To better understand the essence of love, we must try to understand the essence of God, because... "God is love". When we live separated from God, our lives are controlled by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Everything that we think we love is nothing more than the satisfaction of our ego needs. The Apostle John, considered the apostle of love, one of the Lord’s favorite disciples, reclining on His chest, writes: “Do not love the world, nor the things in the world: whoever loves the world does not have the Father’s love in him. For everything that is in the world: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not from the Father, but from this world.” Without a meeting with God, we are driven by the love of eros, the desire of the flesh, animal instincts, and the satisfaction of the selfish and sexual needs of the soul and body. It can be called lowest level carnal love. We try to realize our essence and the need to love and be loved within this framework. But, having satisfied only the desire of the flesh, having received pleasure only at the level of the needs of the body and partly of the soul, disappointment, despondency and even hatred of the object of our desire come, because... This is not the way God intends to realize and receive this supply of great driving force, helping us to live, being the essence of our nature and the meaning of life at the same time. Sexual relations were not intended by God as an end in itself, but to fulfill the commandment of God, written in the 1st book of the Bible “Genesis”: “Be fruitful and multiply.”
We see from the example of the life of Jesus Christ that He spent His earthly life in virginity, showing by his example that a renewed, spiritually reborn person has an alien way of life in satisfying the lust of the flesh, human passions. Only through our spiritual renewal and rebirth, which occurs through our heart and spirit, can we begin to comprehend the boundaries true love. “...The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” By developing our relationship with God through prayer, reading the Word, God takes us to another level of loving relationship. Our spirit, renewed by God, begins to desire the opposite of the desires of the flesh, the highest, the heavenly, because God wants to teach us to correctly love ourselves, and then develop relationships of love with our neighbors.
In my own way historical origin According to the Bible, we are all relatives by flesh and blood, since we were all born of the same flesh. Our first ancestors, from whom all nations and tribes descended, were Adam and Eve. Charles Darwin repented of his theory of the evolution of monkeys at the end of his life, and new sciences that emerged, such as biogenetics and others, also confirmed its entire inconsistency. Sin and rebellion of people against God, the desire for freedom, on the contrary, enslaved the lives of people with all the ensuing consequences. Instead of the life of freedom and love that God planned for humanity, people themselves entered into slavery to sin, the desires of their own flesh, rejecting the guidance and priority of God who gave people love, freedom and power. Instead of a relationship of love, which is the essence of everyone, we have become enemies of God and each other. Enmity is inherent in sinful man, but by the nature God placed in us, we were created to love. It turns out that each of us has the following situation in life without God. “For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh; because the desire is good(love) I have it in me, but I don’t find it to do it. I don’t do the good that I want, but I do the evil that I don’t want. Because according to to the inner man I find pleasure in the law of God; but in my members I see another law, warring against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that is in my members. I'm a poor man" writes Apostle Paul. How familiar this state is to each of us. How many times have we decided to improve, wanted to start new life, to love your family and friends, but in reality it turned out that they caused more pain, brought bitterness and sadness than love. “I don’t understand what I’m doing: because I don’t do what I want, but what I hate, I do”: I scream, get irritated, speak rudely, fight, cheat, etc. The laws of sin are the laws of enmity, slavery both within man himself and outside him. Instead of the law of love, we are at enmity within ourselves, in the family, in the state. This enmity manifests itself in all structures of society. Millions of dollars today are spent in various countries on the production of weapons and hostility. As a result, dissatisfaction with a person’s main need for love leads to his own destruction: depression, access to destructive actions, antisocial behavior - committing crimes, alcoholism and drug addiction, sexual unrestraint, suicide - suicide.
The good God, who is love, seeing the destructive effect of sin, the impossibility because of it of realizing His nature in us, sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to destroy sin, all evil, to destroy the wall of hostility within us, between us and God, between everyone people. “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to walk in.” God loved this world, therefore he allowed the blood of His Son to be shed, to be crucified on the cross, so that each of us would be reborn to a new life, sin would be defeated, peace, joy and love would come into the life of every person. Jesus Christ took our sin, every person on earth, and Himself, with His body, becoming this sin for us, nailed it to the cross. Now all people, in Christ Jesus, have become close to the Blood of Christ. For He is our peace, having made both one and destroyed the barrier in the middle, abolishing it in His Flesh. Having come to Him, we are already each other not strangers and not strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God's household.
There is only one way to find harmony with God, inner world with oneself and peaceful coexistence with other people. This path is Jesus Christ. Through Him we come out of slavery, gain true essence, freedom, let us know God and His love for us. Only through Him does clarity, purpose and meaning come into our lives, and enmity, strife and vanity go away. God's love never fails. God, even now, as 2 thousand years ago, awaits the arrival of every sinner in order to accept him into his arms, forgive him, wash him through the blood of his Son, and give him a new name. Coming to Him, we become former sinners, saved by the grace of God, righteous and saints, thanks to His continued mercy and love.
Through the prayer of repentance, now accept the gift of His unceasing mercy and love into your life: “Heavenly Father, I recognize myself as a sinner who lived according to my lusts and passions, seeking satisfaction only of the flesh and body, my selfishness. Forgive me, I repent with all my heart of all my sins. I thank You for Your Son Jesus Christ, who paid for all my sins and justified me before You. Holy Spirit, enter my heart, teach me from now on to live according to the will of God, to think and seek the high, and not the low. Thank You, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen".
“Love is long-suffering, it is kind, love does not envy, love does not boast, is not proud, does not act rudely, does not seek its own, is not irritated, does not think evil, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; covers all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails” (1 Cor. 13:4-8)
When I read this passage in the Apostle, I immediately remember one person...
My classmates, with whom I spent my years of study, probably still remember our Marina Stepanovna. An old librarian with a “terribly bad” character, as all the debtors considered it... Approaching the doors of the library, even non-believers crossed themselves - lectures and shouts at us, careless readers, like peals of thunder, flew from the third floor to the first. Moreover, her memory often played a cruel joke on her - this cry often did not pour out on the person for whom it was intended.
Everyone avoided our library if possible, and on the first of April, the offended students “tried” as best they could - on the library doors there was always a sign taken from the control room - “Don’t get in! He will kill!
And then one day I had a chance to meet her on the bus. To be honest, I hid for a long time... But I still had to say hello...
It was June 22, many years ago. And then the conversation began. And I learned a lot...
This man opened up to me completely unexpected side. I learned that once upon a time, on this very day, June 21, 1941, a very young beautiful girl Marina, who had just finished school, got married. She sat at the same desk with her husband, beloved Petenka, almost from the first grade.
“We were just friends. But they always loved each other...
We never allowed ourselves anything extra, as is common among young people now. The first time we kissed each other was at the wedding... And we were so happy! Our whole life lay ahead of us!... And tomorrow there was war... Like in the movies... Petenka was taken to the front the very next day, immediately after the wedding. And they killed... In the first battle..."
There are tears in her eyes and pain in her eyes. The pain is alive human soul. A pain that was muffled, but not healed by time... An old woman stood in front of me, but her eyes were the eyes of an eighteen-year-old girl, my age, who lost her beloved husband immediately after the wedding...
– Did you get married later? – I’m trying to distract her somehow, to switch gears. It’s so unbearable for me to see someone else’s pain...
- Married? But I'm already married, baby. Married to Petenka...
The fact that he is not there does not mean that I should forget about him and look at others...
I lived long life, and I have never met someone who could replace my husband... I am his wife, and he is my husband. And this is forever, baby...
- "Love never ends!". With the passing of those we love, it only becomes stronger and covers everyone around us. Our children are gone, but they are with us, and we must live for their sake - enjoy the sun, lilacs, go to concerts and exhibitions. We must live this life for them - this is how the head of the Vera Foundation, Nyuta Federmesser, began her address.
There are a lot of people in the building of the New Opera Theater and... very quiet. Only children run around, make noise and laugh, and their departed brothers and sisters from the photographs on the stands respond to this laughter with smiles. These photographs are carefully pasted by silent parents - pregnant crying girl, young family with infant, an elderly couple...
Two tall, white-haired women - one older, the other younger - stand for a long time, hugging each other at the stand, frozen and not noticing anyone around. The father pastes the photo and gently runs his hand over his son's face.
“Alive,” someone whispers next to me. Alive! Because “there is no separation. There is a huge meeting” - these words of Brodsky became the motto today in memory of departed children.
The ceremonial part was opened by a concert. All parents were called into the hall, where Mikhail Rakhlevsky’s chamber orchestra was waiting for them on stage, for which, as the director said, charitable foundation“Vera” by Nyuta Federmesser, “it’s a great honor to play today for parents in memory of their departed children.”
When the first chords of Bach's third suite fell upon the hall, even the men could not hold back their tears, and the young father in the next row a one-year-old child He hugged his son tighter in his arms, hiding his face. Tchaikovsky, Schnittke, Piazzolla, Strauss... In the middle of the concert, the orchestra fell silent, and in complete silence, the names of the children began to appear on the huge screen - an endless list of almost four hundred names.
Nyuta Federmesser said that when the Vera Foundation began holding such meetings, she often wondered why such a day of remembrance was needed, why parents needed to endure this pain again and again.
– And your letters became the answer to these questions. You write that this day is important for you, because you would like to be useful to other parents, now, after the loss of your child, you have the strength to do this. You come not to relive your pain, but to help others, so that together we can learn to yearn and rejoice again. You are not only the most wounded parents, but also the most rescuers.
Life goes on - sharper, brighter, sometimes more painful - and only you can experience life fully.
Actress and co-founder of the Gift of Life foundation Chulpan Khamatova also noted that the main objective such meetings - a feeling of universal unity:
– It is very important not to be alone, alone with your grief. Many times I tried to imagine what would happen to me if such grief happened in my life, but I couldn’t.
I once received a back injury, which periodically gets worse, and then I can’t do anything because of the pain, just lie down and not move. And one day I thought: what if this time I fall ill forever, what if I don’t get up? And then I realized that only friends who are always there give me hope. The only thing that helps me is the thought that I won’t be alone.
And then parents began to get up on stage and share memories of their children:
About one and a half year old Liza Galaktionova, who died on Easter, and her mother, thin as a girl, crying, said that she was happy, since now their family had a Guardian Angel in Heaven.
– When I found out Lizochka’s diagnosis – spinal muscular atrophy, I thought that I would never be able to be happy as before, to the end. And now I can say that the happiness of our family is now even more complete. Children are our key to the door to the Kingdom of Heaven; through their prayers and suffering, we will be together. And at Lizochka’s funeral service there was also no sadness, but only words about victory over death:
Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death and giving life to those in the tombs!
About Lera Bodrova, who fell ill with cancer at the age of fourteen and struggled with death for six years. Her mother recalled how her daughter did not allow herself to cry when blood vessels burst from endless chemicals, since there were children younger than her around. Or how she, having received a lot of money for her work at a charity auction, spent it not on herself, but on paying for other children to undergo bone marrow transplants.
And how, three days before Lera’s death, a bird flew into her room and sang until four in the morning, when Lera passed away.
About little Timur, who asked the Foundation to give him gifts every day. When they asked him why he needed so many toys, he replied that he didn’t have much time left to live, and he wanted to have time to collect toys for the boy who lives in a neighboring house with drunken parents.
And about many, many other children who, with their suffering and their courage, changed the world around them.
Memories of today's Memorial Day were often intertwined and complemented by memories of last year, and in wonderful ways.
So, Dani’s dad Alexander, who last year shared his joy through tears - he and his wife are expecting a child! – today he went up on stage with his wife and a cheerful girl jumping in a sling in her mother’s arms.
– We took strength from love for each other and from love for the people around us. We have absorbed these forces, and now we want to share them with you. We also ask you to give your strength to others. Happiness is like a breath of wind, it can disappear at any moment, so you need to live for others and help those who need help.
And Elena, the mother of Lesha, who passed away last year on the eve of his 17th birthday, said that she wrote her son’s name on the balloon before releasing the balloon into the sky:
“And four days later Lesha dreamed of me and said: “Mom, thank you for the gift!” Remember, with God everyone is alive, and our children are always with us!
And on the street, hundreds of whites were again handed out to parents balloons. Dul strong wind, the balls were rushing into the sky. And, without waiting for the general command, some parents were forced to let go of the weightless rope with the ball from their hands to let it fly away.
Love never ends
Love is patient and kind, love does not envy,
love is not exalted, is not proud, does not act outrageously,
does not seek his own, is not irritated, does not think evil,
does not rejoice in untruth, but rejoices in the truth;
covers everything, believes everything, hopes everything, endures everything.
Love never ends…
— 1 Corinthians 13:4-8
This is the final chapter in our study of 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, where Paul describes the behavior and attitude of God's love-agape. He ends his tale of agape love with the powerful statement: “Love never fails.”
The ancient Greek word pipto - "to cease" means fall from high place . IN in rare cases it described a warrior who had died in battle. The word pipto is often used to mean collapse, collapse, be disappointed. In verse 8, Paul used this word to establish an unchangeable truth: love never disappoints or fails.
It's no secret that people often let each other down. I'm sure you have been let down at some point. And to be completely honest, you probably didn’t live up to anyone’s expectations either. But God's agape love never disappoints, never fails. You can always rely on her, you can always trust her.
A person you respect may lose his position in society, and this will be difficult for you. Something bad might happen to your friend and it will hurt you again. But you can be sure that God's agape love will never disappoint you. This love is constant, unchanging, reliable. You can always rely on this love, you can trust it. God wants you to learn to show agape love to people, which is why the Holy Spirit prompted the Apostle Paul to write these words in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. These verses are like a mirror into which we must regularly look to see how well we are demonstrating God's love to others.
I have collected all the words, phrases and expressions that we have learned in these chapters and compiled them into a single text. Read it slowly, and then ask yourself: “Did I pass the agape love test? Or do I still need to learn to show such love to people?”
Amplified translation of 1 Corinthians 13:4-8:
“Love is patient and ardent towards others, it has as much patience as can be needed;
Love does not require attention only to itself, on the contrary, it is focused on the needs of others and is ready to give them what they need;
Love is not ambitious, not self-centered, not so self-absorbed that it has no time to think about the wants and needs of others;
Love does not talk only about itself all the time, constantly exaggerating and embellishing the truth in order to look more significant in the eyes of others;
Love is not proud, does not boast, does not behave arrogantly, arrogantly, arrogantly;
Love is not rude or discourteous, it is not careless or reckless, it does not behave with people in such a way that it could be called tactless;
Love does not manipulate, does not weave intrigues and does not invent cunning ways to present the situation in a light favorable to itself;
Love does not start a conflict and does not say words so sharp and caustic that they cause an aggressive reaction;
Love doesn't lead account all mistakes and unfair deeds;
Love does not rejoice when it sees that someone has been treated unfairly, it rejoices, triumphs and rejoices in the truth;
Love protects, protects, covers and keeps people from being exposed;
Love believes with all its might the best in every situation;
Love always hopes for the best in others and for the best for others and looks forward to the realization of this;
Love never leaves, never gives up and never gives up;
Love never disappoints or fails."
So what will be your answer to my questions? Do you treat people with agape love? you strive to achieve highest level love that God expects from you? Do you treat others with God's love? Or do you still need to grow and change for this?
I ask you: pray, talk to God about this topic. How you treat people, how much you love them and how responsive you are to them is very, very important. Therefore, it is worth coming into God’s presence and asking Him to show you to whom and where you lack agape love.
Today the project " Open Library" and the "Subscription Editions" store are releasing the book "Dialogues with Sokurov." It included conversations between director Alexander Sokurov and famous writers, journalists and public figures. Also among Sokurov’s interlocutors in the book are Lyudmila Ulitskaya, Svetlana Alexievich, Kirill Serebrennikov.
KATERINA GORDEEVA:
This is a dialogue about proper care, and we will talk about everything that is included in this concept. " Proper care"in every sense of the word.
Here are very dear interlocutors to my heart, very important to me. And I hope that this will be a meaningful conversation, which, perhaps, will help each of us live this life differently. I'll tell you very short story. When I was little, neither with my grandmother nor with my grandfather, it so happened, I could not say goodbye. My parents took care of me. And I learned about my grandfather’s death a few months later. And in retrospect, rewinding the events of that summer and that spring, I understood when and how my grandfather died. They didn’t invite me to say goodbye to my grandmother because they were afraid that my grandmother would be scared when she realized that she was dying. And every time there was a conversation about my grandparents in the presence of my mother, my mother cried. I was terribly afraid of death, both when I was little, and when I was older, and when I was even older, I sometimes woke up - I think everyone knows this - in a cold sweat and horror: “Now, the world will be, but I will no longer be in it.”
When I had children, I started talking to them. With very small and older and older ones. And every time someone died, I told them about it, even if it was about small children with whom I was friends, and, as it happened, whom they knew about.
Then they started asking my parents when they came to visit us. “Did your mother die?” - they asked my mother about my grandmother. "Yes, she died." And the first six or seven, maybe more, since mom cried.
Children grow up and they repeat these questions. And now my mother can talk about her mother without tears. And he can talk about his dad. Sorry for such a long introduction. But it seems to me that this is a very important problem, some kind of threshold that we cannot cross. Why is it that in our culture, in our tradition - and perhaps this is not only our peculiarity, and it is like this everywhere - it is generally not customary to talk about death and say out loud in front of the living that someone has died? Why are children not invited to funerals, and is this right?
ALEXANDER SOKUROV:
It is probably difficult to talk about the inevitable. We build our entire lives on hope. We hope, we hope... And it is difficult for a person to say that there is a certain point where all these hopes will turn into nothing. We saw how soldiers are treated in war, how soldiers die, how people die, how people kill each other. In general, there is not much moral value in life. Unless we muster some effort into ourselves for this. People are accustomed to death, people are accustomed to the fact that a person can be killed, and they are accustomed to the fact that it is easy to kill. The soldiers look with disgust at the lying dead soldier. The body smells bad, especially a soldier's body.
Alexander SokurovPhoto: Anna GruzdevaIn some religious texts - or in the way people understand them - there are direct calls to deal with a person of someone else's faith, and this is not a sin. It is also difficult for us to talk about this because then we should probably say to ourselves directly: in the very idea of life lies the original aggression, the original absurdity. And if in the minds of some people who are united in civilizational rings, there are some kind of boundaries, then the rest of the living world lives according to the principle - “kill and devour, eat, and it’s better to be alive.” No animal sheds a single tear when eating a child or its equal. And this is, perhaps, a very difficult and big problem. The fact of death, the fact of mortality - it is embedded, on the one hand, in the inertia of life, and on the other hand, in the law that exists in nature. All living things, unfortunately, exist through struggle, and the one who survives is the one who turns out to be the most heartless and cruel. This is probably why it is difficult for us to talk about it.
In Russia it is also difficult to talk about this because Orthodoxy constantly persuades us that there are institutions of life, some other levels and other layers of life. There is an opportunity during one’s lifetime to receive an indulgence, during one’s lifetime to receive some kind of opportunity and right and be sure that someday somewhere else something will happen. And the fact that we are assured of this makes our human situation even more complex, even more difficult: we are always on this neutral territory. Every person lives in anticipation of this vile creature getting to him - now, tomorrow, today, at night? In twenty, thirty, forty years? Nobody knows this.
And one last thing. It’s difficult for us to talk about this, we don’t want to talk about it, because most people go to another world in agony and in the awareness of the inevitability of the approaching end, and no one knows what it even looks like. There is no description, no one returned from there. And a person is born alone, and also leaves alone. This is something that emotionally creates great difficulties for us living people.
In Orthodoxy, after death, a person is buried on the third day. In the Muslim world they act more decisively and, in my opinion, more kindly - on the day of a person’s death, he must be given to the earth. And those who remain to live remain to live without the terrible memories of two or three days of existence next to an already decomposing body.
Because of the contradictions that surround us, it is difficult for us to talk and think about death. And probably also because of the hopelessness of this procedure. It is very difficult for us to find some kind of stability in thinking about death, to find some kind of refuge, to find some kind of way out. The road is long, and no one knows where it ends. And death smells disgusting. People are humiliated by the fact that death also has a disgusting, terrible smell. And nature shows us that this beautiful, unique, intelligent, brilliant flesh is like this.
It is very difficult for us to find some kind of stability in thinking about death, to find refuge, some kind of way out
It seems to me that art has not found a way out of these contradictions. Tries, but can't find it. Maybe there is only one way out - create images beautiful women. This is all that artists were capable of in the face of the fact of the finitude of life and this terrible ending, a terrible mistake of nature - not that we are mortal, but that we know that we are mortal. Our good Lord performed such a good deed - he informed us that we are mortal. This is a trap.
Maybe in Russian culture this is such a complex, difficult problem. IN European countries, V Asian countries, V Arab countries- it happens a little easier, more quickly. But we still need to kiss the dead person, you know?
It seems to me that this is still a complex legacy of the fact that Orthodoxy was abolished for quite a long period and nothing else was given in return. And in the communist doctrine there is nothing about afterlife was not said. Therefore, it seems to me that it became triple scary.
Nyuta Federmesser:
You actually got my point. In general, I probably won’t say anything new and definitely won’t say anything of my own, because everything I think about this topic is what was invested in me by my wonderful, wonderful, loving mother Vera Vasilievna Millionshchikova, and, probably, I’m such a zombie speaker: I’m broadcasting her thoughts.
She always said that palliative care, hospice, death and dying are taboo topics for us because we all grew up in the Soviet Union. Because Soviet Union- this is victorious medicine, this is victorious everything: ballet, space. And no one died. Patients who were considered incurable were discharged home with a very flawed, modest formulation in the medical history: “Discharged to continue treatment at the place of residence.” And by the way, this is still written: “With improvement in condition”, “In stable condition” or “For symptomatic treatment" Doctors never had these conversations.
Nyuta FedermesserPhoto: Anna Gruzdeva
One of the very recent stories: a woman came to the hospice; it was written in her documents that she was being transferred to the hospice for diagnosis and prescribing successful treatment. This is exactly why he is being transferred to a hospice...
I understand how scary it must be to talk to doctors about this. But this is one of the few things with which I internally disagree with my mother: this is not only a relic of the Soviet era, it is simply our human peculiarity.
I recently came across a piece from Anna Karenina, written, in general, somewhat in pre-Soviet times. And this is not a relic of Soviet times (this fear), this is an absolute norm, because death separates us from our closest and most beloved people. None of us knows anything about her, and we can’t help but be afraid of her - she’s disgusting, humiliating, cruel.
When I read Anna Karenina for the first time, I didn’t remember this part at all. Now he has become absolutely amazing for me.
“Levin could not look calmly at his brother, he could not be natural and calm in his presence. When he entered the patient, his eyes and attention were unconsciously clouded, and he did not see or discern the details of his brother’s situation. He heard the terrible smell, saw the dirt, the disorder and the painful situation, and the groans, and felt that it could not be helped. It didn’t even occur to him to think about making out all the details of the patient’s condition, to think about how this body lay there, under the blanket, how, bending, these emaciated legs, rumps, back were laid out, and whether it was possible to lay them down somehow better them, to do at least something to make it at least not better, but less bad. A chill ran down his spine as he began to think about all these details. He was undoubtedly convinced that nothing could be done either to prolong life or to alleviate suffering. But the consciousness that he recognized any help as impossible felt sick and irritated him. And that’s why it was even harder for Levin.” I read it and thought that Tolstoy probably invented palliative care.
I have been working in a hospice for a little over twenty years, I have worked as an orderly, a nurse, a volunteer, in a hospital, in an outreach service, that is, I went to people’s homes. Several years ago, together with amazing person With Lida Moniava, we began to create the first hospice for children in Moscow. This is a very happy place, no matter how strange it may seem to you. Amazingly happy, full of life, filled with love, because people love each other very much before breaking up, more than when they know that they have a lot of time ahead of them.
Photo: Anna Gruzdeva
At the children's hospice, we decided to try to follow the example Western society, where for some reason - I don’t know why - they talk about these topics more simply. We decided to hold Memorial Days for parents. Once a year, in May, when it is still very fresh herbs and when it was impossible to think about anything other than life and awakening, we began to gather in various wonderful Moscow theater halls the parents of children who had left under the care of a children's hospice. And it so happened that I had the chance to be the host of these evenings... There were already four of them. The first one was an absolute failure. I was terribly afraid and made a lot of mistakes, and probably offended many parents. The second time was the most difficult, because I remembered the first failure and was simply afraid to speak. Approximately the same number of people who are sitting here in the hall today, 250-300 people, each of whom died a child. And you need to tell them something from the stage. And for some reason they all came. They all come year after year. For what? Why do they come to engage in this masochism? Among them are a wild number of people with small children and newborns. There are a lot of pregnant women among them. Among them there are a lot of mothers with sick children, who, having lost their own, began to take sick children into orphanages.
There is as much life in these people sitting in the hall on May days as in the May days outside the window. More than in those of us who have not gone through this difficult experience.
And then a formula came to my mind, an amazing formula that helps talk about it and helps... I won’t say “come to terms with it,” it seems to me that you can’t come to terms with it, but it helps to somehow prepare yourself for it. It is very important to prepare yourself for this. This formula is very simple: death is disgusting, it is true, but love never ceases. This is the apostle Paul: “Love never fails.” People leave, and our feelings often become much stronger and stronger after that and remain for years.
K.G.:
Alexander Nikolaevich, you met Victor Zorza, who first came to St. Petersburg. He didn’t go to Moscow, but to St. Petersburg. And there were you, Likhachev and Granin, if I’m not mistaken. And this was the late 1980s. What kind of hospice, what kind of charity could we be talking about then?.. But it was about supporting the sisters of mercy, if I’m not mistaken. What could we even talk about in a situation when the war in Afghanistan ended yesterday, and human life doesn't cost anything, but human death as if it doesn't exist? How did you hear it then, how did you formulate it? And why did the best people of St. Petersburg accept this idea then?
If I'm not mistaken, this was in 1989. Phone call. The man spoke with an accent. Victor Zorza remains in my memory as a person who understands the Russian language well and deeply.
He asked for a meeting, which surprised me very much. He came with a book that he gave me: “The Path to Death. Live to the end." This is about the death of his daughter, who lived twenty-five years in this world and died of cancer. And, as he said, when she was dying, she bequeathed to him and his wife that they spread these amazing hospitals, which were called “hospices” (and she was dying in London), as far as possible. I read this book in one night, and it was one of the hardest readings of my life. Then I came across different books different people who described this problem. And I must say that I always read this with great difficulty.
Audience of Open DialoguesPhoto: Anna Gruzdeva
I think he came to Russia because it was a time when people in Russia had a lot to do with our country. different countries peace. The best people believed in Russia, believed in Russians, believed in Russian community, into Russian humanitarianism... into some of our doomed humanitarianism. When I asked him if he knew where he had come, that he had come to the people who allowed Stalinism, to the people who bear responsibility and do not take responsibility for the colossal “massacre of the babies”... “Yes, yes, but still you are special,” to my surprise, he told me. The conversation was about trying to raise funds so that a hospital like the one described in this book could be opened. I told him: the country is so poor that you can’t just go with a hat, few people will give anything. I remember the conversation well, almost verbatim. But it makes sense to turn to the city authorities, who will help you solve this practically step by step. Intelligent people stood at the head of the city. In general, I had no role in the creation of the hospice. These are the great works of Gnezdilov (Gnezdilov Andrey Vladimirovich - psychiatrist, doctor medical sciences, Chairman of the Association of Oncopsychologists of Russia) and the doctors who began to create this, and those administrators-bureaucrats of Leningrad-Petersburg who had a conscience, and they concentrated some funds. It was created through their efforts.
When Zorza asked me what I could do, I said that I had long had the idea of making four or five films, each of which is nine to ten minutes long, to show people who have begun the process of parting with life.
Even then, doctors understood what time period a small person has and an adult person has. Where does the unconscious state begin, and until what hour is a person still conscious, feels, sees, and so on.
And I had an idea for hospices to create unique foyer-halls, which should open onto the open space, on the bay somewhere, and on the other side there is a huge screen. And when doctors realize that a person has five days left, he has five opportunities, medically prepared, to look at what they will show him. One of these films was supposed to be Rain in spring forest. The other film is a teenager's dream. And so on. Five films.
He liked the idea, but there was no way to implement it, because there were neither funds nor equipment. But some parts of this film were filmed. “A Baby’s Dream in the Forest Under the Snow” was the title of the episode: indeed, a baby is lying in a crib on the shore of a lake. The lake was almost completely frozen. Well, and so on, and so on. Such an evening mood. And part of this episode was later included in the film “Elegy from Russia.”
It also included an episode that our compatriots from Australia sent me: a son films the death of his father. I didn’t dare take the image, but the soundtrack is reproduced in full in the film, the way he, his mother and his mother’s sister sit next to the patient and how they comment on the man’s departure.
I don't know if I'm right that this would somehow help. Maybe I’m wrong, because all those deaths that later happened in my life happened later. It was a performance, and it was some kind of piercing feeling of despair and deepest sympathy. And powerlessness in the face of what is called this creepy word.
Alexander Sokurov and Nyuta FedermesserPhoto: Anna Gruzdeva
I know that then some problems began, and with great bitterness - and he told me about this - Zorza left Russia. He was offended, something happened, he was deceived, and he was forced to leave. Another five years passed from the opening of the hospice in St. Petersburg, and he himself died. I was only once in a hospice in Lakhta, and it made a crushing impression on me. I couldn’t even imagine myself in the place of those amazing doctors and nurses who spend there around the clock.
Are you scared?
A.S.:
I wasn't afraid. It wasn't scary at all. The people who work in hospices are our saints, they are our national treasure. I have never seen taller, better people than these people in my life. I saw different ones. I cannot imagine higher and better than these people. I don’t know what it is, what kind of parents they have, what’s in their souls, and how they themselves live everyday life, and how they manage to create at least some kind of happy existence of their own...
People who work in hospices are our saints, they are our national treasure
K.G.:
Do you want to see them? Half the room here is like that. Please raise your hands, all those who work in hospices in St. Petersburg and Moscow.
Alexander Nikolaevich, when you came, I told you: “I’m afraid of you, I don’t know how to talk to you about all this.” And now, when you talked about Zorza, I realized that I am not afraid of you, because we are connected by Zorza, whom I loved very much and who literally died in my arms. He died after heart surgery, his seventh. His last words were that I should take care of his wife and not give up the hospice business in Moscow. After St. Petersburg, he went to Moscow and began doing hospice work there. Why did he start with Peter? Because St. Petersburg was more liberal then, Sobchak was there. And in general, it seems to me that all the best, beautiful, liberal and wonderful things begin here, and Moscow then picks it up.
In Moscow, he managed to find my mother, and he has already bequeathed the development of hospices to her. In general, he was a very bright guy. In fact, it seems to me that he is a terrible manipulator. I now remember how he lured my mother into this kind of hospice drug addiction.
What do you mean when you say "manipulator"? Some kind of word...
He “recruited” both Gnezdilov and Millionshchikova and “recruited” many people in India, where he did hospices, as his daughter bequeathed to him. “Recruited” and “manipulated” this amazing belief that helping people at the end of life is possible and obligatory...
It seems to me very important that the people who became the engines of this boundless mercy are fantastic lovers of life, who are actually not used to denying themselves pleasures. Andrey Vladimirovich Gnezdilov - the brightest person. We know him very well. Yes, he is sick, yes, he is elderly. But to say that this is “an ascetic who devoted himself to helping the dying...” - never in life. A man who has been surrounded by women all his life, a man who has a lot of hobbies, who can and knows how to spend money with pleasure... if he has any.
Vera Vasilyevna Millionshchikova is a lover of swearing, drinking, singing ditties, and dressing up. She knew all the fashionable shops, all the best cafes and restaurants. Victor Zorza himself lived in a stunning mansion near London, his bedroom windows looked out onto a quiet garden where deer came to walk in the evening. Small snowdrops were blooming in his garden. He walked, looked at these snowdrops... Absorbed every moment...
And in general, the people who work in hospices are very ordinary, we are all very down to earth. We love to live very much.
So it's that simple?
Are you afraid of death?
It seems to me... Everyone chooses for themselves... “Everyone chooses for themselves a woman, a religion, a road, to serve the devil or a prophet” (First line of Yu. Levitansky’s poem).
I can't imagine myself anywhere else. Are we afraid of death? We are afraid. So what, you can’t be afraid? Is there anyone who isn't afraid? But it seems to me that in fact, you and I are all afraid not of death, but of dying. This is different. I am very sorry for the families whose death came suddenly. This is what you talked about at the very beginning - about murder. I suddenly realized that while working in a hospice, I had never thought about death like that. Never ever. We will finish talking, and I will reflect on what I heard from you at the beginning.
Hospice workers are lucky, it turns out, because we don’t see this sudden, acute grief.
“FIVE THINGS YOU NEED TO SAY TO A PERSON BEFORE DEATH - FORGIVE ME, I FORGIVE YOU, I LOVE YOU, I THANK YOU AND GOODBYE”
But the Russian proverb says: “If death, then instantaneous.” And many people dream about this.
This is a disaster because such a death leaves no way for loved ones to accept what is happening. It is a great blessing to have time before leaving. In order to simply learn how to at least speak flatteringly on this topic, we are bringing Lynn Halamish from Israel. Amazing lecturer, thanatologist. And she tells how to talk about death, first of all, with the patients themselves and with their families. After all, some people have been sick for years, others for decades. And people for decades, or years, or months entangle themselves in some incredible web of lies and lies for the sake of love and do not tell each other about what lies ahead, because they seem to be protecting each other.
But in fact, the time when you realize that your life is limited is an amazing time. I am a teacher by profession, I really like to simplify everything so that the children at their desks understand how it works. It works very simply. If you know that the day after tomorrow you have to take the train and go to St. Petersburg, you need to understand that before the train you need to pack your suitcase, leave lunch for your husband... If you know that you are going on vacation in August, then you have until August finish this and this.
Audience of Open DialoguesPhoto: Anna Gruzdeva
If you leave, you are on the verge of something, you finish school, college, get married, these are life blocks for which we all prepare ourselves. And the same life block “how will I die.” And no one says when, for how long, what needs to be done... This is a disaster, because this is the most valuable time, this is the time that you can live better if you know that you have two weeks, two months. You can put them in more love and caring for each other than in our entire lives.
I believe that we work in the most rewarding part of medicine: there are no patients and families who would be more grateful for help than ours. Although it seems to me that it is very rare to really help. But if one in a hundred patients with their family was able, with our support, to discuss everything, talk it through and get time to love, to forgive and say goodbye, this is very worth it. When Lynn arrives, she says, “There are only five things you need to say to a person before he dies. Even if you have two minutes to do it. And if you have two years, then you are lucky because you have more time. And these five things are: forgive me, I forgive you, I love you, I thank you and goodbye.”
Thank you for reading to the end!
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