God-pleasing and God-fearing (cf. Exodus 1:21) physicians are that "they pray to the Lord that He would help them to give relief and healing to the sick for the continuation of life" (Sirach 38:14). But there are, as we have seen, other doctors who do not believe in God either, who do not care about the sick as brothers in Christ (for the sick are only "objects" of experience for them), doctors with whom even the world itself is indignant. It is clear that they cannot give any healing to the sick, but bring him – as a bleeding woman in the Gospel – "to an even worse condition" (Mark 5:26). There are exceptions only when the grace and Providence of God need to act for something through unworthy hands, that is, when the sick person himself is already praying to God for himself or the people around him are praying for him.

It is clear why modern doctors have failures. Doctors of the first kind do not heal themselves, but God heals through them. "We only lay hands on you," said Saints Cosmas and Damian to the sick in explanation of their actions and method of treatment, "but by our own power we can do nothing. All action is produced by the almighty power of Christ, the One True God, in Whom

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you will believe without doubt, you will immediately recover..." And doctors of the second kind, not being conductors of the power of Christ, are helpless and completely depend on the notorious science, on the external circumstances that cause the patient's illness, on their own experience and ingenuity. They are now trying to "lay hands" (I mean treatment with hypnosis, hypnotic passes), but it would be better if they did not do this. It cannot be denied that they conduct a force in this process, but a demonic force.

That is why St. John Chrysostom so categorically, especially in the latter case, asserts about such doctors: "... only it seems that they are curing, but on the

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in fact, they do not cure – not at all." But to say so, some will say, is to go against the obvious facts of the daily recovery of many thousands of patients thanks to existing hospitals and doctors? Alas, the latter do not all think so. In this regard, Dr. E. Vernadsky, who is not at all our supporter, says frankly: "There is a cure for diseases,

in spite of great shortcomings in their cognition, but only because diseases, in fact, are cured by themselves." And again: "The lion's share of any cure, and often the entire cure, falls to the share of -49-

self-healing power of nature, and our participation has, in comparison, an extremely insignificant effect"100. It's like saying: God heals. That's what we'll say.

For me, of course, we can only talk about Christian, church-minded doctors, and external doctors – what should I judge? But God judges those who are outside, says the Apostle (1 Corinthians 5:13). It is about Christian doctors and about their treatment that I will continue my discussions.

Serving the sick, even as an orderly or nurse, is an excellent and most useful thing for the soul. As long as it is done with a reasonable purpose.101 I will quote the words of Elder John the Seer of the famous Serida Monastery,

who says: "To have compassion on the sick and to help them with healing,

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good deed" and "A doctor who cares for the sick receives a reward" from God. But for all this it is necessary that he should be pious, that just as he himself should be nourished by the sacraments of the Holy Church, so that he should not forbid his patients to do the same, but that he should first of all advise them.103 He must be humble and think not about his own glory, but about God's, remembering that "for this reason He gave knowledge to men, that they should glorify Him in His wondrous works" (Sirach 38:6). A doctor must constantly control his relations with the patient and his prescriptions by the commandments of the Gospel and the Church, without unnecessarily forcing his conscience in relation to the violation of fasts, chastity, and the like (undressing, for example, in many cases is completely superfluous – there is a whole medical school abroad that makes diagnoses on the basis of one patient's face). If the physician does this, he will see for himself that certain things, which, as we have seen, have been tempted and indignant by society, will be forbidden to him by his personal conscience. And they are easy for him to understand. For example, the case told by Veresaev about an unsuccessful, fatal throat operation, he himself equates with the so-called (in church canons) involuntary murder, punishable by penance of five years or more; the case of the American doctor Nitus is already a "voluntary", that is, deliberate, murder. His penance is twenty years or more.104 This also includes abortions, the use of such means that entail miscarriage, and the like, although the punishment for them is somewhat (half) reduced.105 Conscience will tell a good doctor where he acts out of duty, and where out of passion.