From the publisher

What is an Orthodox Christian, by what signs can one recognize him in this world obsessed with passions? Where today is the line between him and a pagan who knows only one law - the law of satisfying his manifold needs; where is the dividing line between the believer in Christ and the non-believer, indifferent to everything that is inaccessible to his sensory perception? "Christians," says St. Macarius the Great, "have their own world, their own way of life, and their mind, and their word, and their own activity; but the way of life, and the mind, and the word, and the activity of the people of this world are different. Christians are another, and peace-loving people are another; the distance between the two is great" [1]. And this "distance" is the "otherness" of which the monk speaks – in the way of thinking and feeling. And the sphere of their manifestation is the attitude to what surrounds us in this temporary life, expressed in concrete, visible actions and deeds. The whole life of a "peace-lover" is conditioned by a number of rules, the essence of which is to help him achieve certain goals that he sets for himself, often at any cost. The life of a Christian is conditioned by his faith in God, in future retribution, and the only law for him is the law of Christ's commandments, which themselves are eternal life (John 12:50). And here it is, the way of life of a Christian, the one that Christ Himself calls humanity to. Throughout its two-thousand-year existence, the Christian Church has experienced different times, and its position in the world has also been different. The first centuries of the history of the Church on earth are characterized, first of all, by the fact that there was a strict border between the "new creation" that had cast off the "old man" and the pagan world, which, "smouldering in seductive lusts," did not want to know the persecuted and tormented "Galileans." At that time, every Christian could at any moment end his life with martyrdom and therefore constantly prepared to stand before God, strove to be in a holy life and piety (2 Pet. 3:11); and the very spirit of life of the first Christians showed that they did not have a permanent city here, but sought only the future (Heb. 13:14). The pagan world, in the midst of which they lived and to the lusts of which they themselves had once given themselves, was repugnant to them, there could be no agreement between them and the godlessness and violent depravity that reigned in this world. That is why those with whom they had "rejoiced" together with his "joys" the day before were surprised. For this reason, struck by the holiness and purity of their new existence, their steadfastness and courage in the face of persecution and torture, these people themselves increasingly turned from grievous wolves into sheep of the flock of Christ. But then a completely different period in the life of the Church began: Christianity, which had been persecuted until recently, turned into the state religion of the most powerful empire. The world, although it has changed, has not been completely reborn. And love for him, which, according to the words of the Scriptures, is enmity against God (James 4:4), remained in the hearts of the majority of people living in him. And the Christians who had previously been rejected by him and who themselves did not accept his "paganism" became at the same time a part of him. Thus began a struggle in the heart of the world itself, between the spirit of Christ and the spirit of Antichrist; Christianity sought to transform the world, to sanctify, to bring it to Christ, and the world to earth, to "secularize" Christianity, to turn it from a Divine institution into a kind of social and state institution with its own moral norms, which, however, do not necessarily have to be observed.

Behind us are the persecutions, which in their cruelty are not inferior to the persecutions of the epoch of Decius and Diocletian. Then there were the decades of "anti-religious propaganda", when the state with its entire apparatus waged a purposeful, "scientifically" organized struggle against religion. And the present itself - now that it has become possible to soberly assess it - no longer seems idyllic, full of hopes for the "flowering" of spirituality and the long-awaited "national repentance". What have we seen over the past few years? - Churches were opened, ancient monasteries were restored, the property taken from it was returned to the Church - with difficulty and in small doses. And at the same time, without encountering obstacles or difficulties, what is called in the Scriptures the mystery of lawlessness in action (2 Thess. 2:7) entered into our lives swiftly and irresistibly: unprecedented theft, endless political intrigues, cynicism and cruelty, a merciless struggle for a place in the sun both between the "strong" and the "weak" of this world, military conflicts and mass death of people. met (already!) by the indifference of society, horrible immorality and depravity - this is the reality that surrounds us today. And this is the background against which the Church is being reborn... By God's mercy, many today (although the flow of them has recently thinned out) are turning to Christ, repentance and correction of life are becoming the most urgent need for people. But it is difficult, very difficult in our time for a person who has just decided to live a new Christian life. He comes from an environment in which militant unbelief or "willful forgetfulness" of God reigned, enters the Church from the semi-pagan world - and remains in its very midst. And how can he understand, how can he feel in his heart that now for him "there is another world, another meal, different clothes, another pleasure, another communication, another way of thinking" [2], when he is still completely in the captivity of the former world, under the power of its customs, habits, passions? Everything seems so "familiar" - both that which is ashamed to speak of (Ephesians 5:12), and that which is simply frightening to talk about. A person has come to the Church, his heart is drawn to his Creator God, but it has not yet awakened from sleep, it is still lukewarm, and he does not yet realize that the whole life of a Christian is a struggle, that his path is along a thin thread stretched over the abyss, where temptations are on the left and on the right, and danger is everywhere. But without this understanding there is no salvation, there is no true life in Christ. Therefore, it is necessary to know, to understand what it is, "the spirit of this world," and at the same time to determine one's place in this world, to understand whether you are really with Christ, or whether only your lips confess Him, and your heart is far away, given over to the power of dead interests and deeds (Matt. 15:8). But our "sleeping" is strong and deep, and therefore we constantly need someone to "awaken" us, to point out the surrounding dangers, to warn us, to talk about them, to teach us to avoid them. And at the same time, it reminded us of the bright and unfading truth of Christ, of the ineffable joy of life with Him; that we, people, were created by God only for Him and only in Him do we find the fullness of being and happiness, and therefore it is not fitting for us to hopelessly drown in earthly joys and sorrows. This book by Archimandrite Raphael (Karelin) is such a sobering reminder, sometimes bitter. Perhaps someone will find what he reads in it frightening, but this is the background of our life, the reality surrounding us, in which we exist - and at the same time we do not see it. And the author does not speak of it in order to terrify his reader, to make him tremble; it only makes it possible to examine, to know what it is, and to evaluate it correctly. Fear and despair are feelings that are inadmissible, inappropriate in the life of a Christian. Yes, indeed, our time is the time when the bitterest prophecies of the Savior come true: faith fades (Luke 18:8), love grows cold (Matt. 24:12). But as before the light of Christ enlightens every person who comes into the world, the Church of Christ still stands on earth, insurmountable for the gates of hell until the last day of this world, and in her is the Lord Himself, merciful and saving, loving the righteous and correcting sinners. And that is why, along with the formidable word of denunciation, Fr. Raphael's book also contains a gentle call to eternal life, to the Heavenly Kingdom open to us, a call that the human heart hears and to which it responds. St. Macarius of Egypt. Spiritual conversations. Moscow, 1998. P. 40. ^ St. Macarius of Egypt. Spiritual conversations. P. 57. ^

Part I

What is an Orthodox Christian, by what signs can one recognize him in this world obsessed with passions? Where today is the line between him and a pagan who knows only one law - the law of satisfying his manifold needs; where is the dividing line between the believer in Christ and the non-believer, indifferent to everything that is inaccessible to his sensory perception? "Christians," says St. Macarius the Great, "have their own world, their own way of life, and their mind, and their word, and their own activity; but the way of life, and the mind, and the word, and the activity of the people of this world are different. Christians are another, and peace-loving people are another; the distance between the two is great" [1]. And this "distance" is the "otherness" of which the monk speaks – in the way of thinking and feeling. And the sphere of their manifestation is the attitude to what surrounds us in this temporary life, expressed in concrete, visible actions and deeds. The whole life of a "peace-lover" is conditioned by a number of rules, the essence of which is to help him achieve certain goals that he sets for himself, often at any cost. The life of a Christian is conditioned by his faith in God, in future retribution, and the only law for him is the law of Christ's commandments, which themselves are eternal life (John 12:50). And here it is, the way of life of a Christian, the one that Christ Himself calls humanity to. Throughout its two-thousand-year existence, the Christian Church has experienced different times, and its position in the world has also been different. The first centuries of the history of the Church on earth are characterized, first of all, by the fact that there was a strict border between the "new creation" that had cast off the "old man" and the pagan world, which, "smouldering in seductive lusts," did not want to know the persecuted and tormented "Galileans." At that time, every Christian could at any moment end his life with martyrdom and therefore constantly prepared to stand before God, strove to be in a holy life and piety (2 Pet. 3:11); and the very spirit of life of the first Christians showed that they did not have a permanent city here, but sought only the future (Heb. 13:14). The pagan world, in the midst of which they lived and to the lusts of which they themselves had once given themselves, was repugnant to them, there could be no agreement between them and the godlessness and violent depravity that reigned in this world. That is why those with whom they had "rejoiced" together with his "joys" the day before were surprised. For this reason, struck by the holiness and purity of their new existence, their steadfastness and courage in the face of persecution and torture, these people themselves increasingly turned from grievous wolves into sheep of the flock of Christ. But then a completely different period in the life of the Church began: Christianity, which had been persecuted until recently, turned into the state religion of the most powerful empire. The world, although it has changed, has not been completely reborn. And love for him, which, according to the words of the Scriptures, is enmity against God (James 4:4), remained in the hearts of the majority of people living in him. And the Christians who had previously been rejected by him and who themselves did not accept his "paganism" became at the same time a part of him. Thus began a struggle in the heart of the world itself, between the spirit of Christ and the spirit of Antichrist; Christianity sought to transform the world, to sanctify, to bring it to Christ, and the world to earth, to "secularize" Christianity, to turn it from a Divine institution into a kind of social and state institution with its own moral norms, which, however, do not necessarily have to be observed.

Behind us are the persecutions, which in their cruelty are not inferior to the persecutions of the epoch of Decius and Diocletian. Then there were the decades of "anti-religious propaganda", when the state with its entire apparatus waged a purposeful, "scientifically" organized struggle against religion. And the present itself - now that it has become possible to soberly assess it - no longer seems idyllic, full of hopes for the "flowering" of spirituality and the long-awaited "national repentance". What have we seen over the past few years? - Churches were opened, ancient monasteries were restored, the property taken from it was returned to the Church - with difficulty and in small doses. And at the same time, without encountering obstacles or difficulties, what is called in the Scriptures the mystery of lawlessness in action (2 Thess. 2:7) entered into our lives swiftly and irresistibly: unprecedented theft, endless political intrigues, cynicism and cruelty, a merciless struggle for a place in the sun both between the "strong" and the "weak" of this world, military conflicts and mass death of people. met (already!) by the indifference of society, horrible immorality and depravity - this is the reality that surrounds us today. And this is the background against which the Church is being reborn... By God's mercy, many today (although the flow of them has recently thinned out) are turning to Christ, repentance and correction of life are becoming the most urgent need for people. But it is difficult, very difficult in our time for a person who has just decided to live a new Christian life. He comes from an environment in which militant unbelief or "willful forgetfulness" of God reigned, enters the Church from the semi-pagan world - and remains in its very midst. And how can he understand, how can he feel in his heart that now for him "there is another world, another meal, different clothes, another pleasure, another communication, another way of thinking" [2], when he is still completely in the captivity of the former world, under the power of its customs, habits, passions? Everything seems so "familiar" - both that which is ashamed to speak of (Ephesians 5:12), and that which is simply frightening to talk about. A person has come to the Church, his heart is drawn to his Creator God, but it has not yet awakened from sleep, it is still lukewarm, and he does not yet realize that the whole life of a Christian is a struggle, that his path is along a thin thread stretched over the abyss, where temptations are on the left and on the right, and danger is everywhere. But without this understanding there is no salvation, there is no true life in Christ. Therefore, it is necessary to know, to understand what it is, "the spirit of this world," and at the same time to determine one's place in this world, to understand whether you are really with Christ, or whether only your lips confess Him, and your heart is far away, given over to the power of dead interests and deeds (Matt. 15:8). But our "sleeping" is strong and deep, and therefore we constantly need someone to "awaken" us, to point out the surrounding dangers, to warn us, to talk about them, to teach us to avoid them. And at the same time, it reminded us of the bright and unfading truth of Christ, of the ineffable joy of life with Him; that we, people, were created by God only for Him and only in Him do we find the fullness of being and happiness, and therefore it is not fitting for us to hopelessly drown in earthly joys and sorrows. This book by Archimandrite Raphael (Karelin) is such a sobering reminder, sometimes bitter. Perhaps someone will find what he reads in it frightening, but this is the background of our life, the reality surrounding us, in which we exist - and at the same time we do not see it. And the author does not speak of it in order to terrify his reader, to make him tremble; it only makes it possible to examine, to know what it is, and to evaluate it correctly. Fear and despair are feelings that are inadmissible, inappropriate in the life of a Christian. Yes, indeed, our time is the time when the bitterest prophecies of the Savior come true: faith fades (Luke 18:8), love grows cold (Matt. 24:12). But as before the light of Christ enlightens every person who comes into the world, the Church of Christ still stands on earth, insurmountable for the gates of hell until the last day of this world, and in her is the Lord Himself, merciful and saving, loving the righteous and correcting sinners. And that is why, along with the formidable word of denunciation, Fr. Raphael's book also contains a gentle call to eternal life, to the Heavenly Kingdom open to us, a call that the human heart hears and to which it responds. St. Macarius of Egypt. Spiritual conversations. Moscow, 1998. P. 40. ^ St. Macarius of Egypt. Spiritual conversations. P. 57. ^

Man is a mysterious creature...

Man is a mysterious creature. It is a combination of opposites. It is both great and insignificant; he possesses inner freedom and in this sense is a shadow of the Divinity on earth, and at the same time he is entangled, as with a thin cobweb, by his passions, habits that have become his nature, by the imperious demands of the proud and godless world, by the demonic power of sin, which deprive him of will, make him a medium of dark forces and inclinations. Man struggles helplessly in this web. The Earth in the ocean of space is a speck of dust. Strange creatures crawl on the surface of this speck of dust. They are in constant anxiety, agitation, and struggle with each other. And at the same time, these one-day beings, lost in a corner of the universe, feel that they have a great mission, that they are the masters of this vast world. On earth, life is presented in various forms, and all animals are satisfied with their existence, only one person is not satisfied with anything. He is always longing for something, for some kind of loss. He feels the falsity of his life, although he does not know another; Only a king who has lost his kingdom can grieve like this. He who is born in prison does not know freedom, and therefore cannot yearn for it. Life on earth has its cruel laws, and man is conditioned by them. In this respect he is the object of this world, he is under the influence of the environment and under the influence of external forces. And at the same time he feels inwardly free; he feels responsible for his actions in the face of the higher Truth.

His body is similar to that of other animals, only perhaps weaker and more fragile than that of animals, but man has something that distinguishes him from all creatures, which makes his life not only cosmic, but also supracosmic. His spiritual essence is not measured in the magnitudes of time and space. In his material structure, man is a phenomenon of the cosmos. It is due to thousands of cause-and-effect relationships: a spark that flew out of the bowels of the earth and was extinguished in the darkness of the cosmic night. But his spirit has other dimensions, it is transcendental and therefore greater than the cosmos itself. Usually a person is called the microcosm, this concept was passed on from ancient philosophers. But in fact, the human soul is a macrocosm that is larger than all the universes taken together. There is a phenomenon called pain. A living organism hurts, a dead body does not feel pain. And at the same time, pain is a saving signal that the body is in danger. A person's disappointment in this world, mental pain indicate that a person is moral and at the same time that his life, directed only at the external, is false. The experience of all history has proven that man can find happiness only in God, only in God does his true life begin. Here, on earth, there is no happiness, here is the life of a worm that feeds on dust. St. Augustine wrote that only "the abyss of the Godhead can fill the abyss of the human heart." This abyss of the human heart is greater than all cosmic spaces, deeper than the black pits of the universe, greater than all cosmic creations taken together, greater than the very principle of being and non-being. The abyss of the human heart is Godlikeness, so the ephemeral worm crawling on the earth, the grain of sand of the cosmos, in its spiritual aspect is the master of the entire universe and a part of the world that lies beyond it. Man feels himself at the same time to be the free master of his being and a slave to be sold in the slave market of this world. He feels that freedom is the highest value, but rarely understands what freedom is. It is impossible to be free in the external world, where time and death reign - this is an illusion. Most of humanity has striven and continues to strive for such freedom, but it receives only disappointment and bitterness from even greater losses. What is considered freedom - external freedom - turns into passions and rivalry, that is, into a new kind of slavery, only turned inside out. True freedom is independence from the outside. The highest manifestation of freedom is prayer as an appeal to the Divine. The absolute life of the Godhead is the highest, true, and only freedom, and it is only through inclusion in it that man's life can become free, the rest is illusion and mirage. The king and prophet David said: "Only in God does my soul rest" (Psalm 61:2). He ruled the kingdom, was loved by the people, won brilliant victories over enemies, but only in God did he find peace of heart and space for inner freedom. Evil does not just force a person, it deceives a person, putting on a mask of "good". One of Satan's deceptions is to distract man from God by false good; to close his inner world, to leave him to live in the outer world. In church, the words are often repeated: servant of God. These words cause annoyance in many modern people, they even shock them. Meanwhile, they contain a huge potential for freedom. A slave belongs to only one master who bought it from a slave trader. To be a servant of God means to cease to be a slave of people, to cease to feel dependence on people, to throw off these invisible chains; to accept good from man as good from God, done through man, and to be grateful to God, and to accept evil from man as a punishment from God, accomplished through man for our salvation, therefore also to thank God. To see in everything the good will of God being done for us, and to look at people as instruments and means for the embodiment of God's will and the realization of Divine Providence for us. Therefore, one should equally not be attached to people to the state of a slave, nor have enmity towards them. The words servant of God mean that we must have no one as slaves and do not demand anything from a person, even the closest to us. The rule of being neither master nor slave opens the way for man to his own soul, tears him out of the whirlwind of the world. Accepting everything from people as from God, we ourselves must do for man as for Christ the Saviour, Who invisibly dwells in him, and therefore do not expect gratitude from anyone. If we expect gratitude from a person, then we make him dependent on us, and our good turns into enslavement. If we always remembered that everything we do for a person is accepted by God, then all our actions would take on a mystical meaning, a metaphysical depth. The first condition on the path to spiritual freedom is to surrender oneself and one's loved ones to God in a moment of danger. The second is to have the right scale of values: not to confuse the secondary with the primary. We often waste time, our own and someone else's, on unnecessary or empty things. But even a good deed becomes a sin if the main thing is forgotten and not done for its sake - as if the sentry left his post and went to cultivate the field. The main thing in a person's life is the acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit. This light will illuminate not only our lives and our souls, but will become a source of life for others. That is why it is written in the Bible: "The will of God is your sanctification" (1 Thess. 4:3). The greatest benefactor for a person is the one who has revealed this light to him, who has awakened his spirit. In comparison with this, worldly virtues are lower grades. We often replace grace with a surrogate, a fake: tenderness, tenderness, excessive attention; We joke and entertain a person, thinking that this shows our love for him. But if we were in prayer, grace, even without our words, would comfort our neighbor. Therefore, asceticism in antiquity was perceived not as the individual salvation of man, but as the highest form of good for all mankind, and monasticism - the acquisition of the Holy Spirit - was understood not as egocentrism or a disgusted attitude towards the world, but as a sacrifice for people. Therefore, the highest form of good, the highest podvig, moreover, the most difficult and intense, is to enter one's inner world with prayer, to awaken the heart and turn the spirit to God through the words of prayer. Prayer is the resuscitation of the human heart, the transition from the realm of death to the realm of life. Prayer is fraught with difficulty and pain, especially in the beginning. But when the patient wakes up from oblivion or fainting, he feels pain. Without pain, there is no return to life. To live means to awaken the heart, to make it feel, think and speak. In the Holy Fathers, the word "heart" often serves as a synonym for the soul. A person lives as much as his heart is included in life.

On the Church and Schism

Question. What is the Church? Answer. The most profound, essential and, we would say, all-encompassing definition was given by the Apostle Paul in his Epistle to the Ephesians: the Church is the Body of Christ the Saviour, the Head, who fills all in all (Ephesians 1:22). Question. What does this definition mean? What properties of the Church does it speak of? Answer. The Church is a living organism. It is the grace of God, which embraces all rational creatures that abide in grace through obedience, submission, and devotion to it. The Church is eternal and divine, as the action of eternal Divine energies, as the light pouring from the depths of the Triune Divinity. And at the same time, the Church was created, since it embraces God's creations, created in time. The goal of the Church is to realize the unity between the Creator and His creation, to raise the world from its limited and conditional existence into the freedom and fullness of the Divine life, into the communion of the Divine perfections. The Church is the Body of Christ, therefore, she is one in both the earthly and cosmic dimensions. In the Psalter, the cosmos is compared to the robe - the garment of the Godhead, and in the New Testament the Church is called the mystical Body of Christ the Savior. The Holy Fathers say that the Lord created the universe for the sake of the Church. Thus, the first attribute is the uniqueness of the Church. Secondly, the Church is universal and universal. The earthly Church is organically united with the Heavenly Church. Through the Church, the duality (dyad) of spirit and matter is overcome, and the cosmos is spiritualized in its future transformation. The Church is the Body of the Head, the One Who embraces everything. Consequently, the path to the Heavenly Church lies only through the earthly Church, or rather, these are two aspects of one Church. The Church is a living organism, and a living organism cannot be created artificially. It is impossible to create a living cell from the chemical elements of the cell artificially, in the laboratory, and it is also impossible to create a new Church artificially on the basis of dogmas, canons, rites and the totality of what we know about the Church. All these will be dead theoretical constructions, mannequins and dolls devoid of life. The Christian Church is not the creation of human intellect or even religious genius, but eternal life given by the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. The Incorruptible Head has an Incorruptible Body, so the Church is not subject to death or birth. It is one and the same, and in Divine grace it is identical with itself! The Apostle Paul in his Epistle to the Hebrews compares the Church to the Heavenly Jerusalem, where angels and the souls of the righteous dwell together. Question. What other definitions of the Church are found in the New Testament? Answer. The Apostle Paul in his Epistle to the Ephesians says that the Church is "the bride of Christ." The image of the Church-Bride is the main content of the Old Testament book "Song of Songs", which ancient exegetes compared to the holy of holies of the Old Testament temple. Question. What does this symbol mean? Answer. The eternal, complete, unchangeable, unshakable love of the Divinity for His Church. The bride is the only love of her heavenly Bridegroom. She is a co-heir of His majesty and glory. In the words of the Hieromartyr Cyprian, only the Church has been promised the kingdom of eternal light, eternal communion with God. In the "Song of Songs" it is written: "Thou art beautiful, my beloved, and there is no stain on thee" (Song of Songs 4:7). Beautiful is the grace of God that dwells in the Church; Souls in which grace dwells become beautiful and angelic. The bride is the only one. Those "others" who would want to steal her name were only miserable harlots; She is a beloved. A person can change his love, and God's love is stronger than hell and death - it is unchangeable. There is no stain or blemish in the Church, since the Church is first of all an invisible force that transforms the world. Sunlight, illuminating the earth, remains pure, even if its rays fall into swamps and cesspools. In the "Song of Songs" there are mysterious words: "Put me as a seal on your heart, like a ring on your hand" (Song of Songs 8:6). The seal is a sign of indelible love. The Church is always in the memory of God, in the light of His truth. When we say: he is close to the heart, we mean the closest spiritual unity, one soul is reflected in another, as it were. The royal seal cannot be erased, destroyed, distorted or replaced. The Church is one. The other church is already a counterfeit seal, it is a crime against the "Bride of Christ," it is a lie against the promise of Divine love. A ring is a sign of eternity. A ring is a sign that is exchanged between the bride and groom at the betrothal, a pledge of love that has no end, in which there can be no change. A betrothal ring is an oath that there will be no second bride, that love is inseparable, that betrayal is like the torment of hell. The right hand of God is the action of grace in the world. The ring on the right hand of God is a sign that all the deeds of God, from the very creation to the infinite transfiguration of the world, are performed for the Church, since the purpose of the entire universe is hidden in the Church. In the words of the Apostle Paul, the Church is the pillar and ground of the truth (1 Tim. 3:15). The pillar signifies the steadfastness of the Church, its eternal abiding in the truth. Truth is not only the teaching of the Church, truth is her very life; truth is the grace that has been at work in her since the day of Pentecost. Truth is the unceasing Pentecost in the divine services and sacraments of the Church. Therefore, the Church cannot be built artificially. Therefore, all heresies and schisms (even if not for the schismatics themselves) are called not the Church of God, but human names. The Hieromartyr Irenaeus of Lyons wrote about this in the II century. The Church is the affirmation of the truth. Truth is affirmed through the action of the Holy Spirit on the human heart. The Holy Spirit gives man direct witness, inner certainty, that the teaching of the Gospel is the truth. But at the same time, the Church is the guardian of the doctrine, so to believe in the Church is to accept what it accepts and to reject what it rejects. On the main pillar rests the entire weight of the building, and on the Church of God rests the weight of the entire universe. In ancient times, after military campaigns, kings erected pillars from stone slabs or solid granite, on which they wrote about the victories won over enemies in memory of their descendants. And on the Church there are eternal writings about how Christ defeated Satan and hell and how a Christian can become a winner in the spiritual battle. The Apostle Paul and the Apostle John the Theologian call the Church and the Kingdom of God the Heavenly Jerusalem, where the angels and the souls of the saints dwell together. Jerusalem means "the peace of God," peace as spiritual unity in love and grace. The world is God who dwells in His creations. Question. What is a schism? Answer. The very word "schism" means division, dismemberment, fragmentation, rejection of a part from the whole. Schism is a sin against love, on which unity is based. Where there is no love, there can be no grace. The schism has three planes: ecclesiological, psychological, and occult. The ecclesiological plan is a disbelief in the promise that the Savior gave to the Church, a bold destruction of all church canons, an attempt to create a new "church" without Holy Pentecost. The psychological plane is pride, lust for power and disobedience. The occult plan is the opposition to the grace of God acting in the Church. Question. We would like to consider the schism from an ecclesiological point of view. The schismatics assert that they are the only true Church, and all the above-mentioned properties of the Church belong to their community. What is the main mistake of the schismatics? [1] Answer. The schismatics ignore the conciliar principle and the hierarchical structure of the Church. They believe that in the presence of a bishop of the same mind as them, it is possible to artificially create a new Church. But from the greater proceeds the lesser, and the higher blesses the lower; the bishop receives the grace of his rank from the Church, consequently he is not equal to the Church, but less than it, so he and his supporters cannot create, as it were, a new Church. Otherwise, the bishop would be greater than the Church. Question. How to understand the dependence of a bishop on the Church? Answer. A bishop is elected by a council of bishops of the local Church, which authorizes the consecration of several bishops as its representatives. A bishop is judged by a council of bishops, which can deprive him of his cathedra, forbid him to serve, or depose him from his rank. In addition, the bishop is subordinate to the senior bishop in the region (metropolitan or patriarch). Questions concerning church life are decided by the Synod, and in some cases by the Council. A person who is on the hierarchical ladder can pass on to others less than he has. Therefore, a bishop, being less than the Church, cannot create a Church. By breaking communion with the Church, he is deprived of what the Church has given him. Therefore, a schismatic bishop cannot do anything sacred. Question. Are the schismatics true in saying that the Church is the purity of doctrine, which, in their opinion, is preserved by their community? Answer. Purity of doctrine is a necessary property of the Church, but not yet the Church. Otherwise, the New Testament Church would have been built gradually over the course of three and a half years of the Gospel preaching of Christ the Savior and would have ended with His last farewell discourse. But the Church was created on the day of Pentecost, at the time of the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles. Before His sufferings, the Lord promised His disciples to send down to them the Holy Spirit, Who would guide them into all truth. Christian doctrine is not an abstract doctrine, but the action of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth of the Church, where doctrine is inseparable from liturgics and hierarchical continuity. The Church preserves the purity of the faith in the unity of love, in the unity between the Local Churches, in the unity of the Heavenly and Earthly Churches, in the unity of the people and the hierarchy. This unity is an indispensable condition for the action in the Church of the Holy Spirit, Who is the Guardian of Truth, the Teacher of Truth, and Himself the absolute, perfect, and living Truth. The falling away of schismatics from the Church in the name of dogmatic plausibility based on personal opinions entails the loss of the Spirit of Truth. Therefore, any schism is an area of spiritual darkness, emptiness and falsehood, where neither the unity of love nor religious purity can exist and be preserved. Question. In what is the unity of the Church expressed in her earthly plane? Where is the concrete, visible principle of this unity? Answer. In conciliarity as an expression of the consciousness of the entire universal Church, which, in the words of the Apostle Paul, has "the mind of Christ." Each schism is a struggle against the Church and, above all, an opposition of one's group, in essence, closed-sectarian thinking to the conciliar mind. A tragic example of opposition to the universal Church is the history of the Roman cathedra. Many believe that the cause of its fall was the Latin heresy "filioque" and other deviations incompatible with Orthodoxy, but they were more of a consequence than a cause. The reason is the desire to place oneself above the universal Church, ignoring conciliar thinking as a principle of preserving the truth. That is why particular errors and deviations, which would have been corrected in conciliar unity, entered the practice and consciousness of Rome, and were then dogmatized. Any schism is the claim of the part to represent the whole. The Church is a living body, so a part torn away and torn out of the body becomes a dead, rotting piece. Question. The schismatics say that they have their own episcopate, their own synod, and therefore have their own conciliarity? Answer. At the beginning of every schism, we see disobedience and rebellion against the Church. Conciliarity cannot arise from self-will, and hierarchy cannot arise from a suspended bishop. One of the Fathers wrote that the devil is the monkey of God. We can say that schism is the monkey of the Church. Question. The schismatics refer to the example of St. Maximus the Confessor: when he was persuaded to enter into Eucharistic communion with heretics and told that all the patriarchs had accepted Monophylitism, he replied that if the whole world accepted the heresy, then it would still remain with the truth. Are the schismatics correct in drawing the conclusion from this that one person in the whole world can preserve the truth? Answer. The Monk Maximus said, "if the whole world," but the very word "if" indicates that he did not admit this at all, it means that the phrase is conditional. Here is a rhetorical device, when hyperbole emphasizes and reinforces the idea that truth is above everything, including Eucharistic communion with the tsar and the patriarchs who have accepted heresy. Here the heretics tried to deceive the Monk Maximus, saying that the entire universal Church had accepted Monophylitism, and he clearly saw this lie. Only the Patriarchs of Constantinople and Antioch accepted the heresy, and the Patriarch of Jerusalem and the Pope of Rome immediately rejected it. The Patriarch of Alexandria accepted the heresy temporarily, by mistake, and then, convinced by Maximus the Confessor, returned to Orthodoxy. In the Churches of Constantinople and Antioch, the majority of bishops, priests, and laity remained Orthodox. Therefore, at the Sixth Ecumenical Council, the heresy of Monophylitism was rejected and condemned. The Monk Maximus the Confessor refused communion with persons who had openly and publicly accepted heresy, and in his person tried to find support for themselves. St. Maximus the Confessor, who devoted his life to the struggle against heresy, never identified the universal Church with heretics and did not try to create his own Church. Question. The schismatics refer to the canons of the Council of Constantinople (called the Council of St. Sophia after the name of the cathedral) that prayerful ties with a bishop who teaches heresy to the people should be broken off and his name should not be commemorated at the Liturgy. Answer. In the canons of the Council there is no basis for schism as secession from the Church and the formation of a new hierarchy, on the contrary, the accusers of the bishop must appeal to the local council and await its decision. If the court of a small council does not satisfy any of the parties, then it can bring a complaint or an appeal to the larger one - the district council, but before that it obeys the decision of the first court of bishops. Disobedience to a conciliar court forever deprives you of the right to appeal to a higher authority, since disobedience itself becomes a guilty verdict. As for the rupture of prayerful communion with a heretical hierarch, it presupposes the teaching of heresy in sermons, which are an organic part of the divine service, the teaching of heresy as a church dogma, and stubbornness in heretical opinion, despite the exhortations of the brother bishops. The rupture of prayerful communion with the bishop is a temporary measure until the decision of the council, which must either acquit the bishop, or excommunicate him from the Church, or accept repentance from him. At the same time, the canon of the Council of St. Sophia forbids disobedience to a bishop on the grounds of personal suspicion. All church canons are based on the belief that the Holy Spirit – the Spirit of Truth – will always dwell in the Church, and therefore the universal Church cannot fall into heresy and be deprived of saving grace. Not a single canon of the Holy Apostles, Ecumenical and Local Councils contains even a hint that the purity of dogmas could be preserved through the breakdown of the church structure. Question. The schismatics say that they have their own episcopate and their own Church. That Auxentius, whose name they bear, was a bishop of the Orthodox Church, and that when the Church fell into heresy, he and his followers became the Church themselves. Answer. We have already said that the bishop receives his grace from the Church through consecration - as the lesser of the greater, so by his grace he cannot create the Church, that which is greater than him. A bishop who is suspended by the Church and at the same time performs his ministry is already sacrileging, stealing and stealing the sacred from God Himself. Question. The schismatics call themselves the "Orthodox Greek Church of North America." What does that mean? Answer. The Church is not an abstraction, but a reality. Each church has its own status. What Church are the schismatics talking about? If it is autonomous, then who gave it autonomy? If autocephalous, then which local Churches have recognized it? If it is universal, then how can it be called by the name of a people and a region? This means that it is a Church with a status unknown to Orthodoxy, non-existent and false. But since the schismatics consider it to be the only Orthodox Church in the whole world, in their eyes it must be a "universal" Church, and the name North American Greek is a temporary cover, necessary in order to conceal and disguise its pretentiousness and obvious absurdity. If they are the universal Church, then their bishop must have the authority of the head of the universal Church, that is, to be the "Pope of Orthodoxy," since conciliarity is impossible here. Conciliarity is that quality of the Church which is always inherent in it, and is not created as the number of bishops increases. If they assert that within their schism there exists the principle of conciliarity, then each of their meetings will represent the fullness of the universal Church and be equal to the Ecumenical Council, which can accept and confirm dogmas, form local Churches, and so on. If they are a universal Church, then they can give their representative in Georgia the title of Catholicos-Patriarch or Exarch.

And since each schism tends to disintegrate and fragment, and each part also considers itself to be the only Orthodox, the number of archbishops, exarchs, and patriarchs can increase exponentially. They want to drive believers into this bedlam who have lost their sense of responsibility to the Church. Question. The schismatics present accusations that seem serious to us. Answer. Mistakes, sins, and imperfections are inherent in all people, no matter what position they occupy. It is for this reason that the Orthodox Church considers the claims of the Roman Pontiff to sinlessness in matters of faith and piety absurd. But the Church and the hierarchy are such great gifts of God that they cannot be made dependent on the human weaknesses and imperfections of persons who have received apostolic authority, so the ministry of these persons is salvific for the people. In the Gospel of John, the shepherd is the one who enters the sheepfold through the doors, and the thief and robber is the one who wants to enter there by another way. According to the interpretation of exegetes, the sheepfold is the Church, the gate is a lawful ordination, thieves and robbers are heretics and schismatics who, destroying the fence, that is, the church structure, steal and steal the souls of people. To take a person away from the Church means to spiritually kill him. With the worst of Orthodox bishops, one can be saved through patience and obedience, only not blind, but reasonable, that is, obedience in line with the Gospel commandments and church rules. And to go over to the best of the schismatic bishops means to find oneself in a well-equipped morgue, locked up with the corpses, even though this morgue outwardly has the form of a church. Question. Why did the head of the schismatics not call himself a patriarch, but only a bishop, and then an archbishop? Answer. First, as we have said, for tactical reasons, the schismatics called themselves the Greek Church, and the head of the Greek Church bore the title of archbishop, so one thing led to another. The self-proclaimed archbishop and the self-proclaimed patriarch are not much different from each other. Then the question arises: what kind of patriarch would Auxentius call himself? If he considers his community to be the only universal Church, then the title of this patriarch should be "Patriarch of Patriarchs." Even the title "Ecumenical Patriarch" would mean a local Church, in this case the Church of Constantinople, which would not correspond to the claims of the schismatics to the only true Church. For their "self-sanctification" there would simply be no title in the entire history of Orthodoxy. But the essence of the matter does not change from the name. Schismatics invade local Churches, rule in other dioceses, ordain clergymen, perform a second chrismation, and so on, that is, they do not take into account any church canons. Even the Catholic Church forbade the naming of its bishops by the names of previously existing Orthodox dioceses, so the actions of the schismatics in their autocracy surpassed even the Caesarist tendencies of the Popes of Rome. They are more like the powers of a dictator in wartime, who can abolish any laws, including the constitution, at his discretion. The title of archbishop for the head of the schismatics is just as conditional and camouflage; In fact, he behaves like a monopatriarch. But the mono-patriarchs do not give birth to a conciliar Church, but new arch-patriarchs, for whom the church canons are their own unlimited will. Question. If a bishop has left the Church for schism, but excommunication has not yet been pronounced over him, then to what extent does he preserve the grace received in the Church, and can he be called a bishop at all? Answer. The Church pronounces an official excommunication in order to inform the people that the former bishop has become a false teacher and cannot be given the honor that belongs to the bishop. According to the definition of the Second Ecumenical Council, "everything it does is null and void." St. Cyprian of Carthage writes: "The Church is in the bishop, and the bishop is in the Church" - the Church cannot exist without the bishop, and the bishop without the Church. By leaving the Church, a bishop, a priest and a layman lose everything that they have received in the Church - in the words of St. Cyprian of Carthage, even the name of a Christian. A bishop who violates the episcopal oath of obedience to the Church loses apostolic grace, he can no longer be called a bishop, just as an extinguished ray cannot be called light. The same applies to a priest who simultaneously violates two oaths of priestly oath: obedience to the lawful bishop and obedience to the Church. Church rules forbid taking a blessing from heretics and schismatics; it is called "superstition." Apostolic canons categorically forbid praying together with those excommunicated from the Church, not only in their gatherings, but even at home. ("He who prays with the excommunicated, let him himself be excommunicated" - the 10th apostolic canon.) Question. Can a bishop's sin committed against the Church be an excuse for schism? Answer. Schism is worse than any sin against the Church, since it is a rejection of the Church itself. The Lord said: Search the Scriptures (John 5:39). In the Bible, we can find the answer to our doubts and misunderstandings. The high priest Aaron, even before his calling to the priesthood, sinned grievously: yielding to threats, he made an idol in the form of a golden calf and instituted a feast in its honor. This sin was so grave that the Lord wanted to destroy the entire people of Israel, and only the prayer of the prophet Moses turned away the wrath of God. Moses asked the Lord either to have mercy on the sinful people, or to strike him out of the number of the living. Here we see that the participation in the sin of the prophet's brother was not an excuse for the people. Church obedience is obedience to the will of God, and false obedience is the satisfaction of one's passions by referring to the crimes of others. But Aaron, after his fall, became a high priest, "called of God" (Heb. 5:4). When Korah, Dathan, and Abiram rebelled against the lawful ecclesiastical authority and demanded that they be given the honor and right to perform sacrifices, the wrath of God came upon them: the earth opened up like hell and swallowed them up with its jaws, and the fire that descended from heaven burned up their followers. This execution was similar to the destruction of Sodom, so the schismatics must ponder whose end, the Church or the schism, is the image of the death of the criminal Pentapolis. Although the sin of the priests could be a reason for the rebels to accuse the high priest, the rebellion in the Church, an attempt to seize by force the temple power and not belonging to the rank, was condemned by God and given over to public execution. The blessing given to Aaron and his descendants to be priests of the Old Testament Church was not abolished until the time of the New Testament Church, although the God-killers Annas and Caiaphas belonged to this family. The biblical books tell us about many crimes that were committed by priests and high priests (the 1st book of Maccabees calls one priest an atheist, an impious [3]), but we do not find a single case when church piety would be restored and preserved through schism. The people looked upon the sins of the priests as punishment for their sins and saw salvation in general repentance, not in schisms. Question. Is it possible to find similar examples in the history of the New Testament Church? Answer. During the Arian, Monophysite, and Iconoclastic troubles, there were periods when the whole East seemed to be sinking into heresy. By the beginning of the patriarchate of St. Gregory the Theologian in Constantinople, out of one and a half thousand churches, only one belonged to the Orthodox. Why did none of the Orthodox bishops create their own Church with a new hierarchy coming from them? St. Athanasius of Alexandria spent most of his life in exile and imprisonment, but he did not declare himself and his supporters to be the new Church, but fought for Orthodoxy until his death, so to speak, in a Church engulfed in flames. At the Council of Florence, almost all the Greek bishops accepted the shameful union. Why did not the zealous fighter for Orthodoxy, St. Mark of Ephesus, declare the local Churches, which were represented at the Council of Florence as heretics, abolished, and did not rule over other dioceses? The Holy Fathers knew that the Church is invincible and invincible by the forces of hell, so the breath of grace will dispel the dark clouds of heresies, and the sun of Orthodoxy will once again shine brightly over the world. Here, in fact, Archimandrite Raphael speaks about the principles of schism as such, but in particular he touches upon the problem of schism in the Georgian Orthodox Church. Its history is briefly as follows. In May 1998, the abbots of a number of Georgian monasteries appealed to the Synod with an ultimatum: they demanded the withdrawal of the Georgian Orthodox Church from the World Council of Churches and the refusal to participate in other ecumenical organizations, promising otherwise to stop Eucharistic communion with the Georgian Patriarch Ilia. The Synod satisfied their demands, deciding to withdraw from the WCC. However, some of the monastics decided to go further, demanding also to stop communion with all (!) local Churches because of the participation of these Churches in ecumenical movements. Since this condition was not fulfilled by the Synod, representatives of the "extreme" minority did stop commemorating Patriarch Ilia during divine services and turned into schism. At present, they form a small group that maintains communion with the Greek schismatics. -Ed. ^ Auxentius is the leader of one of the Old Calendarist Greek schisms. -Ed. ^Cm. 1 Poppy. 7:9: the king sent the wicked Alcimus, giving him the priesthoodThis Alcimus was a priest from the tribe of Aaron (1 Mac. 7:14); But Alcimus coveted the high priesthood (1 Mac. 7:21). -Ed. ^

The Image of Christ

All Holy Scripture is Christocentric: the Old and New Testaments can be compared to two circles nested inside each other. Christ is the center of the Old Testament, to which prophetic revelations and temple types lead, like lines of force from the periphery; Christ is the center of the New Testament, from whom come, like the rays of the sun, the eternal light of the Gospel and the power of grace. In the last centuries before the coming of Christ to earth, in the era of nascent rabbinism, the image of the Messiah was distorted, mainly under the influence of national utopias, which led to a tragic result: the majority of the Jewish people did not understand and did not accept Jesus of Nazareth. Where the image of Christ is distorted, Christianity is distorted or completely destroyed. The salvation of man is his transfiguration in the image of Christ the Savior through the grace of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes Christians ask the question: "Will not a heretic be saved if he was martyred for Christ?" But in every heresy and sect the very image of Christ is replaced.