs­day. [Phil 1:20-27; Luke 6:12-19] And He continued all night in prayer to God. Here is the foun­da­tion and be­gin­ning of Chris­tian all-night Vig­ils. A prayer­ful heat chas­es a­way sleep, and ex­hil­a­ra­tion of the spir­it does not al­low one to no­tice the pass­ing of time. True men of prayer do not no­tice this; it seems to them that they had just begun to pray, mean­while day has al­ready ap­pear­ed. But un­til one reach­es such per­fec­tion, he must take on the la­bour of vig­ils. Solitaries have borne this and bear it; ce­no­bit­ic mo­nas­tics have borne this and bear it; rev­er­ent and God-fear­ing lay­peo­ple have borne this and bear it. But though vig­il comes with dif­fi­cul­ty, its fruit re­mains in the soul, di­rect­ly and con­stant­ly pres­ent — peace of soul and con­tri­tion, with weak­en­ing and ex­haus­tion of the bod­y. It is a state very valu­able for those who are zeal­ous a­bout pros­per­ing in the spir­it! That is why in plac­es where vig­ils are es­tab­lish­ed (on Athos), they do not want to give them up. Ev­ery­one re­al­izes how dif­fi­cult it is, but no­bod­y has a de­sire to re­scind this or­der, for the sake of the prof­it which the soul re­ceives from vig­ils. Sleep, more than any­thing, re­lax­es and feeds the flesh; vig­ils more than any­thing hum­ble it. One who sleeps abun­dant­ly is burdened by spir­i­tu­al deeds and is cold to­wards them; he who is vig­i­lant is quick in move­ment, like an an­te­lope, and burns in the spir­it. If the flesh must be taught to be good, like a slave, then there is no bet­ter way to suc­ceed in this than through fre­quent vig­ils. Here the flesh ful­ly feels the pow­er of the spir­it over it, and learns to sub­mit to it; while the spir­it ac­quires the hab­it of reigning over the flesh.

IOCC SoCal Step Up! Walk-A-Thon

October 23, 2013 | News & Events, Uncategorized

When: October 26, 2013

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Be sober, vigilant and pray

October 22, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Tues­day. [Phil. 1:8-14; Luke 5:12-16] The lep­er fell down be­fore the Lord and besought: Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. The Lord said: I will: be thou clean. And im­me­di­ate­ly the lep­ro­sy de­part­ed from him. So does ev­ery mor­al lep­ro­sy im­me­di­ate­ly de­part as soon as one falls down be­fore the Lord with faith, re­pen­tance, and con­fes­sion — it tru­ly de­parts and los­es any pow­er over him. Why does the lep­ro­sy some­times re­turn again? For the same rea­son that bodi­ly dis­eases re­turn. One who has re­cov­er­ed is told, “do not eat that, do not drink this, do not go there.” If he does not obey, the dis­ease again flares up. So it is in the spir­i­tu­al life. One must be so­ber, vig­i­lant, and pray — then the dis­ease of sin will not re­turn. If you are not at­ten­tive to­ward your­self, if you al­low your­self to see, hear, say, and do ev­ery­thing in­dis­crim­i­nate­ly, how can sin not flare up and take pow­er once again? The Lord charged the lep­er to ful­fil all ac­cord­ing to the law. This means that up­on con­fes­sion one must re­ceive a pen­ance and faith­ful­ly ful­fil it; with­in it is con­ceal­ed great pre­ven­tive strength. But why do some say: this sin­ful hab­it has over­come me, I can­not han­dle my­self. Ei­ther be­cause re­pen­tance and con­fes­sion were not com­plete, or be­cause af­ter mak­ing pre­cau­tionary chang­es he ad­heres on­ly weak­ly to them, or in­dulges him­self. He wants to do ev­ery­thing with­out to­il and self-co­er­cion, and is laugh­ed at by the en­e­my. Re­solve to stand un­to death and show [this resolve] in deed, and you will see what pow­er there is in this. It is true that in ev­ery in­sur­mount­able pas­sion that comes up the en­e­my pos­sess­es the soul, but this is no jus­ti­fi­ca­tion; for he im­me­di­ate­ly flees as soon as you pro­duce an in­ner change, with God’s help.

Who is free of temptations?

October 16, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Wednes­day. [Eph. 5:25-33; Luke 4:1-15] The dev­il ap­proach­es the God-man with temp­ta­tions. Who a­mong men is free of them? He who goes ac­cord­ing to the will of the evil one does not ex­pe­ri­ence at­tacks, but is sim­ply turn­ed more and more to­ward evil. As soon as one be­gins to come to him­self and in­tends to be­gin a new life ac­cord­ing to God’s will, im­me­di­ate­ly the en­tire sa­tan­ic realm en­ters in­to ac­tion: they has­ten to scat­ter good thoughts and the in­ten­tions of the re­pen­tant one in any way they can. If they do not man­age to turn him aside, they at­tempt to hin­der his good re­pen­tance and con­fes­sion; if they do not man­age to do that, they con­trive to sow tares a­midst the fruits of re­pen­tance and dis­rupt his la­bours of cleans­ing the heart. If they do not suc­ceed in sug­gest­ing evil they at­tempt to dis­tort the truth; if they are re­pulsed in­ward­ly they at­tack out­ward­ly, and so on un­til the end of one’s life. They do not even let one die in peace; even af­ter death they pur­sue the soul, un­til it es­capes the ae­ri­al space where they hov­er and con­gre­gate. You ask, “What should we do? It is hope­less and terrifying!” For a be­liev­er there is noth­ing terrifying here, be­cause near a God-fear­ing man de­mons on­ly busy them­selves, but they do not have any pow­er over him. A so­ber man of prayer shoots ar­rows a­gainst them, and they stay far a­way from him, not dar­ing to ap­proach, and fear­ing the de­feat which they have al­ready ex­pe­ri­enced. If they suc­ceed in some­thing, it is due to our blun­der­ing. We slack­en our at­ten­tion, or al­low our­selves to be dis­tract­ed by their phan­toms, and they im­me­di­ate­ly come and dis­turb us more bold­ly. If you do not come to your sens­es in time they will whirl you a­bout; but if a soul does come to its sens­es they again re­coil and spy from afar to see wheth­er it is pos­si­ble to ap­proach again some­how. So be so­ber, watch, and pray — and the en­e­mies will do noth­ing to you.