I studied at the Odessa Theological Seminary and there I read books voraciously. And then Vladyka blessed me to go to the Moscow Theological Academy. That's how I ended up in the Lavra.
Soon the question arose whether to become a monk or get married. I knew that the will of God is manifested through circumstances and through people, but in order for it to manifest itself, you need to ask: “Lord, Thy will be done,” - ask for this will to be revealed - and I asked.
First half of the first year at the Academy, I’m 25 years old. One day, the head of the course comes up to me and says: “Let’s go write a petition to the monastery.” I was taken aback: “What makes you think that I’m going to a monastery?” He replies: “I was passing by when you were standing with someone and saying that you need to go to the monastery.”
And I knew for sure that this was too serious, that this was not a joke, that I could not discuss this with anyone until I made a decision myself.
But then the thought immediately arose: “This is the will of God.” And I went and wrote a petition. I didn’t consult with my parents or anyone else; I told my mother only after he came to her.
So I became one of the brethren, then graduated from the Academy. I thought that life would pass like this, but the Lord determined to serve on Sakhalin... But before that I spent 17 years in the Lavra, 13 and a half of them as dean.
The most closed monastery
In the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, the brethren live hidden from the eyes of pilgrims. Almost any monastery is structured this way, but in the Lavra this division of territory is more obvious than anywhere else. The fence guarding the entrance to the fraternal unit...
I will tell you about an incident that well describes this side of Lavra life. When I was dean, a priest from the parish came to visit me (he and I studied together at the Odessa Seminary).
A real pop, all four components: voice, hair, ear, belly. Bearded, long-haired, he looks like a monk. I went into the store to get books, and he was waiting for me outside.
I go out, and he’s standing and talking to some woman. Then she thanks him, leaves, and he explains to me: “I’m standing, waiting for you, a woman comes up and says: “Father, can I ask?” and asks her question. I answered her as best I could.
She was delighted and suddenly said: “You are not from this monastery!” I ask how she knew, and she answers: “But those who live here don’t talk to us - they’re always in a hurry.”
She was right: when you leave the monastery entrance, it is always as if you find yourself behind the front line, where bullets are whistling. You have to get from point A to point B, but instead it immediately starts: “Can I ask you? Can I take a picture of you?".
We lived like in a nature reserve! I don’t know how it is now, but then even on the fences there were signs: “Trinity-Sergius Lavra, museum-reserve.” For the laity, we were like little animals that we wanted to touch. But you can’t touch the animals, otherwise they could be damaged.
When a monk walks through a monastery, he doesn’t walk to look around... Father Kirill (Pavlov) always asked us in confession: “Do you have sight?”
The brothers always go out with the intention of just getting to the temple, for example. And they are stopped: “Please tell me...”. You can't speak - you'll be late for service. On the one hand, for the brethren such conversations are an unaffordable luxury...
Remember Seraphim of Sarov: after communion he went to his room and didn’t talk to anyone, but one could say: “A man came to St. Seraphim from somewhere in the dark, his daughter is dying, and what is this? What kind of selfishness is this? Why did the priest leave and not say a word to anyone?”
But if he were distracted, he would lose the grace of God. After all, he began to accept people only in the last seven years of his life, when he became ready for this.
I am 54 years old, I have not yet reached Seraphim of Sarov, not only spiritually, but also “calendar-wise”. When I return after the Liturgy, as a rule, someone is already waiting for me here. All that remains is to reproach yourself: “Lord, forgive me, I cannot be with You, I must immerse myself in business.”
It happens that people can do something at the same time, talk, and even turn on the TV in the background. I can’t do this, my thoughts are scattered. Therefore, the brethren of the monastery, especially after the service and communion, try to walk in silence.
Bishop
By the decree of His Holiness the Patriarch and the Holy Synod of October 6, 2001, Daniil was determined to be the Bishop of Yuzhno-Sakhalin and Kuril. November 11, 2001 in the Cathedral Cathedral of Christ the Savior by Patriarch Alexy II, Metropolitans of Krutitsky and Kolomna Yuvenaly, Solnechnogorsk Sergiy, Volokolamsk and Yuryevsky Pitirim, Archbishops of Istra Arseny, Vienna and Budapest Paul, Bishops of Orekhovo-Zuevsky Alexy, Khabarovsk and Amursky Mark, D Mitrovsky Alexander Archimandrite Daniel was consecrated Bishop of Yuzhno-Sakhalin and Kuril.
This is how he assessed the situation in the diocese and the mood of the flock:
The environment is very corrupting. In the city of Shakhtersk, the chief of police came up to me: what is it, he says, in a week there are four suicides at school. Two were taken down, two hanged themselves. Girls are raped by choice. Just a nightmare. They collect for the common fund. Such hopelessness... And it is clear that not a single well-fed, well-groomed clergyman, even at gunpoint, will go to this Golgotha. We want to have Easter right away. But our spirit is now, unfortunately, extinguished. In many ways, these are the consequences of that seventy-year captivity, after which our Church is just beginning to come to its senses[2].
Arriving in the diocese, one of his first decrees abolished the fee for baptism and weddings, ordering that they be limited only to donations. On his initiative, the diocese did not increase prices for candles, despite inflation - all these measures are related to the poverty of the majority of parishioners. Under him, a temple was built on the island of Shikotan and a chapel in Tyatin on the island of Kunashir - territories claimed by Japan. They have become unique symbols of the Russian presence on these islands. In 2004, a branch of the Orthodox St. Tikhon's Humanitarian University was opened on Sakhalin. The University branch was closed.
A staunch supporter of intensifying the missionary activities of the Russian Orthodox Church in competition with Protestant preachers with significant financial resources. Thus, recalling his first visit to the diocese, he recalls:
When they took me to the cathedral, I said that it was not a cathedral, but a chapel with an altar - small, nondescript, gray. Later we drove along Pobeda Avenue and saw a new building, beautiful, large - a Catholic church. It was a challenge. A challenge not only to the Orthodox Church, but also to the Russian state.
On December 24, 2010 he was appointed to the Arkhangelsk Department[3]. By the decision of the Holy Synod of December 27, 2011, he was appointed head of the Arkhangelsk Metropolis[4], in connection with which on January 8, 2012, in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, Patriarch Kirill was elevated to the rank of metropolitan[5].
Father Micah
I was the dean of the Lavra for 13 years and three months. I am very grateful to God, because I saw what other monks do not see - the virtues of many, many, many of our fathers and brothers. Everyone has his own treasure, which the Lord gives him.
Father Mikhei, the Lavra bell ringer, now deceased, himself told me such a case. He was very short from birth. And when he was in school, they began to test some drug on him to cause growth.
He grew up, but serious hormonal disorders occurred: his beard did not grow, his voice was like that of a woman. And how many times was he mistaken for a woman! In 1987, a correspondent came to talk to Father Micah - and this monk was an amazing bell ringer, from God - and every other time he asked: “What did you say, mother?”
And then one day Father Micah told me: “I felt very sad that I had no talent. Moreover, I am in such a miserable state. And I began to cry and ask the Lord to help me, to give me something. And then at night I had a dream: we were all standing near St. Sergius, Father Kirill came up, and suddenly from somewhere he scooped something up with a bucket. I don’t see what it is, but I understand that it is the grace of God.
Father Kirill is carrying this bucket, and suddenly one drop spills out of it, shining like a pearl, and falls to the ground. Everyone rushed after her. And I grabbed her! I open my palm, and it shines so much that my eyes hurt, and I woke up with pain in my eyes. Soon after that I began to hear, as others cannot hear!”
How he began to hear! They said that once a large bell was made at the ZIL plant. They called Father Micah to listen to him. He came up, touched it lightly and said: “A quarter tone is missing.” They had already calculated it themselves, but he understood without any calculations. And he advised: “Remove the chamfer half a millimeter - it will sound clear.” They did just that at the factory and were shocked: they, with all their technical equipment, did not know what to do with this bell.
This is what Father Micah was like. When he told this, he always said: “Father Kirill was carrying a whole bucket, but I got one drop, and what did that drop do.”
Excerpt characterizing Daniil (Dorovskikh)
- ABOUT! Ooooh! - he sobbed like a woman. The doctor, standing in front of the wounded man, blocking his face, moved away. - My God! What is this? Why is he here? - Prince Andrei said to himself. In the unfortunate, sobbing, exhausted man, whose leg had just been taken away, he recognized Anatoly Kuragin. They held Anatole in their arms and offered him water in a glass, the edge of which he could not catch with his trembling, swollen lips. Anatole was sobbing heavily. “Yes, it’s him; “Yes, this man is somehow closely and deeply connected with me,” thought Prince Andrei, not yet clearly understanding what was in front of him. – What is this person’s connection with my childhood, with my life? - he asked himself, not finding an answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball in 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more vivid and stronger than ever, awoke in his soul. He now remembered the connection that existed between him and this man, who, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looked dully at him. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart. Prince Andrei could no longer hold on and began to cry tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over them and his delusions. “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Marya taught me and which I did not understand; That’s why I felt sorry for life, that’s what was still left for me if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!" The terrible sight of the battlefield, covered with corpses and wounded, combined with the heaviness of the head and with the news of the killed and wounded twenty familiar generals and with the awareness of the powerlessness of his previously strong hand, made an unexpected impression on Napoleon, who usually loved to look at the dead and wounded, thereby testing his mental strength (as he thought). On this day, the terrible sight of the battlefield defeated the spiritual strength in which he believed his merit and greatness. He hastily left the battlefield and returned to the Shevardinsky mound. Yellow, swollen, heavy, with dull eyes, a red nose and a hoarse voice, he sat on a folding chair, involuntarily listening to the sounds of gunfire and not raising his eyes. With painful melancholy he awaited the end of that matter, which he considered himself to be the cause of, but which he could not stop. Personal human feeling for a short moment took precedence over that artificial ghost of life that he had served for so long. He endured the suffering and death that he saw on the battlefield. The heaviness of his head and chest reminded him of the possibility of suffering and death for himself. At that moment he did not want Moscow, victory, or glory for himself. (What more glory did he need?) The only thing he wanted now was rest, peace and freedom. But when he was at Semenovskaya Heights, the chief of artillery suggested that he place several batteries at these heights in order to intensify the fire on the Russian troops crowded in front of Knyazkov. Napoleon agreed and ordered news to be brought to him about what effect these batteries would produce. The adjutant came to say that, by order of the emperor, two hundred guns were aimed at the Russians, but that the Russians were still standing there. “Our fire takes them out in rows, but they stand,” said the adjutant. “Ils en veulent encore!.. [They still want it!..],” Napoleon said in a hoarse voice. - Sire? [Sovereign?] - repeated the adjutant who did not listen. “Ils en veulent encore,” Napoleon croaked, frowning, in a hoarse voice, “donnez leur en.” [If you still want to, well, ask them.] And without his order, what he wanted was done, and he gave orders only because he thought that orders were expected from him. And he was again transported to his former artificial world of ghosts of some kind of greatness, and again (like that horse walking on a sloping drive wheel imagines that it is doing something for itself) he obediently began to perform that cruel, sad and difficult, inhuman the role that was intended for him. And it was not just for this hour and day that the mind and conscience of this man, who bore the brunt of what was happening more heavily than all the other participants in this matter, were darkened; but never, until the end of his life, could he understand either goodness, beauty, truth, or the meaning of his actions, which were too opposite to goodness and truth, too far from everything human for him to understand their meaning. He could not renounce his actions, praised by half the world, and therefore had to renounce truth and goodness and everything human. Not only on this day, driving around the battlefield, strewn with dead and mutilated people (as he thought, by his will), he, looking at these people, counted how many Russians there were for one Frenchman, and, deceiving himself, found reasons to rejoice that for every Frenchman there were five Russians. Not only on this day did he write in a letter to Paris that le champ de bataille a ete superbe [the battlefield was magnificent] because there were fifty thousand corpses on it; but also on the island of St. Helena, in the quiet of solitude, where he said that he intended to devote his leisure time to the exposition of the great things that he had done, he wrote: “La guerre de Russie eut du etre la plus populaire des temps modernes: c 'etait celle du bon sens et des vrais interets, celle du repos et de la securite de tous; elle etait purement pacifique et conservatrice. C'etait pour la grande cause, la fin des hasards elle commencement de la securite. Un nouvel horizon, de nouveaux travaux allaient se derouler, tout plein du bien etre et de la prosperite de tous. Le systeme europeen se trouvait fonde; il n'etait plus question que de l'organiser. Satisfait sur ces grands points et tranquille partout, j'aurais eu aussi mon congress et ma sainte alliance. Ce sont des idees qu'on m'a volees. Dans cette reunion de grands souverains, nous eussions traites de nos interets en famille et compte de clerc a maitre avec les peuples. L'Europe n'eut bientot fait de la sorte veritablement qu'un meme peuple, et chacun, en voyageant partout, se fut trouve toujours dans la patrie commune. Il eut demande toutes les rivieres navigables pour tous, la communaute des mers, et que les grandes armees permanentes fussent reduites desormais a la seule garde des souverains. De retour en France, au sein de la patrie, grande, forte, magnifique, tranquille, glorieuse, j'eusse proclame ses limites immuables; toute guerre future, purement defensive; tout agrandissement nouveau antinational. J'eusse associe mon fils a l'Empire; ma dictature eut fini, et son regne constitutionnel eut commence... Paris eut ete la capitale du monde, et les Francais l'envie des nations!.. Mes loisirs ensuite et mes vieux jours eussent ete consacres, en compagnie de l'imperatrice et durant l'apprentissage royal de mon fils, a visiter lentement et en vrai couple campagnard, avec nos propres chevaux, tous les recoins de l'Empire, recevant les plaintes, redressant les torts, semant de toutes parts et partout les monuments et les bienfaits. The Russian war should have been the most popular in modern times: it was a war of common sense and real benefits, a war of peace and security for everyone; she was purely peace-loving and conservative. It was for a great purpose, for the end of chance and the beginning of peace. A new horizon, new works would open, full of prosperity and well-being for all. The European system would have been founded, the only question would be its establishment. Satisfied in these great matters and everywhere calm, I too would have my congress and my sacred alliance. These are the thoughts that were stolen from me. In this meeting of great sovereigns, we would discuss our interests as a family and would take into account the peoples, like a scribe with an owner. Europe would indeed soon constitute one and the same people, and everyone, traveling anywhere, would always be in a common homeland. I would argue that all rivers should be navigable for everyone, that the sea should be common, that permanent, large armies should be reduced solely to the guards of sovereigns, etc. Returning to France, to my homeland, great, strong, magnificent, calm, glorious, I would proclaim its borders unchanged; any future defensive war; any new spread is anti-national; I would add my son to the government of the empire; my dictatorship would end and his constitutional rule would begin...
Hidden Gifts
Father Kirill (Pavlov) tried not to show his spiritual life even to us. I lived through a wall, you come to the priest in the morning, and he hides the fact that he prayed all night. Any virtue is deeply chaste.
When Archbishop Vasily (Krivoshein), who lived at the same time in the same monastery with the Monk Silouan on Mount Athos, was once asked to talk about the elder, he replied: “I can’t say anything, I didn’t see him then. He was not invested with some kind of rank, a confessor, for example, through which grace could be manifested. He was a simple monk and hid the grace of God.”
So is Father Kirill. I never asked him: “Father, pray, what should I do in such and such a situation?” I only said: “Father, think with me about how best I should act here,” because words about prayer would already be a reason for vanity.
When I came to the monastery only six months ago, entered the Academy and was a novice, one bishop called me to become a subdeacon. He says: “Come to my diocese, I will quickly ordain you, you will serve.” The Bishop was close to the then governor of the Lavra. But I felt that it was necessary to stay in the monastery: I am not yet a fledgling chick, where should I go?
He came to Father Kirill, whom he had known for only six months. I ask: “Father, what should I do? How can we find out the will of God? Father Kirill answers: “Choose where your heart leads. You can go, or you can stay here.” I say: “Father, I want to find out the will of God,” but I feel that he has closed himself.
But I got so fired up that I said: “If I wanted to go or not go of my own free will, then I would not come to you. I renounced my will and came to you to ask the will of God, but you don’t want to help me. If my soul perishes, the Lord will ask you.” Father Kirill hugged me, and my tears were already flowing, and said: “Calm down, don’t go anywhere.”
After that, my father and I had contact. And I answered that bishop: “I won’t go anywhere from the monastery, unless they kick me out.” But he did not refer to the priest.
Father Selafiel
When I lived in the Lavra, I asked about how it was there before me. After all, not everything is written down. For example, after the war, in the 1950s, non-believers were specially settled in the Lavra. Family people lived in the fraternal buildings, and nearby there were monks, how many there were then.
And one such family man, who did not believe in God, as I was told, loved to play songs on the harmonica. Like an Orthodox holiday, the demon kindles it, so he goes out into the yard and plays.
One day one of the brethren could not stand it and said to him: what are you doing, God can punish you. That same night the man died. It was a huge shake-up for everyone, although some said: “Well, sometimes I drank too much.” If a person does not want to believe, he will not believe.
Those fathers had much more obedience than in my time. I found the father of Schemamonk Selafiel, he was a front-line soldier and lived for 94 years. Silishchi was immeasurable; it was rare that any student could defeat him in arm wrestling. Having lost to old Father Selafiel, the students took up dumbbells and weights out of shame.
And in the elder’s cell there hung a portrait of Theodorushka, his wife, who died at the age of 60. She made him promise, dying, that he would not marry again and would go to a monastery. He gave his word and went to the monastery, also about 60 years old, although he looked 40.
Then he said: “I,” he says, “didn’t know how everything worked. They told me: you are now a novice. I understood this: since I am a novice, that means I obey everyone. One monk will say to me: bring it, I’ll bring it, another: take it away, I’ll take it away, a third: help me, I’ll help.” All this added up, he ran so much that one day he was walking somewhere and became exhausted - he fell.
The dean saw, found out what was the matter, why from early morning until late at night Father Selafiel was knocked off his feet, and laughed: “Remember, novice, you must obey me, the dean’s father. And the rest is not needed."
He was a very loving old man. When he got sick, people went to his cell for confession, although it is not customary for us for women to go into cells. And he received everyone and treated them to more.
At first Father Selafiel was strong, but in his old age he would sometimes sway and fall. They gave him a cell attendant. His cell attendant leads him through the entire Lavra to a prayer service with St. Sergius, and it was winter, there was snow outside, and it was slippery. The cell attendant Vasya slipped - and it was not the old man on the young man, but the young man hanging on the old man. And nothing! “Hold on, Vasya,” Father Selaphiel says and moves on.
Archimandrite Vitaly
Archimandrite Vitaly’s father was recently buried - he was an amazing person.
He went to a fraternal prayer service every day. Not everyone goes to it, and Father Vitaly, in addition, carried out economic obedience, was an assistant to the housekeeper, and then was in charge of the shop. He told the following story: “One day I had no strength left. You run through obediences, and in the evening there is a service, you still need to read all the rules in order to serve in the morning. I physically couldn’t do it anymore.”
He came to Father Kirill and began to complain: “Father, it’s so hard to go to brotherhood every day.” Father Kirill replies: “Father Vitaly, everything must be done within one’s strength. If you’re tired, don’t go, rest.”
Father Vitaly recalled: “When I heard this, I felt so good! The next morning I wake up, remember what I asked the priest - I can sleep a little more. As soon as I closed my eyes, I saw St. Sergius. St. Sergius says: “You are all lazy! Father Simon - that’s God’s servant.”
Then we had only Father Simon, an inspector at the Moscow Theological Seminary and Academy. Then he was Metropolitan of Ryazan, and now he has passed away.
Father Vitaly says: “I jumped up, got dressed, came running - I was in time!”
And then Father Simon had only one granny cleaning up. Father Vitaly comes up to her and asks: “Father Simon rarely goes to fraternal prayer services?” She replies: “Yes, he doesn’t always go to the brotherhood, but every morning he gets up and starts the day with a prayer service to St. Sergius.” Father Vitaly even began to cry, and then he went to the brotherhood every day.
Family and education
Born into a working-class family, his mother was a believer. Graduated from high school in Voronezh (1978). In 1978-1979 he worked as an assembler at the Scientific and Technical Institute of Semiconductor Engineering (NIIPM). From 1979 to 1981 he served in the Armed Forces. Later he recalled:
I ended up in the special forces. And I saw military life from the inside. I liked her very much - serious, decent. I even began to think about becoming a military man. But some kind of doubt still undermined me from within, something oppressed me. They unexpectedly gave me a vacation. I come home, enter the room where the ancient icons hung, and deeply, deeply inhale their smell. It seemed to pierce me. I rushed to the temple, confessed, took communion. This was my first conscious coming to church.
He graduated from the Odessa Theological Seminary (1984), the Moscow Theological Academy with a candidate of theology degree (1988).
Father Afanasy
Father Afanasy, the rector and caretaker of the Trinity Cathedral, was like a child. A man of amazing purity and jealousy. We sometimes joked about him like a monk. But to another joke, Father Afanasy sternly replies: “Don’t talk to me, I haven’t had time to finish reading the rule yet.”
Prayer rules are like gymnastics, an exercise for the soul; or how for an ordinary person to clean the apartment, wash the body. For example, we had Father Neil, who died in the schema. If he ever missed a rule, he always wrote it down, and when he went on vacation, he read all the rules several times - he made up for it.
Notes
- [calendar.rop.ru/10.html Orthodox calendar 2013]
- [pravoslavie.ru/press/5017.htm Bishop of Yuzhno-Sakhalin and Kuril Islands Daniil: It is no coincidence that we ended up on this island / Orthodoxy. Ru]
- [www.patriarchia.ru/db/text/1368474.html Bishop Daniil (Dorovskikh) was appointed to the Arkhangelsk See]
- [www.patriarchia.ru/db/text/1909396.html Journals of the meeting of the Holy Synod of December 27-28, 2011]
- [www.patriarchia.ru/db/text/1930828.html On the week after the Nativity of Christ, the Primate of the Russian Church celebrated the Divine Liturgy in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin]
Father Sophrony
Hierodeacon Sophrony was also a front-line soldier. He loved all the poor, the crippled and the sick. Everything he had, he gave away. In his cell there was a light bulb, there was a table and a chair, but there was nothing else. The icons are also paper. He always picked up food from lunch. I look: he takes the herring, wraps it in two napkins and puts it in his pocket. I feel sorry for his cassock.
I think: is he not getting enough to eat, or what? And he was acting like a fool. In fact, he gave everything he brought out to people. When he had nothing, he could come running to me.
He always knocked on the cell with his fist, and I knew that it was Father Sophrony. “Listen,” he says, “there’s a woman there, she’s in trouble, she needs help somehow, give me something!” I say: “I gave it to you yesterday,” - “It was another woman!” Give me something anyway!”
Then it turned out that he not only visited me, he also went to the treasurer, he visited everyone, took from everyone, gave everything away. You look, he talks to all the beggars, listens and listens, worries, tries to console and help.
Links
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Father Alexey
Father Alexey died young - he crashed in a car. He was tall, taller than me, such a handsome Russian, with shoe sizes 46 or 47. While still a student, he dug graves, buried homeless people or lonely grandmothers who had no one else to bury, and when he moved to the monastery, he was given the same obedience.
He made himself a shovel from a helicopter blade, a big one, and dug. And those grave diggers who worked there for money, knowing that he was burying the homeless, came and helped him for free.
In the early 90s, freezers in morgues sometimes did not work. Sometimes they will bring someone from nowhere, from someone unknown. The man is lying there - already black, there is a terrible stench. Father Alexei buried such people too. They bought him a Gazelle, and in this Gazelle he transported the dead from the morgue to the cemetery; there were several coffins there.
I remember how one young monk went to help him - Father Alexei asked. This young man later said: “I was tormented by prodigal warfare. We arrive at the cemetery, and I ask Father Alexey to open some coffin and look. This is how I explain: the war of prodigy has attacked.”
Father Alexey tells him: “Now, here they found a woman - she hanged herself in the forest.” He opens the coffin, and it’s summer, there’s a skull there, the skin has already peeled off, and a healthy fat cockroach runs out. The young monk said how the smell hit him, so he had the whole breakfast across his throat and stood up.
They buried her. He later said: “We’re going back in the Gazelle, my soul is peaceful. Guys and girls walk past in an embrace, but nothing touches me!” Mortal memory, as the fathers wrote, is very helpful in fighting passions.
Obediences
How does a church person differ from a non-church person? In addition to the mind, the ecclesiastical also lives in the heart. Just as a mother feels her child, so a spiritual father feels his children and prays for them.
As a dean, I had to assign obediences. Who would go to serve in parishes outside the walls of the monastery, who would serve in a convent for a month or two - we had 26 points outside the walls of the monastery. Who sings, who reads in the churches of the Lavra, who confesses at the early Liturgy, who confesses at the later Liturgy, who serves, and so on.
The “personnel” was on me, and it was very difficult, because where there are people, there are temptations. Someone will say “bless you” and go where they are appointed, and someone will begin to ooh and ahh that in a convent, for example, the abbess has a difficult character.
Many of the monks were very old, almost dying, and I assigned them a cell attendant who helped them. Cell attendants sometimes came and told very instructive things.
One monk looked after such an old man, and he was very stern (as Elder Joseph the Hesychast writes, the monastery needs both soft people, like cotton wool, and hard people, like iron - both are needed). This elder did not even want to accept the cell attendant.
A young monk came to him, and he said: “I don’t need anyone.” The old man already had lice, the young monk washed him and began to look after him. His two cell attendants changed: first one, then the other. One looked after a child like a mother, and the other simply asked: “What, father, do you need? Nothing? Then I went." The elder had already become so attached to the caring cell attendant that he asked the second one about him when he came.
When the elder died, his cell attendant came to me, said: “He has died,” and burst into tears. I hugged him and said: “You knew it was already coming?” He answered me like this: “Yes, I saw it, but God has no copies, He always has the original. I understand that such a person will never appear on earth again. I was so sorry to part with him.”
When you talk to elders, it strengthens your spirit, you understand what brotherhood and unity are. This is an experience that you cannot read in a book. What is in a book passes through the consciousness, but in life it passes through the heart. Many secular people were envious when they learned that if a monk fell ill, he would have two novices who would take him to church and look after him. “How great you are! You’ll be lying around with us, they’ll put you in a nursing home, but you won’t abandon your own!” I answered like this: “In our country, on the contrary, novices ask to look after some elder, realizing that this is a matter of love.”
There were clashes and disobedience. I remember once I wrote a monk for obedience, and he was annoyed with me, came and said: “No, I won’t go there.” And he himself is old enough to be my father. What to do? I approached Father Kirill and said, without naming names: “Father, what should I do? I asked the man to submit to obedience, but he refused. I don’t want to go to the father governor to complain, what do you advise me to do?” He says: “Let’s pray for him.”
A few minutes passed, and this monk comes to confession. Then I hear someone knocking on the cell. I open the door, he immediately kneels: “Forgive me, father, I have sinned.” I immediately bowed to him: “Forgive me, brother, I have sinned too!” From that time on, wherever you wrote him, he always went. This is Father Kirill and his prayers.
Father Kirill
One woman, already deceased, and in 1986 an old woman, was the spiritual daughter of Father Kirill. She told me: “I worked at a factory in Moscow, and came to confession in Odessa with Father Kuksha (Reverend Kuksha died in 1964, and she visited there just shortly before his death). During confession, the priest asks: “Where are you from?” - "From Moscow". - “Oh, there’s a Lavra behind your gardens, go there! You will find Father Kirill there, go to him for confession.” Father Kirill was still very young at that time, he was not 45 years old.
She recalled: “The name immediately flew out of my head. I came to the Lavra, I walk, I pray, I look. The priest is coming, my heart is relieved, I ask what this priest’s name is, and they answer me that it is Father Kirill. I came to him for confession. But I work at a factory, young, unmarried, the guys there joke, pester me, I have such thoughts that I’m ashamed to tell a monk about it. I didn’t say: I think next time. The next time I came - again I can’t say, I’m ashamed. I finished, the priest is silent, then he bends my head and says: “Why don’t you confess this sin? If you die, God forbid, where will your soul go?”
Father Kirill received the people, and I lived across a hardboard partition from him. I heard him reading his evening prayers: it was half past twelve or one in the morning, and at five he would be on his feet. I even tried to take care of him...
One day I went out quietly, I saw people in the corridor, Father Kirill was taking confessions, around midnight. I tell people: “Let’s go out quietly, Father needs to rest,” and I took them out. I go to Father Kirill, I say: “Father, you still need to rest, there are no people there anymore,” and he took me by the hand and said: “They left, but this is all in my heart, I won’t be able to sleep.” .
One monk (he is still alive, so I won’t name him) told me: “I ran to the temple, and the priest had already finished confession. I knock on the cell - he opens. Father, I want to confess! He smiles and says that if nothing happens before the morning, then after the brotherhood he will immediately confess. I left, but in my heart: “What is this! What a confessor! How come?!". There is more and more indignation. I remembered all the saints!
The next morning I get up, come to the brotherhood, and then we go to the blessing. I go up to the priest, and he says: “Forgive me for yesterday.” He was the first to ask me for forgiveness! I bowed and left. Then I came and said: “Father, forgive me, damned one!”
One of the current bishops said that in his youth he dropped out of a theological educational institution. Then he came to Father Kirill and said that his parents were against it and didn’t believe in God. The future ruler was very worried about this. Father consoled him like this: “Don’t worry, both of them - mom and dad - will come to God in due time.” And sure enough, his dad built a temple in the village shortly before his death.
Do not trust in princes, in the sons of men
We must remember that in the monastery there are sins, there are passions, because there are people. Every person has some kind of weakness. The Lord allows this so that we do not become proud. It’s scary when people paint a picture of someone’s righteousness, and then suddenly this picture collapses, and then all their faith collapses.
We also had temptations in the Lavra: one monk (he lived in the Lavra, but was not on staff) drank heavily, even from the tavern they once called: take him away, they say. But he also repented strongly: he made a thousand prostrations in the morning.
There was also such a temptation: a sick woman began to chase after one of the hieromonks. She even climbed through the monastery fence with superhuman dexterity. She screams that this is her husband, but in fact he doesn’t know where she came from, and he’s afraid to confess at the service because of her, because she might throw a hysteria during confession...
“I believe in God, and He lives in my soul, and not in the Church. Why go to church if God is with me?” In the modern world, such a belief has conquered the minds of many people. But aren't they mistaken? Metropolitan Daniel of Arkhangelsk and Kholmogory discusses this.
—What happens to a person when he receives Baptism? The Kingdom of God is invested in everyone, the entire Kingdom in a “compressed form” is invested in human nature, like a seed, and this seed needs to be grown. Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk makes a comparison with a spark, which a Christian must fan like fire in a furnace. For example, to inflate a samovar, it is taken outside into the wind. And a person enters the temple of God because the wind blows there, the wind of grace. Without a temple it is impossible to grow the seed of the Kingdom of God. What is our task? To bear fruit, and this is holiness. We are striving for this. In the church, when the Divine Liturgy is celebrated, before the Chalice with Communion is taken out, the exclamation is heard: “Holy to the saints.” That is, this shrine is given to those people who have purified themselves. Cleared of what? Of course, not from physical dirt, although from that too, because we come to church in clean clothes and shoes, but this is secondary. First of all, the shrine is given to those who have cleansed their hearts of sins.
Let's imagine that a person lives in a swampy place, surrounded by trees and bushes through which the sun does not break through. He cannot grow a garden in this place, but will plant it where there is direct access to the sun. This sunny place is the temple of God, where our flower begins to grow. If a person does not go to worship services, a state occurs, like inside an Egyptian pyramid. Archaeological scientists found wheat in these structures. Having lain there for several thousand years, it remained a grain that did not bear fruit. And when they took it out, put it in the ground, watered it, looked after it, this wheat sprouted.
When a person says: “God is in my soul,” the reasonable question is: “How did He get there? And does he always live there? For Christians, the Lord is a great guest. Before serving the Divine Liturgy, the clergyman reads the prayer “To the Heavenly King,” which all Christians know. There are wonderful words in it, we ask God: “Come and dwell in us” (that is, “dwell in us”). Why “dwell into us”? Further interpretation - “and cleanse us from all filth.” And when a person is cleansed of filth, then he will be saved - “and save our souls.” And the temple is a meeting place with God, where the grace of the Holy Spirit richly penetrates our hearts. Our task is to take it out of the temple, bring it to our homes and act in such a way that the Lord remains in the heart as long as possible. But sometimes we haven’t even reached the stop before we lose it—God has left. How does He leave us? The Holy Fathers say: just as bees fly away from smoke, so the Holy Spirit leaves the human heart, which becomes involved in sin.
When they say that God is in the heart - well, wonderful, this state of a person is called “holiness”. Finally we have found a holy man! Residents of the United States, Protestants, said this: every fifth person is a saint. Yes, that’s what they say to themselves: I’m a saint. They don't dig deep. If I don’t physically cheat on my wife, I don’t steal, I follow the laws of my country, I’m a good father of the family - that’s it, then I’m a saint. And we Christians understand that we are very far from holiness.
It is in the temple that we unite with God, and not only spiritually, but also physically, we unite with the Lord through the Communion of His Body and Blood. Christ himself says in the Gospel: “Truly, truly, I say to you: unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink His Blood , then you will not have Life in you” (John 6:53).
So what kind of God is there in the soul if there is no life? Living people are divided into two categories: those who are truly alive and those who are dead. The living fulfill the Law of God. It is not breathing or movement that makes a person alive. So what? Communion of the Mysteries of Christ and works of mercy, that is, life according to the Law of God. And without this, it only seems to a person that he is living, but in fact he exists. It is impossible to acquire the Holy Spirit without a temple, without divine services. The goal of human life is union with God, this is called the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, that is, His acquisition, unity with the Holy Spirit. This is also called salvation, deification, acquisition of the Kingdom of Heaven - different expressions, the essence of which is the same.
A person is a cell of the church organism, which in order to function must be saturated with blood, and each of us lives by this Blood when we partake of the Mysteries of Christ. We call each other brothers and sisters, because we are truly relatives, not only spiritual, but also physical: we have the same blood in our bodies, we are all connected. This means that we must feel each other, worry about each other when someone is feeling bad, and vice versa, learn to rejoice when it’s good. When we receive communion, we unite not only with each other, but also with the Mother of God, with the first man on earth Adam, with all the saints...
- But some people are confused by the question about Communion - how can you eat the Body and Blood of Christ? These perplexities were born two thousand years ago. Let us remember the words of the Lord from the Gospel: “I am the living Bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; And the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” People hearing this said, “What strange words! Who can listen to this? And from that time many of His disciples departed from Him and no longer walked with Him” (in chapter 6 of the Gospel of John).
- Everything is very simple. Why doesn't holy water spoil? Because after certain prayers Divine grace enters into it. Water isolated from its environment cannot remain fresh for long. The same is true in our case. The Lord knew that we cannot eat the human body and drink blood, so he did it differently. After the prayers that are read in the temple, the Divinity is united with bread and wine, just as in Christ the Divinity was united with human nature. We see with our eyes and taste bread and wine with our taste buds. Divine grace does not completely change nature, does not change the chemical composition. People bring water for consecration, but if it is rusty, then even after it is consecrated, it will not cease to be rusty, just as it had an iron taste, it will remain so. That's why I say: take the best water. We also take the best wine, the best wheat, and people receive communion under the guise of bread and wine of the Body and Blood of Christ.
- But why bread and wine?
“The Lord chose the simplest way.” What could be simpler than wine? In ancient times it was always in every home. This is not just a drink, but a medicine; people were treated with it. The Apostle Paul in his letter to Timothy writes that for the sake of his sick stomach he should drink wine mixed with water. This is a method of treatment. When people received wounds, they poured wine and oil on them. And bread is the main product, it is life, and “bread will strengthen a person’s heart,” wrote the psalmist David, writing prophetically about the Sacrament of Holy Communion. Here it “strengthens” in the spiritual sense.
The Lord took the simplest thing that every person has in everyday life. There is no need to bring baobab or some foreign fruit - flour and wine are available to everyone. During the Liturgy, after the invocation of the Holy Spirit, bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Christ. The great mercy of God: He unites with us, and not when He wants, but look what God has given - when we want. What kind of boss will say: “Come to me whenever you want,” or the king: “My palace is always open, come at any time,” this does not happen. And the Lord says: “At any moment.” He, the incomprehensible God, so humbles himself before man, and not only the entire earthly life of God is humility before people, no, the entire history of people’s lives is the humility of God before them. He humbles himself and enters into us, into this unclean dwelling. Someone cleaned everything out - it’s nice to come in, and another fussed with a rag, but the Lord comes even after that. It comes so that a person can live, because without God he cannot live, just like without oxygen.
Communion is the main Sacrament for which the temple is built. Not for the sake of Baptism, you can baptize anywhere, not for the sake of the Wedding, but for the sake of performing the Divine Liturgy. The Lord gives himself to man at any moment. If someone gets sick, can he say: the best professor in the country, come and treat me. And which professor will come running? And the Lord appears immediately.
The altar contains the Gifts - the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. A man is admitted to the hospital, he feels bad, he wants to unite with the Lord, he calls the clergyman and he gives communion to the patient. The Lord descends into our nature to cleanse, sanctify, and exalt. Here is an example: hostages are released, they are brought out into the light, and their eyes are blindfolded. Some people, seeing this, are indignant: why didn’t they take off the blindfolds? But a person after a long stay in the dark can become blind for life. It’s the same in spiritual life - an unpurified, unenlightened person is not ready to meet God.
The meeting with God takes place here on earth through the main sacrament - the Communion of the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. After this we say: yes, now God is with me. But we are not proud of this, but we state and congratulate each other on the best day of our lives. This is truly the best day - not the one when you got an apartment or got married, or a son was born, this is all secondary, but the one when you unite with God in the sacrament of Communion. The correct connection bears fruit - purification, sanctification, revitalization. Our spiritual body begins to revive, but this happens gradually. Often the Lord does not show this because of our pride and vanity, so that we do not think about ourselves and rise above others. You need to compare yourself not with those people who are inferior, but with the holy saints of God.
