theologians-from-russia

"In religion three things do not exist but these things preserve it: national language, national dress and national customs."

"Our heart distracts us when it inclines to the fulfillment of its own fallen desires, when it leaves the path of God's will."

"When you read the Gospels, do not seek enjoyment, do not search for exalted feelings, do not try to find brilliant thoughts. Seek instead to perfectly see holy Truth."

"Our helmsman, the mind, sometimes loses his way and takes our whole life along with him down the wrong path."

"The light of Christ's teaching is heavy and intolerable for the sons of the world. They run from it into their dark, soundless pits—into distraction, into various earthly pastimes, into carnal pleasures. There, in their moral darkness, they live their earthly life with no spiritual, eternal goals."

"It is harder to fool the conscience than the mind.The conscience is capable of fighting long and hard against the mind deluded by its love of sin."

"A desire fulfilled is a desire that will return with twice the demands."

"The spiritual harvest requires a heart that is harrowed by repentance, softened by compunction, and irrigated by tears."

"Being offended at the sins of others is a serious spiritual disease."

"Let us guard our senses, not allowing them to be the channel for sin to enter into the cell of the soul."

"The prince of this world tries to keep us in constant diversion, darkening us through the pleasures of the body!"

"Even in Eden, the mind tried to acquire knowledge without wisdom and attentiveness, and the knowledge proved to be lethal!"

"The world pushes us off course because it serves vanity and death and tries to force everyone else to serve its fallen masters, sometimes with kind words, sometimes with outright persecution.."

"Self-love is a twisted love for one's self. This love is insane and fallen. He who is full of self-love, passionate for fleeting pleasure, for sinful indulgence, is an enemy of himself. He is a self-murderer. Thinking to love himself and pamper himself, he ends up hating and destroying himself eternally."

"Indulging sinful and vain desires always leads to obsession with them, and after the obsession comes slavery, which is death to everything spiritual. Those who allowed themselves to follow their desires and carnal mind became obsessed with them, enslaved by them, forgot God and eternity, and waster their earthly lives pointlessly, dying an eternal death."

"Earthly wealth does not belong to us, as those who have never thought about this erroneously believe. Otherwise, it always and forever would remain in our possession. But it changes hands constantly, thereby proving that it is given only for us to watch over temporarily."

"Wealth belongs to God; man is only the temporary caretaker. A faithful caretaker will follow exactly the wishes of the one who has entrusted the wealth to him. And we, temporarily ruling over the wealth given to us, must rule over it according to the will of God. Let us not use it as a means of indulging our desires and passions, as a resource for eternal perdition. Let us use it for the good of mankind, which lives in need and suffering."

"Let us not foolishly waste our abilities of soul and body; let us not bring them as a sacrifice to the vain and fading world."

"Those who desire to learn attentiveness must reject all empty activity in their lives."

"All the saints assiduously avoided distraction. Constantly, or at the very least as often as possible, they concentrated their thoughts within themselves, paying attention to every movement of the mind and heart, directing these according to the commands of the Gospels."

"Despair is a mortal sin; it is the rejection of an active, living faith in Christ."

"The fall has become so assimilated to the essence of all mankind that rejection of the fall has become tantamount to rejection of our very life."

"Brothers! Let us study the all-powerful and life-giving commandments of our great God, Creator, and Redeemer. Let us learn them assiduously, by word and by life. They are read in the holy Gospels, but they are known only as much as they are done in actual fact."

"The Lord came to the earth to save sinners, and so he expects an inevitable admission of sinfulness from every person; judging one's neighbor is a rejection of this acknowledgement."

"The only mind that is healthy is the one that wholly and completely follows the teaching of Christ."

"Do not waste time trying to determine who is right and who is wrong, you or your neighbor. Instead, try to accuse yourself and preserve peace with your neighbor through your humility."

"The truth of the scribes and Pharisees contented itself with studying the letter of the Law of God without any corresponding study of the life according to the Law, so instead they led a life contrary to God's Law. As a result of their superficial knowledge, those who limit themselves to studying the letter of the Law fall into pride and conceit."

"The books of the Holy Fathers, according to the words of one of their number, are like a mirror—the soul who looks at them often and with attention will be able to see its deficiencies."

"As someone who is in one mind and heart with the Holy Fathers, you will be saved."

"Do you want to belong in heaven and to its society; do you want to be a sharer of its blessedness? From this moment, begin to spend your time with the saints. When you leave your mortal body, they will accept you as their own, as an acquaintance, as a friend."

"Conversation and acquaintance with a saint will impart sanctity."

"Try to integrate the Gospel into your mind and heart so that your mind will in a manner of speaking, swim in it, live in it. Then your every action will truly become evangelical."

"Consider how wise and careful you must be. Do not gamble with your eternal fate."

"Do not content yourself with unproductive reading of the Gospels; strive to fulfill its commandments, read it with deeds. This is the book of life, and one must read it with one's life."

"Do you want to learn to love God? Separate yourself from any word, deed, thought and feeling forbidden by the Gospels."

"If you think that you love God, but in your heart lives an unpleasant disposition toward even one person, you are grievously self-deluded."

"He who has felt spiritual love will only despise carnal love, seeing it for the unsightly parody of love that it is."

"Guard your conscience. Do not forget that you are the image and likeness of God, that you are obliged to present this image in purity and holiness to God himself.Woe to you if God will not recognize His image, will not find in it any similarity with Himself! He will utter the dreadful words: "I do not know you.""

"No sin is unforgivable except the sin that is not repented of."

"There are known instances when Blessed Staretz Silouan in prayer beheld something remote as though it were happening close by; when he saw into someone's future, or when profound secrets of the human soul were revealed to him. There are many people still alive who can bear witness to this in their own case but he himself never aspired to it and never accorded much significance to it. His soul was totally engulfed in compassion for the world. He concentrated himself utterly on prayer for the world, and in his spiritual life prized this love above all else."

"In my young days ... I had been attracted to the idea of pure creativity, taking the form of abstract art. ... I derived ideas for my abstract studies from life around me. I would look at a man, a house, a plant, at intricate machinery, extravagant shadowscapes on walls or ceilings, at quivering bonfire flames, and would compose them into abstract pictures, creating in my imagination visions that were not like actual reality. ... Fortunately I soon realised that it was not given to me, a human being, to create from 'nothing', in the way only God can create. I realised that everything that I created was conditioned by what was already in existence. I could not invent a new colour or line that had never existed anywhere before. An abstract picture is like a string of words, beautiful and sonorous in themselves, perhaps, but never expressing a complete thought ..."

"No one on this earth can avoid affliction; and although the afflictions which the Lord sends are not great men imagine them beyond their strength and are crushed by them. This is because they will not humble their souls and commit themselves to the will of God. But the Lord Himself guides with His grace those who are given over to God's will, and they bear all things with fortitude for the sake of God Whom they have so loved and with Whom they are glorified for ever. It is impossible to escape tribulation in this world but the man who is given over to the will of God bears tribulation easily, seeing it but putting his trust in the Lord, and so his tribulations pass."

"There are three things I cannot take in: nondogmatic faith, nonecclesiological Christianity and nonascetic Christianity. These three - the church, dogma, and asceticism - constitute one single life for me."

"If one rejects the Orthodox creed and the eastern ascetic experience of life in Christ, which has been acquired throughout the centuries, then Orthodox culture would be left with nothing but the Greek minor [key] and Russian tetraphony."

"Stand on the edge of the abyss and when you feel that it is beyond your strength, break off and have a cup of tea.""

"Most people neither hear nor understand God speaking in their hearts: they listen to the urging of passion, which inhabits the soul and with its clamour drowns the still small voice of God."

"The persecution of Blessed John Maximovitch the Wonderworker did not end with his death. It is true that some trouble-makers repented and publicly wept, kissing the coffin when everyone was parting with the Saint. But his enviers continued to resent him, as they do even up till today, when it is politically convenient to pronounce him a saint. After his death some leaders in his Synod, having seen that he had ended triumphantly, decided to put a stop to the publishing of his miracles and memoirs about him, in order to conceal their deeds against him."

"How difficult is to please you people. I celebrate too long and he too short!"

"Sanctity is not just a virtue. It is an attainment of such spiritual height, that the abundance of God’s grace which fills the saint overflows on all who associate with him. Great is the saint’s state of bliss in which they dwell contemplating the Glory of God. Being filled with love for God and man, they are responsive to man’s needs, interceding before God and helping those who turn to them."

"Many were aware that it was not necessary to ask Vladika to visit someone. The Lord Himself inspired him where and to whom to go."