Author: orthodoxaustralia

Update 26th of May 2016: it may appear the issue has been resolved as the facebook user provided the following status update on his facebook page: “It appears the post, the comments and my activity history on facebook have been restored. My emails are still missing but won’t complain about those as i can see everything again on facebook. Will blame it on a “glitch” and assume that somehow facebook engineers saw this complaint and helped restore what had been lost. Thank you to those involved, whomever they may be – may God bless you!”

Original post: The following notes have been forwarded to us by a facebook reader who appeared very concerned about his recent experience on Facebook. You can write us at orthodoxaustralia@yahoo.com.au if you have witnessed this or had a similar experience:

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1068019226611594&id=100002105812678

“How strange, a facebook article seen by many, commented on by many, about the Occult-Ecumenist Stained-Glass Window at the Entrance of the Orthodox Academy of Crete, the host of the Pan Orthodox Council, has been taken down. There were valuable comments there for all to see. The article has been taken offline. It was the english translation of this article in Greek plus much of the others contributions to understanding the message behind it. My facebook log activity shows like i had never shared it, visited or contributed to it. There are things that can’t be just said in the public space without consequences …

Not only that but my new friend i made while commenting to this post, who requested my friendship, has been removed from my facebook, as his private messages i received from him have all dissapeared. All gone!

When i checked my yahoo mail, all the facebook confirmation emails … gone as well. Who is that powerfull to do all these?”

http://www.romfea.gr/diafora/8446-apokrufistiko-oikoumenistiko-bitro-stin-orthodoji-akadimia-kritis

The original Facebook post that was removed was located here:

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=266308217051392&id=100010166475870

“He laid the foundations of the earth that it never should move at any time”.

Where do the Bible and the teachings of the Holy Fathers fit in with the observation of today’s science?

The “missing link” may be found in the falling of the universe (of the whole of Creation) due to sin of man. The Earth may had been created as the center of the universe and maybe even everything was static then, or maybe everything rotates around the Earth even today while the Earth remains static. But what we know is that with the fall of man the whole universe fell, got corrupted and trends towards entropy. When we look at gravity we see one of the consequences of the fall – unless something “struggles” against gravity, it falls down to earth and crashes. So it is with the soul of man – it has spiritual gravity, without doing nothing, without struggle, it falls into Hades. Today we are rotting on account of the Fall and unless energy is pumped in, all leads to chaos – third law of thermodynamics states the same principle. So in order to prevent the destruction of the whole universe things may had had to “start” to rotate so it did not completely destroy itself before time – the centrifugal force of rotation counters that of gravity and prevents everything from collapsing, for now. In other words, with the fall of Man and of the whole Universe, the laws of the fallen world as we see today had been put into effect, and they may not be the same laws that were originally established. It is said that a new Heaven and a New Earth shall be created after their complete destruction. When looked at the Cosmos from this perspective, the fact the Earth may rotate or may not rotate today starts to look less and less in contradiction with what the Bible states.

All that we can observe today are the laws of the fallen universe. Some of them we came to understand, some we didn’t and never will. While some of the glare of the former universe still remains for us to wonder at, it will never give us the full splendor of the one to come … neither will we ever discover its laws. It appears that whatever scientific knowledge we have, is really only a model of the reality and not the reality itself. Blessed Fr Seraphim Rose talked much about the essence of created things. This is what we don’t see in our fallen state. For example, pick up a rock and look at it. What do you see? Do you see the the essence that it carries in God’s Creation, do you see why it exists? No. But a really holy person might see some of that, but not all. Science today only deals with the how’s, where’s and what’s. But it can never handle the “why’s” of existence. At our repose, our guardian angel takes us on a “tour” of creation in order to glimpse the infinity of this process and to get a better understanding of the essence of things. This, according to the Holy Fathers, happens in the first few days after death and before one comes before the Lord for the “temporal” judgement. Hence, even an unbeliever then, can not escape the fact and must confess that: “God is the Lord and have appeared unto us, blessed is he who cometh in the name of the Lord”.

Having looked at the creation from the Orthodox perspective and not from the perspective of this World’s wisdom, it may therefore not be completely senseless to think that God created the universe initially in stillness, for God is stillness. St John of the Ladder spoke of the last step of ascension towards God as something beyond prayer, contemplative stillness. As the man fell, entropy started to enter the creation, and this entropy means movement, agitation, hence planets and stars started to spin, move, shake, gravity formed etc. We can see it in our lives today, how much farther agitation has entered the world compared even to earlier centuries. Stress (a form of entropy) is engulfing everything. And what does stress lead to? Sickness – the result of the state of entropy which is destruction. The modern society is heading for complete sickness and destruction on account of increasing entropy and continual fall. War is one of the lowest forms of entropy and means complete destruction. It is easy to see that the world today is heading towards total entropy and chaos, yet some call this evolution …

Likewise, spiritually the man also fell from the state of continual contemplation of God to that of entropy where contemplation has been replaced by agitation – think of the multitude of thoughts we are subjected to every day, every moment. The modern man is plagued by disquitness and continual bombardment of thoughts. The more he falls away, the more disquiet and entropic (unsettled) his mind and soul are, and the only way back is through seeking stillness in prayer: thoughts are to be suppressed as a must of having any sort of meaningful prayer. Thus does not finding God also mean returning to the original state of stillness? Stillness of the creation is revealed from the very first passages of the Genesis 1:2 – “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters”. The Spirit of God is shown hovering, meaning remaining in a still position above the waters.

When Christ appeared to His Disciples after the resurrection He found them in a state of excessive entropy (hiding in fear of the jews) and He said onto them: “peace be onto you”! Fear is also spiritual entropy that leads to destruction, so what Christ did was giving them a little of the stillness their souls needed in order to stop fearing, replacing in them the state of fear (entropy) with that of contemplation saying: here I am, stop being afraid! The “peace” our Lord was talking about is that stillness and quietness of soul which man lost in the fall.

There is one difference in the entropy of body and that of soul, between the entropy of material world and the spiritual. While the material world, and therefore the body, can not recover from the fall which is leading to their total destruction (death of the body and the destruction of the universe followed by the creation of a new Heaven and a new Earth), the spirit can recover through repentance. Therefore stress and sickness can not be avoided in this fallen world, but can be used for saving the soul – by bearing them and accepting them with joy as an acknowledgement of the state of our sinfulness.

The perverted Christian understanding could not be more prevalent today than is in what the Pope just said. He speaks of “Christian roots of Europe”, but does not tell you Western Europe has lost touch with true Chriatianity in 1054 when it separated from Orthodoxy and adopted a new doctrine soon after (Pope Gregory VII (r. 1073-1085) initiates a new conception of the Church and the role of the papacy within it. According to Gregory, the Church is obligated to create “right order in the world” rather than withdraw from it. Gregory seeks to create a papal monarchy with moral authority over the “temporal sword” and rule over the clergy. Gregory’s claims are enunciated in the “Dictates of the Pope”. First Crusade followed a short few years after). He dares portray Christ’s Disciples as “conquers”, a false ideology rooted in the history of crusades Catolicism raised to “spread Christ’s word”. Orthodoxy never promoted such aberrations. On the contrary, Christ taught his Disciples to shake the dust of their feet while leaving those who were not willing to listen, not to take the sword to convince them …

“Today, I don’t think that there is a fear of Islam as such but of ISIS and its war of conquest, which is partly drawn from Islam,” he told French newspaper La Croix. “It is true that the idea of conquest is inherent in the soul of Islam, however, it is also possible to interpret the objective in Matthew’s Gospel, where Jesus sends his disciples to all nations, in terms of the same idea of conquest.”

http://www.infowars.com/pope-francis-likens-jesus-to-isis-says-muslims-migrants-must-breed-with-europeans/

The Pan Orthodox Council today is no different to the Council Of Florence in the 15th century. Those who were opposed to it then (and they were few, only one Bishop – St Mark of Ephesus) were right, and justified by later synods. Those who oppose the Pan Orthodox Synod today are right as well, and they shall too be justified.

Metropolitan Philaret of NY (reposed in 1985, found incorrupt in 1998)

“The strength of Orthodoxy has always lain in Her maintaining the principles of Church Tradition. Despite this, there are those who are attempting to include in the agenda of a future Great Council not a discussion of the best ways to safeguard those principles, but, on the contrary, ways to bring about a radical revision of the entire way of life in the Church, beginning with the abolition of fasts, second marriages of the clergy, etc., so that Her way of life would be closer to that of the heretical communities.”

“With such attitudes, is it any surprise that compromise reigns supreme in the relationship between the Orthodox promoters of ecumenism and the Roman Catholics, Protestants and Anti-Chalcedonians?…
Yet, behind these practical manifestations of the so-called ecumenical movement, other broader aims are discernible which lead to the utter abolition of the Orthodox Church.

Both the World Council of Churches and the dialogues between various Christian confessions, and even with other religions (such as, for instance, Islam and Judaism) are links in a chain which in the manner of thinking of ecumenists must grow to include all of mankind…

According to ecumenists, all this could be accomplished by a special Council, which in their eye would be truly “ecumenical” since they do not recognize the historical Ecumenical Councils as being truly so.”

Fr. Seraphim Rose on the Pan-Orthodox Council

“Measured by the sober standard of unchanging, Patristic Orthodoxy, the preparations for an “eighth Ecumenical Council” (now termed Pan-Orthodox Council) are exposed as un-Orthodox, lacking in seriousness, and profoundly unpastoral and irresponsible. Such a Council is a project rooted not in Orthodox wisdom and in heartfelt concern for the salvation of souls, but rather in the “spirit of the times”; it is intended to please, not God, but the world, and in particular the heterodox world. **Judging from the experience of the Vatican Council and its effect on Roman Catholicism, such a Council, if it is held, will produce profound disorders and anarchy in the Orthodox world**…the proposed “Ecumenical Council,” on the basis of the preparations that have hitherto been made for it, cannot be anything but another “robber council,’ a betrayal of Christ and His Church.” ~ (Fr. Seraphim Rose in 1976)

Dear Brother in Christ, Dimitry,
Rejoice in the Lord!

We were very glad to receive your letter and read it with great interest. We were touched at your defense of such “unpopular” ones as we. However, it would probably be best to discount a good part of what is said about our dire straights. Our last winter was a little harsh for the first month, but we were never in a very desperate condition; and after Christmas the weather turned quite mild. Fr. Cyprian apparently took too seriously some comments Fr. Herman made to him, which were not intended seriously. In January we received a letter from Fr. Cyprian: “immediately pack up and come to Jordanville by the beginning of Lent; we’ll send Holowka to help you move. Your situation is hopeless and you’ll fall into prelest, and besides Jordanville is dying off and in ten years there’ll be no one left to do the work, and if you don’t come nobody else will be inspired to come either.” Needless to say, we took this as another temptation, of which we’ve gotten quite a share since our tonsure (that, by the way, is supposed to be a sign that what we’re doing is good after all), and we stayed put. Last month we saw Fr. C. again in S.F, and his refrain how is: “You’re bezpopovtsi, you must get ordained or you’ll fall into prelest” (which logic is not too clear to us).

Well, in the meantime we stay put, do our work (which never stops piling up), and remain more convinced than ever that we are right where we should be. By the way, so you will know: we aren’t really trying to persuade anyone to join us. We didn’t come here to “establish a monastery,” but to save our souls and print the OW. If others are crazy enough to join us, perhaps God will bless a real monastery here; and if He blesses it, then He will give us the means of nourishing it, both physically and spiritually. Vladika John did tell us that he “believed’ there would be a missionary monastery such as we dreamed of, but we wait to see what God’s will is for us. We told a few people (you, Fr. Seraphim, and 3 or 4 others) that in case of need or if your heart feels so moved, there is a refuge here; whereupon Fr. Seraphim started looking for “candidates” to send us — which we don’t need! If a monastery here is God-pleasing, then it will “build itself,” or so we believe.

But about you: you’re undecided, the clergy give you various advice…. Can I “advise” you too? If so — then don’t take any advice too seriously, not even (or maybe even especially!) from bishops; 9 out of 10 bishops are entirely preoccupied with their own problems, such as finding priests, etc. The fact that you are undecided means — that you’re undecided, neither more nor less. It doesn’t mean you want to be in the white clergy, for that is a definite decision in itself.

Vladika Andrey’s advice to join the white clergy is probably not a revelation. Fr. Herman, for all his veneration for Vladika Andrey (he was his spiritual father), on several occasions found it necessary to go against his advice — once when he refused to bless him to go to the seminary, and again several years ago when word came through a third person: “if Gleb isn’t married yet, he should become a celibate priest.”

The most sensible advice right now, of course, is to finish the seminary. But not necessarily; there is something more important, and I don’t know if anyone else will come out and say it to you, so I will. We recall your discouragement about Jordanville last year; last week a visitor told us that you walk around the monastery with a very discouraged look; and your letter repeats that Jordanville doesn’t inspire you. Answer a question: Of that which was inside you two years ago and persuaded or inspired you to go to Jordanville, how much is left? Or another question: What (or who) does inspire you? The greatest mistake — or rather, sin — you could make would be to allow the spark that brought you back to the Orthodox Faith to go out. And if Jordanville is doing that to you — and it has been known to do it — then you had better get out. If you sacrifice everything to finish the seminary, and while doing it go around gloomy, accepting thoughtless mockery and humiliation for the sake of “humility” (while in your heart carrying not humility at all, but just fatalism), and not being inspired by anything — then you may finish the seminary, but you probably won’t be good for anything! ·

Forgive me for being so bold, but I feel a certain responsibility for you, having known you since before the day when you said: “If I should ever become really Orthodox, I would want to be a monk.” In fact, your sister even tells me that my vague answer to your question about drugs led you to take marijuana — so maybe I can make up for that!

But what can one say by letter? We would like very much to have a good talk with you. But from this distance I will venture my opinion: down deep you are not undecided at all; it is circumstances, lack of inspiration, and no one to guide you that make you that way. Down deep you’re burning with a converts zeal and thirst for podvig, serving the Church, weeping and shouting for joy at what God has opened up for you — that whole undreamed of heavenly world which the Church gives you the means to approach, as compared to the filth and stench of the state in which you once were. Do I need to say more? We’re both converts too!

Down deep you want the full uncompromising Orthodox life. You want not merely to “serve the Church” or find a place in the Church establishment” (probably you don’t want that!), but you want to give your whole heart and soul and strength to God. But what form does this take? Apparently you have no one to point the way or inspire you. And you’re faced with an atmosphere wherein the Church has become a habit, even a career, a clique with its own jokes and vices — and worst of all, the means of deadening a living soul and putting out its spark. It’s wrong to douse this spark in the name of humility, patience, obedience, or any other Christian virtue; these too can become habits and deadening. The spark of Christian faith must be nourished; it can survive for a time with little nourishment, but if there is nothing to inspire it, it will not survive long. You were stupid enough (let me be frank) to fall for Nikita’s line, disregarding good advice and falling behind in your studies by doing so; but now if you let your disillusionment leave a scar on your soul, and you go around as an embittered, complaining, bored zombie, you will be no good to anyone, and it will be your own fault.

Your heart will say whether all this is right. But what to do? I’ll tell you what I’ve felt for a long time, since the time when what we have now was still a dream and you didn’t know what you believed: that if God opened your heart to Orthodox faith, you would think and feel as we do, and you belonged here with us. But you have to have something more definite than that to guide you, and our existence here is, frankly, so precarious that we couldn’t ask anyone to join us who didn’t come to it by himself. And we couldn’t accept you without first having a good long talk with you and presenting to you the real difficulties that face us, which are somewhat more serious than firewood and “prelest.” But first of all comes your own heart, which must find a place where it can be nourished so that you can produce fruit. If that place is with Fr. Panteleimon, we would be more than glad for you, because we believe he can nourish the “spark” as few others seem to do.

We fear most for you that “public opinion” will force you into a category into which you don’t belong, and that you will be weak enough to accept this and get stuck in it for life — or even worse, as happens too often, get bored with the whole thing and quit the Church altogether. You’re probably not in high repute in Jordanville — a weakling who thinks too much, gloomy, behind in his studies, knows English better than Russian, with some kind of shameful sins in his past; he won’t amount to much — put him in the korovnik, and maybe we can find a parish or some such place for him. If this is anything like the truth — don’t accept it! You’re called to more than that. You still have the “spark” — and you’re called to keep it alive and communicate it to others, producing fruit on Christ’s harvest, perhaps in an unconventional way. Don’t forget it! And don’t let anyone tell you to be “humble” and “obedient” and let someone else — who doesn’t see your heart or care who you are — fit you into a conventional mould that doesn’t fit you.

Keep in mind Vladika John; pray to him. He’s our guiding star, and when we sometimes get gloomy and begin to think that it’s pointless to go against the conventional view, that after all the Church is supposed to be a career and not something to get inspired about and inspire others with, that what we’re doing is too risky, that it’s better to let our enthusiasm die out and let someone else tell us where we can be of “humble service” to the Church — then we bring to mind Vladika John and somehow everything makes sense again, and the “conventional” view doesn’t make sense at all and if this attitude continues to prevail among Russians abroad they will fulfill the threat of Vladika John in 1938 and uzrezhetrcr ________. And then we go back to our lives of Saints and Holy Fathers and get our inspiration from them.

Our relationship to Vladika Nektary, by the way, is quite good, and in fact, although Archimandrite Spyridon (and not Fr. Mitrophan) is officially our “starets,” we do not get to see him too often, and this function is actually performed for us by Vladika Nektary, who has comforted us greatly in our trials, and who tells us: I (Earlier he tried to persuade us to join him at his podvorye in Alameda (not Burlingame), but our soul was just not in the kind of monastery he wanted, and it would have placed our mission of the printed word in a decidedly secondary position, which we viewed as dangerous. And besides, we have always been very sensitive of the rule of St. John Cassian: “It was the advice of the Fathers, an advice always in season, that a monk should at all hazard flee the society of bishops and women; for neither women nor bishops permit a monk to remain at peace in his cell, nor fix his eyes on pure and heavenly doctrine.” Monks and bishops are of most benefit to each other and to the Church when they are independent of each other, we’re thoroughly convinced!

We’ve already heard about the Coptic service in Jordanville, and are only puzzled how it could have been allowed. But then, we ourselves were thoroughly chastised by Fr. Panteleimon and the Greeks about our Zeytoon article, although our minds are still open on that subject.

Fr. Theodore Tenkevich I knew for several years before he went to Jordanville, and was well acquainted with some of his strangenesses. We somehow thought he had “outgrown” them, but alas…. He was one of the original “founders” of our Brotherhood, and when he returned from Greece and wrote us he wanted to come to us, we had hopes; but Fr. Panteleimon painted us a dismal picture of him, and his sporadic correspondence with us only confirms it.

Pray for us. Write. We would love to see you, but will wait and see what God sends. Local folk tell us we’re in for a real winter this year, but we go forward blindly. The Post Office recently tried to take away our 2nd Class mailing permit on a technicality, that we don’t have an office in the city in which we mail. But the outcome was happy: now we mail in Platina instead of Redding, and if the snow is deep, our winter OWs will go down the hill on sleds! (Don’t tell that to Kippie!)

With love in Christ our Saviour,
Seraphim, monk

Dear Brother in Christ, Laurence,

You have told us of your willingness to drop everything and come to join us here as a full-fledged brother; and you have expressed your doubts. Now it is for us to tell you what you can expect and what we expect of you when and if you join us, no longer as an honored guest and brother from far away, but as a full member of our community.

1. First of all, we welcome you as a full and organic member of our monastic-missionary body, fully sharing our common joys, sorrows, difficulties, and everyday life, and giving your maximum to the common work and responding to the common need without second thought. We will sacrifice ourselves to the utmost to make room for you in our common body, and we will expect the same of you. Under no circumstances will we allow you to live as a “bachelor” and adjust ourselves to your whims and eccentricities, nor as any kind of “guest,” paying or free, who gets room and board in exchange for work or money. You are a full member of us, or there is no point in your coming.

2. Our spiritual orientation is: devotion to St. Herman and discipleship to Vladika John and faithfulness to his testament and tradition to us, which includes in some degree being a “reflection of Valaam.” We have neither startsi nor great spiritual gifts to offer you; we can only invite you to be our fellow-orphan of St. Herman and Vladika John, asking together their help to make up our numerous deficiencies. Many from outside, as you already see, will judge us, will say we are in “prelest,” etc., and you will fall under the general condemnation. We cannot defend ourselves by pointing to any “spiritual” qualities which we do not have, but only by the fruits which God may bring forth from our common labors. We have sufficient testimony from outside to tell us that these fruits so far, even if small, are nonetheless real.

Vladika John divided his day into four parts of six hours each: rest, spiritual reading and reflection, work, and prayer. That is also the formula of our common life, only with the hours adapted to our weakness and needs. The active part of our day is devoted to work and prayer; no idleness. You will be given a chotki and a brief rule of cell prayer; besides this, you will carry the chotki with you everywhere and use it as your chief weapon against idleness and vain imaginings, fighting the devil with the Jesus Prayer.

3. As you know, we are experiencing difficulty with the local “authority,” whose ideas concerning our status and the idea that inspires us are totally opposed to our own. Therefore, you must know that we do not accept him as Head of our community, nor do we accept his Ukase concerning our monastery, concerning which we have reported in writing to the Secretary of the Synod. Sooner or later there will doubtless be an open battle with the “authority,” and you will be expected to stand shoulder to shoulder with us in this, fighting for the common idea that inspires us (without which we will not be faithful to Vladika John), and being counselled by responsible persons in the Church who know us and our work. We may well have to endure disgrace. But know that one bishop (N) has openly encouraged us to “disobedience,” if that be necessary, telling us to “treasure the blessing of Vladika John above everything,” and another (L) has said: “the fact that sorrows come to you testifies to the fact that you are doing a work of God… I think that you should be patient, undertake no dramatic moves, but by your conduct and your ‘line’ show that this (the behavior and ukase of V.A.) goes against your soul and is not suitable to you.” In the meantime we consider that our monastery does not yet have an official status and is in a state of “persecution” until such day as we shall be free to exercise our monastic right to present our own Rule to the Synod and elect our own Head. Until that time we take protection under the name of “Brotherhood” which Vladika John blessed.

4. Our rule being coenobitic, everything is held in common, and no one has anything of his “own” — except, for practical purposes, the personal effects, books, icons, etc., in his own cell. All needs are paid for out of the common treasury; you must come to us poor. We will ask you to put whatever money you have left from the world in a safe place outside and not touch it until you either leave (in which case the money becomes your adjustment money back to the world) or make your final decision to remain with us (in which case you distribute the money to whomever you please, or to the monastery). If you come with your car, you will put the keys in the common treasury and it will be used by the community as needed and with blessing and will not become “yours” again until you make your final decision on staying or leaving, when you will decide how to dispose of it. In other words, you will be entirely dependent on the community, which means also: you on us, and we on you. The worry that we cannot feed another mouth is real only if you do not intend to work; the additional income to be expected from the wholehearted addition of two hands to the work force will more than feed one extra mouth.

5. Authority, when necessary, is exercised by the eldest in our community, Fr. Herman, and after him by Fr. Seraphim. The obediences to be given form a part of the whole work and circumstances of the community, and their importance will generally be evident. If in particular cases you do not always see this, you will just have to trust us. So that the activity of community will proceed by common consent, and not according to the whim of individuals, nothing is undertaken without a blessing, no matter what one may “feel” or “think,” and all obediences are performed according to the rules and spirit of the community. Phrases such as “I insist, I demand, I refuse,” etc., are absolutely forbidden. General questions affecting the whole community will be decided “soborno,” by common consent (such as questions of stoves for winter). We do not acknowledge the right of any ecclesiastical authority outside the community to issue commands regarding our internal life, organization, or any individual member; any such attempt will be judged and acted on by the common consent of all members of the community. Our community is a monastery and not an episcopal dacha.

6. Worldly actions, conversation, manner, tone, objects, etc., are absolutely prohibited, as being utterly destructive of the monastic spirit. This includes:

a. Singing worldly songs, whistling, ostentatious spitting, littering.

b. Radio, newspapers, or magazines besides those received by the community, unless by special blessing for a definite purpose.

c. Crude or sexually oriented talk, reference to “urination,” etc.

d. Arguing, proving ones point, raising ones voice, idle comments, complaints, and in general everything that upsets the general peace and order.

e. Demanding of special treatment or privileges, such as bed pans, special foods or preparation, or other paraphernalia and habits of old maids and self-pampered bachelors. Sufficient allowance will be given in cases of illness, allergy, etc.

f. Demands to be placed in a position of authority, on a “Board of Directors,” etc. — these concepts are foreign to the nature of our community’s existence.

g. Nosiness, curiosity, idle questions.

h. Crossing the legs (for: Life of St. Arsenius the Great).

i. And free and easy, worldly manner with visitors. After visitors have been greeted one or more brothers will be assigned to them, and the others will continue their work.

j. No food is kept in kellias, and no eating between meals, unless with blessing (water is allowed between meals).

7. Finally, in everything the spirit of mutual love, trust, and respect must prevail. For infractions of the above rules, penances of pokloni may be given; but the severest punishment will be given to the brother who allows the sun to set on his anger against another brother. According to the rule of St. Cassian, such a one will not be allowed to pray with the brethren until he comes to repentance and begs forgiveness. For without mutual love, trust, and respect, nothing written above makes any sense, and there cannot be any community at all.

And so, dear brother in Christ, you have the picture. We expect much of you, and we will try to give you much in return. Only in principle you must agree with all that is written above; and if you fall, accept correction. As slaves of Christ we cannot offer to God and His Church great spirituality, wisdom, organization, or podvigs; but we can offer our absolute determination and strenuous effort to be faithful to the testament of Vladika John to us and to forge a community which in some way preserves his spirit, helping, encouraging and strengthening each other in our weaknesses and falls, and being open and honest with each other. The rules above are in accordance with the “Decree on Monasteries” of the Russian Church Abroad, which we shall read to you on your next visit.

Your brothers in Christ our Saviour,

Dear Brother in Christ Laurence,

Congratulations on your namesday! May God grant you to grow with each year in Christian virtues and attain in the end to His eternal Kingdom!

Enclosed is our official epistle to you to help you make up your mind about joining us. What does it say to your heart?

Fr. Fyodor s being so upset is apparently significant of something; he complained also to Deacon Nicholas. As for giving advice, he asked for it, telling Fr. Herman that he was dissatisfied where he was, that he had a chance to go to Vlad. Vitaly, or maybe he would join us, and what did Fr. Herman think? Fr. Herman’s reply was by no means unkind or sharp, but it was very definitely based on the idea that we could not possibly ask someone to travel 3000 miles to our primitive conditions when he was no more than casually (if at all) interested in what we are doing. Fr. Herman suggested that he read several issues of the OW if he wanted to know what makes our community “tick,” but that probably he would find himself more at home with Vlad. Vitaly’s Russian-oriented work. That Fr. Fyodor could get so upset at this leads one to suspect that he indeed did have in mind just what he told you: that he, being experienced (?) in monasticism, wanted to come and “run the show.”

But of course he is correct when he says that what we are doing is “irregular” — from the point of view of the prevailing Russian Church practice. There are, however, plentiful precedents from the lives of Saints — St. Sergius, for example — for going to the wilderness to save your soul. “Establishing a monastery” is another matter, but we did not come here with the intention of “establishing a monastery,” and in fact we’ve had nothing but trouble since Vladika A. “established a monastery” for us; but if this is what God wills and the Church desires that we have, then we will fight to have a real one, and not a fake one that is just a bishop’s whim, and we will fight for the genuine, independent monastic spirit and not be tempted by any barren fig trees that come around boasting of their “experience,” ukases, organizational ability, or whatever.

In the prevailing Russian understanding today a “monastery” is a place with an incidental collection of people, with a definite function in the Church: to serve as a bishop’s summer residence, picnic center, manpower pool for church needs, etc. And “monks” are those people who becomes slaves, crushed by the authorities for the sake of “obedience,” who can be used by the church organization: the more hopeful ones as bishops, the less hopeful ones as hieromonks in parishes that can’t afford anything better, and the complete fools to remain in the monastery and tend the cows. Against such a perverted idea, both of monasteries and of “obedience” and the monastic virtues, we emphatically protest, and if God grants us to have a real monastery here, it will fit into this “accepted” picture only over our dead bodies. This is what V. A. has in mind (and Vlad. Vitaly also, who recently forbade an Athonite hieromonk to reestablish the skete at Grad Kitezh or anywhere else), and this is apparently what Fr. Fyodor thinks also. In this concept “monasticism” has become some kind of spiritual gymnastics (pokloni, obediences, etc.) which can be acquired by living for a while in a “monastery” and once you have it you can become an incidental member of any other “monastery” and offer others the fruit of your gymnastic experience — in the meantime rising in the hierarchy of church ranks until, if you’re lucky, you become a bishop and you can run your own show. No! Monasticism is a disposition and effort of the soul striving for salvation, and its coenobitic form is forged by living in community with others of the same mind and soul and coming to be one in aspiration with them, each one spurring the others on to salvation. This, from all signs, is what Fr. Panteleimon has, and the Greeks in general seem still very aware of monasticism in itself and not just as a function in the Church at the mercy of bishops. Fr. Neketas was shocked when we spoke to him of Fr. Panteleimon as a candidate for bishop; an abbot isn’t supposed to be “promoted” to bishop, but remain where he is for life; and if Fr. Panteleimon did become a bishop, except in an extreme emergency, he would lose all respect in Greece.

This concept, however, seems to be dying out among Russians, certainly among bishops.

Concerning your quitting your job: it would doubtless be best for your peace of mind (“economic security”) if you took a “leave of absence,” preserving the right to return to your job; this would be normal and we would not regard it as a lack of faith in us or anything of the sort. However, in this way you would not get your retirement money and so would not be able to take your trip?? or maybe a shorter trip?? Decide what is wisest, by normal human standards.

This will be background for the accompanying epistle. We hope to see you on Uspeniye, when you will see the fantastic invention being put into operation for us by our Redding Orthodox neighbors.

With love in Christ,

Dear Brother in Christ, Laurence,
Greetings in our Lord Jesus Christ. Rejoice in the Lord!

Congratulations with the namesday child. We are sending him an inscribed copy of vol. 6 of the OW, so he can clearly see what we are doing.

The calendar has been sent to Nicholas Mabin, airmail. Time is fast approaching when we must either print it or give up the project for this year. First we must finish two OWs, the first of which has been begun. Pray for us!

Response from the Russian OW has been very disappointing. Have the Russians really lost all sense of what a podvizhnik is?

We’ve apparently reached the peak of the pilgrim season. Yesterday we had a surprise visit from our nearest Orthodox neighbors, the Harveys of Redding (a Russian woman married to an American, at whose baptism by Vladika John, it turns out, I was present). Mrs. Harvey knows much about Vladika’s Shanghai days and says, “Vladika performed so many miracles that we took them for granted, and most of them are not written down.”

Last week Fr. Neketas visited us for 2 days and served Liturgy twice, once at midnight, Greek style; Fr. Sergius from San Diego arrived in time for the second Liturgy. Now there is a real priest who puts our Russians to shame. From what he says, added to what we’ve already heard, it would seem that he is not at all in favor with the Archbishop — why, is a mystery, but it’s sad.

Our cool summer finally became warm (but not really hot) for a month, until last week when we had three days at 98 degrees (the hottest since we’ve been here), with 80 degrees at night, and we felt in a constant state of fever. But that was all, and today one feels already an early-autumn coolness in the air. Mrs. Harvey confirms our fears of a hard winter — there’s an abnormal amount of butterflies on the highway! (I don’t know whether that’s Russian folklore or what!) Anyway, we expect that God’s kindness to us our first two winters is about to change to strictness, and the problem of firewood and winterproofing what buildings we have is about to be undertaken in earnest. Problems of chicken coops and hens also stand before us.

We got two more rattlesnakes after your departure, which cause us to “walk circumspectly.” We also struck up an acquaintance with a small owl who came at dusk two nights looking for our mice. We even talked to him, and he answered 4 or 5 times with a clucking sound, until he got tired of answering the same question so much.

How goes your resolve to abandon the world, both within and without yourself?

•. Pray for us.

With love in Christ,
Seraphim, monk

P.s. We’re sending you a book on forced labor in USSR: please xerox it (you’ll probably find it interesting reading too) and send it to the address below. The Meteora book is for you to read; bring it back with you your next trip.

Mr. Y. Gabriel Jegoroff
932 1/2 Margaret St.
Monterey, Calif. 93940

[Fr. Herman’s note:] rush, hurry up! quick, as soon as possible, immediately, at once, fast, NOW!

Dear Father in Christ, Panteleimon,
Evlogeite!

On looking over our file of letters to you since our “crisis” began in January, I note that we have sent you a “progress report” about every two months; and another one is now due! And so I send you this brief report, even though there is very little if any change in our situation, in order to keep you informed and, for our own benefit, to bring everything out in a “confession” so it will not lie hidden within us and later, taken too much for granted by us, cause some kind of trouble. This, by the way, is the exact opposite of the principle by which Vladika Anthony operates: keep everything hidden, do not let a person know how he stands, and then operate suddenly so as to catch him by surprise so you can do with him whatever you want. This we find to be spiritual poison, which only produces bitterness and resentment, which are pointless and fruitless.

After our last letter to you we heard from San Francisco that Vladika Anthony knew or suspected our attitude toward him, and that he was resolved not to lose his reputation of “peacemaker” for our sakes, and so he would not touch us for the time being. Perhaps Vlad. Nektary advised him not to be so hard on us, or perhaps he just guessed at our feelings. At any rate, we received a striking confirmation of this diagnosis very soon. On the Feast of the Ascension, when we were still unable to travel to San Francisco because of our truck, we were astonished when shortly after dawn who should arrive but Vladika Anthony himself! He acted as though it were the most natural thing in the world for an Archbishop not to be serving in his own Cathedral on such a feast day (Vladika Nektary served there), and told us he had wanted to come to us after Pascha but only now got the opportunity. We of course were quite nervous, but resolved to place all our hope in God, and His saints, to accept gratefully the spiritual gifts of Divine Liturgy and Holy Communion, and then see what God would send us — we rather hoped that we would finally “have it out” with Vladika and bring everything into the open.

After Liturgy Vladika said we would have no reading at Trapeza, as we had “much to talk about.” After some small talk, the Russian who had driven Vladika retired to rest, and we waited to see what Vladika would say. To our great astonishment we found that he was just as tense and nervous as we were — and that he didn’t say anything at all! He asked about our service on Pascha, without expressing any disapproval of the fact that we didn’t try harder to get to San Francisco then; he told us about the service at Fort Ross the next week without even suggesting that we come to “be seen”; and said not a word about “obedience,” “prelest,” or anything of the sort!

After Vladika himself retired to rest for a while (to my kellia, where Fr. Herman had placed in a conspicuous place a small card with the text in Russian, to inspire us: “Stavropigialny missionary Brotherhood of St. Job of Pochaev — Vladika Vitaly”), Fr. Herman and I consulted: we decided he had indeed come as a “peacemaker,” and that if he himself does not raise any issues we also should say nothing, following Vlad. Laurus’ advice not to do anything rash but simply to continue acting independently. After resting, Vladika briefly looked at our printshop, where he made the offhand comment (with a nervous laugh) that perhaps he had offended us in the past? — to which we said nothing at all. And he left.

Nonetheless, with this visit our situation did not change in the least; only a “cease-fire” had been declared, as it were. We simply continued our independent printing activities expecting war to break out again when we finished our Russian Life of Vladika John, which we issued as published by the Brotherhood of St. Herman of Alaska” — which Vladika had supposedly abolished! We left San Francisco on the same day we came, and Vladika Anthony had time only to read the text hurriedly before we left, and obviously he had not yet “digested” it thoroughly. To our surprise, in principle he did not seem opposed to it, did not even protest that he hadn’t been informed in advance, and about the text he only wondered “what will people in the Kazan church think?” (Here is the life of a saint of universal significance, a patron saint of the Russian Diaspora — and he wonders what the local trouble-makers might think! That surely reveals something about restriction to a narrow, “diocesan” outlook, to say the least!) But we fully expect some later repercussions, and do not expect the “ceasefire” to last indefinitely!

So you see, we have “peace” for a while, and we continue to operate independently; but the basic unhealthy situation remains unchanged. How long it will be before the next battle breaks out we do not know, but we suspect it will not be until after the Sobor of Bishops in Sept., at which Vladika will doubtless wish to present himself as “head” of a peaceful and flourishing monastery. We remain at our battle stations, but we follow the advice of Vladikas Laurus and Nektary not to do anything rash and to wait until we are provoked into action. Meanwhile we will shortly send a new letter to Vladika Laurus and see if he has any further advice. Our present idea is to wait until Vladika Anthony makes some new attack against our independence, and then to present him with an outspoken letter, full of respect and love but very firm, telling him what we will not do. We are convinced that he will listen only to strong words and actions; meek requests he will simply ignore or crush. We are quite certain that he will fight long and hard against a stavropignialny monastery in his Diocese (Matushka Ariadna has that status, and he can’t do a thing with her!), and that he would never have permitted it if we had asked for it explicitly before our tonsure; doubtless he will finally grant it, if at all, only to avoid a scandal. If only he could be made to see that as independent we will be his best friends, whereas as his crushed slaves we would be only his secret enemies! Our resolve to be unflinchingly firm is only reinforced by seeing Vladika Nektary — who, facing death, finds his most difficult trial is to accept spiritually Vladika Anthony’s unjust and condescending treatment of him, not allowing bitterness to creep in. Vladika Nektary chose the path of meekness; but we cannot afford that! We are only sad that we ourselves cause Vladika Nektary sorrow because we would not become his disciples when he himself wanted to establish a monastery — but we realized then that that would be the end of our independent mission of the printed word, and we hate to think of the position we would now be in if we had agreed to follow him out of politeness or pity. We do not regret that we have faithfully followed the words of St. John Cassian: “Flee women and bishops!”

We regretfully come to the conclusion that in the San Francisco Archdiocese, under the present leadership, there is simply no room for monks; they can exist and flourish only independently of that lead leadership, as Abbess Ariadna does. Vladika Anthony’s relentless (but apparently unintentional — that’s just the way he operates) persecution of his monks is emphasized by his visit to Vladika Nektary in the hospital, where he so upset the sick and dying man that the nurse had to make him leave” (He was apparently chastising him for opening a parish in Portland without his knowledge — he needn’t worry, that parish seems to be in the process of closing itself down, and almost certainly will do so without Vladika Nektary.)

There you have our situation, up to date. If we do not hear from you on our manuscript questions, we will call you within the next 3 weeks or so. Our summer has been mercifully cool until the last few days, but now the heat has begun in earnest and both of us are suffering from it. Pray for us, dear Father!

With love in Christ our Saviour,
Seraphim, monk

P.s. A bad sign — word reaches us from S.F, that laymen (whom we know) close to Vlad. Anthony are spreading the story that we are in “prelest,” have no one in charge of us, etc. Why doesn’t the ruling hierarch tell us his “suspicions” instead of laymen?

Dear Father Panteleimon,

Evlogeite! This is solely a “Publication Question Sheet”; a letter will follow shortly. Thanks be to God, we are well and in good spirits.

1. Life of St. Mamas: safely received with many thanks. It will go in the May-June issue, as Vladika John will have to be our saint for March-April! By the way, it does no good to send us anything by “special delivery,” which is unheard of here; all our mail just sits in the post office until we go and get it.

2. Life of Blessed Archbishop John in Russian is enclosed — this is our closely guarded “secret project” about which no one knew. Glory be to God, we finished it the evening before Vladika Johns repose and delivered it at 6. a.m. to the Sepulchre before Liturgy. First response from everyone was favorable, after the shock wore off, but we await further repercussions. We visited for two hours with Vladika Nektary, who was just sent home; his condition is still serious, but hopeful; he is on a strict regime with absolute rest prescribed, even idle gestures being prohibited.

3. Calendar: have you checked through the whole thing? How widespread are the discrepancies in dates of commemoration of saints, and how can we make the calendar usable for Greeks as well as Russians? We would like to start printing, God willing, in Sept.

4. Service to St. Nectarios: we would like to print this year as part of OW (and separately), if possible before November. We hope to print one service a year, next year hopefully St. Mark of Ephesus. We have your translation of Vespers and the French translation of part of Matins; can you supply the Canon and anything else missing? If you want to supply the whole Matins, wonderful; otherwise we will translate from French. But we will need to know what Tone the kathismata are in, also the stikhera or lauds, and whether there are any “special melodies” here or in Vespers. Also, please give Acrostic, if any — but we don’t require it to fit the English Canon! (This is what the Slavonic Menaion does.) And please suggest whether we should supply more rubrics and/or text of the “common” parts of Vespers and Matins for our Americans who don’t know the order of services.

5. If we catch up, print the calendar, etc., this year, we would like to begin thinking, for next year, of printing a full Horologion for church use. What do you say and suggest? Will we need to appeal to an “English Liturgical Committee” of the Synod, which might involve endless complications and delays, or is it sufficient for your monastery and ours to work out the text between us and then offer it jointly to the English-speaking Orthodox world? Daniel Olson was just here for another week and volunteered his services, and astutely observed: everything depends on a standard Psalter, no adequate version of which has yet been printed in English; and he thought we should use yours. Can you send us a copy, or is it being printed?

If we do not hear from you in writing within a reasonable time, we will have to put you again to the expense of a phone call! As you see, we are full of hopes and plans for the future, while God gives us the time and opportunity. We are more than ever convinced that Vladika John and St. Herman are with us, and with their help we can do much.

Asking your prayers,

With love in Christ our Saviour,
Seraphim, monk