"Archimandrite Cyprian's book "Orthodox Pastoral Ministry" is, in our opinion, the best guide for pastors written to this day in the Russian language. In a lively and accessible language, Fr. Kyprian speaks about what he has learned from his own experience over many years of pastoral ministry. The book deals with the spiritual, moral and intellectual preparation for the priestly ministry, about the "pastoral calling" and "pastoral mood", about ordination, about the temptations that await the priest in his pastoral activity, about the appearance, behavior, material support and family life of the priest. A special section of the book is devoted to "counseling"—spiritual guidance and confession. It seems to us that the work of Archimandrite Cyprian should become a reference book for every clergyman of the Russian Orthodox Church," said Met. Hilarion (Alfeyev).

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Part 1: The Foundations of Pastoral Ministry

Ideological Justifications of Pastoral Care.

Before proceeding to the study of the traditional questions of pastoral theology, it is necessary to clarify the fundamental prerequisites that should form the basis of pastoral work and which must be built in full accord with the basic data of the Orthodox worldview. Pastoral care itself presupposes a certain environment. It is forbidden to shepherd in the wilderness and in seclusion. A solitary life is a special form of service to God, but there is no place for the pastor's activity, which takes place in the world and in the society of people. Therefore, it is necessary to find out what will be the attitude of the future pastor to this world and to man. It is necessary to determine the attitude of man in the world. A pastor must make a correct assessment of this world and society, which draws man to the earth and often distracts him from God.

The first question that confronts us is, "What is peace?"

It must be admitted at once that this term in theological literature is confusing and often ambiguous. Peace, in addition to its direct meaning, is also used in theology as a well-known ascetic term. It is to this second meaning of the word "world" as a spiritual and moral category that we shall turn in the first place, in order to speak later about the world in its direct sense.

Asceticism understands the word "world" as a certain state of our soul. It is not something outside the person, but in the person himself. This is what the Holy Scriptures and all patriotic literature teach us. The attitude of the Christian mind is especially pronounced in the writings of the Ev. St. John: "The world lies in evil" (1 John 5:19). The world does not know God (John 1:10; 17:25). The Apostle Paul adds that the world has not known God in its wisdom (1 Cor. 1:21). Moreover, the world hates God and Christ (John 7:7; 15:18-19). Hence the clear conclusion: it is impossible to love the world and God (1 John 2:15). Therefore, the pessimistic view of this world is understandable: "The world passeth away, and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God endureth for ever" (1 John 2:17). The Old Testament words come to mind: "vanity of vanities" and "all kinds of vanity" (Eccl. 1:1). Everything passes, everything is perishable, all the aspirations of the sons of men are nothing but vanity...

If we turn to patriotic testimonies, then the "world" in their view is the totality of forces and aspirations hostile to God and goodness around man. The world lies all in evil, it is all poisoned and infected with sin. One should not jump to conclusions. Only the shell of this world is sinful. Evil is seen not in the essence of the world and its nature, but in what surrounds and envelops it. The world is not evil in itself, but it lies in evil.

Here are a few excerpts from the Holy Fathers, and the most severe ones, which, it would seem, should be more irreconcilable with created nature. Prep. St. Isaac the Syrian writes: "Peace is a collective name that includes the enumerated passions. The world is the life of the flesh and the wisdom of the flesh" (Homily 2 and 85). Abba Isaiah of Nitria teaches: "The world is the expanse of sin, the arena of unnaturalness; it is the fulfillment of one's carnal desires; It is the thought that you will always be in this age. Peace is taking care of one's body more than taking care of one's soul. Peace is about what you leave behind." (Philokalia, vol. 1, p. 372). St. St. Mark the Ascetic adds to this: "Because of the passions, we have received the commandment not to love the world, nor the things of the world. But not in such a sense as to recklessly hate the creatures of God, but to cut off from oneself the occasion for these passions" (ibid., p. 529). Theoliptus of Philadelphia put it this way: "By peace I call the love of sensible things and of the flesh" (Dobr. 5:176).

From what has been said, it is clear that "world" in the language of Orthodox asceticism does not mean nature, not the empirical world, not God's creations, but a certain category of negative spirituality. The creature itself is not suspected. There are many stories about the love of ascetics for creatures, for nature, for animals. Orthodox asceticism is characterized by a joyful acceptance of the creature with love and great reverence.

This reverence for and acceptance of the created world makes a significant correction in the use of words. "The world" means not only the totality of passions and the arena of sin, but first of all the creation of God, and it must be remembered that this creation is "very good." The created world is a reflection of another uncreated plane, according to which the Creator created this cosmos that surrounds us. The richest Greek language was content with the same term "cosmos" to denote both "peace" and "beauty." This divine structure of the world, the reflection in it of a reality other than empirical, provides the richest material for the so-called "symbolic realism" of the Holy Fathers, and hence abundant means for deepening into oneself and into the contemplation of this world. Only a creature of divine origin is capable of being sanctified and transfigured. If the world were evil in itself, it would mean that it is the creation of an evil inclination. But evil, as St. Maximus the Confessor teaches, "is not in the nature of creatures, but in the irrational and sinful use of them."

It is necessary to draw from Orthodox dogmatics quite full-blooded and sober conclusions. It is necessary to stop taking under suspicion that which God has not taken under suspicion, that which God has not abhorred. It is impossible to dogmatically confess the Chalcedonian Creed about the perception of human nature by God and at the same time to be a Manichaean, a Bogomil or a Skopets in life and in one's worldview. Christianity defeated the Monophysites dogmatically, but, in the correct words of a Western historian, it did not overcome the well-known "psychological Monophysitism." This abhorrence of man and the world as a creature of God very subtly and firmly envelops asceticism, liturgics, everyday life and ethics of the Christian. First of all, the pastor must understand this and oppose it in every possible way. It is necessary always to bear in mind the decrees of the Council of The Hague, which condemn immoderate asceticism and pseudo-pious Puritanism, which have no place even in a sober Orthodox worldview. This should be the cosmological basis for pastoral care.