Morning. I pass by the cathedral, where the relics of one of the great workers for my native land - the right-believing Prince Alexander Nevsky - rest. Schoolchildren with bags on their shoulders are running past me, overtaking each other. They enter the cathedral, quickly approach the artistic shrine of the saint of God, make prostrations and venerate themselves.

They have an exam today. They ask for grace-filled help from the heavenly patron.

I look at them and think: what attracts children's hearts in a difficult moment of their childhood life? Of course, faith, pure simple faith, which is believed only by children and the childlike souls of such righteous people as St. Sergius of Radonezh and St. Seraphim of Sarov. Oh, if only this faith would be preserved in them forever! If it had never been extinguished!

I remember my childhood. From the first days of my conscious life, as soon as I remember myself, I see myself in the arms of my parent, who carried me through the snowdrifts to God's temple; I liked to go there not only on holidays, but also on weekdays, not only for God's services, but also at the time when my father, a sacrificial clerk, heated church stoves. From the walls of the church the faces of the saints of God looked at me, serious, reverent, with a prayerful expression. There was a smell of incense and wax in the air. It seemed that in this sacred silence the Angels of God were invisibly, but perceptibly to the heart. The mysterious curtain in the royal doors, the holy shroud behind the kliros, the old, darkened banners, the rows of icons going to the vaults of the church, to the iconostasis - everything spoke to the child's heart: this is not an ordinary place, this is the house of God...

I am not talking about participating in Divine services by serving as an altar boy, singing and reading on the kliros: I will only say that I remember myself in my arms; I remember how, when I received this holy book for the first time, I kissed it, childishly rejoicing in its "red handwriting", the cinnabar printed lines. I remember that, under the influence of this joy, I immediately made a promise to stand on the kliros with my father, and then to read the Six Psalms. As a six-year-old boy, I had already made an attempt to do this - alas! - the first time I failed: in a thin voice I read 5-6 lines and was embarrassed, cowardly, cried... And the old priest from the altar is already exclaiming to my father: "Read it yourself!" ... But a week later I had already conquered myself and rejoiced with a childlike heart: I had read all the Six Psalms..

Forgive me, dear readers, for this deviation from personal childhood memories: after all, this is a small illustration of the history of our spiritual upbringing in the bosom of our native Church. After all, it is this love for the church, for the service of God, that explains the stability of church views, by which our spiritual class lives. We were drawn to the temple of God by an unknown, but tangible to the heart. Here I am at the Zaikonospassky Theological School. It was the early morning of a hot summer day (exams ended in mid-July). We, the children, got up early in order to have time to go around the cathedrals, and to count poorly prepared, and to eat a piece of black bread (we had no idea about tea then). And so, in groups, we leave the low gates from the school yard, go to the Kazan Cathedral, venerate the miraculous icons of the Kazan and the Nurse of the Child, go to the Iveron Icon, from there to the Assumption Cathedral, in order to venerate the relics of the saints of All Russia, the robe of the Lord and the Vladimir icon of the Lady. Here is the Archangel Cathedral, and in it are the relics of the royal infant - Demetrius, who - we have heard this - still holds in his hand those nuts with which he played at the moment of the attack on him by the murderers... Oh, little martyr - we firmly believe - will help us, children, at the exam! And here is the Chudov Monastery, with its silver iconostasis and the incorrupt relics of the great sorrower of Holy Russia, a friend of St. Sergius, St. Alexis. He must certainly make, according to our childish concepts, three prostrations. From Chudov - through the holy Spassky Gates, without fail, with bare heads - we go to that St. Basil's Intercession Cathedral, which with its original architecture attracts the attention of not only every Russian, but also all foreigners. Here, having venerated the holy relics of Blessed Basil and John, we will certainly drink three sips (of course, on an empty stomach) of holy water... This is how we prepared for the exams. So childishly we clung to the Mother Church. And we are not alone: we saw gymnasium students, seminarians, and other students making pilgrimages to the shrines on the days of exams. They went around the shrines, stocked up on spiritual strength, strengthened their faith...

Is it the same now?!

Not so long ago, ten years ago, there was something similar. I lived about 30. years in the Lavra of St. Sergius. In the last years of my stay there, my obedience was, among other things, to guide the young pilgrims. It was gratifying to see the school children, tired of unaccustomed walking, but cheerful in spirit at the sight of the cherished shrines. And involuntarily I remembered my first trip to this very monastery with my parents, in 1863 or 1864. I then saved three or four rubles for the trip, refusing tea, but saving sugar cubes and selling them to help my parents for this trip. When the opportune time came, I began to ask my father and mother to go on the long-awaited journey. When I heard: "We know, son, that this is a good deed, but what can I do: there is no money!" - I triumphantly laid out my "sugar" capital before them, and - oh, joy! "I disarmed them!" In the morning we were already on the way. 60 versts were done in a day and a half. Here the holy Lavra in all its glory was revealed to us. Here is the field, which, due to ignorance of history, of course, my parents called me "Mamaev".

And in my imagination there was already a picture of the historical battle, which I had already read about in the life of the saint of God. Here is the cathedral - the chamber of Sergius, where he rests in the fragrance of the shrine. What the child's heart experienced then - it is impossible to retell. But that is why I understood these young pilgrims, because I had once experienced what they seemed to me to be experiencing in their hearts before my eyes. In the summer of 1903 alone, I counted up to 5,000 pilgrim students. There were not only children: there were many young men and maidens, students and cadets, and at that time, seven, only seven years ago, they came to the grave of St. Sergius, in order to draw from this life-giving, watering the Russian soul, the grace-filled power with which our Holy Russia had been strong until then.

Is it the same now?!

Some kind of snowstorm swept over our homeland. It blinded the eyes, made heads spin, drove many people crazy. The spiritual foundations of our historical existence have collapsed before our eyes. It is as if Satan came out of the depths of hell and, by God's permission, sent a stream of deadly winds over the Russian land. Will the Lord disperse these satanic influences with the spirit of His mouth? Will the Russian people sober up from this disastrous blow? Will Russia be saved?..

The answer to this question depends entirely on us. Children with a sensitive, pure heart already predetermine it. They already show by their own deeds that even if the branches have broken off from this hellish storm, the roots of the tree are intact: they are strong enough to sprout new shoots, they are strong enough to give new strong branches... If only to support these sprouts, to let the branches strengthen. If only we could preserve these bright, pure impulses of young souls from the miasma that still permeates the spiritual atmosphere around us.

Give it, Lord!