Then we went into a special huge room for preaching, where 150-200 listeners were sitting on the floor; An old man, a very well-fed bonze, came, made a short prayer before the idol, went up to the pulpit and began to preach, prefacing her with some kind of proclamation in a completely hoarse and wild voice, as if deliberately breaking and disfiguring him; the people shouted something and fell silent, and the bonze began to preach; but it almost consisted of a set of old songs, so that even Isogai did not understand. During the sermon the bonze broke his voice terribly, sometimes he seemed to cry, sometimes he shouted, but in general he spoke all the time laughing and laughing; The sermon lasted 15 minutes.

From there we went not far to the same tera Nishina; This one is a little richer, but a complete copy of the first. From here we also went to the sermon; a young bonze preached here; we found it already in the middle; he explained that we are before God as children before our parents, and we must behave and cleanse ourselves of the sins that we have. And where did he find such and such a God? And what kind of sins are for a Buddhist? Isogai explained that these are the most ordinary worldly offenses, and this does not concern the essence of spiritual life, the heart. After all, a Buddhist also has some kind of search for the purity of life. Are they not from Christianity and are turning it over in their own way? After all, the Protestants cleverly instilled in the Japanese the idea of freedom of belief for everyone in their own way, since it is not important, but the recognition of the One God is important.

From time to time the bonze hummed something in the middle of the sermon, and then everyone began to repeat and babble too; here many people woke up, completely asleep and now awakened by this uproar and howling. After the sermon, the bonze read a few words from some sacred book of this church, written by its creator: this is done at the conclusion of every day's sermon. Now there are two sermons here every day at this time; And if they gather like this every day, then it is very good for Buddhism, it means that it still has many sincere followers. After the sermon, everyone left money on the floor. If our Christians did the same, then our work would be a little better. But for the time being, everything ecclesiastical has been created for them by foreign, Russian hands, and therefore the heart does not have such a warm attitude towards what is not theirs: everything is thought to be corrected by the one who did it. Well, yes, this will gradually take root, little by little everything will be at their hands, at least in the form of minor repairs, and then they themselves will take care of everything as their own.

It is the same in Russia: if a school is built for the peasants, they do not send their children to it with much love, and it is absurd to talk about repairs; Not ours, they think they will fix it anyway. But if even a bad one, and the men themselves build a school for themselves, so they take care of it.

At 6 o'clock in the evening from Sakuma I went first to Yamamoto Luka: he had been baptized, as I was told, five years ago. Now he does not go to church and does not confess, which is why I did not soon find out where he lived; all my co-workers justified their ignorance of him by the fact that he had fallen behind the Church. His wife is a pagan, and she must be strict about it. Luke met me in the shop and immediately received my blessing; I began my speech directly from a painful place for him: Jesus Christ endured the cross for us, and you, having accepted baptism and the grace of God, neglect this greatest love of His; for if only you had shown this to your parents, you would have been a very ungrateful and wicked son; but for us the Son of God Himself descended from heaven to earth. If you really contained this grace you received, you would really find it the greatest strength for yourself, and the power of God would really help you. Remember that we will all die and then we will have to give an answer to God in everything: what answer will you give in this? He has an icon. I advised him to come to my house some day for a conversation, as perhaps he was at a loss in front of his wife, and the boys were crowded around, so that he had to drive them away; he advised to come to church from time to time, and to confess and commune during Lent, and briefly spoke about the sacrament of Holy Communion as a means of being with Christ.

Then we went to Katajima Stephen, whose wife was baptized on Trinity Day; I wanted to congratulate her and give her the icons, but it turned out that she was taking a bath. By the way, the Japanese in general do not hesitate to show themselves completely naked and only wear belts; Their baths are common to all. And yet it does not seem to be that their manners are too depraved in comparison with European licentiousness, where, for instance, in France, the population is positively dying out. The old woman, who was worried, said that we would come at another time, and went to Mruyama Theodora, but we did not find her at home – there was a lock. We went to Miyamoto Hariton and Natalia. They live very far from the church; sometimes they still seem to come to church; only Chariton did not take communion this year; he justifies himself by the fact that although before receiving baptism he agreed with the owner (a tobacconist) to give him a leave of absence to go to church from time to time, the pagan owner still does not let him go and forces him to work every day; I nevertheless advised us to arrange it somehow, because without prayer we cannot live spiritually, and in Lent I advised us to take communion; we are called believers, and therefore we must live and act according to this faith; every man is called a carpenter from his own work, a carpenter from carpentry, and so on; so are we: for it is only for us that Christ suffered on the cross, in order to give us His saving grace; but grace, though in our hands, may not save us if we do not accept it and use it. For example, I have a book in my hands, but if I do not understand the signs, then I will understand nothing in it, and if I gradually understand the signs, then I will understand the book, and so grace: if we do not live it, then it will not be effective for us, and vice versa. Natalia complained that her breasts hurt; I said that especially in illnesses we must turn to God, because if the wardrobe breaks down, then I will not fix it myself, because I cannot and do not understand, I will call the master, he understands it well and will do it; so in the beginning God created us out of nothing, but He alone can really help us in our needs and illnesses, and therefore we must always turn to Him. If we really ask God for help with faith for anything, then we will certainly receive, for God knows us well and loves us more than parents: these can sometimes forget children, but God will never forget, if only we turn to Him (the story of Fukase). In conversations he sometimes asked to talk with pagans about Christ, since Christ brought the Cross for everyone and everyone equally needs salvation. He asked: where does Morimura Habakkuk live with his sons Elijah and John? He is Natalia's uncle. Neither Father Sergius Suzuki nor the catechists have seen or visited him, since he does not go to church. It turned out that Miyamoto knew, and he pointed it out to us, so next time we can put him in as well. Thus, God willing, we will find everyone, but the Christians themselves will say about everyone – where he is. They know each other. On the way back, we again went to the old men of Kitajima, but the old man was planing something, so I interrupted and decided to say a few words and leave; the old woman was very happy, her face was so soft and kind; I gave her icons of the Savior, the Mother of God and Mary Magdalene. She was very grateful; I sometimes encouraged her to go to church (although I am aware that it is difficult for her: they live far away, and she is already an old woman); She said very happily that she would always try to the best of her ability, and now she would come the day after tomorrow. I said goodbye and left; And the old man left his work and saw him off. At about 9 o'clock we returned.

Today Vladyka sent a letter in which he writes that everything I do is good so far, it should be; Fr. Archimandrite Sergius will tell about it in Kanda at the meetings, and it is wonderful, although, Vladyka writes, he does not say anything about his sermons, except for the usual good-natured reviews, for example: the old women slept well, and then diligently thanked for the word; this is his humility. He now knows more signs than Vladyka, and he reads the Japanese newspapers more freely than he does (writes Vladyka). Thank God. I probably won't get to that; the signs fall out of my head, I can't remember them, and I don't have time to deal with them at all; So today I did not have time to rewrite them. Vladyka enclosed a letter from a certain Tokito from the Osaka Noogak-koo (middle school), he wants to listen to the teaching and asks for a teacher; at the direction of Vladyka, I advised the catechist Jacob Fujia to go and get to know this man, so that later I could get to know him myself, whether he really wanted to listen to the teaching. Yes, it would be very good to have a catechetical school here: the pagans have opened their ears for listening, and we cannot satisfy them.

The weather is changing, it is raining. Something will happen tomorrow.

May 31/12 June. Yesterday, a little over 30 people gathered for the vigil, except for the guys. My soul rejoiced at the sight of this poverty, but in comparison with the former, one might say, some wealth. I involuntarily stood before God with one thought: Lord, soften the hearts of all people, especially those who believe and believe in You; Enlighten our mental eyes of the heart, grant us to comprehend Thy power, the sweetness of communion with Thee, and the loftiness of prayer to Thee from the depths of our souls; let everyone sincerely try to come to Thy temple to pray to Thee, and whoever really has no time, let him at least at home sincerely regret that he is not together with others before Thee; and so sincerely sigh before You, asking for Your grace. And those who, through the action of Satan, have weakened in faith or even fallen away, Thou Thyself by Thy wise means alone direct them again to Thy flock, put into their hearts by the force of the circumstances of their lives sincere repentance and bold, though humble, prayer before Thee, with a sincere desire to return to Thee; Lord, this is Thy work, and we are only Thy servants, unworthy laborers in Thy harvest field. Truly act Thyself through us, as the true master of this work, and give us Thy grace, enlightening, enlightening, stirring us up to Thy work; grant sincerity to all our deeds and words first of all, and then impregnate them with Thy grace, that Thy power may be clear to all, both faithful and unfaithful, that they may sincerely confess Thy holy name.

After the vigil, the worshippers sang for a long time in the large room; as it turned out today, it was the new Lord's Prayer; I sent them biscuits yesterday: after all, they will be more willing to do business. Today, before the mass, Tokito, about whom His Grace wrote, came: Fujia had not yet been with him, but he himself heard from inquiries that there was an Orthodox church here in Osaka, and he came. I asked him how he came to the idea of listening to faith; it turns out that he himself came up with the idea that it is impossible to live without God and true faith in Him. He is from Kagoshima, where we even have a priest, but he has not heard the teachings at all; there is a father, a mother and a brother.

I told him that if he really wanted to listen to the teaching, then let him always remember the following: one cannot be saved only by bearing the name of a Christian, and not by confessing and fulfilling the law of Christ in life. It is useless to go through the school of mastery and do nothing about this skill; Therefore, it is necessary to try to go to church to pray, to make confession, to take communion, and in general to sacredly fulfill the teaching of Christ in life: our Christian life is completely different, different from ordinary life; here we are gradually preparing for death, so that later we may be real citizens in the Kingdom of God. He is free twice a week, and therefore Fujii will go to him to preach in this way, who now has (in addition to Morioka) a new listener. I advised you to come to our church now, so that you can gradually get used to everything ecclesiastical here. It's a pity that he lives in a school that is outside the city and very far from here.

There were as many people at Mass as at Vigil; two took communion. For some reason, today's service was especially joyful for me: it must have been the continuation of yesterday's impression after the vigil, although I was not clearly aware of this. Thank God, this is His gift: my community is beginning to gather. After Mass, at the meeting, I spoke. Today's Sunday – the commemoration of all the saints – is a clear proof of the vitality of Orthodoxy: before us is a whole host of saints as real boats of the Kingdom of God. If we saw a people or a huge army that laid down its life for the Fatherland, or better yet, for the faith, we would understand that there is a real force here, the power of love: this would not be in vain, that is, such self-sacrifice. And before us: some of the saints for Christ endured various misfortunes and deprivations while preaching His teaching for the salvation of people, forgetting their comforts and tranquility, and even willingly and courageously endured torture and death – these are the holy apostles; others endured the beheading of limbs and death in various forms and forms, even terrible to remember, again only for the sake of Christ – these are the holy martyrs; still others went to deserts and solitary monasteries and, depriving themselves of any rest, performed the work of salvation – these are venerable men; some in general worked for salvation in life, spared no effort, and so on. And indeed they were saved: even here the power of God's grace was manifested in them; they were truly people, wholly filled and guided by the grace of Christ; After their death, their relics and miracles for believers, as proof of the reality of their salvation, and consequently, they received what they strove for here in heaven. This is really evidence. If we really put to our hearts everything that we hear in church, then for us the power of Christ's grace will be clear and understandable, effective. You understand the Japanese book well, because you used to make an effort to understand all the signs and now they are your own and not a secret at all; And I am holding the same book in my hands and do not understand anything in it, since I did not try to understand the signs.

In the same way, grace is a real power for all, but only those who truly accept and take it to heart recognize its power and live by it. Thus, remembering now all our saints, let us try to imitate them, so that we may be truly Christians, and after death in the Kingdom of God with the saints.

Then I briefly spoke about the joy with which Christians gathered for divine services in Kobe and Kakogawa, and many took communion; I advised them to confess during this fast, fasts are deliberate days for repentance. Of course, we must always have in our hearts a repentant mood before God, but we often forget this, and therefore, at least during the fasts, we must come to our senses and sincerely repent before God. After talking for about 20 minutes, I went to the children at school. And there the choir director had already placed them in rows for singing. To the violin, and first to the harmonium, they sang a lot – almost everything from the Liturgy, and then something from the vigil, very well. The guys liked it. I encouraged them and said that later it would be possible to sing on the kliros (although it is possible even now, but let it be gradually, so that it would come out as if my consent to their desire, and not my advice, it would be stronger later).