LET EVERYTHING THAT HAS BREATH PRAISE THE LORD (A Paschal Stork)!

 

LET EVERYTHING THAT HAS BREATH PRAISE THE LORD!

A Paschal Stork

Svetlana Rybakova

On Paschal days, life is filled with joy, and even the other God’s creatures, animals and birds, praise the Lord these days! This story took place on April 24, 2020, during a cross procession, which was held with the blessing of Archbishop Sophrony of Mogilev and Mstislavl of the Belarusian Orthodox Church.

The Belynichi Icon of the Mother of GodThe traditional procession of the cross from Mogilev to Belynichi in honor of Holy Pascha and the Mother of God took place on Friday of Bright Week, on the eve of the feast-day of the Belynichi Icon of the Mother of God (April 12/25). According to Church tradition, this icon was brought in the thirteenth century by pious monks to the town of Belynichi and placed at St. Elias Church, where a miraculous, supernatural light shone from the icon of the Heavenly Queen during Vigil. This icon of the Theotokos is specially venerated in Belarus.

Those who participated in the cross procession recalled that an unusual pilgrim, a white stork, had joined the column at some point. In Belarus since ancient times, storks have been regarded as “birds of peace”. The number of their huge nests increases every year, and locals treat weak or injured “citizens of the sky” carefully.

The participants of the extraordinary event recalled the “winged pilgrim” with joy. As the procession was walking among the awakening spring fields, a stork appeared from somewhere. Making a circle over the cross procession, it began to descend, as if peering into the Belynichi Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos, which the Cossacks in the cross procession were carrying on a special bearer.

After that, the stork descended and walked ahead! “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!” the pilgrims sang joyfully, while the tall, stately bird was strutting beside them.

    

The wonderful stork walked in procession right with the faithful along the side of the road as far as Belynichi—over seven miles! When the “winged pilgrim” was slightly behind, because the faithful were walking at a regular pace, it flew up to where the banners were being carried, and then walked again!

Those in the cross procession were worried for the stork’s life when the bird flew over to the traffic area. The traffic police car that accompanied the cross procession even delayed traffic several times so that cars would not accidentally knock down the “winged worshipper”. Then everyone begged it to cross or fly to the safe side of the road and continue along with the column, and the stork obeyed them.

But all the attempts of those in the cross procession to persuade the stork to rest were in vain: the bird walked on and on, afraid neither of people, nor of passing cars or trucks. This went on for more than four hours.

    

When the pilgrims would stop for a short rest, the bird would stroll serenely among groups of the faithful, but it was not so tame as to allow anyone to stroke it or to take food from their hands.

When they made their last halt in the woods just over a mile away from the town, the miraculous “pilgrim” stood, surrounded by people, listening to prayers and Paschal hymns. Then it went straight up to the Belynichi Icon of the Mother of God, bowed before it and, according to eyewitnesses, touched the highly venerated icon with its peak with reverence. After this pause, the stork proceeded as part of the cross procession to its final destination.

It was already dark when the pilgrims reached the town. The stork took wing, and making a circle of honor, as if blessing the people, flew away… This is a lesson of boundless devotion and trust in God and His Most Pure Mother that a brave bird taught the pilgrims. Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord (Ps. 150:3). Christ is Risen!

Svetlana Rybakova
Translation by Dmitry Lapa

Sretensky Monastery

5/9/2024

thanks to:

https://orthochristian.com/160089.html

St. Gregory of Nyssa on the Apparitions of Spirits of the Dead, or Ghosts

 

St. Gregory of Nyssa on the Apparitions of Spirits of the Dead, or Ghosts 

St. Gregory of Nyssa on the Apparitions of Spirits of the Dead, or Ghosts In his treatise On the Soul and the Resurrection, St. Gregory of Nyssa is said to have been taught by his sister St. Macrina regarding eschatological topics as she lay on her death-bed following the repose of their brother, St. Basil the Great. 

   Commenting on the details of the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, St. Macrina makes the following observation: "Why, seeing that Lazarus' soul is occupied with his present blessings and turns round to look at nothing that he has left, while the rich man is still attached, with a cement as it were, even after death, to the life of feeling, which he does not divest himself of even when he has ceased to live, still keeping as he does flesh and blood in his thoughts (for in his entreaty that his kindred may be exempted from his sufferings he plainly shows that he is not freed yet from fleshly feeling)— in such details of the story (she continued) I think our Lord teaches us this; that those still living in the flesh must as much as ever they can separate and free themselves in a way from its attachments by virtuous conduct, in order that after death they may not need a second death to cleanse them from the remnants that are owing to this cement of the flesh, and, when once the bonds are loosed from around the soul, her soaring up to the Good may be swift and unimpeded, with no anguish of the body to distract her. For if any one becomes wholly and thoroughly carnal in thought, such a one, with every motion and energy of the soul absorbed in fleshly desires, is not parted from such attachments, even in the disembodied state; just as those who have lingered long in noisome places do not part with the unpleasantness contracted by that lengthened stay, even when they pass into a sweet atmosphere. So it is that, when the change is made into the impalpable Unseen, not even then will it be possible for the lovers of the flesh to avoid dragging away with them under any circumstances some fleshly foulness; and thereby their torment will be intensified, their soul having been materialized by such surroundings. I think too that this view of the matter harmonizes to a certain extent with the assertion made by some persons that around their graves shadowy phantoms of the departed are often seen. If this is really so, an inordinate attachment of that particular soul to the life in the flesh is proved to have existed, causing it to be unwilling, even when expelled from the flesh, to fly clean away and to admit the complete change of its form into the impalpable; it remains near the frame even after the dissolution of the frame, and though now outside it, hovers regretfully over the place where its material is and continues to haunt it." 

   Thus we see a possibility from these observations that the spirits of the dead, otherwise known as ghosts and phantoms, who had fleshly or worldly attachments in this life could be so attached to their life in the flesh that their spirits remain near the bodies from which they separated, or possibly even near what they were attached to in this life. We should note that this is set down as a possible theory of why spirits seem to make their appearance near their graves. Yet St. Gregory also warns that demons can be behind such apparitions. In his Letter Concerning the Sorceress to Bishop Theodoxios, he explains that the so-called spirit of the Prophet Samuel which appeared by the witchcraft of the Witch of Endor (1 Sam. 28) to King Saul was in fact a demon rather than his actual spirit. This view was held by other Church Fathers also, though some also proposed that this may indeed have been his spirit. Read the entire letter here. 

Thanks to John Sanidopoulos

https://www.daimonologia.org/2014/10/st-gregory-of-nyssa-on-apparitions-of.html

Elder Paisios on Loving the World around Us - by Dionysios Farasiotis

 

Elder Paisios on Loving the World around Us

Posted on May 13, 2019 | by Dionysios Farasiotis | SourceReading time: 2 minutes

 

A few days after Pascha I decided to take an afternoon walk in the forest outside of Florina… It was a joy to be with the animals, the birds, the trees, and even the smallest blade of grass bursting with life…. I cheerfully spoke to them and they listened to me. I tenderly caressed them and understood their intentions and the movements of their inner beings. I loved them all. This extraordinarily beautiful, peaceful, and loving relationship between man and the world must have characterized the genuine life of Paradise. “The elder must be in such a state every day,” I thought.

Indeed once he [Elder Paisios] said,

“When I was in Stomio at the little monastery near Konitsa, there were two large bears who would come to the place where I would dispose of the garbage. The poor things were hungry, so I would go and give them some bread. The animals can recognize your disposition when you approach them, if you intend to kill them or if you approach them with genuine love.”

At this point, the elder opened up his hand and called to a red robin that was resting in the branches of a tree, and the little bird came and happily perched on the elder’s finger.

“The animals enjoy being with man and look at him as their king. In Paradise, Adam called the animals one by one and gave them each a name according to its kind. Animals recognized man’s superiority and were happy in his presence. After the fall, however, this relationship was destroyed. Man looked at the beasts with the intention of killing them, and the animals became wild. Nevertheless, the wild animals are still more sincere than man is. If you approach them with love, they return to that pristine state. Man has ruined the animals. Even the dog that lives continually by man’s side has changed, acquiring a police mentality and distrustful character. I used to feed a little kitten around here that would come and rub itself up against my leg and purr. Although it was very tame, when one day, I tossed a piece of bread to it, the animal pulled back in fear. What had happened to it? Someone had thrown stones at it and ruined the animal’s attitude towards people. So you see, this evil state of affairs begins with man.”

thanks to:

https://catalog.obitel-minsk.com/blog/2019/05/elder-paisios-on-loving-the-world-around-us

Saint Anthony the Great and demon who came

 

Saint Anthony the Great and the Demon Who Came To Him in Repentance 

(St. Justin Popovich) By St. Justin Popovich 

   Apart from this Life of Saint Anthony, written by his holy disciple, Saint Athanasius the Great, there is also information contained in books of the Holy Fathers about other miracles and experiences of Saint Anthony. Here we will put forward another of these miraculous experiences of the truly Great Anthony: 

 Venerable Anthony, great among the perfect, was clairvoyant. Having experienced demonic temptations, he no longer succumbed on their cunning. And many times he saw with his bodily eyes both angels and devils working around people, to draw them each to their side. He was so great and powerful in virtues, that he mocked unclean spirits and ridiculed them. Sometimes he infuriated them, reminding them of how they had been cast out of heaven, and how they had to suffer eternally in the fire. 

   And this happened once: Two demons agreed on how to approach the famous elder Anthony. And they talked among themselves about how neither of them should approach him, fearing that the elder would inflict severe wounds on them. Because the elder had achieved great fearlessness and a perfect life, and he had acquired the Holy Spirit. 

And one of those two demons said to the other: "Brother Serefer (because that was the name of this demon), if either of us repented, would God accept our repentance? Could it be or not?" 

The other answered: "Who can know that?" 

And Serefer said: "Do you want us to go to Elder Anthony, who is not afraid of us, and to find out about it from him?" 

The other answered him: "Go, go, but be careful, because the elder is clairvoyant, and he will see that you are tempting him, so he will not want to ask God about it. Still, go, if only you so you could find out what you want." 

   And Serefer turned into a man, and went to Elder Anthony, and began to weep before him and lament. And God, wanting to show that He does not turn His face away from anyone who repents, but accepts all who resort to Him, and wanting to give an example to a sinner person that He would not to turn His face away even from the devil, the chief of evil, if he truly repents, temporarily hid from the elder the intentions of this demon. 

And the Saint, seeing a man in front of him and not a demon, asked him: "Why, man, do you weep and cry from the heart, and shake my soul with your tears?" 

And the cunning demon answered: "Holy Father, I am not a man but a demon, and that because of the multitude of my iniquities." The elder asked him: "What do you want me to do for you, brother?" (Because the Saint thought that out of great humility he called himself a demon. And God had not yet revealed anything to him about this). 

The demon answered: "Holy Father, I pray for one thing only: pray fervently to God to tell you, would He receive the devil if he repents or not? Because if He received the devil, He would receive me, because I have done deeds that he did." 

The elder said: "I will fulfill your will. But go to your house today, and come here tomorrow, and I will tell you what the Lord says about it." And the demon left. And when night fell, the elder raised his holy hands to heaven, and prayed to the One who loves mankind, to tell him whether He would receive the devil if he repents. 

And immediately an Angel of the Lord stood before the elder and said: " Thus saith the Lord our God: 'Why do you ask Me for a demon? He came to test you cunningly.'" 

And the elder said to the Angel: "Then why didn't the Lord God reveal it to me, but hid it from me, so that I wouldn't see the demon's cunning?" 

The Angel answered: "Let it not trouble you, for this is the wonderful providence of God for the benefit of sinners, so that sinners, who have committed many iniquities, do not despair but repent, knowing that the all-merciful God does not turn His face away from anyone who resorts to Him, even if it was the cunning devil himself, if he really did it. Besides, God did not reveal it to you, in order to reveal the stubbornness and despair of demons. So when the tempter comes to you and asks you, do not cut him off immediately, but tell him this: 'God is so merciful that He does not turn His face away from anyone who resorts to Him, even if he is the devil himself. Here, He promises that he will receive you too, only if you fulfill what He orders you to do.' And if he asks you: 'What is He ordering me?' say unto him, 'Thus saith the Lord God: I know who you are, and from where you have come. You are an ancient evil and you cannot be a new virtue; you have long been the chief of evil, and you will not stop doing evil now. Accustomed to pride, how can you humble yourself to repentance and find mercy? But, in order not to have this excuse on the Day of Judgment, that you wanted to repent but God did not receive you, here, the gentle and merciful Lord also determines (only if you agree) repentance, because He says:

Standing in one place for three years, and facing the East, cry out and say this day and night: God, have mercy on me, the ancient evil! - Say this a hundred times. And again another prayer: God, save me, who am darkened by delusion! - And say the same thing a hundred times. And again: God, have mercy on me, the abomination of desolation! - Say this also a hundred times. So cry out to the Lord constantly, because you don't have a body to get tired or weak. And when you do it with humility, then you will be accepted into your original dignity and included among the Angels of God.' And if he promises to do this, you accept him for repentance. But I know that ancient evil cannot become new good. And let this be written for the last generations, so that sinners who want to repent do not despair. Because from this, people will easily be convinced that they should not despair for their salvation." When the Angel said this to the Venerable Anthony, he ascended to heaven. 

And when the dawn came, the demon, who from afar began to cry and weep like a man, he approached the elder, and he bowed. The elder did not rebuke him at first, but he said in his mind: "At the wrong hour you came liars, devils, scorpions, creators of evil, ancient evil, snake-eater!" Then the Saint said to him: "As I promised you, I prayed to the Lord my God. He will receive you to repentance, if you adopt what my powerful and almighty Lord commands you through me." 

The demon asked: "And what is it that God has commanded me to do?" 

The elder answered: "God commands you like this: Facing the East, you are to stand motionless in one place for three years, crying out day and night: 'God, have mercy on me, the ancient evil!' - You are to say this a hundred times. Then you are to say a hundred times like this: 'God, have mercy on me, the abomination of desolation!' - And after that again a hundred times this: 'God have mercy on me, who am darkened by delusion!' - And when you do all that God commands you, you will be included among the Angels of God, and you will be in the original dignity in which you were before." 

Serefer immediately threw off that false form of repentance, laughed out loud, and said to the elder: "O monk! if I wanted to call myself the ancient evil, and the abomination of desolation, and the one darkened by delusion, I would have done it earlier, in the beginning, to be saved. Should I call myself an ancient evil now? Not at all! And who says that? Oh, I am wonderful in my glory until this hour, and all cowards obey me! And why would I call myself the abomination of desolation or the one darkened by delusion? Not at all, monk, not at all! For I still rule over sinners, and they love me, and I am in their hearts, and they live according to my will. Does repentance make me an unnecessary and wicked servant? Never, evil old man, never, never will it be that I push myself from such a great honor into such disgrace!" Having said that, the devil became invisible. And the elder stood in prayer, and thanked God, saying: "You have told the truth, Lord, that ancient evil cannot become a new virtue; the creator of evils cannot be the creator of new goods." We have endeavored, brethren, to tell you this not in vain, but that you may know the gentleness and mercy of the Lord. Are you sinful - repent! If you do not repent, then you will suffer more terribly than demons in hell, not because you have sinned - (because we all sin, and no one is without sin except one God) - but because you did not want to repent and pray to the Judge before your death. For in the state death finds us, so will we be sent there. If you die without repentance, serving the devil with various and different sins, you will be completely with him and you will be condemned to eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. And if before death you flee from sin, and please the Lord with repentance and faith, oh! how many treasures you will enjoy after death! For you will find a merciful Judge, and you will be worthy of bliss, and you will dwell with the bright Angels, where for all who have pleased God, there is inexpressible beauty and eternal joy and gladness. May we all receive this in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and always and through all the ages, Amen. From Lives of the Saints. 

Translated by John Sanidopoulos.

thanks to :

John Sanidopoulos

https://www.daimonologia.org/2022/01/saint-anthony-great-and-demon-who-came.html

THE SHACKLES OF DEATH. WHY IS THERE NO REPENTANCE IN HELL? Part 3. ~ Valentina Ulyanova

 

THE SHACKLES OF DEATH. WHY IS THERE NO REPENTANCE IN HELL?

Part 3. “When the will is taken away after death”

Valentina Ulyanova

Photo: mykaleidoscope.ru    

And now it’s time to return to where I began in this article. To the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ Himself in the parable of the wedding feast gave us an image of the “shackles” of sinners after death, warning us not to delay repentance. Let me remind you that Blessed Theophylact of Ochrid explains that the “shackles” symbolize that the powers of action of our souls will be bound:

“The Lord then says to His servants, the angels of punishment, Bind his hands and feet, that is, the soul’s powers of action. For in this present age is the time to act and to do, but in the age to come all of the soul’s powers of action are bound, and a man cannot then do any good thing to outweigh his sins.”

Venerable Arsenia (Sebryakova) makes herself very clear. She writes about the taking away of the will after death:

“As long as you live on earth, you cannot realize to what extent your spirit is enslaved and dependent on another spirit. You cannot fully know this, because you have free will by which you act when and as you want. But when that free will is taken away from you after death, the soul sees to whose power it is enslaved. The Spirit of God brings the righteous into the eternal abodes, enlightening them, illuminating them and making them like God. But the souls which were in communication with the devil will be possessed by him.”¹

St. Simeon of Thessalonica connects freedom of choice, possible only in this life, with the possibility of repentance:

“Here we have time to make amends for our transgressions, as long as we have freedom of choice; and then there will be one time—of separation and retribution for what everyone has chosen for himself. Let none of those who are possessed by sins or by any delusion (in order to justify or delight themselves) deceive themselves with such delusions; the torments for the unrepentant are eternal. This is why repentance is possible to the last gasp. Indeed, if it benefited us there, it would not have been given to us here. And what wonder would the Savior’s economy of salvation have done if there were repentance or the end of torments there? Do you see the folly of the impious?”²

It should be understood that here we are not talking about the will in general, but about the part of the will by which we choose whether to repent of our sins or not—gnomic will. We’ll give a few words about what this is.

Priest German Kapten writes that St. Maximus the Confessor was the first to speak about the difference in human volitional abilities: about natural will that belongs to the essence, and gnomic will, which is the ability to make a reasonable choice.

“Natural will, in his opinion, was good after Creation and bore no evil. It is necessary for man to exist in this world, to regulate all human abilities, from vital ones—nutrition and breathing—to more subtle intellectual needs.

“St. Maximus interpretes Adam’s sin not as a legal crime, but as a gnomic choice that turned his mind away from God to uλη (materiality without any formalization).

“St. Maximus the Confessor shows that the free choice of evil corrupted the essence of the unrepentant sinner, and thus he cannot return to perfection. For the saint, the ontological place of corruption is the will, or rather, its fragmentation.

“Initially, Adam’s gnomic will was only a possibility, but after the fall, he and his descendants must constantly choose. Any choice involves torments—the experience of the very need to choose and the consequences of your decisions.”³

It can be assumed that the gnomic part of human will can exist only within the boundaries of time, and it cannot work in eternity. “The choice is possible, provided that there is time,”⁴ writes Priest German Kapten.

Archimandrite Raphael (Karelin) explains in detail the change of the human will after death, this power of the soul that is important for repentance:

“The words it [sin] shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come (Mt. 12:32) do not mean the severity of the sin committed, but your inner state that makes you unable to repent; and Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven (Mt. 18:18). If you have not repented of your sins in your earthly life, you will not be able to repent in the afterlife either; sin will become your personal quality, and the afterlife for you will mean becoming like demons.”

Recalling the prophetic word, For in death there is no remembrance of Thee (Ps. 6:6), Archimandrite Raphael (Karelin) writes:

“These words mean the expression of your faith and belonging to a certain denomination. The soul of a non-believer or an adherent of another faith cannot accept the Orthodox faith after death in hell—that is, it cannot be born again. In the afterlife is revealed what constitutes the contents of the human soul, what was acquired in earthly life.

“In Patristic works, the same call sounds like the ringing of an alarm bell: to treasure the time of our life on earth, to treasure every day and hour, for after death it will be too late. The Apostle Paul writes that it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment (Heb. 9:27)—the particular judgment of the soul before the Last Judgment.

“In hell the human soul cannot help itself. There is no choice of confession or change of faith. Only the living who remain on earth and the Church itself by praying for the dead can help some to be saved, but under two conditions: firstly, if a person in question was Orthodox and belonged to the earthly Church; secondly, if he repented of his sins, did good works, but could not reform properly and died in an uncertain spiritual state when the good in his soul was mixed with evil. Then the Church can fill in what is missing without changing the direction of the personality itself. <…>

“St. Maximus the Confessor, a great Christian thinker, in his dispute with the Monophysites points out that two aspects can be distinguished in the human will: natural will as desire (the early Fathers called it the irritable power, and some modern theologians call it the reactive one) and gnomic will—the possibility of choice. St. Maximus the Confessor says that human freedom is put into practice through life in God, and then gnomic will is united with the natural one. When you are possessed by satan, you are enslaved, and your will is subject to self-corruption. This process of destroying gnomic will has its completion in hell… Man’s natural will remains in hell, but his gnomic will ceases to work, since faith—the kingdom of freedom—has become obvious, and the moral composition of the soul—static, which can be changed by the prayers of the Church, including private prayers. ... After death, unrepentant sinners will be determined by their sins…

“The earthly life of a sinner and his destiny after death... do not depend on his desire, but on his sins. In fact, a sinner says ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to temptations in his earthly life. Here gnomic will makes choices between good and evil, truth and falsehood, virtue and sin, grace and passions, God and satan. Here, free human will is in a state of the permanent possibility of choosing motives and decisions, but after death another process begins—the revelation of the moral potential that you have acquired. Here a sinner can only be helped from the outside—by the power of prayers and almsgiving, and only on condition of his faith in Jesus Christ, repentance, and the good works that he had time to do before death⁵.”

All the Holy Fathers say that repentance, which is salvific for us—the choice of a will that turns to God (Greek: “metanoia”, meaning “change of mind”)—is possible only in this life. There is no repentance after death. There the soul of an unrepentant sinner cannot receive the saving effect of grace, and his will becomes completely subordinate to sin, to which he submitted in his lifetime at his own choosing.

In conclusion, I will repeat that whatever our eternal destinies may be, we will see for ourselves that we created them ourselves with our earthly lives and chose them ourselves with our virtually daily choices. By choosing to obey the will of God or sin in both important and seemingly insignificant things, we create our eternity.

St. Justin (Popovich) writes that God does not violate our freedom, respecting the choice of the personality:

“Providence ... does not violate, destroy or block freedom, because it is a gift from God; a gift that is the essence of the nature of rational beings; a gift that makes them what they are; a gift given to them by God as their inviolable, inalienable and personal attribute... God, being invariably Good, does not destroy or limit the freedom granted ... the freedom of His creation always remains inviolable…

“If the will inclines towards evil, then Providence leaves it to act independently. <…>

“God does not eliminate evil in the world, since this would mean destroying the freedom of the rational and moral beings, with which He Himself endowed them. He does not prevent evil in the world, since otherwise He would limit the freedom of action of these beings… However, the fact that He allows sin must not be understood as God’s inattention to the destinies of created beings, but solely and exclusively as His desire not to infringe on their freedom and allow it to act, so that they may choose independently either good or evil, voluntarily moving towards the former or the latter.”⁶

People who chose evil in their lifetimes will remain in eternity with the fruit of this choice. Evil will reign in them, and God will remove them from Himself, because they have moved away from Him.

St. Irenaeus of Lyons explains the logic of the deprivation of salvation:

“And to as many as continue in their love towards God, does He grant communion with Him. But communion with God is life and light, and the enjoyment of all the benefits which He has in store. But on as many as, according to their own choice, depart from God, He inflicts that separation from Himself which they have chosen of their own accord. But separation from God is death, and separation from light is darkness. And separation from God consists in the loss of all the benefits which He has in store. Those, therefore, who cast away by apostasy these aforementioned things, being in fact destitute of all good, do experience every kind of punishment. God, however, does not punish them immediately of Himself, but that punishment falls upon them because they are destitute of all that is good. Now, good things are eternal and without end with God, and therefore the loss of these is also eternal and never-ending...”⁷

St. John Chrysostom writes about the righteousness of God’s judgment of those who don’t choose blessed deeds, but choose deeds deserving damnation:

“But to the others He saith, Depart from me, ye cursed (no longer of the Father; for not He laid the curse upon them, but their own works), into the everlasting fire, prepared, not for you, but for the devil and his angels. For concerning the Kingdom indeed, when He had said, Come, inherit the kingdom, He added, prepared for you before the foundation of the world; but concerning the fire, no longer so, but, prepared for the devil. I, saith He, prepared the Kingdom for you, but the fire no more for you, but for the devil and his angels; but since ye cast yourselves therein, impute it to yourselves.”⁸

In order for this tragedy not to happen to us the Lord gives each one of us a life, time and freedom of choice. And the price of this choice is eternity.

Valentina Ulyanova
Translation by Dmitry Lapa

Pravoslavie.ru

2/24/2024

1 St. Arsenia (Sebryakova) of Ust-Medveditsky. Letters. Letter 45.

2 St. Simeon of Thessalonica. Commentary on the Divine and Sacred Creed of Our Orthodox and Immaculate Christian Faith.

3 G.Yu. Kapten. Criticism of Origenism in the Philosophy of St. Maximus the Confessor.

4 Ibid.

5 Archimandrite Raphael (Karelin). On Modern Neognosticism.

6 St. Justin (Popovich). Dogmatics of the Orthodox Church.

7 Hieromartyr Irenaeus of Lyons. The Denunciation and Refutation of Pseudo Knowledge (Against Heresies). The citation source: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103527.htm

8 St. John Chrysostom. Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew. The citation source: http://ww1.antiochian.org/node/17259

thanks to:

https://orthochristian.com/158815.html

THE SHACKLES OF DEATH. WHY IS THERE NO REPENTANCE IN HELL? Part 2. ~ Valentina Ulyanova

 

THE SHACKLES OF DEATH. WHY IS THERE NO REPENTANCE IN HELL?

Part 2. Why is there no repentance after death?

Valentina Ulyanova

Part 1

Photo: omolitvah.ru    

Reading these and other similar testimonies, many are perplexed. How, they think, can we reconcile more acute senses of the soul with the impossibility for it to repent? The fact is that repentance is more than a mere feeling. Remorse is possible after death, as Blessed Theophylact writes in the above commentary—but it will be fruitless for those who did not repent in their lifetimes. The Venerable Ephraim the Syrian says the same: “There are tears of repentance, when the soul desires eternal good things, and they are very sweet and beneficial. And there are tears of remorse, where (according to the Savior’s word) there is weeping and gnashing of teeth (Mt.8:12), and these tears are bitter and useless, because they are altogether fruitless.”¹

The fact is that repentance is not only the awareness of your sins, but also the desire and opportunity to change, to be cleansed from them, to be spiritually transformed. Transformation is possible only by the movement of the human will and the work of grace, and “the time and place for the action of grace is here alone”, as the Holy Fathers wrote.

St. John of Kronstadt said:

“A terrible truth. Impenitent sinners after their death lose every possibility of changing for good, and therefore remain unalterably given up to everlasting torments (for sin cannot but torment). <…> Who does not know how difficult it is, without God’s special grace, for a sinner to turn from the way of sin that is so dear to him into the path of virtue?... But for the grace of God, what sinner would have returned to God? For it is the nature of sin to darken our souls, to bind us hand and foot. But the time and place for the action of grace is here alone: after death there remain only the prayers of the Church, and these prayers can be efficacious for penitent sinners alone—that is, only for those who have developed in their souls the capability of receiving God’s mercy or of benefiting by the prayers of the Church—that is, the light of the good works which they have taken with them out of this life.”²

Blessed Theophylact of Ochrid wrote:

“The sinner is in darkness even in this life, as he has fallen away from the Sun of Righteousness. But as there is still hope of conversion, this is not yet the ‘outer’ darkness. But when he has died and an examination has been made of the things he has done, then the outer darkness in its turn receives him. For there is no longer any hope of conversion, but he undergoes a complete deprivation of the good things of God. While he is here in this life he enjoys to some degree the good things of God, I mean, the tangible things of creation, and he believes that he is in some manner a servant of God, living out his life in God’s house, which is this creation, being fed by Him and provided with the necessities of life. But then he will be altogether cut off from God, having no share at all in the good things of God. This is that darkness which is called ‘outer’ by comparison to the darkness here, which is not ‘outer’, because the sinner is not yet completely cut off from this time onward.”³

Reflecting on the same subject, St. Theophan the Recluse, wrote:

“Now or tomorrow death will come, and it will end all that is ours, and will in itself be imprinted on our destinies forever, for there is no repentance after death. We will stand before the Judgment seat in that state death finds us.”⁴

“The law of life is such that as soon as someone plants the seed of repentance here, even at his last gasp, he will not perish. This seed will grow and bear fruit—eternal salvation. And if someone does not plant the seed of repentance here and passes over with the spirit of unrepentant persistence in sins, then he will remain there forever with the same spirit and reap forever the fruit of it according to its kind—God’s eternal rejection.”⁵

As we can see from these words, a salvific change after death is possible only for those who, according to St. John of Kronstadt, “have developed in their souls the capability of receiving God’s mercy—the light of the good works which they have taken with them out of this life.”

All Orthodox Christians who died in repentance have hope of salvation from hell, even if they did not have time to bring the fruits of repentance sufficient for cleansing their souls and therefore did not attain Paradise: the prayers of the living can help them. Their painful state can be changed. Their “seed of repentance”, albeit small, can bring the fruit of eternal life through the prayers of the Church.

The Epistle of the Patriarchs of the Eastern Catholic Church on the Orthodox Faith (1723) reads:

“The souls of people who fell into mortal sins and did not despair at death, but once again before being separated from the real life of those who repented, only who did not manage to bear any fruits of repentance (which are: prayers, tears, contrition, consolation of the poor and expression in actions of love for God and neighbors that the entire Catholic Church from the very beginning recognizes God-pleasing and useful), the souls of such people descend into hell and suffer punishment for the sins they have committed, without depriving, however, of relief from them. They receive relief by infinite goodness through the prayers of the Priests and the beneficence performed for the dead; and especially by the power of the bloodless Sacrifice, which, in particular, the clergyman brings for each Christian about his relatives, in general, for all, the Catholic and Apostolic Church brings daily.”⁶

That is, it is not that the love of God turns away from the sinner after death, but the soul itself changes after death, and if there is no “light of the good works” or “seed of repentance” in it, it will not be able to receive God’s help and be transformed by repentance. The Holy Fathers unanimously write about this. I will give just a few examples.

St. Anthony the Great:

“What do crying and sobbing mean, if not the boundlessness of cruel and terrible torments? and what is depicted by gnashing of teeth, if not the greatest regret for the sins committed? Then—and this will surely happen—we will begin to resent ourselves, to repent with gnashing teeth, when repentance will not take place, when there will be no benefit from it, when the time given for repentance will have passed.”⁷

St. Gregory of Nyssa:

“After death no one will have a chance to heal the disease inflicted by sin by the memory of God, because confession has power on earth, but it does not exist in hell.”⁸

St. John Damascene states in his book, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith:

“You must know that the fall for the angels is the same as death for people. For after they fall they have no repentance, just as humans have no repentance after death.”

Why does this happen? The fact is that the personality cannot change after death. Entering eternity beyond the grave, the soul begins to live according to the law of eternity.

St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov) teaches that after death a person begins a different way of existence, passing from a temporary life into eternity, immutability:

“Death is a great sacrament. It is the birth of a person from this earthly, temporal life into eternity.”⁹

The things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal (2 Cor. 4:18), the Holy Scriptures say about what awaits everybody after this temporary life. The attribute of eternity is the qualitative immutability of phenomena. The qualitative state of the soul acquired during life on earth cannot change after passing into eternity. Therefore, after the death of the body the soul can only change within the limits of the quality that it acquired in earthly life: either to grow in virtue or degrade in sin. He who in his lifetime acquired a penitent spirit and striving for goodness will be perfected in goodness by the grace of God; and he who had no repentance in his soul, but wholeheartedly served his passions, will fall more and more into the abyss of evil.

Archbishop Luke (Voino-Yasenetsky) speaks about this in a brief yet very profound phrase:

“The life of the brain and the heart and the combined, miraculously coordinated life of all the bodily organs are required only for the formation of the spirit and cease when its formation is completed or its direction has been fully determined¹⁰.”

The Australian surgeon Pyotr Kalinowsky explained the deep meanings of these words of St. Luke:

“These words of Archbishop Luke speak about the most important thing—what gives a person life on earth. Archbishop Luke, having spoken about the purpose of our life on earth, proceeds, saying that after the death of the body in the immortal human soul eternal life and endless development in the direction of good or evil continue.

“The most terrible thing about these words of the archbishop is that at the moment of death of the body all further development of the soul in the direction of good or evil has already been determined. In the afterlife, two paths lay before the soul—towards the light or away from it, and after the death of the body the soul can no longer choose its path. The path was determined by human life on earth. <…> However, the sinner’s dark soul, which remains dark even after the death of the body, can no longer change.

“This is what the Lord Jesus Christ Himself says: My Father is the Husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit (Jn. 15:1-2).

“For a person who realizes that his life on earth is only a part of his life and that in the afterlife he will continue the development begun here, his entire temporary existence acquires a special meaning.”¹¹

St. John Damascene writes about this attribute of eternity:

“Further, everlasting life and everlasting punishment prove that the age to come is unending. For time will not be counted by days and nights even after the resurrection, but there will rather be one day with no evening, wherein the Sun of Justice will shine brightly on the just, but for the sinful there will be night, profound and limitless. In what way then will the period of one thousand years be counted which, according to Origen, is required for the complete restoration?”¹²

St. Theophan the Recluse explains the immutability of the personality in eternity as well:

“You forget that there will be eternity, not time; therefore, everything there will be eternal, not temporary. You count the torments for hundreds, thousands and millions of years, whereas there the first minute will begin, and there will be no end to it, because there will be a never-ending minute. The counting will not go any further, but it will be in the first minute, and it will remain like that.”¹³

Monk Mitrofan explains this phenomenon based on the Word of God:

“Today shalt thou be with Me in Paradise (Lk. 23:43), Jesus Christ said to the penitent thief. It means that every soul upon separation from its body will be either in Heaven or in hell. When? Today, the Lord Jesus Christ said.

“How do we understand the word ‘today’? How can it be reconciled with the teaching of the Church about the third, the ninth and the fortieth days? There are days, nights and years on earth, but eternity is either light or dark. Thus, the word ‘today’ means time after death—eternity. The third, the ninth and the fortieth days are on earth, but there are no days in the afterlife. There is only ‘today’ and there is no other day.

“The sacrament of death is the door through which the soul, having separated from its body, enters eternity.”¹⁴

St. Luke (Voino-Yasenetsky) writes about this as well:

“The eternal bliss of the righteous and the eternal punishment of the sinners must be understood in such a way that the immortal spirit of the former, enlightened and powerfully strengthened after liberation from the body, receives the opportunity for unlimited development in the direction of goodness and Divine love, in permanent communion with God and all the bodiless powers. And the dark spirit of evildoers and those who fight against God in permanent communication with the devil and his angels will be tormented forever by being alienated from God, Whose holiness they will finally know, and by the unbearable poison that evil and hatred are fraught with, infinitely increasing in incessant communication with the center and source of evil—satan...”¹⁵

To be continued…

Valentina Ulyanova
Translation by Dmitry Lapa

Pravoslavie.ru

2/23/2024

1 St. Ephraim the Syrian. Lessons in Repentance. The citation source: https://stjohndc.org/en/content/blessed-are-they-mourn-they-shall-be-comforted

2 St. John of Kronstadt. My Life in Christ. Part 1. The citation source: https://www.ccel.org/ccel/kronstadt/christlife.ii.html

3 Blessed Theophylact, Archbishop of Ochrid. A Commentary on the Gospel According to Matthew. The citation source: https://catenabible.com/com/58a5ce5154b4f95416b2f7a1

4 St. Theophan the Recluse. Homily on Meatfare Sunday.

5 St. Theophan the Recluse. Letters to Different People on Various Subjects of Faith and Life. Letter 2. On Eternal Torment of Unrepentant Sinners // http://www.odinblago.ru/feofan_pisma/

6 The citation source: https://moscsp.ru/en/poslanie-patriarhovvostochno-kafolicheskoi-cerkvio-pravoslavnoi-vere.html

7 St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Patericon.

8 St. Gregory of Nyssa. Homily on Psalm 6.

9 St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov). A Word on Death.

10 St. Luke (Voino-Yasenetsky). Spirit, Soul and Body.

11 P. Kalinovsky. Transition: the Last Illness, Death and Afterwards .

12 St. John Damascene. An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith. Book 2. Chapter I. The citation source: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/33042.htm

13 St. Theophan the Recluse. Thoughts on Various Subjects of Faith // Manuscripts from the Cell. Moscow, The Rule of Faith, 2008.

14 Monk Mitrofan. The Afterlife.

15 St. Luke (Voino-Yasenetsky). Spirit, Soul and Body.

thanks to:

https://orthochristian.com/158814.html