Fear of expulsion from the parish should keep true believers and church people from falling into grave sin. According to church rules, parishioners are all persons of the Orthodox confession who live within the boundaries of a given parish and maintain a living connection with the parish church. All these persons are entered in a special parish book together with their families. This book notes the surnames, first name, homeland, rank and occupation of each person, how old or date of birth and baptism, date of being and confession and Holy Communion, marriage, time of death, time of moving to the parish or leaving it. The duty of a parishioner is to take part in divine services in his parish church on Sundays and, if possible, on feast days, to confess and partake of the Holy Mysteries of the Body and Blood of Christ several times a year, to take part in works of charity, Christian enlightenment and mutual assistance. This is how the life and work of a good parishioner of the Russian Orthodox Church, zealous for his personal salvation and for the development of the parish to which he belongs, is presented.

Brothers of Jesus Christ

In the Holy Scriptures "there is something incomprehensible, which the ignorant and the unconfirmed turn to their own destruction, like the rest of the Scriptures" (2 Peter 3:16).

Such incomprehensible passages for sectarians are those that speak of "Jesus' brothers" (Matt. 13:54-56; Mark 6:2-3; Luke 8:19-21; John 2:12). Soon after the miracle in Cana of Galilee, Jesus Christ came to the city of Capernaum and here in the synagogue began to teach the people. The inhabitants of Capernaum knew very well that Jesus had not studied ancient Jewish theology anywhere, and therefore they were amazed at the power and depth of His teaching. Rumors of the miracle at Cana also came to them, and they cried out in amazement, "Whence hath He such wisdom and power? Is He not the son of carpenters? Is not His Mother called Mary, and His brothers James and Josiah, and Simon and Judas? And are not His sisters all among us? Where did He get all these things from?" (Matt. 13:54-56). It is on the basis of these words that "the ignorant dare to assert that the Most Holy Virgin Mary, besides Jesus, had other sons. But first of all, the holy Evangelist Matthew does not speak of the "brothers of Jesus" on his own behalf, but only repeats the words of the inhabitants of Capernaum, just as the same Evangelist repeated the words of the Pharisees, that Christ casts out demons only "by the power of Beelzebub, the prince of demons" (Matt. 12:24; 9:34).

If the sectarians accept the words of the inhabitants of Capernaum about the children of the Most Holy Theotokos as true testimony, then in this case, without violating the laws of logic, they must continue their blasphemy and, together with the Capernaumians, say that Jesus Christ was the son of a carpenter, and also blasphemously repeat the above-quoted words of the Pharisees, i.e., in other words, they must confess that they are anti-Christians, enemies of Jesus. like the Pharisees. Various sectarians, from among yesterday's Orthodox, who are not able to say a living word on their own, but only blindly repeat the words of cheap American preachers, certainly want it to turn out according to the Scriptures that the Most Holy Virgin had children. To this we will invite them to find a place in the Holy Scriptures where it is said that they were. The existence of a dispute around this question indicates that the sectarians have an irreconcilable enmity towards the Mother of God. Only because the Orthodox Church teaches that She had no children, except for the Only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the sectarian is tempted to say the opposite.

However, we will try to acquaint the reader with this issue in more detail. First of all, the words "brothers" or "brother" in the language of the Holy Scriptures in no way testify to uterine kinship. In the Old Testament, every fellow countryman is called a brother, for example: "Do not despise the Edomite (these are the descendants of Esau, the Gentiles), for he is your brother" (Deuteronomy 23:7). In the New Testament, every fellow believer is a brother, regardless of national origin (Matt. 23:8; Rom. 1:13; 1 Cor. 1:26; Galatians 4:12, etc. (. Exactly the same meaning has the Greek word "adelphos", the Hebraic "ah", in Russian "kinsman". And the sectarians themselves call all those belonging to their sect brothers. The same must be said about the "brothers" of Jesus Christ. in order to be justified in asserting that the "brothers" of Jesus Christ were "in utero", it is necessary to indicate in the Holy Scriptures at least a hint that the Most Holy Virgin Mary was the Mother of James, Josiah, Simon and Judas. But this is nowhere to be found! On the contrary, wherever "His Mother" (John 19:25) or "the Mother of Jesus" (John 2:3), i.e. the Mother of the only Son. Otherwise it would have to be said: Mother of Jesus, James, Josiah, Simon, and Judas.

On the cross, before His death, Christ entrusts the care of His Mother to the Apostle John: "Woman, behold Thy son." Then he says to the disciple: "Behold thy Mother!" (John 19:26-27). Such an adoption could not have taken place if the Virgin Mary had other sons, since the duties of Jesus Christ in relation to His Mother would have to be automatically transferred to the eldest son, i.e. James. Who was the mother of these "brothers" of Jesus? Is it possible to find an indication of this in the Holy Scriptures? Can. Speaking of the women standing on Golgotha at the Cross of the Lord, the holy Evangelist John the Theologian names three Marys: "At the cross of Jesus stood His mother, and His mother's sister Mary of Cleopas, and Mary Magdalene" (John 19:25). The Evangelists Matthew (27:56), Mark (15:40) and Luke (24:10) call Mary of Cleopas the mother of James and Josiah.

The Evangelists do not mention whether Mary of Cleopas was the matter of Simon and Judas (not Iscariot). But since Simon and Judas are also called the "brothers" of Jesus, and their names stand next to James and Josiah, we have the right to assert that they were also the children of Mary of Cleopas. The Most Holy Virgin Mary is nowhere and never called their mother. There is also other evidence of this. Thus, for example, Judas calls himself the brother of Jacob (Jude 1). This James, clearly different from one of the brothers, the sons of Zebedee, was the chief bishop of the Church in Jerusalem. The holy Apostle Paul calls him the brother of the Lord (Galatians 1:19), i.e. the son of Mary of Cleopas, a relative of the Most Holy Virgin Mary. There is no deliberate mention of Simon in the Holy Scriptures in this sense, but there is an indication by the most ancient historian of the Church, Egesippus, that he, Simon, was also the son of Mary of Cleopas. However, if anyone wants to dispute this instruction, we do not care: let Simon be the son of someone else, this will not prevent him from being called the brother of the Lord, if there is a reason for it. The Most Holy Virgin Mary was the only daughter of the parents Joachim and Anna, and, therefore, Mary of Cleopas could only be Her cousin or second cousin, and the "brothers" of Jesus were only the second or fourth cousins of the Lord. For a normal person, everything seems to be clear. But the Most Wise One says: "Pound a fool in a mortar with a pestle together with the grain, his foolishness shall not be separated from him" (Proverbs of Solomon 27:22). Oh, if only it were foolishness! The stubborn desire to disagree with the arguments of reason and with the testimonies of the Holy Scriptures, the irrepressible desire to assert at all costs that the Virgin Mary had other children, and most importantly, the blasphemous desecration of the Mother of God by sectarians, involuntarily makes one think that in addition to "ignorance" and "stupidity" their will is also enslaved by the "prince of this world."

Unable to refute that the "brothers" of Jesus were the sons of Mary of Cleopas, the sectarians say: "... if Jesus Christ was the firstborn, then it means that there were subsequent children no longer from the Holy Spirit, but from Joseph." But the Holy Scriptures say otherwise. In biblical language, the firstborn is everyone who is born first, even if there are no other children after this birth (Exodus 13:2; 34:19-20). In this sense, Christ Himself calls Himself the "firstborn": "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last" (Rev. 1:10); "Thus saith the First and the Last, who was dead, and behold, he lives" (Rev. 2:8). The words of the Evangelist Matthew: "And I did not know her, until at last she gave birth to her firstborn son" (Matthew 1:25), can in no way be understood in the sense that after the birth of Jesus, Joseph "knew" Mary. The Greek word eos u, "as at last," is a negative form of expression to mean that Joseph "did not know" Mary before and after the birth of Jesus Christ. In the Gospel account of the Annunciation, an angel said to the Most Holy Virgin Mary: "And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bear a son, and shalt call His name Jesus." And Mary said, How shall this be, since I know no man? (Luke 1:34). From these words of Her it is evident that She was not Joseph's wife, as the sectarians assure. But Joseph, an aged widower, betrothed to Her in order to take care of Her, without intending to live with Her in marriage. Knowing this, we understand Her perplexity.

The Jews had the most sacred thing – the Ark of the Covenant, in which the stone tablets of the Covenant, the golden vessel of manna and the vegetated rod of Aaron were kept. No one dared to touch this ark. A Jew named Uzzah who touched this holy object was immediately punished with death (2 Samuel 6:1-7). How would Joseph have dared not only to touch, but also to "know" the New Testament Ark, in which the Son of God dwelt? The Archangel Gabriel calls the Virgin Mary grace-filled and blessed among women (Luke 1:28). He says that He who is born of Her is of the Holy Spirit. Elizabeth calls Her the blessed and Mother of the Lord. One of the Jewish women says, "Blessed is the womb that bore thee, and the breasts that nourished thee" (Luke 11:27). The Virgin Mary Herself, according to the words of the Archangel, says: "From henceforth all generations shall bless Me" (Luke 1:48). To assert after this that the Most Holy Virgin Mary had children with Joseph means to pronounce blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, it means to commit a devilish sin, which will not be forgiven either in this or in the next age!

On the Unification of Churches

The convocation of the Catholic Ecumenical Council by the Pope of Rome caused many interpretations and judgments both in the press and in the conversations of private individuals. They became interested in the convocation of this Council in the hope that there could be a certain degree and form of unification of the Catholic and other Christian Churches, and first of all the Orthodox. The Roman Catholics are intensively engaged in propaganda in this direction, understanding, of course, unification in the sense of the full unification of the Orthodox Church with the Roman Catholic Church. But all the Catholic hype around their upcoming Ecumenical Council and the possibility of the unification of the Churches is only a theory, without any practical application. The highest aspiration of all Christians should be the creation of the unity of the Church of Christ on earth. Christ founded one Church. It is His mystical body. The head of the Body of Christ, the Church, is Christ. Thus, the preservation of the unity of the Church is the law of her Divine Founder. Disunity or tearing apart the unity of the Church is a great sin against the Lord Himself.