* Readiness for persecution by this world and its princes. Fearless rejection of all conciliation (conformism).

• A humble consciousness of one's own unworthiness and striving for the reverence of Christ, and not the denunciation and condemnation of dissidents.

* An experience of faith and living in the gospel that led to the bowing of one's head to the service of God.

Pastoral mood

This question is the cornerstone of the science of pastoral care and determines the innermost things that lie in the actions of the priest. It is not so much a question of content as of the direction of the pastoral heart. The knowledge and training of the priest will be discussed in the next chapter. Here we will examine the question of where the spiritual vision of the pastor is directed and what distinguishes his ministry from all other ministries in the Church.

This question has been considered in different ways in science. For a long time, under the influence of the scholastic West, our textbooks repeated what was said in the Catholic and Lutheran "chodegetics." Anthony (Khrapovitsky) gave this question a completely different direction. He returned to the roots of the Holy Fathers and the true Orthodox tradition, having decisively shaken the ashes of dry scholasticism.

It is usually pointed out that the pastor must be prayerful, spiritual, unmercenary, sober, meek, etc. But all these virtues are essentially required of the laity as well, and of the pastor their application is required more strictly and must reach perfection. However, this means that the difference is only quantitative, not substantive, and the priesthood does not confer any special gift on the Christian. The merit of Met. For Russian Orthodox theology, St. Anthony posed the question to his listeners: "Is there a special gift of pastoral care, and if so, what does it consist of?" – and to this question he gave an interesting, original, and not at all rational and scholastic answer. This answer should not be accepted as an absolute truth, outside of which there is no other, possibly true answer, but this answer fully corresponds to the spirit of Orthodox patristics and asceticism. Later we will speak of the incompleteness of his view, expounding its essence and the teaching of some of the Holy Fathers.

First of all, we will say that Met. Anthony was a conductor of a strong psychologism and moralism. This is evident from his work "Psychological Evidence for Free Will and Moral Responsibility," in his articles on the moral application of dogma, and in his famous work "The Dogma of the Atonement." At that time, in the era of positivism and determinism, such a view was a ray of bright sunshine and a fresh breath of life-giving wind. In our time, theology is unable to reconcile itself to this alone.

Psychologism and moralism are also pursued by him in pastoral theology. Vocation has absolutely no significance, the emphasis is placed on spiritual and ascetic training. Attention was devoted to the revelation of one's pastoral gift and mood, and to the multiplication of this gift in oneself. This teaching can be schematically reduced to pastoral influence.

Man's will is free, but it is subject to the influence of every other will acting upon it to the extent of its importance. The power of influence is not so much in the words and content of what is said, but in the persuasiveness of the spirit, morality, and perfection. "Pastoral preaching," said Met. St. Anthony is presented in the Holy Scriptures as a force that acts independently of the content of the teaching, but depending on the inner mood of the speaker. The influence of a shepherd's soul on his flock depends mainly on the degree of his devotion to his calling. The main condition is not in scholarship, not in the psychological subtlety of the moral figure, but in something else that does not need any intermediary or external manifestation, or that remains undetermined externally in all these manifestations, but flows directly into the soul of the person being instructed.

What is this special mood that can have such an effect on the person being taught? The gift of compassionate love," Met. Antony. This gift can revive a fallen sinner, lift him from the depths of despair, and give him the strength to further moral improvement. It should not be forgotten that even the very redemption of the human race is explained by this author as compassion for people in their sins, moral bearing of their inner burdens, and experiencing them in His heart with compassion and love. As is well known, Christ's redemption of our race is attributed to the moment of Gethsemane's moral sufferings, in which the Chalice is not of the physical sufferings of the Cross, but of moral suffering for the human race.

In his work, the pastor must strive, and he is given the grace-filled gift of spiritually identifying himself with others, "assimilating to himself, to his heart, every neighbor" (Vol. 2, p. 256), to spread his message to the entire flock. In his moral experience of the sins of his flock, in his compassion for their shortcomings, the pastor should ideally reach the point of identifying himself with others to such an extent that "all I disappear and only We remain." In other words, this teaching tries to overcome separateness, subjectivism, and to reveal to the highest degree the conciliar empathy of all members of the Body of Christ with the sufferings and joys of others.

To this doctrine of compassion and empathy, Met. Anthony is easily confirmed in the epistles of Ap. Paul, and in the writings of some of the Fathers. In fact, if, according to the words of the Apostle, in contrast to the Old Testament, we have a High Priest who can have compassion on us in our infirmities (Hebrews 4:15), then Ap. Paul may say, "My children, for whom I am again in the pains of birth" (Tal. 4:19) or "Whosoever faints, with whom shall I not faint?" (2 Corinthians 11:29) and even strive that "I may be all things to all, that I may save some" (1 Corinthians 9:22).

That such a gift of compassion is given to the priest and precisely in the sacrament of consecration, Met. St. Anthony finds confirmation in St. Chrysostom, who, in his commentary on the Epistle to the Colossians, writes: "Spiritual love does not give birth to anything earthly: it comes from above, from heaven, and is given in the sacrament of the priesthood, but the assimilation and maintenance of the gift of grace depends on the striving of the human spirit."