And until I grow old and until I turn gray, do not leave me, O God.(Ps. 71:18). A little more, and I won’t have the same strength, my complexion will fade, my dexterity and dexterity will disappear. Like a fading spring, thoughts will fade away, memory will dry up, and what you read will be forgotten. The skills and abilities that were once so valued by employees will disappear. And taking away my last strength - the remnants vital energy, I will finally be given an allowance sufficient not for life but for survival. But even then, during retirement, You, God, do not leave me.
Old age, which we observe every day, is a insightful revelation about ourselves. This is a magic mirror that brought from the near future a true image of each of us. “Here, it’s you,” the mirror of life tells me. “Is it really me? - a bitter question arises in me. - So weak, hunched over, in an old-fashioned shabby suit, wandering somewhere, leaning on a stick - to a pharmacy or a store - to modestly take a place in line last place. How scary it is to admit this truth: I, no one needs here, am unable to support myself.” Yes, this is true, this is the path of our life. But if this is tomorrow’s me, and I see it today, then it means that helping the elderly should reign today.
"Fishing". Artist Leonid Baranov
Once upon a time, old people were taken to the forest, lowered into a snowy ravine on the bast, and left to their fate. This arbitrariness boomeranged back to those who committed it. Old age will punish anyone who once violated it.
Here we have an old Indian from Jack London’s story “The Law of Life.” He is too weak to follow the tribe to distant, more fertile places. His son is the leader of the tribe, but there is no place for the old man on the sledge. Therefore, he sits right in the snow in front of the fire with an armful of brushwood left for him. He remembers how he once left his father... This is inevitable, he believes. But deep down in his soul, he still wants his son to come back for him, so that his family, warm hands will sit him next to them and take him away. Alas, the old man's last visitors are hungry wolves.
Illustration for Leo Tolstoy’s fable “The Old Grandfather and Granddaughters”
Here is Leo Tolstoy’s well-known fable “The Old Grandfather and Granddaughters”. Grandfather is too old, his teeth have fallen out, food flows back out of his mouth, he dropped the cup and broke it... So they put him behind the stove, so as not to spoil the painting in the house, they gave him a wooden basin. And the simple-minded but quick-witted grandson is already making the same bowl out of wood for his parents. And wow, they were ashamed and returned the old man to a normal life in the family.
Do not despise man in his old age, for we too grow old.(Sir. 8:7) is a simple but obvious biblical truth. To prevent wolves from approaching you, you yourself must not act like a wolf towards the weak and infirm. To be treated with dignity tomorrow, treat others with dignity today.
Son! accept your father in his old age and do not grieve him in his life. Even if he has become impoverished in mind, have mercy and do not neglect him in the fullness of your strength, for mercy towards your father will not be forgotten; despite your sins, your prosperity will increase. On the day of your sorrow you will be remembered: like ice from warmth, your sins will be forgiven. He who deserts his father is the same as a blasphemer, and he who provokes his mother is cursed by the Lord.(Sir. 3: 12–16). Here are the biblical foundations for social assistance, protection of the elderly. Blessing from God comes only due to the fact that you support, and do not take away, give, and do not take away, work for others, and do not demand exhausting labor from them.
And yet we are afraid of old age. We avoid it, like a gloomy door leading into a dungeon, into a world of shadows and unknown ghosts. Is there any consolation with a small pension, after years spent working? Eat! Because there is a Comforter. I am the Lord your God; I hold you for right hand yours, I tell you: “don’t be afraid, I am helping you”(Isa. 41:13).
Old age is inscribed in God's Providence. This means that in her weaknesses and deprivations there is spiritual meaning
Old age is inscribed in God's Providence. Each age is given its own trials from God. And the age of the elderly is not without its test of strength. This means that there is some kind of spiritual meaning in all these weaknesses, external poverty and deprivation. If God allows trials, then we need to go through them.
A pension issued by the state was invented not so long ago. The first law on state responsibility for the elderly appeared in England in 1601. The law applied only to the weak and poor, because it was believed that if you can earn a living, then continue to work. Only in the 20th century did pensions become legal for everyone. Until this time, care lay entirely with the responsibility of loved ones, if the old man had any left. And if we look from our time deep into the centuries, we will see only labor, labor, labor, and more infirmities, and so on until the lost Paradise, when the sentence was pronounced: With sorrow you will eat from it (the earth) all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it will produce for you... by the sweat of your brow you will eat bread until you return to the ground from which you were taken, for dust you are and to dust you will return(Gen. 3:17–19). Do we know a time or country where things would have been different?
Abraham and Sarah
I open it Old Testament and I see that old age is first mentioned in relation to Abraham, and it is called good old age(see: Gen. 15: 15). Here before us is an almost hundred-year-old man, without a homeland and without offspring, without social guarantees, without insurance payments and pensions. He wandered from foreign land to foreign land, cultivated the land by the sweat of his brow, ran out of fear to Egypt, worried about the future and himself promised land did not receive it, being only a temporary alien on it.
And yet God called the limit of his life a good old age. Because good old age is where God is present, where there is a clear conscience and clean life. A good old age is where there is freedom of the soul and there is no excruciating pain, in the words of Pavel Korchagin, “for aimlessly lived years.” It was in old age that forefather Abraham found the amazing joy of direct communication with the Lord. And everything in his life seemed humanly impossible, unfeasible, but Abraham believed the Lord, and He counted it to him as righteousness(Gen. 15:6). Fear not, Abram; I am your shield; your reward is very great(Gen. 15: 1) - this is what the Lord says to everyone who believes that He is nearby, that He is our Shield and our Fence.
But here I open it New Testament, Holy Gospel, and with surprise I see and read the words of the Savior addressed to to the supreme apostle Peter: Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you girded yourself and went where you wanted; and when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and lead you where you do not want to go (John 21:18). Isn't this about us and our reforms?
Why, Lord, do You, having conquered death and corruption, so easily agree to the senile infirmity of Your disciples? Why have You allowed weakness and helplessness to rule over us? The days of our labors are extended, but we cannot find peace.
– Because old age reveals to us the whole truth of life to the end!
God has a special plan for our old age. This is the time when you stand alone in the face of eternity, in the face of God. This is the time when you are at the threshold and therefore everything unnecessary goes away. This is a time of many losses, but also many gains. Temptations and attractions, which actually did not give anything genuine to the soul, go away. In the midst of weakness comes insight.
How amazing it is that it was in old age that many found God, took spiritual life, prayer, repentance most seriously and, as a result, found true joy. I see the eyes of these people - there is more joy in them than in the eyes of the dissatisfied “Pepsi generation”. The wind of senseless haste has gone, and in the inner silence of old age, a person finally heard the call of faith - God's voice calling for the salvation of your soul.
Without experiencing the infirmities of old age, it is impossible to understand what a person is and for what he is called to live
Many fantasies and dreams lived in me during the rise of my youth. I am used to conquering every problem. Nothing remained unachieved that he himself set as the goal of life. The sudden onset of infirmities and illnesses instantly took away everything and opened my eyes to who I really am. Without tasting this weakness, it is impossible to understand what a person is and for what he is called to live.
To a young, immature heart, life seems like a vast field where you can endlessly pick flowers and enjoy their fragrance. Old man reaped thorns and thistles from this field, cultivated it “by the sweat of his brow” - old age leads to humility.
Youth and youth want to try everything at once - old age knows the value of things.
Youth lives in extremes; old age comes to moderation.
Youth is wasteful - old age is thrifty.
Youth is radical in its judgments, ready to cut from the shoulder - old age becomes more lenient, able to endure and forgive.
Even when an elderly person cries, his tears, like age itself, are golden. He cries for his children and grandchildren, for their sorrows, mistakes, and stumblings. And this means that the heart of an elderly person is alive. The dead don't cry for anyone. But for a heart to go from dead to alive, one must go through a life-long journey.
No, old age is not a dungeon, but a mountain top. And on the top of this mountain God will not leave you
No, old age is not a dungeon, but the top of a mountain that you climbed, albeit exhausted from the previous ascent, but you still reached, reached, reached. You walked to this peak without falling into a gorge or an abyss, because all your life you were led by the hand by the Invisible Patron. And at the top of the mountain He will not leave you.
In the lines of His Revelation we hear a quiet, like a wind fresh air, life-giving answer: And until your old age I will be the same, and until your gray hair I will bear you; I created and will carry, support and protect you(Isa. 46:4). In infancy my parents carried me in their arms; in old age you carry us in your arms, You Yourself, Lord.
All our lives we endure infirmities, but all our lives we find ourselves in someone’s reliable hands. In infancy - in the hands of parents, in school years– in the hands of teachers, in youth – in the hands of close friends or a professional team. In the hands of family, loved ones and loving ones. In the hands of doctors when you need treatment. IN difficult moments- in the hands of confessors. These hands prevent us from falling into the abyss of despair and emptiness. The hands of God are invisibly present behind them. And even if the state does not support you, God will send a person who will certainly support you.
So, you have reached the top of the mountain, and from this top you can see everything around far away, as someone who is at the foot or who is still desperately climbing up, loaded with a backpack of daily problems, cannot see. Old age gives you the opportunity to catch your breath, come to your senses and look around.
Old age has been called the golden age, and this age keeps its treasures within itself. Old age has its joys, its talents, just as the sunset has its unique beauty. Yes, it’s sunset, the sun is setting, but how pleasing it is to the eye. The golden age is pleasing, just like the gold of autumn. Autumn is, first of all, a bountiful harvest, the fruits of previous labors, without which the new generation will not survive.
I flip through the pages of my life and notice how much I miss my grandparents. And it seems like everything is there: parents, beloved wife and children. But what is missing are those who were with me in my childhood, who loved selflessly and invariably took the side of their grandson in every childhood problem. Who was not crushed by the boulders of momentary problems, but resolved each issue measuredly and sedately. There were no problems in being close to them, and the silence of their souls conveyed an inexplicable quality to my heart. peace of mind. They went through famine, war, repression, unheard of work on a collective farm, they lost everything in the early 1990s, but they never broke down. Because God did not abandon them, and with God no one will break.
Weary hands and kind eyes - this is the beauty of an elderly person. Life experience and wise advice- this is his treasure. Cosiness hearth and home with a crowd of nimble grandchildren - this is his happiness: You will see your sons' sons(Ps. 127:6). But if you are alone and no one is around to say: “ Good morning" or "How are you doing?"? If there is no one who will be your joy and nourishment in your old age(Ruth. 4:15)? Even then, your Heavenly Father is next to you, for whom you are always, at any age, a dear child.
We are fighting for social freedoms for centuries, but for some reason they are not there and these freedoms are not there. There is freedom of the heart, freedom of the soul. When the shackles of sin and the bonds of memories of an unrepentant past do not oppress you. When, instead of insults and disappointments, you still do your humble work.
What comforts you in old age? Oddly enough, this is work, activity, busyness
What comforts you in old age? Oddly enough, this is work, activity, busyness. While you are doing something, it is as if old age does not exist, it is unnoticeable. And as soon as you fold your hands and sit still, that’s it, old age will take over you. It will come as discontent and grumbling, as self-pity and reproaches of everyone around. Lack of action will be expressed in the activity of unnecessary thoughts, which in a monotonous buzzing swarm will occupy the space of the mind, begin to mercilessly sting the heart, and suck out the strength of the soul.
How my father surprises me. After retiring, he and his mother settled in the village, took up farming, feed the animals every day and cultivate the garden. Parents have no time for empty things. But if you are physically poor, thank God and do it mentally. Prayer is the highest activity of the soul, which is possible in any place and at any time, as long as the flame of faith does not go out in the heart. God settled my parents next to the temple - that’s where they found happiness!
We, the future old people, are apparently not used to enduring infirmities; we want to be looked after. And if you are sick, you want to play the role of the evangelical paralytic, whom four friends carried to Christ, and they prayed for him. But if God wants you to be not this paralytic, but one of his four friends, who strained themselves, carried the paralytic on the bed, climbed onto the roof and dismantled it, with difficulty lifted their unfortunate friend there, and then lowered him inside the house, falling with fervent prayer to the Savior? Through the faith of his friends, he received not only healing, but even forgiveness of sins, but the friends themselves, I wonder, received what? But will God forget the one who forgot about himself, but did not forget about his friend?
Warm care for loved ones - children, grandchildren, relatives - provides comfort in old age. Here's how the philosopher Plato said about it: by trying for the happiness of others, we find our own happiness.
If we focus on ourselves, we will be overwhelmed by resentment. And everything around will seem wrong: the asphalt is laid out wrong, transport moves wrong, water flows from the tap wrong, especially the neighbors and all the people around live wrong, and the government is the culprit of all. Dissatisfaction deprives the soul of happiness.
When you have good feelings for at least someone, and above all for your grandchildren, then this goodness is already inside you, it will warm your soul. Thus, the aged forefather Jacob, called Israel for the contemplation of God given to him, especially loved young son Joseph. Israel loved Joseph more than all his sons, because he was the son of his old age, and they made him a coat of many colors.(Gen. 37:3). For the younger one, the old man makes clothes himself, and does not wait for someone else to do it, much less demand something for himself. And in this he is happy. Elderly people even now knit mittens and woolen socks for little children, they are ready to lose themselves in caring for the kids - and the infirmities of old age disappear.
Life of a thousand rubles or what condemnation leads to
Priest Valery Dukhanin
AND life is full incredible stories, which cannot be found even in fictional works. Vitaly, an oncologist, told me this.
Once a woman with a newly diagnosed terrible diagnosis- a brain tumor. The woman came to Vitaly with her disappointing photo. The picture, indeed, presented a terrible picture: the entire brain was covered with a tumor, but this did not fit in with the general condition of the cheerful patient. Vitaly realized that something was wrong here and decided to take a second photo.
It turned out that there was no tumor. Apparently, in medical center or the clinic where the patient was admitted from, there was some kind of equipment failure. The woman was incredibly happy and hurried to her room to pack her things. That’s where the temptation happened: it seemed to her that her money was missing. The fact is that she used a thousand-ruble bill as a bookmark in the book. This expensive bookmark was no longer there. The woman succumbed to temptation: she called the doctors and caused a scandal. Vitaly also came to the noise. The patient, having forgotten about unexpected joy with a failed diagnosis, she became more and more indignant, blaming the staff and doctors for everything.
Vitaly noticed that the woman’s face was turning red: apparently her blood pressure was rising. He decided to go get some medicine in order to somehow help her, calm her down, and relieve the emotional intensity. Unfortunately, he didn’t have time: the patient had an attack and they couldn’t pump her out. It seems incredible, but the woman died. A little later, the cleaning lady found a thousand-ruble bill under the bed, which, as it turned out, fell out of the book and thus caused the sudden death of the patient. This is how you judge your neighbors, vain accusation they turned into an irreparable tragedy.
Not all of us see the disastrous consequences of condemnation, but these consequences undoubtedly exist. Condemnation is a disease of our time, it is something we live with all the time. We look at everything through judgmental glasses, we speak judgmentally, we think condemning others. Often condemnation is the only topic of communication. Two people meet only to judge the third. The most common topics of everyday conversations are to mince words about someone’s life, laugh at other people’s mistakes, complain about their superiors, etc. AND appearance another person, and his gaze, and his tone - everything is subject to the categorical judgment of our thought.
Condemnation is a certain indicator, a sign of what is happening inside you. Condemnation is born from dissatisfaction and ends in indignation. By judging others, we outrage ourselves and deprive our own soul of peace. If you look inside the soul of the condemner, you can see how dissatisfied thoughts are swarming, disturbing, and itching there. They are like boils on the body, the touch of which causes pain. Therefore, everything is wrong for such a person everywhere: in the family, at work, in the state. He is looking for someone to complain to, whine to, and at the same time say all sorts of nasty things to.
Condemnation and gossip are like the tedious hum of flies that swarm over a stinking pit and buzz about something monotonous. Judgmental and like a fly. He always flies with his thoughts over something nasty, bad, unclean - other people's mistakes and mistakes, and he always itches and buzzes that everything is bad, that everything is wrong.
To judge means to see only the dark around you. But our eyes are created by God to react to light, and our soul is created to see light, but we ourselves set the eye of our soul to darkness. Ultimately, talking about the dark means being dark yourself. Therefore, people who are mired in condemnation tend to be sad and gloomy.
A conversation with someone who is accustomed to condemning is tiring, it sucks the strength out of the interlocutor, carries him along with him into discontent and endless gossip, and leaves behind some kind of dregs. It is like mud rising from the bottom of a lake. Therefore, it can rightly be said of every condemner that he muddies the waters. After communicating with him, only dark feelings remain inside.
Condemnation comes entirely from rebellion. Rebels always strive for revolution, to overthrow those in power, so that they themselves can come to power and judge those who came before. The rebels' judgment is merciless. And one who has fallen under the passion of condemnation is a rebel. He overthrows everyone and everything in his soul, and in everyone he will find evidence for his verdict.
The initial thing here is the pain of the soul, and condemnation of others is only a way of expressing it. In this sense, it is impossible to please the condemner, and he himself becomes like evil dog who barks and lunges at everyone he meets. This is how the soul, subject to the passion of condemnation, is torn, it barks and rushes at everyone, no matter who he is, ready to tear and bite.
In the Orthodox ascetic tradition there is the concept of smart doing, when all inner world, the whole soul of a person is directed towards Christ, the mind cuts off evil thoughts and cultivates good ones, the heart gives birth to warm feelings, the will is directed towards good. Condemnation, in a sense, is also an act, only not smart, but crazy. The entire inner world, the entire soul of such a person is looking for something to grab onto in order to condemn the person, to express dissatisfaction and indignation.
Condemnation produces within the condemner an imbalance of all his mental strength. He loses integrity because he internally throws himself first at one, then at the other, relying on his crooked, deceitful thoughts. After condemnation there is no peace or purity inside. There is a complete confusion of gloomy thoughts and feelings. In this sense, condemnation is a mental illness.
The condemner often believes that he is just stating facts, that he is not afraid to talk about injustices, about what really exists. But the condemner does not notice that he is often specifically looking for something to convict and accuse another of. He is like a man who carries home various rubbish and rubbish, fills his home with it and sits in this rubbish. So the soul of the condemner is likened to a place for collecting all kinds of garbage.
In fact, condemnation is born not from the observation of injustices as such, but, we repeat, from the rebellion of our own thoughts, the riot of internal feelings that rush from side to side, ready to attack anyone, just to find a reason for this.
If a person does not overcome rebellion within himself, then he will condemn the people closest to him: parents, husband or wife, children, he will complain and be indignant. The life of such a person is a complete disaster. After all, he himself sees only troubles all around and is annoyed.
What to do? How to overcome condemnation within yourself?
Essentially speaking, a person will never be freed from the passion of condemnation until he tastes humility. In this sense, each of us has our own measure of condemnation of our neighbors to the extent of the pride of each of us. After all, condemnation means that you have placed yourself above others and consider yourself capable of assessing their lives and actions, rendering a verdict, just as a judge pronounces a sentence on a defendant or a doctor diagnoses a patient.
A soul that has acquired humility is freed from condemnation. Humility brings peace into the soul, rebellion goes away, and a person stops judging, nothing itches him inside, he does not stop looking at other people’s shortcomings.
One woman, Natalya, told. She has severe pain in the back, so that she cannot withstand the entire service in the temple. Once Natalya came to a service and tried to sit on a bench. But another woman did not allow her: she first pushed her aside, and then specially put her bag in that place so that no one would sit down. Realizing that she would no longer be able to sit down, Natalya stepped aside and began to pray from her heart for this woman. She was so humbled and completely immersed in prayer that there was no anger or indignation lurking inside her. Unexpectedly for her, after sincere prayer for her offender, Natalya’s back stopped hurting. So the Lord gave her consolation because she humbly faced rudeness, and after that, instead of condemning her, she prayed from her heart for that woman. She didn't even ask for herself, didn't expect any relief from the pain. But the Lord consoled her. And every time, instead of condemning us, we sincerely pray for other people, the Lord will give everyone some kind of gracious consolation.
Prayer for another person is already an act of goodness, a desire for salvation for one’s neighbor. Prayer is the opposite of the stigma of condemnation, just as warmth is opposite to cold, light to darkness, love to hatred.
When we love someone, we see qualities in them that others don't see. The lover is not prevented from enjoying the meeting with his beloved by any of his imperfections; in fact, he does not notice this, it is as if there are no imperfections. On the contrary, with antipathy towards another person, everything about him becomes an irritating imperfection - his tone, his gaze, and his manner of behavior. His very presence is already unbearable, already a subject for condemnation.
Love and humility do not come immediately. What to do exactly now?
An angry dog bites when unleashed. Therefore, first you need to put her on a chain, let her bark from there. Anyone who wants to overcome condemnation in himself must, first of all, curb his tongue, not let it off the leash, forbid himself to speak as soon as condemnation creeps up his throat. Even if you mentally still judge, but first, at least be silent.
You can even try this exercise. For a week, don't say anything bad about anyone. Just as an experiment. From Sunday to Sunday, from confession to confession, do not utter a single bad word to your neighbor. If you say something about someone, then only good things. This is how work on yourself will begin.
Sometimes we think that we are not judging, but are just talking about the actions of another person. How is one different from the other?
Reasoning turns into condemnation according to the simple principle mentioned: when we start saying bad things about people. Let this bad seem to correspond to them, but by pronouncing the dark, we put a stigma on them. Let's try to say good, bright, kind things, then there will definitely be no condemnation.
Believe me, if we stop saying bad things about people, then nothing will collapse, neither law and order, nor pedagogy, nor intra-family relationships will collapse. On the contrary, there will be more purity and light. Let the picture of life seem incomplete. But it is better for it to be incomplete due to the displacement of darkness, rather than due to the constant expulsion of light.
But correcting your word is not enough; it is important to correct your thought. What we see in a person depends on how we look. A bee will find a beautiful flower everywhere and sit on it to collect useful nectar, and a fly will find dirt everywhere and sit there to collect new microbes.
So you saw a drunk man and immediately thought: “Idle man, beggar!” And how does the light carry such a thing?!” But imagine that there was a time when the mother who gave birth to him looked at him with love, how she doted on him and hoped that his life would turn out happily. His drunkenness is a disease, he suffers from it, just as each of us suffers from our secret ailments of the soul. His soul is waiting for help, and even a simple prayer from the heart for him will benefit him.
TO St. Seraphim Vyritsky is somehow young married couple brought a large amount of money as a donation. Saint Seraphim did not accept them, but blessed them to give them to the first person he met on the way to the station. Imagine their surprise when the first person they met turned out to be a man staggering from intoxication. The young wife was confused: how can you give money to someone like that? But the husband made a decision: “We will act according to the priest’s words.” When they handed money to a drunken man, it turned out that by doing so they saved him from committing suicide. He worked in trade, and he had a shortage of exactly the amount that they gave him. Fearing prison, he fell into despair and thought about committing suicide. Unexpected alms saved his life. Thus, the saints saw through the misfortunes of people and saved them, but we are ready to condemn them in advance and thereby contribute to their destruction.
If we saw our own sins, would we look at the sins of another? When your tooth hurts, will you think about what someone else is hurting? And when we see our shortcomings, when our soul hurts about our own weaknesses, the sins of others become irrelevant. That is why the ancient patericon contains the famous words of St. Pimen the Great. Someone asked Abba Pimen how a person can achieve not to speak ill of his neighbor. The elder replied: “If a person, looking at himself, finds shortcomings in himself, then he sees perfections in his brother. And when he seems perfect to himself, then, comparing his brother with himself, he finds him thin.”
The Lord reduced all our salvation to a single phrase: Judge not, and ye shall not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; forgive and you will be forgiven(Luke 6:37). May God grant us all to be saved and not to be condemned.
It’s like in the funny old movie: “I slipped, fell, woke up - a cast.” Almost the same with me. It’s not clear where he “slipped” with this oncology, where he caught it. But after the operation I woke up. I woke up for sure - in intensive care.
With a tube in the trachea, to the beeping of some kind of device that was counting heartbeats. Then the beeping stopped, but the heart continued to beat. As one aptly put it close person who has undergone something similar: recovery from post-operative anesthesia is like a rehearsal for death. I have never experienced such torment in my entire life. The body did not obey, the muscles were seized by a spasm, similar to the agony of a dying person, it was bad inside, pain was felt in everything.
When I came to my senses, I first heard someone’s remark: “I saw him on Spas.” This phrase was said three times. Then I managed to turn my head a little, and I noticed a young black-haired nurse who was asking someone in surprise: “Pop? Pop? For some reason, no one answered her, and the tube in the trachea that provided artificial respiration did not allow me. Then the very kind, gray-haired face of the doctor-grandmother appeared close, she cupped my cheeks with her warm palms and said tenderly: “We’re coming to our senses, my dear, we’re coming to our senses.” Kindness and love shone from her eyes with pure light. This love inspired strength, warmed the soul, so that every word of this kind grandmother brought me to my senses. We always grab at least the small particles of kindness and love that we meet in life - without this we die.
Soon the tube was taken out, and the first sigh was like the sigh of a newborn baby who saw the white light - a sigh of life. It was then that the young black-haired nurse asked me a question. Somehow, childishly, she asked naively: “Please tell me, how did you come to God?”
Gathering my strength and feeling that I wouldn’t be able to say much, I uttered my first words after a small personal resurrection: “I came to God at the age of thirteen, when I received Baptism, and during this Sacrament I felt God’s presence, inside I was joyful, free, easy " The nurse was surprised and objected: “But it could just be the effect of endorphins.” And I gathered my last strength, which I put into a single phrase: “The soul is connected to the body, so endorphins should also appear.” That is, the joy of the soul that has found God is reflected on the whole person: heart, mind, will - and, of course, on the body with the manifestation of the corresponding hormones. The dialogue ended, everyone went about their business, and I remembered those teenage years that decisively influenced my entire life.
A simple Soviet atheist family. Dad, mom, sister and I are absolutely non-believers. Only in the village did my grandmother have icons hanging. We spent every summer with her - simple childhood happiness. In the evenings we walked along a rural road and came to an old abandoned temple. The rays of the setting sun gently fell on the old red bricks and reflected a gentle pink-purple hue. I remember this reflection of the evening sun on the temple for the rest of my life as a reflection of Paradise, as the warmth of Light that warms the soul.
The door to the temple opened with a creak. But for some reason, inside, even among the emptiness of the ruined shrine, the Mystery was so clearly felt. Just now you were in the ordinary, earthly world, but you went inside the temple, and everything was different - silent and mysterious, as if you were on the threshold of something indescribable.
Nobody talked about God to us children. Only once did we see my grandmother on her knees praying in front of the icons - this was when, during a thunderstorm, lightning almost killed her, passing into the ground some one and a half meters away.
By inscrutable fates, a priest appeared in the village from time to time - an incomprehensible and alarming creature, although we did not even see him. While staying at someone's home, he performed services for those who wished. My grandmother suggested that we be baptized. We refused.
How I remember my teenage atheism! Someone nearby said: “I believe in God, and you?” “No,” I answered boldly, “I don’t believe in God.” In such an answer I felt the strength and independence of my personality. I knew from experience: “There is no God,” because my personal experience, and indeed, did not reveal Him to me. I did not see him, did not hear him, did not contemplate him with either my intelligent or sensual eye. I did not see him either in the morning joy of the sky or in the evening silence of the setting sun. And can a blind man see? To see, you need to see. The nightingales did not sing to me about Him in the resurrected spring nature and the leaves of poplars and birches did not whisper with a quiet rustle. And can a deaf person hear? Only rare childhood feelings, the search for the endless joy of life and reflections of Paradise on the walls of a rural temple awakened in the soul some kind of call, an inexpressible thirst for the Ineffable.
A year after the Millennium of the Baptism of Rus', it was as if the genes of our ancestors awoke, as if our pious forefathers and foremothers who had passed this thousand years appeared, huddled together, and menacingly said: “We have been building Orthodoxy in Rus' for a thousand years, and you?”
We, the children, decided to go to church to be baptized ourselves. I, my Native sister, cousin and her husband stepped under the arches of the cathedral church with great interest. Why we went to be baptized, we ourselves did not know. Whether they saw this as a protective ritual, or they went for the sake of participating in a thousand-year-old tradition, I don’t remember. But definitely not because they believed. Thank God, no one asked us about our faith before Epiphany, and I think that now, in our days, they would definitely drive me away.
In the Gospel, the Lord told a short parable: Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which, having found, a man hid, and out of joy over it he goes and sells everything he has and buys that field.(Matthew 13:44). The peculiarity of this parable is that a man discovers a treasure hidden in a field suddenly and unexpectedly for himself, without preliminary grueling searches. He himself did not know that there was a treasure hidden in the field, but when he found it, he gave up everything he had for its sake. This parable is also about me.
It felt like someone took all the dirt out of you and infused heavenly light inside
Here we are standing in the baptismal room. A serious priest came, looked at those gathered with a stern look and began the ceremony. What were my feelings at that moment? I understood Church Slavonic words with difficulty, if not at all, and the priest pronounced them quite indistinctly. No one explained the symbols and rituals of Baptism to us; we kept pace with others, turning back and forth, renouncing, blowing, spitting, joining together, and for the first time applying the inept sign of the cross on ourselves. But despite all my rational failure to assimilate the rite of the Sacrament, for the first time in my life I experienced an amazing change of heart. How difficult it is to put into words! Without any internal adjustments or self-hypnosis, without even thinking about experiencing anything, the soul felt something completely new. Joy, lightness, purity, freedom shone inside, as if Someone had taken out all the dirt from inside you, thrown it out, and instead of it instilled heavenly light inside - the grace of the Holy Spirit. Well, God exists, how understandable and clear it is - so simply a new knowledge was revealed in the soul. The invisible and incomprehensible God suddenly immediately became as obvious as obvious to his baby. dear mother, as soon as the baby was born.
St. Augustine, in his Confessions, tells how his friend, who was unconscious due to illness, was baptized. When he came to his senses, he completely parted with his previous errors and spent his days until his death in sincere fidelity to Christ. This only means that God's grace sometimes, by some Providence of God, it acts on us even without the participation of our mind.
It's like a clear revelation to the heart. So it was possible to experience that God really exists and that He is very close to the soul, as if you were visiting Heaven. It is impossible to confuse this with anything. It is like a penetrating light that has declared you, the light of love. And you feel that God accepts you with warmth and love into His arms. After this, you yourself understand that in order to get closer to Him - and this is where all your joy and happiness lies - you need to go to church, overcome your weaknesses and ignorance, delve into the prayers, traditions and rituals of the Church, and completely transform your life.
That whole day was permeated for me with some kind of light and some kind of indescribable joy. I was drawn to the temple, and I really felt that the Lord was amazingly close, He was nearby. Now in the morning dawn, and in the singing of the nightingale, and in the breath of the fresh wind, and in the lush foliage of poplars and birches - the presence of the Creator, Loving and Caring God was revealed in everything. How good it is to be enlightened!
Contact with God is transformative: joy follows a change in the soul
The light is clear summer sun you cannot confuse it with the timid flicker of a lantern, a living soul with the coldness of a robot, love with prudence. Likewise, the presence of God cannot be confused with any earthly joy.
No, a meeting with God cannot be confused with the action of endorphins themselves. You may feel joyful from a delicious drink, from pleasant communication with a loved one, from success and achievements. All these joys come and go, with a surge of hormones they will turn your head and disappear like foam on the seashore. Meeting with the Lord fills the soul with the depth of all-encompassing warmth and joy, purity and freedom, love for everyone you see, and purity of thoughts and feelings.
Contact with God not only delights, but transforms.
Joy follows a change in the soul that has come into contact with the grace of God.
May God grant everyone this joy and this happiness!
Many hastened to condemn Bishop Demetrius, trying to convict him of supporting ritual belief. However, if we listen to the words of the bishop, we will notice that Bishop Demetrius does not actually extol ritual belief as such. He says that simple people never lived by intellectualism. For them, theology has always been living faith in God, expressed in a variety of rituals. And indeed it is.
What is the use of requiring working people to study theological treatises every day if, firstly, they understand little of it, and secondly, this will not at all endear them to God. Orthodox theology is still not intellectualism, but a life of the heart with God, an expression of faith outwardly, not only in good deeds, but also in rituals, customs and traditions.
I remember that back in ancient times the Alexandrian theological school proposed dividing all Christians into two categories. One category is simple believers who are not capable of high theological knowledge. For them, it was considered sufficient to profess the faith without unnecessary theology, to adhere to the Creed in simplicity, to fulfill the commandments of God and not to try to penetrate into the allegorical meaning of the Holy Scriptures. Another category is those who are capable of high speculation, contemplation in Holy Scripture allegorical meanings, to sublime reasoning about God.
By the way, ascetic fathers such as Rev. John The Climacus and Saint Gregory the Theologian strictly warned: it is dangerous for someone who is not purged of passions to touch theology. That is why heresies often arose from attempts to theologize when a person did not overcome pride and other passions. On the contrary, the prayer of the simplest people, not experienced in theology, found a response from God.
The Monk Paisius the Svyatogorets told how on Mount Athos in the monastery of Esphigmen lived such a simple old man that he even considered the Feast of the Ascension one of the saints. The fact is that in Greek the word for “ascension” - “analipsia” - is feminine. The elder prayed the rosary and said: “Holy saint of God Analipsia, pray to God for us!” One day one of the monks in the monastery almshouse fell ill, the elder had nothing to feed him, then he went down to the lower floor, opened the window facing the sea, stuck out his hands and asked: “My holy Analipsia, give me a fish for my brother!” And a miracle happened - a huge fish jumped out of the sea straight into his hands. When the Monk Paisius told this, he added that we know what the Ascension really means, but we cannot beg even a tiny fish.
If you take away Easter cakes and Easter from ordinary people, religious processions and pilgrimages to shrines, immersion in holy springs and many other customs and rituals, and in exchange for giving books on theology, we will dry up the inner world of ordinary people, deprive their faith of vitality and turn it into perverse fantasies about texts they do not understand.
People, in principle, cannot live without traditions, customs, and rituals. If this need of ordinary people is not churched, it will be expressed in the most terrible superstitious ideas. Therefore, let everyone go to God in their own way: an intellectual - through mental exertion and comprehension of the mysteries of theology, ordinary people - through rituals and simple heartfelt prayers.
Recorded by Oksana Golovko
//Dear brothers and sisters!
Thank you all for your sincere support and prayerful help!
Unfortunately, on further treatment new means were needed.
Fundraising is carried out by the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra. I'm attaching the link.
May the Lord protect everyone and help everyone with His ineffable grace!
//
Social service of the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra
Let's help Father Valery Dukhanin!
Dear brothers and sisters!
Urgently need help for treatment! Famous Orthodox spiritual writer - Priest Valery Dukhanin,
candidate of theology, vice-rector and teacher of Nikolo-Ugreshskaya
theological seminary, and just
good man with great and with a loving heart, is currently undergoing comprehensive treatment abroad.
Father Valery is the author of many books and articles devoted to the meaning and significance of the Orthodox faith.
Some of them, such as “The Hidden World of Orthodoxy: modern man on the path to God"
“New Miracles of St. Sergius” has already gone through several editions.
When the priest was sent for treatment, well-wishers collected the expected amount.
But, unfortunately, these funds are not enough, and we ask everyone who cares to help
contribution to this good cause.
In order to purchase
necessary for Father Valery medicines and continue
chemotherapy in Russia, you need to raise 400,000 rubles
Dear brothers and sisters!
When making a donation, do not forget to include your names,
they will be submitted tosorokoust in Lavra
P.S. Read the latest essay by Father Valery
"Resuscitation and Angels, or Walking on the Edge of the Abyss"
"Resuscitation and Angels, or Walking on the Edge of the Abyss"
Priest Valery Dukhanin
In life we are given harsh lessons. But after these lessons, life becomes different. It is impossible to be the same person you were when, even for a moment, you went beyond the boundaries of the usual, found yourself on the threshold of a different existence. The value of life itself is learned on the verge of death, the value of light - after the darkness of the night, the value of any God's gift - after its deprivation.
The first chemotherapy turned out to be a serious poisoning for me. Toxication has reached the nerve pathways. Speech was cut off, swallowing movements were paralyzed, and breathing became difficult.
The wife tried to call an ambulance - all the cars were on the move. I managed to show in my phone the number of the paramedics I knew who worked in the ambulance. Thanks to them, the car arrived much faster, while I was trying to swallow air from the open window on all fours.
A friend later asked me if it was possible to pray in such a state. With your speech turned off and your tongue muscles blocked, you still try to pray mentally. Trying with all your heart to address the familiar in short words: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner! Holy Lady my Mother of God, save me, a sinner! Holy Angel of God, my Guardian, help me.” And further short prayers St. Sergius Radonezh, blessed Matrona of Moscow, heavenly patron of the martyr Valery Melitinsky...
But there comes a moment when you don’t have enough oxygen, you can’t breathe through your mouth, and then a malfunction occurs inside, and in a sense, panic sets in. Thoughts lose focus, convulsions pass through the body, the only desire is to simply breathe normally. At such moments, prayer evaporates like moisture on hot sand. You simply begin to fight for life, look for how best to take a breath, stupidly and helplessly losing prayer - this main, healing source of our life.
At some point it flashed: if I’m already dying, then let it happen quickly, so that my loved ones don’t see all the torment and so that I can simply step over the threshold that separates the temporary from the eternal, the corruptible from the imperishable. This is how we ask at every litany for “the Christian death of our belly, painless, shameless, peaceful...” But somehow this request was not fulfilled, leaving me on the edge of the abyss, on the verge of the unknown.
It was clearly revealed to me what happens when the prayers of loved ones make up for your helplessness. Then the wife asked the frightened children to pray. Kneeling down in front of the icons, they poured out their heartfelt request with tears and in simple childish words. At that moment it was clearly revealed to me what happens in life when you don’t live by your prayers at all. When the prayers of those who love you, for whom you still matter, make up for all your helplessness and weakness. Through the prayers of our neighbors, we get rid of troubles, gain salvation from God, are healed and resurrected. These prayers become wings that lift your wounded soul and prevent it from falling down.
I will also say that on the verge of transition you feel how much that seemed important to you suddenly reveals its emptiness. In your very heart you see how in vain you were always rushing somewhere, trying to earn something, seemingly to support your family, but in this race the life of your family, your children passed you by, the joy of communicating with those closest to you disappeared. Happiness is always near us, but we ourselves run past it. To stop and break out vicious circle, we are given harsh life lessons from God.
But finally the ambulance arrives. I see the doctor’s confused face, confusion in his actions. He measures my blood pressure and pulse, and then measures something else with some device and says in surprise: “Strange... Why is there less oxygen in the blood than normal?” For some reason he puts a catheter in my arm... and only just before we go out to the car he gives an injection, after which the cramp in my body disappears.
At the hospital they put me on a drip. But the next evening the attack repeated. I was sent to intensive care. Since that evening I was speechless, I could not utter a single word. I remained only a silent contemplator of what was happening and watched how God, through people, saved the lives of the same people and restored their health.
Having never encountered this before, I was amazed at my perception. Previously, I thought that this was a place of some kind of inconsolable grief, a desperate struggle for life, a final farewell. It turned out that the day spent in intensive care was one of the most happy days in my life. It is like birth into the world, resurrection, after which the joy of the day and the light of the sun, the happiness of communicating with loved ones and the precious opportunity to serve God are experienced most vividly.
There was no grumbling, no swearing, no complaints or threats. Whatever the patient, doctors and nurses represented an example of exceptional sacrifice. Each one carefully, peacefully, calmly carried out his work, as if they were not people, but angels appointed by God to do one single thing - to save people. Watching what was happening, I came to this amazing conclusion: the entire intensive care unit is filled with angels.
The meaning of spiritual insights is not necessarily that you see angels, but that you see something angelic in people, in those who surround you. If all around you dissatisfiedly see only sins, shortcomings, vices, then who are you in your own way? inner essence? Everyone notices what is natural to them. If in the people around you you see the good, the pure, the angelic, then it means that the Lord visited you and did not deprive you of His grace. However, at that moment I myself only saw my own weakness and the amazing kindness, caring, and cordiality of the intensive care staff.
One elderly doctor, coming up to me, said with complicity and compassion: “You pray to yourself. And when you can, pray out loud. Thank God, we have a lot of prayers. Prayer is often the best help." And I prayed. My heart became so peaceful and calm that I compared these sensations only to being in the altar at a service. Angels fill the altar of the temple, a guardian angel is next to each of us. But God's angels They are also present where lives are saved, where people, forgetting about themselves, only care about how to help those like me, helpless. Why don’t we notice this in our everyday life?
They have a gift from God to bring people back to life - and thereby participate in the sacrament of salvation
Let no one judge me, but at that moment the intensive care unit seemed to me like a sacred altar, and the actions of the intensive care personnel looked like the sacred rites of temple servants. They recreate life in a person, do the impossible by earthly standards, have a special gift from God to resurrect and return people to life, thereby participating in the sacrament of salvation of people created by God. Of course, all this does not apply to eternal salvation soul, found only in the temple, but to the temporary salvation of the body. But we save our souls before we part with our bodies, which means that this temporary salvation, the restoration of the health of the body, is also important for us.
And then everything ended very simply. They pumped me out, brought me back to life and calmly sent me home. They did not expect any gratitude, no appreciation, no money, although it is difficult to believe that the salaries of ordinary city doctors are high. Kindly and with a smile, they advised me not to come to them again. They themselves remained there, like doctors on the front line, selflessly saving the life of anyone mortally wounded.
It’s a pity that we often don’t notice how people are selflessly working next to us, performing holy service, saving the lives of people just like us. Just like the children praying for you, the intensive care doctors are like angels, heavenly guardians who protect and preserve our lives.
I remember only one more petition from the litany, which after resuscitation became the most important for me, above all earthly achievements and accomplishments: “We ask the Lord to end the rest of our life in peace and repentance.” If you die, it is better to die peacefully, but if you live, then only in repentance. And entrust yourself into the hands of God. This is the most important thing. God bless everyone!
Priest Valery Dukhanin
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