-50-

But in practice, it will be said, all this is impossible to fulfill. For His true servants—and there are few of them—God will always find a place and an opportunity for them to fulfill His commandments without difficulty. It is impossible only for non-believers and those who do not want to be saved, they create for themselves this impossible environment, which is pleasant to them, from which they do not want to part. What is impossible of what is impossible? If you can't, do what you can. If your conscience does not allow you to do this, go away and do what your soul strives for (up to becoming a monk). Therefore, it is more correct to ask the question not about the possibility or impossibility of being a doctor at the present time, familiar with all the rules of science, and at the same time a true Christian, but about the possibility and necessity for everyone to fulfill the commandments of Christ in a given situation and to the extent of his spiritual strength (and it is certainly not appropriate for the Church to take under its protection all the modern debauchery of medicine without exception).

As for the sick, their work is less responsible before the law of God. Only crowns await them for enduring sorrow, torment, and suffering. If only they were humble. In any case, there is no sin to be cured. In the answers of St. Barsanuphius the Great to a layman we read: "As for showing oneself to a doctor, I will say: leaving everything to God is the work of the perfect, although it is difficult, and the weakest thing is to show oneself to the doctor, because this is not only not a sin, but also a sign of humility, when he, as the weakest, wished to show himself to the doctor. But even then it must be recognized that without God even a physician cannot do anything; but if it pleases God, He will give health to the sick."106

The greatest of the saints themselves did not refuse medical remedies in some cases. It is only worth remembering how St. Basil the Great wrote from

107

desert (according to our words - from the resort), not without irony over himself, to a certain high civil official, apologizing for his absence from the city and the inability to meet him as befits him: "For a whole month now I have been treated with native warm waters in order to get some benefit from it. But in vain, apparently, I work in the desert, or even seem worthy to many

laughing, not listening to the proverb that says that it will not benefit the dead and

108

warm."

-51-

Let us also recall how the lamp of the Church, St. John Chrysostom, wrote from exile in a letter to Olympias (his spiritual daughter), blessing her to take care of her health and encouraging her to do so by his own example: "... I beseech your honesty, and as a great mercy I ask you to take greater care of the healing of the disease of your body. True, even despondency109 produces sickness; but when the body has also suffered and is completely weakened and remains in great neglect, does not use either doctors, or the well-dissolved air, or the abundance of necessary things, then consider that from this there is a considerable increase in danger. Therefore, I ask your honesty to use various experienced doctors and medicines that can eliminate this kind of disease. In the same way, a few days before, when, owing to the state of the air, our stomachs were disposed to vomit, we also took advantage of other kinds of care, as well as the medicine sent by my lady, the most respectable Synclitia, and eliminated the disease, without finding it necessary to use it for more than three days. Therefore, I ask you to use it yourself and see to it that it is sent to us again, because when we began to feel upset again, we again took advantage of it and corrected everything."110

Such examples are not isolated, they can be doubled. All of them show that ascetics even have a certain freedom in relation to their body, exhausted by feats and sorrows, but that this freedom must be used skillfully. Those who do not have the mind of Basil and Chrysostom, or even just a good Christian, that is, beginners, should ask for the blessing of their elder and spiritual guide in what is permissible. "Whoever has any disease," the ancient saints teach,111 "should inquire about it to one of the fathers and do everything according to his advice. For sometimes it happens that an elder has

and secretly gives healing, so that bodily physicians are not always

112