Introduction to ORF

Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future

by Fr. Seraphim Rose

1983 edition

Introduction

Part I   The "Dialogue with Non-Christian Religions"

Part II  "Christian and Non-Christian Ecumenism"

Part III  "The New Age of the Holy Spirit"

Part IV  The Present Book

Part I 

The "Dialogue with Non-Christian Religions"

Ours is a spiritually unbalanced age, when many Orthodox Christians finds themselves tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive (Eph. 4:14).  The time, indeed, seems to have come when men will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be inclined unto fables (II Tim. 4:3-4).

One reads in bewilderment of the latest acts and pronouncements of the ecumenical movement.  On the most sophisticated level, Orthodox theologians representing the American Standing Conference of Orthodox Bishops (SCOBA) and other official Orthodox bodies conduct learned "dialogues" with Roman Catholics and Protestants and issue "joint statements" on such subjects as the Eucharist, spirituality, and the like – without even informing the heterodox that the Orthodox Church is the Church of Christ to which all are called, that only her Mysteries are grace-giving, that Orthodox spirituality can be understood only by those who know it in experience within the Orthodox Church, that all these "dialogues" and "joint statements" are an academic caricature of true Christian discourse – a discourse which has the salvation of souls as its aim.  Indeed, many of the Orthodox participants in the "dialogues" know or suspect that this is no place for Orthodox witness, that the very atmosphere of ecumenical "liberalism" cancels out whatever truth might be spoken at them; but they are silent, for the "spirit of the times" today is often stronger than the voice of the Orthodox conscience.  (See Diakonia, 1970, no. 1 p, 72; St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly, 1969, no. 4, p. 225; etc.)

On a more popular level, ecumenical "conferences" and "discussions" are organized, often with an "Orthodox speaker" or even the celebration of an "Orthodox Liturgy."  The approach to these "conferences" is often dilettantish, and the general attitude at them is so lacking in seriousness, that rather than advance the "unity" their promoters desire, they actually serve to prove the existence of an impassable abyss between true Orthodoxy and the "ecumenical" outlook.  (See Sobornost, Winter,1978, pp. 494-8, etc.)

On the level of action, ecumenical activists take advantage of the fact that the intellectuals and theologians are irresolute and unrooted in Orthodox tradition, and use their very words concerning "fundamental agreement" on sacramental and dogmatic points as an excuse for flamboyant ecumenical acts, not excluding the giving of Holy Communion to heretics.  And this state of confusion in turn gives an opportunity for ecumenical ideologists on the most popular level to issue empty pronouncements that reduce basic theological issues to the level of cheap comedy, as when Patriarch Athenagoras allows himself to say, "Does your wife ever ask you how much salt she should put in the food?  Certainly not.  She has the infallibility.  Let the Pope have it too, if he wishes" (Hellenic Chronicle, April 9, 1970).

The informed and conscious Orthodox Christian may well ask: where will it all end?  Is there no limit to the betrayal, the denaturement, the self-liquidation of Orthodoxy?

It has not yet been too carefully observed where all this is leading, but logically the path is clear.  The ideology behind ecumenism, which has inspired such ecumenistic acts and pronouncements as the above, is an already well-defined heresy: the Church of Christ does not exist, no one has the Truth, the Church of Christ is only now being built.  But it takes little reflection to see that the self-liquidation of Orthodoxy, of the Church of Christ, is simultaneously the self- liquidation of Christianity itself; that if no one church is the Church of Christ, then the combination of all sects will not be the Church either, not in the sense in which Christ founded it.  And if all "Christian" bodies are relative to each other, then all of them together are relative to other "religious" bodies, and "Christian" ecumenism can only end in a syncretic world religion.

This is indeed the disguised aim of the masonic ideology which has inspired the Ecumenical Movement, and this ideology has now taken such possession of those who participate in the Ecumenical Movement that "dialogue" and eventual union with the non-Christian religions have come to be the logical next step for today's denatured Christianity.  The following are a few of the many recent examples that could be given that point the way to an "ecumenical" future outside of Christianity.

1.  On June 27, 1965, a "Convocation of Religion for World Peace" was held in San Francisco in connection with the 20th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations in that city.  Before 10,000 spectators there were addresses on the "religious" foundation of world peace by Hindu, Buddhist, Moslem. Jewish, Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox representatives, and hymns of all faiths were sung by a 2000-voice "interfaith" choir.

2.  The Greek Archdiocese of North and South America, in the official statement of its 19th Clergy-Laity Congress (Athens, July, 1968), declared: "We believe that the ecumenical movement, even though it is of Christian origin, must become a movement of all religions reaching towards each other."

3. The "Temple of Understanding, Inc.," an American foundation established in 1960 as a kind of "Association of United Religions" with the aim of "building the symbolic Temple in various parts of the world" (precisely in accord with the doctrine of Freemasonry), has held several "Summit Conferences."  At the first, in Calcutta in 1968, the Latin Trappist Thomas Merton (who was accidentally electrocuted in Bangkok on the way back from this Conference) declared: "We are already a new unity.  What we must regain is our original unity."  At the second, at Geneva in April , 1970, eighty representatives of ten world religions met to discuss such topics as "The Project of the Creation of a World Community of Religions"; the General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, Dr. Eugene Carson Blake, delivered an address calling on the heads of all religions to unity; and on April 2 an "unprecedented" supra-confessional prayer service took place in St. Peter's Cathedral, described by the Protestant Pastor Babel as "a very great date in the history of religions," at which "everyone prayed in his own language and according to the customs of the religion which he represented" and at which "the faithful of all religions were invited to coexist in the cult of the same God," the service ending with the "Our Father" (La Suisse, April 3, 1970).  Promotional material sent out by the "Temple of Understanding" reveals that Orthodox delegates were present at the second "Summit Conference" in the United States in the autumn of 1971, and that Metropolitan Emilianos of the Patriarchate of Constantinople is a member of the Temple's "International Committee."  The "Summit Conferences" offer Orthodox delegates the opportunity to enter discussions aiming to "create a world community of religions," to "hasten the realization of mankind's dream of peace and understanding" according to the philosophy of "Vivekananda, Ramakrishna, Gandhi, Schweitzer," an the founders of various religions; and the delegates likewise participate in "unprecedented" supra-confessional prayer services where "everyone prays according to the customs of the religion he represents."  One can only wonder what must be in the soul of an Orthodox Christian who participates in such conferences and prays together with Moslems, Jews, and pagans.

4.  Early in 1970 the WCC sponsored a conference in Ajaltoun, Lebanon, between Hindus, Buddhists, Christians, and Moslems, and a follow-up conference of 23 WCC "theologians" in Zurich in June declared the need for "dialogue" with the non-Christian religions.  At the meeting of the Central Committee of the WCC at Addis Ababa in January of this year (pre-1975-jh), Metropolitan Georges Khodre of Beirut (Orthodox Church of Antioch) shocked even many Protestant delegates when he not merely called for "dialogue" with these religions, but left the Church of Christ far behind and trampled on 19 centuries of Christian tradition when he called on Christians to "investigate the authentically spiritual life of the unbaptized" and enrich their own experience with the "riches of a universal religious community" (Religious News Service), for "it is Christ alone who is received as light when grace visits a Brahmin, a Buddhist, or a Moslem reading his own scriptures" (Christian Century, Feb. 10, 1971).

5. The Central Committee of the World Council of Churches at its meeting in Addis Ababa in January, 1971, gave its approval and encouragement to the holding of meetings as regularly as possible between representatives of other religions, specifying that "at the present stage priority may be given to bilateral dialogues of a specific nature."  In accordance with this directive a major Christian-Moslem "dialogue" was set for mid-1972 involving some forty representatives of both sides, including a number of Orthodox delegates (Al Montada, January-February, 1972, p. 18).

6.  In February, 1972, another "unprecedented" ecumenical event occurred in New York when, according to Archbishop Iakovos of New York, for the first time in history, the Greek Orthodox Church (Greek Archdiocese of North and South America) held an official theological "dialogue" with the Jews.  In two days of discussions definite results were achieved, which may be taken as symptomatic of the future results of the "dialogue with non-Christian religions": the Greek "theologians" agreed "to review their liturgical texts in terms of improving references to Jews and Judiasm where they are found to be negative or hostile" (Religious News Service).  Does not the intention of the "dialogue" become even more obvious? – to "reform" Orthodox Christianity in order to make it conformable to the religions of this world.

These events were the beginning of the "dialogue with non-Christian religions" at the end of the decade of the 1960's and the beginning of the 1970's.  In the years since then such events have multiplied, and "Christian" (and even "Orthodox") discussions and worship with representatives of non-Christian religions have come to be accepted as a normal part of contemporary life.  The "dialogue" with non-Christian religions" has become part of the intellectual fashion of the day; it represents the present stage of ecumenism in its progress towards a universal religious syncretism.  Let us now look at the "theology" and the goal of this accelerating "dialogue" and see how it differs from the "Christian" ecumenism that has prevailed up to now.

Part II

"Christian and Non-Christian Ecumenism"

"Christian" ecumenism at its best may be seen to represent a sincere and understandable error on the part of Protestants and Roman Catholics – the error of failing to recognize that the visible Church of Christ already exists, and that they are outside of it.  The "dialogue with non-Christian religions," however, is something quite different, representing rather a conscious departure from even that part of genuine Christian belief and awareness which some Catholics and Protestants retain.  It is the product, not of simple human "good intentions," but rather of a diabolical "suggestion" that can capture only those who have already departed so far from Christianity as to be virtual pagans: worshippers of the god of this world, satan (II Cor. 4:4), and followers of whatever intellectual fashion this powerful god is capable of inspiring.

"Christian" ecumenism relies for its support upon a vague but nonetheless real feeling of "common Christianity" which is shared by many who do not think or feel too deeply about the Church, and it aims somehow to "build" a church comprising all such indifferent "Christians."  But what common support can the "dialogue with non-Christians" rely on?  On what possible ground can there be any kind of unity, however loose, between Christians and those who not merely do not know Christ, but – as is the case with all the present day representatives of non-Christian religions who are in contact with Christianity – decisively reject Christ?  Those who, like Metropolitan Georges Khodre of Lebanon, lead the avant-garde of Orthodox apostates (a name that is fully justified when applied to those who radically "fall away" from the whole Orthodox Christian tradition), speak of the "spiritual riches" and "authentic spiritual life" of the non-Christian religions; but it is only by doing great violence to the meaning of words and by reading his own fantasies into other people's experience that he can bring himself to say that it is "Christ" and "grace" that pagans find in their scriptures, or that "every martyr for the truth, every man persecuted for what he believes to be right, dies in communion with Christ" (Sobornost, Summer 1971, p.171).   Certainly these people themselves (whether it be a Buddhist who sets fire to himself, a Communist who dies for the "cause" in which he sincerely believes, or whoever) would never say that it is "Christ" they receive or die for, and the idea of an unconscious confession or reception of Christ is against the very nature of Christianity.  If a rare non-Christian does claim to have experience of "Christ," it can only be in the way which Swami Vivekananda describes:  "We Hindus do not merely tolerate, we unite ourselves with every religion, praying in the mosque of the Mohammedan, worshipping before the fire of the Zoroastrian, and kneeling tot he cross of the Christian" – that is, as merely one of a number of equally valid Spiritual experiences.

No.  "Christ," no matter how redefined or reinterpreted, cannot be the common denominator of the "dialogue with non-Christian religions,"  but at best can only be added as an afterthought to a unity which is discovered somewhere else.  The only possible common denominator among all religions is the totally vague concept of "spiritual," which indeed offers religious "liberals" almost unbounded opportunity for nebulous theologizing.

The address of Metropolitan Georges Khodre to the Central Committee meeting of the WCC at Addis Ababa in January, 1971, may be taken as an early, experimental attempt to set forth such a "spiritual" theology of the "dialogue with non-Christian religions" (full text in ibid., pp.166-74).  In raising the question as to "whether Christianity is so inherently exclusive of other religions as has generally been proclaimed up to now," the Metropolitan, apart from his few rather absurd "projections" of Christ into non-Christian religions, has one main point: it is the "Holy Spirit," conceived as totally independent of Christ and His Church, that is really the common denominator of all the world's religions.  Referring to the prophecy that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh (Joel 2:28), the Metropolitan states, "This must be taken to mean a Pentecost which is universal from the very first...  The advent of the Spirit in the world is not subordinated to the Son...  The Spirit operates and applies His energies in accordance with His own economy and we could, from this angle, regard the non-Christian religions, as points where His inspiration is at work" (p. 172).  We must, he believes, "develop an ecclesiology and a missiology in which the Holy Spirit occupies a supreme place" (p. 166).

All of this, of course, constitutes a heresy which denies the very nature of the Holy Trinity and has no aim but to undermine and destroy the whole idea and reality of the Church of Christ.  Why, indeed, should Christ have established a Church if the Holy Spirit acts quite independently, not only of the Church, but of Christ Himself?  Nonetheless, this heresy is here still presented rather tentatively and cautiously, no doubt with the aim of testing the response of other Orthodox "theologians" before proceeding more categorically.

In actual fact, however, the "ecclesiology of the Holy Spirit" has already been written – and by an "Orthodox" thinker at that, one of the acknowledged "prophets" of the "spiritual" movement of our own day.  Let us therefore examine his ideas in order to see the picture he gives of the nature and goal of the larger "spiritual" movement in which the "dialogue with non-Christian religions has its place.

Part III

"The New Age of the Holy Spirit"

Nicholas Berdyaev (1874-1949) in any normal time would never have been regarded as an Orthodox Christian.  He might best be described as a gnostic-humanist philosopher who drew his inspiration rather from Western sectarians and "mystics" than from any Orthodox sources.  That he is called in some Orthodox circles even to this day an "Orthodox philosopher" or even "theologian," is a sad reflection of the religious ignorance of our times.  Here we shall quote from his writings (as cited in J. Gregerson, "Nicholas Beryaev, Prophet of a New Age," Orthodox Life, Jordanville, NY, 1962, no. 6).

Looking with disdain upon the Orthodox Fathers, upon the "monastic ascetic spirit of historical Orthodoxy," indeed upon that whole "conservative Christianity which ... directs the spiritual forces of man only towards contrition and salvation," Berdyaev sought rather the "inward Church," the "Church of the Holy Spirit," the "spiritual view of life which, in the 18th century, found shelter in the Masonic lodges."  "The Church," he believed, "is still in a mere potential state," is "incomplete"; and he looked to the coming of an "ecumenical faith," a "fullness of faith" that would unite, not merely different Christian bodies (for Christianity should be capable of existing in a variety of forms in the Universal Church"), but also "the partial truths of all the heresies" and "all the humanistic creative activity of modern man ... as a religious experience consecrated in the Spirit."  A "New Christianity" is approaching, a "new mysticism, which will be deeper than religions and ought to untie them."  For "there is a great spiritual brotherhood ... to which not only the Churches of East and West belong, but also all those whose wills are directed towards God and the Divine, all in fact who aspire to some form of spiritual elevation" – that is to say, people of every religion, sect, and religious ideology.  He predicted the advent of "a new and final Revelation":   "the New Age of the Holy Spirit," resurrecting the prediction of Joachim of Floris, the 12th century Latin monk who saw the two ages of the Father (Old Testament) and the Son (New Testament) giving way to a final "Third Age of the Holy Spirit."  Berdyaev writes: "The world is moving towards a new spirituality and a new mysticism; in it there will be no more of the ascetic world view."  "The success of the movement towards Christian unity presupposes a new era in Christianity itself, a new and deep spirituality, which means a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit."

There is clearly nothing whatever in common between these super-ecumenist fantasies and Orthodox Christianity, which Berdyaev in fact despised.  Yet anyone aware of the religious climate of our times will see that these fantasies in fact correspond to one of the leading currents of contemporary religious thought.  Berdyaev does indeed seem to be a "prophet," or rather, to have been sensitive to a current of religious thought and feeling which was not so evident in his day, but has become almost dominant today.  Everywhere one hears of a new "movement of the Spirit," and now a Greek Orthodox priest, Father Eusebius Stephanou, invites Orthodox Christians to join this movement when he writes of "the mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit in our day" (The Logos, January, 1972).  Elsewhere in the same publication (March, 1972, p. 8), the Associate Editor Ashanin invokes not merely the name, but also the very program, of Berdyaev: "We recommend the writings of Nicholas Berdyaev, the great spiritual prophet of our age.  This spiritual genius ... is the greatest theologian of spiritual creativeness ... Now the cocoon of Orthodoxy has been broken ... God's Divine Logos is leading people to a new understanding of their history and their mission in Him.  The Logos is the herald of this new age, of the new posture of Orthodoxy."

Part IV

The Present Book

All of this constitutes the background of the present book, which is a study of the "new" religious spirit of our times that underlies and give inspiration to the "dialogue with non-Christian religions."  The first three chapters offer a general approach to non-Christian religions and their radical difference from Christianity, both in theology and in spiritual life.  The first chapter is a theological study of the "God" of the Near Eastern religions with which Christian ecumenists hope to unite on the basis of "monotheism."  The second concerns the most powerful of the Eastern religions, Hinduism, based on a long personal experience which ended in the author's conversion from Hinduism to Orthodox Christianity; it also gives an interesting appraisal of the meaning for Hinduism of the "dialogue" with Christianity.  The third chapter is a personal account of the meeting of an Orthodox priest-monk with an Eastern "miracle-worker" – a direct confrontation of Christian and non-Christian "spirituality."

The next four chapters are specific studies of some of the significant spiritual movements of the 1970's.  Chapters Four and Five examine the "new religious consciousness" with particular  reference to "meditation" movements which now claim many "Christian" followers (and more and more "ex-Christians").  Chapter Six looks at the spiritual implications of a seemingly non-religious phenomenon of our times which is helping to form the "new religious consciousness" even among people who think they are far from any religious interest.  The seventh chapter discusses at length the most controversial religious movement among "Christians" today – the "charismatic revival" – and tries to define its nature in the light of Orthodox spiritual doctrine.

In the Conclusion the significance and goal of the "new religious consciousness" are discussed in the light of Christian prophecy  concerning the last times.  The "religion of the future" to which they point is set forth and contrasted with the only religion which is irreconcilably in conflict with it: true Orthodox Christianity.  The "signs of the times," as we approach the fearful decade of the 1980's, are all too clear; let Orthodox Christians, and all who wish to save their souls in eternity, take heed and act!

Read more:

http://startingontheroyalpath.blogspot.com/2009/08/0rthodoxy-and-religion-of-future.html

Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future 

Epilogue to the Third Printing

(1st Edition)

MAY 1976

http://remnantrocor.blogspot.com/2014/09/epilogue-to-3rd-printing-orf.html

Hollywood's Satanic agenda ... VERY eye opening

Hollywood's Satanic Agenda

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usDcUOdYFtU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALrMSSQ2OZg

DOWNLOAD

https://app.box.com/s/43o1ylmz6j5rulnk0hkhtfzboi6oq919

This very informative documentary film makes a clear historical connection between Hollywood and Antichrist.  Many Orthodox can benefit by being reminded of the immediacy and the seriousness of Satan's use of television and movie entertainment in these end times.  

But be aware that the narrator, a heterodox, is snared in the "born again" deception, which is cousin to the charismatic deception [see: Book Reviews Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future  ch.7 in the sidebar].  He does not appear to be hostile towards the Church [as some obviously are], but maybe, rather, simply unaware of its existence.  The last 10 minutes are typical sola scriptura.

An inherent contradiction in the film is that we are shown flashes of scenes from a Hollywood portrayal of Christ to oppose the satanic images with the Christian side.  If Hollywood [not the TV itself which is just a machine] is evil, does it not stand to reason that even a seemingly honest Hollywood depiction of Christ will be twisted?  And so it is.

See below what our Met. Vitaly wrote about TV.  He did not believe it was possible to outlaw TV in Orthodox homes.  But, it would be the best advice.  It has been said that the "elect" who might be saved could be the ones who didn't watch TV.  I believe throwing out the TV [and reading the holy Fathers instead] is the fastest most effective way anyone can become "not of this world".

also see below: Serbian Saint Dimitri Tarabicz

http://www.pc-freak.net/faith/orthodox_prophecies/members.cox.net/orthodoxheritage/The%20Righteous%20Dimitri%20Tarabibicz.htm

 In the 1700's, St. Cosmas of Ætolus predicted:  "The time will come when the devil puts himself inside a box and starts shouting, and his horns will stick out from the roof-tiles..."   Also it was prophesied that the "box" would be in everyone's home and families would worship it in their homes.


Also see this post:  About the Theatre
http://remnantrocor.blogspot.com/2013/02/about-theatre.html

Television

by Archbishop [now Metropolitan] Vitaly

We have not yet felt the huge after-shock of the coming of television which in a short while has managed to secure a niche for itself in almost every home. Its powers of persuasion and attraction have proved to be practically supernatural and are coupled with a subtle and awesome ability to corrupt. Today, the priesthood cannot and must not ignore the phenomenon of television—a phenomenon unrivaled in the extent of its influence over the human soul. Without exaggeration, a campaign against it must be our immediate and primary concern because every day and every hour its effects are being felt in our own homes.

Its power can be overcome! All we really need to do is to see it in perspective. It is indisputably a brilliant invention and our chief problem lies in the fact that our conflict is not really with it at all, but with ourselves and our own perpetually debilitated wills. We simply do not have the strength to tear ourselves away from its extraordinarily seductive spell. I am reminded of the words of St. Paul: "All things are lawful unto me but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any" (1 Cor. 6:12).

So let us look at television objectively, see the good and the evil in it, and only then will we be in a position to make use of its positive aspects and to reject the negative.

Firstly, no invention, no mechanism nor electronic device is inherently evil—there is no such thing as intrinsic evil, for evil exists only in the will of those who act contrary to the will of God. Such phenomena as television are rather manifestations of the Divine Wisdom which man has the privilege of discovering within the laws of nature, so that he may all the better and with all his heart give praise and thanks to the Creator. Given nothing else but the sheer quantity of programming, it would be foolish to say that no good at all comes of it. The chief good and perhaps the only good fully realized is this television has brought people home again.

The whole period beginning with the First World War and ending with the nineteen-fifties has been singled out by sociologists because of one characteristic, the tendency of people to "go out" in search of stimulation. People may have slept at home and even had their meals at home, but "leisure time" was spent elsewhere. People "went out," coaxed by sports events, movies, dancing, and an endless array of "entertainments." The results, especially for children, were catastrophic. "Home" became not much more than a dormitory and all the former connotations of the word were lost. It had been a place where children first learned to comprehend the things around them and to use their imaginations, a place where the newly-awakened imagination lovingly animated lifeless forms around it and first learned to dream. But now, the children were cast out into the streets, completely unprepared for the cruel and bitter realities they encountered, the realities of our times, which so insult the soul.

Suddenly, for the first time in five decades people came home—to watch television. Television was not presenting anything new; we cannot credit it with that. It was simply appealing to the lower instincts of the common man and bringing those same things which he had sought in the streets into his living room. So there is no use speaking of the "morality" of the change that came about, and yet the change itself gives cause for optimism. Amidst the indignity, corruption and temptation that we now live in, we must clutch at straws and hope that they will keep us afloat.

Let us concede, then, that television encourages us to stay home and try to build on that. Were we to damn it outright, we would find no one to listen. Such is the power it wields over us.

Conceivably, television could graphically and comprehensively present us with the complex issues confronting science, art and technology and thus increase our knowledge and awareness. Conceivably, it could eradicate ignorance and that peculiar semi-literacy which has always brought the world to grief.

Let us for a moment assume that it seeks to do these things, for the sake of the argument, and go on to examine its destructive influence on the soul.

Television keeps us from reading. Why bother when we can both hear and see everything on television? Why strain our imagination when television can do all the work for us? We are handed programs on a platter, masterfully prepared and piquantly sauced—all we have to do is eat.

Television has carried us to the ends of the earth and into space, taken us to the ocean’s bottom and into the earth's crust, into factories and operating rooms where we have practically participated in the most complex surgery. It has shown us nations and peoples whom we might otherwise never have seen. And yet, paradoxically, it has made us slothful and apathetic. Television's vast storehouse of audio-visual information has proven to be an indigestible glut which has made us indifferent to the real world around us. When all is said and done, it has nurtured our ignorance.

I will try to explain. When we read, an extremely complex psychological process occurs. It involves, first and foremost, an effort of the will. To choose a book and read it through requires a concentrated effort, whereas it takes no effort at all to watch television. No matter how brilliant the author of a given book may be, our imagination creates its own images as we read. We create a universe of our own. In fact, we may be drawn to our favorite authors precisely because we participate with them in the mysterious process of creation.

The imagination is only one aspect of the soul. It is the source of creativity and exploration and it is developed through reading. This helps to make us not only useful members of society but life-loving individuals as well. Television, on the other hand, far from stimulating the imagination, has no need of it. The work of the imagination is completed by the time a program is broadcast, and all we end up doing is looking at the end-product of the imaginations of others, often alien to our own. As we are deprived of our imaginations, so are we deprived of our souls, and our creative powers are paralyzed.

We see God's creation through a glass darkly and forget that "...the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made..." (Rom. 1 20). Very subtly, television turns us into materialists who retain an intrinsic animal ability to see, but lack any inner vision—the vision of the soul. We are being encouraged to look more and more but not to see. We are becoming like the idols which King David the poet and prophet spoke of in his psalms: "They have mouths, but they speak not; eyes have they, but they see not. They have ears, but they hear not; noses have they, but they smell not. They have hands, but they touch not; feet have they, but they walk not; neither speak they through their throat. They that make them are like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them (Ps. 115 5-8). Once we are able to look and yet not see the essence of things and the threads that bind them all together, we have become truly ignorant.

Much has already been written about the corrupting influence of television, but I would like to bring it to mind once more. No parent would ever take his or her children to any place of dubious repute. If someone suggested a stroll through the slums, it would be taken as a bad joke, a sign of mental instability, or of intoxication And yet, let us not be hypocritical, all you parents of respected and honorable; Orthodox families! Of course you declined the invitation to the slums, but you think nothing wrong in gathering in your living room and with a barely perceptible and innocent flick of the wrist inviting the lowest forms of human society into your homes, the walls of which are probably even graced with icons. You are about to meet every conceivable sort of maniac, murderer and psychopath. You won't even flinch and your conscience will remain clean. But your children will have nightmares; they will grow nervous, irritable and insufferably rude. Even you will not fall asleep as easily as before because of the oppressive burden of the immoral hideousness you have seen.

All of these things are a profanation of your home, which, in the highest understanding of the Orthodox Church, is your church as well. The Apostle Paul often called the Christian home the "church within the house" (Rom. 16 5; I Cor. 16:19; Col. 4:15; Phil. 1:2). You are also profaning your soul and the souls of your children, because your eyes and your ears are the instruments of your soul and the images you see, as well as the things you hear, enter into it. Images are stored in our subconscious like photos in an album and they can profane our heart of hearts. They re-emerge from the disturbed mind at any moment and in any place, in accordance with laws that we know nothing about at present. The interfere with our relationships with other human beings and take away the joy and the immediacy of living. It was with these things in view that the Orthodox Church stated succinctly and without equivocation, "Your eyes see the truth and what the eyes perceive goes directly to influence the soul. Wisdom tells us that this is so. Therefore guard your heart above all else you treasure, for the source of life is there" (100th canon of the Sixth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople).

What a Mephistophelian joke we have become the brunt of since then! Knowing full well that we Orthodox would never knowingly engage in unlawful assembly, Satan so cleverly and completely clouded our judgment that, with our own hard-earned money, we obtain an electronic device which introduces us to corruption, debauchery and murder and turns our home into an insane asylum. Satan has taken away from us that sense of human dignity which the holy prophet David so treasured that he constantly and tirelessly besought the Lord not to let the devil make a laughing-stock of him.

Since we undeniably do see all the above-mentioned depravity on television, it becomes important to note another critical consequence of our actions. In our everyday lives we have practical, moral, psychological and social barriers placed between us and the commission of evil. The soul, if only through inertness and laziness, tends never to remove them. But the impact and example of the realism of television effortlessly overcomes these barriers. It familiarizes us with all the approaches to sin as if they were of our own making, and consequently sin comes easily to us. This would explain the waves of appalling crimes which have become endemic in our time and which even our social agencies are concerned about—crimes which cannot be predicted—"motiveless crimes." A young boy, for no apparent reason, murders his parents one morning. A student indecently assaults his teacher. There are countless examples in the police records, but it would be inappropriate to cite any more here.

What means of resistance can I suggest, for it is clear that we must resist? First of all, we must work together, both the shepherd and the flock, making this our highest priority. Of course, the best and simplest thing to do would be to sell the television set, and the sooner the better. Let me qualify that: sell it and give the money to the Church for the benefit of the poor. This first suggestion is for those righteous souls who have already taken up the sword, those elect of God whose aim in life is salvation. Even more blessed are those who never acquired the thing in the first place, who never needed it. However, I understand that for the time being this, my first suggestion, will seem too harsh for the majority of the faithful. We have been captivated by television and our wills have become so feeble and sickly that few can respond to such a call. But do not be dismayed—there have always been few heroes and even fewer martyrs. The righteous always seem to be alone.

I would like to remind us all once more, as faithful Christians, of the positive qualities of television, particularly of its ability to keep us at home and together. We have all noticed on many occasions where the family gathers in the evening, with apparent dignity and decorum, before the television set in the semidarkness. Our struggle against the harmful effects of television comes down to taking advantage of its ability to bring us together and at the same time negating its corrupting influences. We must revitalize our willpower and establish a firm "modus operandi" in our use of this invention. Firstly, only the parents or some responsible member of the family should be allowed to turn it on. Secondly, it must be given the aura of "forbidden fruit" and children should be permitted to see only the occasional good movie, solely as a reward for their achievements and good behavior.

It is important to accompany every such film with a discussion and one's own conclusions, putting the subject into an historical perspective and citing related themes from literature. Everything must be seen in the light of Orthodoxy and the teachings of the Holy Fathers.

I would like to believe that those who choose to oppose fervently the corrupting influence of television will also be guided by the Lord who will suggest ways to ward off evil. During all fasts it could be made a rule to disconnect-the television or even to remove it altogether. Our diligence will of course depend on the extent of our desire for salvation, on our piety as a community and on our devotion to the Church.

From Orthodox Life, vol. 31, no. 1, 1981, pp. 42-46. Translated from Russian by Alexander Maidan.

The PROPHECIES of the Righteous Dimitri Tarabicz

The following are a few excerpts from the prophecies of the Righteous Dimitri Tarabicz (recorded around the 1850s). He was an illiterate Serbian villager who lived in an extremely pious eremitic manner in the mid 19th century; most of his prophecies were recorded by his godfather, the priest Father Zacharias. Here are excerpts from parts that deal with a Great War ahead of us. It should be noted that many of his 20th century prophecies, especially those involving Serbia, have come true.

You see my god-father, when the world starts to live in peace and abundance after the Second Big War, all of that will be just a bitter illusion, because many will forget God and they will worship only their own human intelligence... And do you know my god-father, what is human intelligence compared to God’s will and knowledge? Not even a single drop in the ocean!

Men will build a box and within will be some kind of gadget with images, but they will not be able to communicate with me already dead, even though this image gadget will be as close to this other world as hairs on the human scalp are close to each other. With the help of this image-gadget man will be able to see everything that is happening all over the world.

People will drill wells deep in the ground and dig out gold [another name for crude oil is “black gold”], which will give them light, speed and power, and the earth will shed tears of sorrow, because there will be much more gold and light on its surface than in its interior. The earth will suffer because of these open wounds. Instead of working in the fields, people will dig everywhere, in right and wrong places, but the real power will be all around them, not being able to tell them: “Come on, take me, don’t you see that I am here, all around you.”

Only after many years, people will remember this real power, and then they will realize how stupid it was to dig all those holes. This power will also be present in people but it will take a long time before they discover it and use it. Thus, man will live for a long, long time, not being able to know himself. There will be many learned men who will think through their books that they know and can do everything. They will be the great obstacle for this realization, but once men get this knowledge, then people will see what kind of delusion it was when they listened to their learned men. When that happens, people will be so sorry that they didn’t discover it before, because this knowledge is so simple.

They will believe that their illusion is the real truth, although there will be no truth in their heads. Here at home it will be the same as all over the world. People will start to hate clean air and this divine freshness and all divine beauty and will hide in rankness. Nobody will force them to do that, but they will do it of their own free will. Here, in Kremna, many a field will become a meadow, and many a home will be abandoned, but then those who have left will come back to heal themselves by breathing fresh air.

In Serbia it will not be possible to distinguish a man from a woman. Everybody will dress the same. This calamity will come to us from abroad but it will stay with us the longest. A groom will take a bride, but nobody will know who is who. People will be lost and will become more and more senseless day by day. Men will be born not knowing who was their grand-father and great grand-father. People will think that they know everything, but not a thing they will know.

The Serbs will separate from each other, and they will say: “I am not a Serb, I am not a Serb.” The unholy one will infiltrate this nation and bed with Serbian sisters, mothers and wives. He will sire such children that among the Serbs, since the beginning of the world, these will be the worst of offspring. Only weaklings will be born, and nobody will be strong enough to give a birth to a real hero.

At one time, we shall disappear from this land of ours. We shall go to the north, and then realizing our stupid deed, we shall return. When we come back, we shall wise up and chase away the unholy one, not to see him, in God’s name, ever again…

The whole world will be plagued by a strange disease and nobody will be able to find a cure; everybody will say I know, I know, because I am learned and smart, but nobody will know anything. People will think and think, but they will not be able to find the right cure, which will be with God’s help, all around them and in themselves.

Man will travel to other worlds to find lifeless deserts there, and still, God forgive him, he will think that he knows better than God himself. There, except of the eternal peace of God, he will see nothing, but he will sense with his heart and soul all of God’s beauty and power. People will drive in rigs upon the moon and stars. They will look for life, but life similar to ours they will not find. It will be there, but they will not be able to understand it and see that it is life.

One who goes there, God forgive him, not believing in God as it is proper for an honourable and decent person, when he comes back he will say: “Oh, you people, who mention God’s name with doubt, go there where I was, then you will see what is God’s mind and power.”

The more people will know, the less they will love and care for each other. Hatred will be so great between them that they will care more for their different gadgets than for their relatives. Man will trust his gadget more than his first neighbor…

Among people of a nation, far in the north a little man will appear who will teach men about love and compassion, but there will be many Judas and hypocrites around him so that he will have many ups and downs. Not one of these hypocrites will want to know what is real human grace, but his wise books will remain, and all the words he will say, and then then people will see how self-deceived they were.

Those who will read and write different books with numbers will think that they know the most. These learned men will let their lives be led by their calculations, and they will do and live exactly how these numbers tell them. Among these learned men there will be good and evil men. The evil ones will do evil deeds. They will poison air and water and spread pestilence over the seas, rivers and earth, and people will start to die suddenly of various ailments. Those good and wise will see that all this effort and hard work is not worth a penny and that it leads to the destruction of the world, and instead of looking for wisdom in numbers, they will start to seek it in prayer.

WORLD WAR III

When they start to pray more, they will be closer to God’s wisdom, but it will be too late, because the evil ones will already ravage the whole earth and men will start to die in great numbers. Then people will run away from cities to the country and look for the mountains with three crosses, and there, inside, they will be able to breathe and drink water.

Those who will escape will save themselves and their families, but not for long, because a great famine will appear.

The greatest and the angriest will strike against the mightiest and the most furious! When this horrible war starts, woe to those armies that fly over skies; better off will be those who fight on ground and water.

People waging this war will have their scientists who will invent different and strange cannonballs. We [i.e., Serbians] will not fight in this war, but others will do battle over our heads. Burning people will fall from the sky over Pozega [a town in Serbia]. Only one country at the end of the world, surrounded by great seas, as big as our Europe [Australia?], will live in peace, without any troubles… Upon it or over it, not a single cannonball will explode!

Those who will run and hide in the mountains with three crosses will find shelter and will be saved. But not for long times, since the great famine will appear. Food will be plentiful all over the cities and villages, but all will be poisoned… Many in order to feed themselves will eat everything and will die immediately. Those who will fast and endure fasting, those are the ones who will survive, because the Holy Spirit will preserve them; those will also be the ones closer to God in the time of great famine and perdition.

In that time, far away in the Russian mountains, a young man named Mihail will appear. He will have bright face and his entire appearance will radiate with mercy … he will come to the nearest Monastery and ring on all monastery bells, and to the people who will gather there around him, he will say: “You forgot about me (who I am), that I didn’t die but am alive…” Mihail will go everywhere but mostly he will dwell in Constantinople… those who have ears let them hear.

Archimandrite Sebastian Dobovich

Eugene Rose  Lay Sermon  Dec. 1965

On November 30 was the 25th anniversary of the death of Archimandrite Sebastian Dabovich, an important figure in the history of Orthodoxy in America.  Few Orthodox in America are perhaps aware of the promising beginning that was made by Orthodox missinaries in the 18th and 19th centuries.  From Blessed Father Herman and the early missionaries to Alaska, through Bishop Innocent [later Metropolitan of Moscow], to the first Orthodox bishop of San Francisco at the end of the last century, a serious attempt was undertaken to make the riches of Holy Orthodoxy accessible to Americans.   One of the most notable examples _ and results – of this missionary endeavor was the life and writings of Archimandrite Sebastian.  Born in 1863 in San Francisco of Serbian parents, he was the first native American to become a priest and monk in the Orthodox Church.  Fluent in Russian, Serbian and English, he preached the Gospel in all three languages.  He is remembered fondly by many Serbs as the founder and inspirer of many Serbian parishes.  In the English language he preached sermons and gave lectures, a number of which he published, together with independent essays, translations, and expositions of the Orthodox Faith.  In these he took as his motto the phrase of St. Paul: speaking the truth in love [Eph. 4:15].  Without judging those outside the Church, and showing every kindness to them in his relations with them, he nonetheless preached the truth without compromise, condemning all liberalism and indifference in religious matters as "foul treachery" to God's Truth, proceeding from a lack of faith and conviction.

His is an example Orthodox missionaries of today might well heed.  The temptation is strong to forget the essentially missionary nature of Orthodoxy, or to substitute for it a weak and timid "ecumenism" that fears to speak the whole truth least some be offended by it.  But one cannot be true to Holy Orthodoxy in this way.  Orthodoxy is the one true Church of Christ, the only pure and genuine Christianity; and this fact places upon Orthodox believers the obligation, when speaking of the Church to others, to do so straightforwardly and without adulteration – with love, surely, but above all with love for God's Truth.

The consecration of The Rt. Rev Weller as an Anglican bishop at the Cathedral of St. Paul the Apostle in the Protestant Episcopal Diocese of Fond du Lac, with the Rt. Rev. Anthony Kozlowski of the Polish National Catholic Church and St Tikhon of Moscow (along with his chaplains Fr. John Kochurov, and Fr. Sebastian Dabovich) of the Russian Orthodox Church present.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarch_Tikhon_of_Moscow

The Acension of Our Lord

Eugene Rose  Lay Sermon  June 1964

"God is ascended with jubilee,

and the Lord with the sound of a trumpet."

[Psalm 46:5]

On the feast of the Ascension of our Lord we celebrate the fulfillment of this prophecy of King David, which is used as the prokimenon of the day.  What does it mean for Orthodox Christians?  It is not only Jesus Christ Who has ascended; for He has raised human nature itself to the heavens.  We too shall rise from the dead and, if we are judged worthy, will rise with our regenerated, spiritual body to heaven, where, as the Blessed Augustine says, "all the people of God shall be made equal to the angels."

But the thought of this promise reminds us also of our responsibility.  The risen Lord is no longer with us in the flesh, but only through His invisible Holy Spirit.  The interim between the First and Second Coming of Christ is for us a time of witness and testimony of Him Whom we worship without seeing.  The Lord, just before His Ascension, commanded His disciples: "Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature" [St. Mark 16:15]; and He told them, "ye shall be my witnesses ... unto the uttermost part of the earth" [Act 1:8].

Christ has been with us for forty days, and we have rightly feasted; we must now, being filled with the Holy Spirit of God, strive to spread His Gospel and be His witnesses before the world.  For everything that we do, or fail to do, we shall be judged by Him Who shall return to earth in the same way He ascended to Heaven.  With such a sobering thought in mind, how can we not be zealous to make His truth known, so that all may join in the joyous cry of this feast, "Be thou exalted, O God, above the heavens, and Thy glory over all the earth" [Psalm 107:5].

The Prayer of the Good Thief

Eugene Rose  Lay Sermon  April 1964

For Orthodox Christians this Feast of Feasts, the Resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ, is already Heaven on earth.  He Who first rose from the dead has opened to all the gates of eternal life, and those who have properly prepared for this great Feast, in accordance with the commandments of God and the disciplines of His Church, have already now a foretaste of this life.  On this day, as it will be in the Kingdom of Heaven, all is joy, and glory, and light.

The season of preparation for the Feast is long and difficult.  Yet so great is the mercy of our God to us that He does not reject those who are late in preparing themselves.  Those who begin only at the sixth or the ninth hour, or even at the eleventh hour, as or Father in Christ St. John Chrysostom tells us, are welcome at the Feast as those who have fasted from the very first.

Indeed, the Church of Christ remembers especially, not only in connection with the events of the Saving Passion of our Lord, but also at every celebration of the Divine Liturgy, one who turned to the Savior only at the very last moment.  This is the Good Thief who hung on a cross beside our Lord, and whose prayer is the prayer of every Orthodox Christian: "Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom."

We are all, whether we realize it or not, in the position of this thief.  Like him we have been condemned by our sins as unworthy of this life; like him we have nothing to hope for in this world and face only suffering and a miserable death if we hope for no other life than this.  But if, like him, even in our suffering and unworthiness we yet turn to the God Who condescended to share our human weakness, even to such an ignominious death, and believe that He has the power to fulfill the promises He has made to us, – then is our condemnation revoked, our sins forgiven, our unworthiness overlooked, and out pain and sorrow and death swallowed up in victory and joy and eternal life.

By such faith, which is affirmed in the radiant services of the holy day and week, we are lifted above this earth and offered a glimpse of the life to come.  We already know in some measre the meaning of the promise with which our Lord answered the prayer of the Good Thief, and nowhere in the Holy Scriptures are there words more full of hope and encouragement for us: "Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with Me in paradise."

The Radiant Feast

Eugene Rose  Lay Sermon  April 1965

The Resurrection of our Lord, the Feast of Feasts is called in the Church calendar "radiant" or "bright," as is every day of he week that follows.  And indeed the dominant theme of the Feast, felt especially acutely by those who have attended many of the dark, somber services which the Orthodox Church prescribes for Great Lent and Passion Week, is one of brilliant, dazzling light  During the Matins of the Resurrection every light in the church is lit, the clergy is attired in bright vestments, every believer holds a lighted candle, and the constant theme of the hymns and canticles is one of light.

"The Day of Resurrection!  Let us be illumined, O ye people!  Let us purify our senses and we shall behold Christ radiant with the light ineffable of the Resurrection...  Now are all things filled with light... Let is behold Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, Who lighteth the life of all mankind...  Holy is this redeeming and radiantly-effulgent night, the harbinger of the bright and beaming Day of the Resurrection, on which the Light Eternal that hath no bounds shone forth in the flesh from the grave for all mankind."

The brightness of the Feast of the Resurrection is symbolic of many things: of purity, of life, of the everflowing joy and grace of the Feast.  But it is also much more than a symbol; it is already a foretaste of what every Christian lives for: eternal life in the Kingdom of Heaven.  In the Canon of the Resurrection we hear: "Shine, shine O New Jerusalem, for the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee."  The New Jerusalem is the Kingdom of Heaven, in which everything and everyone shall be filled with light; "then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father [St. Matt. 13:42].

Already in our perishing world this light has become visible.  It is the light of the Transfiguration of our Lord that blinded the Apostles on Mt. Tabor; it is the light with which the Prophet Moses shone after he had spoken with God on Mt. Sinai so that his face had to be covered with a veil; it is the light with which St. Seraphim of Sarov and others of the great saints have shone.  It is the light seen with his inward eye by every Orthodox Christian who lives the life of grace in the Church through the sacraments, the life lived so intensely by the recently-canonized Orthodox pastor, St. John of Kronstadt, that he could feel and exclaim: "All if fire, all is light, all is warmth."  Those who have received Holy Communion on the Feast of the Resurrection, after having fasted and morned with the Church throughout Great Lent, already know something of this radiant joy.

If we can begin such a life in this corruptible flesh, can we even imagine the life that we shall lead in the spiritual body with which we shall be resurrected in our Lord?  Then the darkness of sin will no longer obstruct the action of grace in us, and we shall shine with the light of the spiritual Sun, our Lord Jesus Christ, and all who shall attain to that Kingdom will live in effulgent light.

The Veneration of Icons in Holy Orthodoxy

Eugene Rose  Lay Sermon  March 1964

The first Sunday of Great Lent is celebrated by the Orthodox Church as the Feast of the Triumph of Orthodoxy.  Originally this Feast was established to mark the restoration of icons after the period of Iconoclasm, and among the anathemas read on that day there is still one directed against "those who insult and blaspheme the Holy Icons."   The Orthodox Church, then, places veneration of images on a level with the doctrines of Christian faith; and the central place occupied by this veneration in the life of Orthodox believers is another indication of its great importance.

Why is it so important?  One reason is that the use of images answers a very deep need of human nature.  Fr. John of Kronstadt has said has said, "Icons are a requirement of our nature.  Can our nature do without an image?  Can we recall to mind an absent person without representing or imagining him to ourselves?  Has not God Himself given us the capacity to representation and imagination?"

There is yet a more profound reason for the Orthodox veneration of icons.  This is the theological reason indicated in the Kontakion of the Feast: "The illimitable Word of the Father accepted limitation by incarnation from Thee, O Mother of God; and He transformed our defiled image to its original state and transfused it with the Divine beauty."  It is because God has taken human form and so restored this form to its original likeness to Himself, that it is proper for us to reverence images of our Lord, His Most Holy Mother, and the Saints, in whom the Divine image has also been restored.

The art of iconography, having such a high origin, is not an ordinary art; it is sacred.  Too many, alas, even among Orthodox believers, try to judge it by secular standards.  It is often said that icons in the traditional style are "unrealistic" of "unnatural".  But the Saints, too, according to the standards of the world are "unnatural"; and the same may be said of Christian Truth itself.  These things must be judged by a higher, spiritual standard.  "Realistic" images of the Saints are incomplete because they represent only their earthly appearance.  Traditional iconography, such as is still practiced in centers of Holy Orthodoxy like the Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, N.Y., depicts the Saints as they actually are spiritually and as we shall finally see them in the Kingdom of Heaven.  Such are appeals not to the senses but to the spirit.

That is why genuine icons cannot be painted by an ordinary artist.  While he is working, the icon painter must fast, pray, and be in a state of humility and contrition.  And the believer who stands before a finished icon must be in a similar state.  An icon is not to be appreciated as a work of art; its purpose is rather to help us to pray and to lift our minds and hearts above this earth into Heaven.  According tot he Holy Fathers who compiled the decrees of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, at which the veneration of icons was restored, "The more continually the Saints are seen in iconic form, the more are the beholders lifted up to the memory of the prototypes and to an aspiration after them."

In a world that is plunging to its destruction along the path of a thousand enticing novelties, the Orthodox icon, like everything else connected with Holy Orthodoxy, stands out as constant and unchanging, guiding faithful Orthodox along the one sure path to eternal salvation.  The constancy of the iconographic tradition and of the Orthodox teaching regarding the veneration of icons, is one of the many signs by which we know the truth of what the Church teaches us on this Sunday of Orthodoxy: "This is the Apostolic Faith, this is the Faith of the Fathers, this is the Orthodox Faith, this Faith hath confirmed the universe."

St. John, A Prophet

Eugene Rose  Lay Sermon  Oct. 1966

ST. JOHN OF KRONSTADT, 

A PROPHET WHO  RAISED THE DEAD

The newly-canonized Saint of God, John of Kronstadt [1829-1908], whose feast we celebrate on October 19/November 1, is surely one of the greatest of Orthodox Saints.  Even in his own lifetime he performed, by the power of God, countless miracles.  For believing Christians he was a fervent intercessor, and he healed thousands of the afflicted, whose letters and telegrams reached him every day.  He was a prophet as well, and he foretold the coming Divine chastisement of the Russian people for their sins.  He prophesied of the dispersion of the Orthodox Russian people to every corner of the globe, where by their presence they would make orthodoxy known to the unbelieving world, as well as of their return to the homeland before the end of the world.  And like the Prophet Elisha in the Old Testament [II Kings 4:32-37] he performed even the most impossible of miracles – he raised the dead, thus testifying to the undiminished power of God, which works even in our own day through men of faith and holy life.  The following miracle is related by Eugene Vadimov in the book I.K. Sursky, Father John of Kronstadt:

The wife of O., while preparing to bear her fourth or fifth child, was taken seriously ill.  Her doctors determined that the foetus had died and that a Caesarean section was required to remove it.  But first the family sent a telegram to Fr. John of Kronstadt, whom they knew.  Fr. John replied: "Leaving immediately, praying to God.  John Sergiev."

The next day about noon he entered the O. apartment, where by that time a whole crowd of relatives and friends had gathered.  "Where is Liza?" Fr. John asked, entering the drawing-room with his customary rapid gait.  "Take me to her, and all of you remain here quietly."

Fr John entered the adjoining bedroom and closed the heavy doors after him.  Minutes passed that seemed like half-hours.  In the drawing-room it was quiet as a burial vault.  And suddenly the bedroom doors were flung open with a loud noise.  In the doorway stood a gray-haired old man in a priest's cassock, over which he had on an old stole with a thin, dishevelled gray beard, with an extraordinary face that was red from the intense effort he had exerted at prayer and covered with great drops of sweat.  And suddenly there almost thundered from Fr. John fearful terrible words, words that came from another world.  "The Lord God has been please to work a miracle!  He had been pleased to resurrect a dead child in the womb!  Liza will bear a son!.."

"It's incomprehensible!" said one of the doctors who had come for the operation just two hours after Fr. John had left.  "The foetus is alive ... I don't understand a thing about it, not a thing ... I affirmed and affirm now that the foetus was dead and that blood-poisoning began long ago."  The other doctors understood no more.

The same night Mrs. O. was successfully and quickly delivered of a perfectly healthy boy.