lasting tranquility

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The human soul can never be satisfied with material things; we have an infinite desiring capacity, in the face of which nothing finite can ever satisfy us…

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We live in a time of rapid change, when every innovation is presented to us as progress, but before real change, real progress can take place, something must first change within us.  And for this to happen, we must become completely estranged to all things earthly and human, to all human logic, to all human ways of thinking and to every so-called material good.  We must be indifferent in the face of all things.

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And only then, when we have become strangers to all, can God become all things to us, as if there existed nothing else in the world for us except God.

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It is this alone than can grant us true and lasting tranquility.

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Elder Aemilianos of Simonopetra

everything is simple

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everything is simple

“Everything is simple. Begin gradually and you will be able to do everything. Even if you are not able to do everything as you would like. Do what you are able to do. The Lord is not strict about minor details. He values diligence and purpose.”

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Saint Theophan the Recluse

heart of humus

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a heart of soil

“The sowing, germination and development of the Christian life differs in essence from the sowing, germination and development of the natural life. The difference is the result of the special character of the natural life and its relationship to our human nature. A man is not born a Christian, but becomes such after birth.

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The seed of Christ falls on a heart that is already beating.

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Since the natural man is fallen, he is opposed to the demands of Christianity. In a plant, however, the beginning of life is the stirring sprout in the seed, an awakening of dormant powers.

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The beginning of a true Christian life in man is a kind of re-creation and rebirth, an endowment of new powers and of new life.”

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Saint Theophan the Recluse

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eternal joy

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God is the one who gives us joy, and we should ascribe all our joy to Him.  But what about those times when my life is not joyful?  In a word, I am miserable.  We should pity the man who does not feel this joy and this celebration.  He loves only the earth.  He is in love with only rubbish and dung.  He gives God his debris, and when our heart produces only rubbish, it receives very much the same in return from God.

The soul that thirsts for God, on the other hand, is continually bathed in Divine Light.  The face of such a person becomes divinely luminous.  You see him and you ask yourself, could this man be Christ?

Thus the Christian becomes a strange spectacle, a Christ-bearer, a God-bearer, and a Spirit bearer.  He or she reveals the unsurpassable beauty of Christ.  And when Christ suddenly appears, resplendent in all His beauty, He fills one with joy, gladness and sweetness… Something strange takes place within us, something which cannot be grasped by human thought  And how could it be otherwise?  For our “desire for God transcends our desire for the world, and thus it cannot be satisfied by anything in the world”.

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Elder Aemilianos of Simonopetra Monastery

sweet praise

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Psalms and Hymns

 

Psalmody is the ABC for beginners, progress for the more advanced, confirmation for the perfect, the voice of the Church. It makes festivals radiant; it creates mourning that is in accordance with God, for psalmody draws tears even from a heart of stone.

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Saint Ephraim the Syrian

 

Blessings as we usher in the Nativity Season

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Praise the Lord, for a psalm is a good thing;

Let praise be sweet to our God.

The Lord is building Jerusalem,

And He shall gather together the dispersion of Israel;

He heals the brokenhearted

And He binds up all their wounds.

He numbers the multitude of stars

And calls them all by name.

Great is our Lord, and great is His strength;

His understanding exceeds every measure.

The Lord raises up the gentle,

But humbles sinners to the ground.

Begin with thanksgiving to the Lord;

Sing to our God with the harp,

To Him who covers heaven with clouds,

Who prepares rain for the earth,

Who makes grass grow on the mountains

And the green growth for the service of men,

To Him who gives the cattle their food

And who gives food to the nestlings of ravens

When they call upon Him.

He shall not take pleasure in the strength of a horse,

Nor be pleased with the legs of a man;

The Lord is pleased with those who fear Him,

And with those who hope in His mercy.

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Psalm 146

 

walk with Christ into the Nativity

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-psalter-groupThe Psalter Prayer Book

Psalmody is calm of soul, author of peace.

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Psalmody is convenor of friendship, union of the separated, reconciliation of enemies.

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Saint Ephraim the Syrian on Psalmody

Tomorrow, November 15, ushers in the period of the Nativity Fast for Orthodox Christians.  This is a 40 day period leading up to the Nativity of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Aside from amending and curtailing some of our physical nourishment, we also increase our spiritual nourishment, in the form of almsgiving, prayer and worship.  This is our time of preparation.

For more than a decade, I have been a part of an incredible group of women, who pray the psalter during the seasons of the Nativity and Great Lent.  It is a time of year, toward which we always look forward.  If you have never participated in a psalter prayer group, it is very easy to get one started.

The Psalter is the Book of Psalms broken into twenty groupings of psalms, called Kathisma’s.  It is not necessary to have twenty members in a psalter prayer group, but if you do, then the psalter is prayed in it’s entirety every day by the group.

It’s about twenty minutes to pray a Kathisma, but it is wonderful time to reorient oneself from the constant droning of what often becomes a hectic season of Christmas shopping, dashing here and there to holiday parties (which are no doubt fun times to spend with friends), and the overall commercialism of a season which no longer wants Christ in the midst of it.

So each day of praying the psalms becomes a twenty minute respite for calm of soul.

In praying the psalter, each woman also prays for one another and so psalmody within a psalter prayer group is absolutely the conveyor of friendship and union of the separated, because though we pray each in our own homes, we pray with oneness of soul uniting us in prayer.  Some members have moved out of the area over time, and so that makes these occasions of the year when come together again through the Psalms, all the more special.

By the end of the Nativity period, each woman will have prayed through the psalter twice and that is both a sober grounding and a blessing.

“It is the profound Christian persuasion that Christ walks within the psalms”(1)  and so it is a great joy to pray the psalms, as we walk with Christ on this journey toward His Incarnation.

Have a Blessed Nativity Season.

(1) Father Patrick Henry Reardon, Christ in the Psalms

just how is one to be

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Guard the Heart Saint Theophan

 

 on guarding the heart

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“Just how is one to be?…to shun everyone is, of course impossible, but refuse whenever possible to enter into this circle of worldly life.   When it does pull you against your will, act as if you were not there.

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look but do not see, listen but do not hear

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Let what you see pass by your eyes and what you hear pass by your ears.  Outwardly behave like everyone else, be straightforward and sincere, but guard your heart from sympathies and attractions.

The main thing is to guard the heart, then you will be there in body but not in soul, faithfully carrying out the commandment of the Apostle  ‘be as they that use this world, as not abusing it ‘(1 Cor 7:31)”

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 Saint Theophan the Recluse

the force of love

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Romans 8:35-39

“the kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force” (Matthew 11:12)

“No one on this earth can avoid affliction and although the afflictions that the Lord sends are not great – men imagine them beyond their strength and are crushed by them.  This is because they will not humble their souls and commit themselves to the Will of God. But the Lord Himself guides with Grace those who are given over to God’s will and they bear all things with fortitude for the sake of God whom they so loved. And through Him they are glorified forever.  It is impossible to escape tribulation in this world but the man who is given over to the Will of God bears tribulation easily by putting his trust in the Lord – so his tribulations pass.  Embracing suffering with Faith and Trust – that is the key to beating them without getting crushed by them.

+Elder Sophrony