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This book contains the reflections of a hierarch of the Orthodox Church of Antioch on the life position of a Christian in the modern world. In it, Vladyka George Khodr touches upon such acute topics as the attitude of a Christian to social activity and politics, technological civilization, social and national liberation struggles. Considerable attention is paid to the problems of the so-called "third world". The author speaks ambiguously on the question of the possibility for a Christian to use weapons for the sake of the triumph of a cause that he considers to be right. The main idea of the book is that belonging to the Church should cease to be an external and formal circumstance in a person's life and become a determining factor in all his affairs.

ru Tatyana Trushova If you found an error - write to e-mail saphyana@inbox.ru ExportToFB21 14.09.2011 OOoFBTools-2011-9-14-12-6-8-378 1.0 THE INVOCATION OF THE SPIRIT Spirit and letter Kiev 2006

Metropolitan George (Khodr) The Invocation of the Spirit

A word to the reader

I cannot hide my excitement at the thought that this collection will be published in Russian. Perhaps the reader will find in it some trace of what I owe to Russian culture, having been brought up by its theological thought. I studied theological disciplines in Paris, at the St. Sergius Institute, created by Russian theologians. There I got a taste of subtle and loving leadership, and there I met active and lively youth inspired by the gospel. 

I came to Paris shortly after the death of Fr. Sergius Bulgakov, but I had the good fortune to study with Bishop Kassian (Bezobrazov), Archimandrite Cyprian (Kern), Professor Anton Kartashev, Fr. Vasily Zenkovsky, Fr. Nikolai Afanasiev, Fr. Alexei Knyazev, Sergei Sergeevich Verkhovsky, Fr. George Florovsky, Professor Vladimir Weidle, and Fr. Alexander Schmemann. 

Even before entering the institute, I read Nikolai Berdyaev and some Russian religious thinkers. Perhaps it was their thoughts and Dostoevsky's books that prompted me to choose the St. Sergius Institute. In addition, there was a great strong friendship with the Russian youth from the Christian Movement. 

But I did not come to St. Sergius Institute from the Arab desert. The Church of Antioch is my mother. And it was in Antioch that Christ's disciples were first called Christians (Acts 11:26). There I found faith, there began my prayer life. And there, in 1942, we, seventeen young students, created the Orthodox Youth Movement, which became the most powerful source of Christian life in the space where our local Church operates. Evangelization began, and souls of extraordinary vitality were manifested in it. All of our current monasticism came from there. Most of our missionary priests, our bishops, were educated there. Anyone who speaks truly fervently about Jesus must have been touched by our apostolic message. The Lord has delivered us from narrow conservatism, from rigid ritualism, and has commanded us to bear witness to the authentic life of the Gospel. This is perhaps the best that the Church of Antioch has been able to give to universal Orthodoxy.

Much of what you will find here comes from this experience. Theological formulations serve to imprint this experience in the language of concepts. Enriched with all the best in our tradition, church spirituality brings life to the world. 

The most interesting thing in this book comes from the experience of the neighborhood of different religions in our regions. Perhaps the peculiarity of our Orthodoxy is that we have a concept of the modern East, but also of the West, for Western culture also lives in us. Orthodoxy, rooted in the experience of the Fathers, and perhaps especially of the ascetic Fathers, accepts every breath of the Spirit.

Metropolitan George (Khodr) of Mount Lebanon

A Call to Christians

You are the bearers of the great call, you are the leaven of salvation. You have become such because of Him Whose name you bear, into Whom you were baptized. However, you are mistaken if you think you mean anything without Him. You are also mistaken if you think that others can never change for the better, as if names are valuable in themselves, and that Christ cannot, with or without water, baptize into God anyone to whom He wishes to bestow His grace. Surely everything comes from the Savior whom you worship: all truth, all purity, all greatness, every ideal. Everything good that is in this world was created by Christ in one way or another. But the Lord acts wherever He pleases, and it is not for you to limit His activities. He promised to fill you with His grace, but He did not say that He would make you the guardians of it alone. I adjure you: do not be "greater royalists than the king" – than your King, who is able to "raise up children for Abraham out of these stones" (Matt. 3:9).