The Catalog of Good Deeds

“Why?” Why didn’t God stop all of these hurricanes? Why did my friends lose their jobs? Why can’t I stop this bad habit? Why am I struggling financially?

Each of us has our own set of “whys” that we ask ourselves and that maybe we ask God in prayer each day. We want there to be a rhyme and reason to life. We want there to be order and justice. We want our prayers heard and answered.

There’s some dissonance when we know we’re prayerful people (or at least people who consistently try to pray) but things don’t go as planned. We lose our jobs, bills pile up, family members pass away, and natural disasters seem only to be more frequent. We need God more than ever, but these problems have a habit of pushing us away from our faith.

Here are three things to keep in mind in the midst of hard times.

1. God IS with us

When things are going well, it isn’t so hard to remember God. It’s when nothing seems to be working out that we wonder where God is in our lives. In the Old Testament, the Prophet Elijah (St. Elias) went in search for God to speak to Him. He found that God wasn’t found in these big shows of the earth’s power (the wind, the earthquake, or fire)...but He was found in a quiet whisper (1 Kings 19:9-13). Later, when God chose to become man, He wasn’t born a king, he was born to a young girl in a cave. Jesus was born and called Immanuel (literally “God with us”) in a way the people weren’t expecting (Matthew 1:23). So maybe God is with us when we least expect it, too.

For many of us, it can be really hard to sense God’s presence with us when we’re going through tough times. Sadness and grief can lead us to despair and despondency. Worry can lead to anxiety and fear. And fear just leads us to isolate and get lost in the what-ifs in our thoughts.

So how do we see that God is with us? There’s a beautiful Orthodox prayer service called the “Glory to God for all Things Akathist” that helps us to meditate on our many blessings and gratitudes when we might be inclined to see none. God is with us in the love of friends and family. Even after a disaster, God is made known to us in the acts of kindness shown by strangers and in the service given by emergency personnel. God is with us, and we recognize His presence when we learn to see the many signs of His mercy.

2. We can’t always explain suffering

Since so many of us ask “Why?” when we face suffering, there is no shortage of people giving explanations. Many Protestant pastors have suggested that natural disasters serve as signs of the Second Coming of Christ or serve as punishment for societal sin. Other people, like Kirk Cameron (actor from the 1985-1992 sitcom Growing Pains and the popular Left Behind series about the supposed “Rapture”) suggest that storms like Hurricane Irma are meant for individuals to personally repent.

One blogger, commenting on Kirk Cameron’s remarks, wrote:

People who are wounded and grieving and heartbroken need to be cared for and comforted and embraced—they don’t need any armchair theology about why this is a good thing, or how it’s a Divine personal message, or what God might be personally saying to them. It’s one thing for a victim to seek and speculate on such things for themselves, but something else for us to do it for them…

Maybe we should admit the mystery, discomfort, and the tension that spirituality yields in painful, terrifying times.

Maybe when people are being terrorized by nature or by the inhumanity around them, instead of shouting sermons at them—we should shut up and simply try to be a loving, compassionate presence.

This response meant so much to me, personally, because I still feel an instinctive cringe awaiting some religious leader giving their interpretation of the impending doom that natural disasters might represent. It’s part of my own path of healing having been raised in a Rapture-centric community before becoming Orthodox.

Sometimes we can look too hard for meaning in situations that simply are. We live in a broken world with pain and suffering and being a Christian doesn’t make us imune to the ways of the world. I can’t give meaning to another’s suffering. I can’t even guarantee I’ll make sense of my own; the only thing I can do with it is offer it up to God in prayer.

3. Prayer isn’t a transaction

When we encounter difficult times, prayer is either the last thing we think about or it’s the thing we grasp onto. As I watched Hurricane Irma approach Florida, I had to consciously reject the urge to freeze with anxiety about family and friends, and instead turn to prayer. In the moment, prayer was the only thing I could do. But what if my prayers aren’t answered? What if what I ask for (protection for people I love) isn’t what I get?

I can approach prayer as a transactional process with God or I can approach it as a transformational encounter with Him as part of our relationship. I’m abusing my relationship with God if I expect something from Him in return for my time and energy in prayer. If I think I’ll get what I want if only I fast properly or say the right words, or ask the right saint to intercede for me, I’m not committing myself and others to God.

Instead, I can chose to give my worries and concerns up to God. I can tell Him what is making me scared, and I can ask Him that His will “be done on earth as it is in heaven” as we pray in the Our Father. I pray so that I can make myself aware of being in the presence of God and so that God can soften the hardness of my heart. And then, naturally, God gives me the strength I need to endure the hard times.

Source: https://blogs.goarch.org/blog/-/blogs/holding-on-to-god-in-hard-times

Question: Father Andrew, please tell me how to save my child. My daughter is 11. She’s lost interest in God and doesn’t want to go to church. Instead, she spends her days glued to her smartphone, and she is furious if I attempt to take it away. When she was younger, I was teaching my daughter to love God. We went to church, confessed and took communion often. I have always sheltered her from evil. Now she watches films with foul and angry words and says that they’re “cool”. How can I save my daughter? Maria.

Answer by Fr. Andrew Lemeshonok: Small children bring small troubles. She’s 11 now. Imagine what will happen when she’s 16? You’ve got to help your daughter to become a Christian. All good encounters that you had in the past, all your prayers and communions, haven’t been lost, believe me. She’s in her transition to adulthood now. She isn’t a little girl anymore. Unfortunately, children are sometimes attracted to sins—various sins. They want to be adult. They want to imitate the grown-ups, and sadly, they often choose to imitate bad adults. Therefore, you’ve got to muster your patience and humility. Talk with her wisely, with love and attention. Watch that bad film together and then explain to her that it isn’t as great as it seems. Watch a good film with her. Both you and your daughter will need your prayers and the effort that you must make to ensure that your daughter defeats all temptations of this world. God will never let you down.

Most children are susceptible to the smartphone addiction that you mention. Unfortunately, the filth that is so widespread nowadays sometimes sticks to their souls. That’s why we should fight for our kids. Summon your patience and humility, and learn to be a mother with faith. You can take a little child to church by giving him or her a sweet or taking her in your lap. It is harder to get an eleven-year-old girl to be interested in the church, and it’s harder still with a sixteen-year-old girl. I believe that if you do your best to lead a Christian life, you’ll win.

September 17, 2018

St. Elisabeth Convent

There was a rich man who helped the poor, and everybody loved him dearly. He had a big iron piggy bank mounted on his wall and an inscription in gold letters above it, which read, “God’s Piggy Bank”. When the Lord sent the rich man a happy event, such as christening, name day, or something else, his wife used to tell him:

“God has given us so much! Please invite many guests to have fun with us.”

“How many guests should I invite?” the rich man would ask his wife.

“Forty people”, the wife would reply. The rich man would then pause to think and then respond:

“You know what, my darling? There are so many poor people around us right now. Their children are crying and won’t sleep because they’re hungry. Why not invite twenty guests instead of forty, and I’ll put the rest of what I would have spent on the other twenty guests into the God’s piggy bank.”

That’s what he usually did.

When the good man heard of any disaster (a fire or a flood), he would always say to himself, “Thank You God, You have protected me from this misfortune!” and throw a thanksgiving donation into the box.

Whenever a merchant came to the rich man, the rich man would choose some goods and go to a different room to get the money but then he would cast a glance on his piggy bank and say to himself, “Why buy so much? You can do with half of that.” He would buy half of what he had intended to, and throw the money that he could have used to pay for the other half into the God’s Piggy Bank.

Day by day, year by year, the rich man’s piggy bank grew bigger and bigger.

Before he died, he convened the elders of the village where he lived and told them, “I didn’t rob my own children or something but I still managed to collect a lot of money to donate to God’s cause. I spent and wasted less than I could. You will find what I could have wasted in this piggy bank.”

When the elders opened the piggy bank, there were tears of joy in their eyes. After the rich man reposed in the Lord, people called him their benefactor. The memory of that good man will always remain in his home village. A shelter for kids, a school, a hospital, and a new stone church will remind the later generations about him and his piggy bank.

Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds

Editor's Note: The Amish have been capturing the imagination of Americans for decades, challenging the status quo with their utter rejection of the 'goods' of modern life.

The Russians have their own version of the Amish phenomenon in the face of the Old Believers, also called Edinovertsi (One-Faithers), who disdainfully turn down a sparkling, crude materialism in exchange for a strict, simple life.

Old Believers are Russian Christians who did not accept the reforms of the Official Russian Church in the 1600s. Since then, they have maintained a strict, vividly separate culture and identity, settling in separate communities and farming the land.

Old Believers usually have large families and dress traditionally; phones and washing machines are forbidden. Children do not attend school and are taught to read religious books in Old Slavonic, an old, complex language used in Russian Church services.

Throughout the 20th century, religious persecution forced the Russian Old Believers to wander through countries and continents. Today, however, with the support of the Russian government, they have been slowly returning and settling in conservative communities throughout Russia.

This is a series of mini-interviews with adherents talking about their lifestyle. This particular one explains how the Old Believers maintain a very strict, semi-monastic rule and tradition of prayer and piety.

From the time of Patriarch Nikon and Tsar Alexey Mikhailovich’s liturgical “reforms,” daily life and even the worldview of the Orthodox person has changed considerably.

We routinely hear from our pastors, and then from the laity echoing them: “What’s the difference, if at least there is love, and your conscience doesn’t reprove you…” and other variations on the theme of fulfilling this or that Church rule.

Indeed, the two main commandments of our Lord Jesus Christ were put in these words: Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart (Mt. 22:37) and Love thy neighbour as thyself (Mt. 22:39). Without that, all of our labors on religious soil turn into legalism, hypocrisy, and phariseeism.

However, our pious ancestors—and before them no less than the pious Byzantines, heirs to the works of the holy hierarchs Basil the Great, John Chrysostom, and Gregory the Theologian—tried to baptize their entire lives and everything around them.

It is no accident that the highest works of art, the most significant monuments of ancient Rus’, surviving until this day, have a clearly expressed religious character and are directly related with Church culture.

Architecture, painting, literature… It’s as if Russia was one continuous church. Let’s not idealize it: There are times in the history of our country when many events happened that are quite bitter to remember today, but the presence of the Christian ideal as the orientation of the life of the state and society cannot be denied.

It seems those pious times have sunk into oblivion, and we live in that world and those conditions in which we live…

There are no longer long services and plangent, angelic singing in our city parishes, and icons of the Rublev school are found far from everywhere.

But grains of these olden times, of this semi-monastic life have been preserved, by the will of God, and survived to our day in the Edinoverie (United Faith, Old Rite) parishes of the Russian Church.

Let the reader not be scared of the words “Edinoverie”, “Old Rite parishes”, “Orthodox Old Believers”, and simply “Old Believers”. We’re not talking about representatives of some Christian confession or, God forbid, about schismatics, but about the same ecclesial fullness.

The Edinoverie arose as a movement of unity between the old and new rites already in the end of the eighteenth century.

Since that time, two rites with unity of faith have been active in the Russian Orthodox Church on equal footing. As Edinovertsi can freely visit new rite parishes and participate in their Sacraments, so the parishioners of regular Orthodox churches can freely come to our “ancient” services and even become members of our communities if desired.

Edinovertsi approach the Divine services very tremulously. Having decided to go to such a church, already from the outskirts you will see parishioners hurrying to the service, like the heroes from some film on ancient Rus’.

The men have unshaven and untrimmed beards, dressed in traditional untucked side-button high collar shirts, girded with a belt, and in pants and boots! Inside the church many wear black kaftans down to the floor.

The woman wear sarafans and opaque head coverings, held together in a specific way with a pin, and which cover the chest and back. Married women wear a povoinik under their head covering—knitted bonnets, testifying to the wearer’s marriage.

In their hands parishioners carry a long leather (as a rule) chotki—lestovka, or “ladder” prayer rope—with triangles sewn on the end.

If you’re planning to go to a Edinoverie parish and you don’t have special liturgical clothing, it’s no problem. Just remember the most important rule: Clothing should be discreet and tidy, like in a regular Orthodox parish. Sleeves should be long and opaque, and women must be dressed in a skirt, and headscarves are better held together with a safety pin.

Before the entrance of the church, and entering into it, Edinovertsi make the Sign of the Cross with three bows from the waist, silently praying, “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (bow). “Thou hast created me, O Lord, have mercy upon me!” (bow). “Countless times have I sinned, O Lord, have mercy and forgive me, a sinner!” (bow). They take a special embroidered prayer mat — podruchnik — from a stack usually piled up inside the entrance. Later they lay their heads and hands on it, prostrating to the ground, to preserve them in cleanliness. Men and women stand strictly on their own sides, on the right and left respectively. Extra walking around the church is best avoided. If there is enough time before the start of the service, you can sit on a bench by the wall.

They don’t use electric lighting during the services in Edinoverie churches. The space of the church is illuminated by lampadas and candles. Such dimness better disposes a man to prayer, not distracting his gaze. Vegetable oil is used in the lampadas, and the candles are necessarily of wax. If they want to light candles, it’s better to do so before the start of the service. In some Edinoverie churches, before lighting a candle, they make three bows with the above-mentioned prayer “O God, be merciful…”, and also pray to the saint depicted on the icon.

Before the beginning of the service the priest leaves the altar and stands before the Royal Doors and reads the Seven Bow Beginning. This is a special “preparatory” prayer. It attunes us internally, calling us to gather ourselves. Preserved custom has this prayer read before leaving home and after returning from common prayer, and in the most extreme cases it replaces the morning and evening rule. It goes:

O God, be merciful to me, a sinner. (bow)

Thou hast created me, O Lord, have mercy upon me! (bow)

Countless times have I sinned, O Lord, have mercy and forgive me, a sinner! (bow)

It is truly meet to bless thee, O Theotokos, ever blessed and most pure and the Mother of our God; more honorable than the Cherubim and more glorious beyond compare than the Seraphim, without corruption thou gavest birth to God the Word; true Theotokos, thee do we magnify. (prostration, always)

Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit! (bow)

Both now and ever and unto the ages of ages, amen! (bow)

Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy, Lord bless. (bow)

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, for the sake of the prayers of Thy Most Pure Mother, by the power of the precious and life-giving Cross, and my holy guardian angel, and for the sake of all the saints, have mercy and save me, a sinner, for Thou art good and lovest mankind. Amen. (Prostration, without the Sign of the Cross).

After the dismissal “Lord Jesus Christ…” there are three more bows with the prayer “O God, be merciful…”

If you arrive at an Edinoverie church after the beginning of the service, say the “Beginning” yourself, and then carefully stand in a free place and join the common prayer. Here note that parishioners stand in church with their arms folded over their chest. According to patristic interpretation, such a stance symbolizes the folding of angels’ wings, standing before the throne of God. And you will note, to your great surprise, that it’s much easier to endure the long services in this position.

Don’t be confused by the differences in some words and endings of the prayers. This is how they were everywhere in ancient Rus’ until the middle of the seventeenth century. For example, you might hear the unfamiliar “… i vo veki vekom” or “And in the Holy Spirit, True Lord, the Giver of Life…” in the Nicene Creed.

If you wind up at the All-Night Vigil, you will note that the people sit in Matins at the Kathismas, rising only during the “Glory” to make the Sign of the Cross. There are opportunities to sit during the reading of the instructions, if they are given. The All-Night Vigil is long in Edinoverie churches; it can take from four to six hours. However, many newcomers have noticed an inexplicable ease and even an invisible “help” in standing.

Pay special attention to the kliros. There can be two klirosi—right and left, but usually there’s one. The kliros is led by a cantor, holding a pointer in his hands, with which he sets the singing, and points to important points in the hymns in the books, including when he hears if someone has slipped up. The cantor stands in the very center of the singers, and they align around him in “battle formation.” In Edinoverie churches, Znamenny singing, the main type of ancient Russian singing, coming to Rus’ from Byzantium, is used in the Divine services. The choir sings in one voice; instead of notes, hooked notation, peculiar for modern man, is used to indicate voice intervals. Even just looking at them, there inevitably arises a feeling of contact with something ancient, and at the same time eternal. Precisely such angelic singing was once heard by the ambassadors of the Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir in the church in Constantinople. Znamenny “chant” is quite extended, ascetical, unemotional, and collected. Of course, if you compare Byzantine and Russian Znamenny singing, there are clear differences. The sound of our equivalent is free and loud, and the performance is quite strict—manifesting the national, northern color. Such singing helps the faithful to focus on prayer.

The prayers are read in a special way, as well as the liturgical readings from the Gospel and Epistle and the Six Psalms. This reading style is called poglasitsi—it is a kind of word pronunciation in plain chant. Poglasitsi is used for the Psalms, the Old Testament readings, the Epistle readings, the Gospel readings, the instructions, and so on. Reprints of seventeenth century books are used in reading and singing. Sometimes you can see ancient books of past centuries in leather bindings on the analogion, with yellowed pages, and ancient ornamentation and illustrations. Before the beginning of a reading, every reader, as a rule, does a prostration on a podruchnik, and, receiving a blessing from the priest, starts to pray.

The services end the same way they began—with the Seven Bow Beginning. Then the priest reads the homily from the ambo. Then the community follows into the trapeza. In some parishes, they have preserved the wonderful tradition of processing to the trapeza accompanied by the singing of the troparion of the day or feast. Before eating, all ceremoniously pray together. During trapeza you can read from a soul-profiting book, and on feasts it is customary to sing ancient Russian spiritual verses. Singing, as you know, is the soul of the people. It expresses its national character through its contents, which make you relive the events reflected in it. That is why it’s very important for Edinovertsi to sing Christian, and not worldly songs, in times of rest. This is another echo of a bygone era, and the desire to “draw near to the Kingdom of God,” Christianizing all the space around you.

During Edinoverie gatherings they read the Sacred Scripture with commentaries, the lives of the saints, the works of the holy fathers, and other edifying literature.

Because of the small number of parishioners, Old Rite churches are in close communication with one another, with active inter-parish cooperation. Edinovertsi of neighboring dioceses often visit one another; it can happen that faithful from various corners of the country, and even the world, come together for patronal feasts.

Those treasures of the liturgical and parish life that from the time of ancient Rus’ until our day have been borne by the Old Ritualists (Edinovertsi), are common to the entire Russian Church. Today they receive individual elements of Church piety in completely different churches and monasteries. Some use Znamenny singing on the kliros, somewhere they paint the churches according to the canons, others do not use electric light in the services. All these tools contribute to a better perception of God, deeper contact with Him for all those desiring of it, and for private prayer.

Interest in the Old Rite in the Church is growing with every year, attracting more and more supporters of a life according to the laws of ancient Rus’. May God grant that this interest not fade, but only increase, and most importantly—that it unswervingly help us all to move towards the salvation of our souls.

Vladimir Basenkov

Translated by Jesse Dominick

Originally appeared at: Pravoslavie.ru (http://orthochristian.com/104149.html)

Source: https://russian-faith.com/people/russian-amish-old-believers-guardians-ancient-russian-discipline-prayer-n1300

Medallions, pendants, and bracelets with images of the saints: there are so many products in some church stores! How should we treat them? Shall we wear them? Can a cross be a piece of jewelry? What if cross-shaped earrings are trendy now? Here are the answers by Archpriest Nikolay Markovsky, the parish priest of Holy Protection Church in v. Zaitsevo.

We have to bear in mind that the Cross is the symbol of our salvation. We all know perfectly well that it used to be a tool used for humiliating execution of lower-class criminals in the Roman Empire. When Jesus redeemed our sins on Mt. Golgotha, the Cross became the sign of His victory over death and a sacred object for every Christian. You cannot replace the Cross with anything else, with any icon, medallion, or ladanka.

If an individual wants to wear a medallion with the image of a saint, it’s fine. Each one of us has a heavenly patron. There are many people who venerate St. Spyridon of Trimythous, St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, St. Seraphim of Sarov, and other saints. You mustn’t replace your cross with these medallions but you can wear them together. The Cross is irreplaceable, and the rest is just supplementary to it.

Many people treat crosses or medallions not as sacred objects but as fashion accessories, and choose them accordingly, in jewelry stores based on their own aesthetic preferences. They wear these items over their clothes for everyone to see. It is unacceptable, too. A cross is a very personal item. Everyone carries his or her own cross on his or her neck, and it’s the cross that the Lord gave us during our baptism. When people show it off so that it becomes a fashion statement, it’s a sin. You should wear your cross modestly, under your clothes, and not show it off. The same is true of medallions and ladankas, too.

There are fashionistas who wear earrings and other jewelry in the shape of crosses. I think it’s outrageous. We read in the Gospel that the Lord carried his cross to Golgotha to be crucified on it, and the cross absorbed God’s Blood. The images of the Cross are sacred for every Christian. When people wear them in their ears, noses, and so forth, it’s a sacrilege, which calls for immediate repentance. Let’s take a flag of a regiment that fought in the Great Patriotic War as an example. It is soaked in the blood of the soldiers who carried it with them during all battles and died under that flag. Will you use that flag as a carpet or a fashion item? Everyone knows that the flag is sacred for the soldiers who survived that war. Similarly, the cross is sacred for all Orthodox Christians. You mustn’t wear it in the way that it wasn’t meant to be worn.

You might ask: what about athletes who do contact sports? They take off their crosses during training sessions because the crosses can be damaged. My opinion is that it is allowed to take the cross off and to put it in your pocket. Sometimes doctors also ask their patients to take off their crosses before a surgery or certain medical examinations. I was in a situation like that not long ago. The doctors were Christians, so they simply suggested that I put my cross on my hand, and I complied. That’s an example of direct necessity, and there’s no getting around it.

Is it required that you wear a cross with the Crucifixion scene on it?

Of course, a cross should look like a cross: that is, the Crucifix of our Lord Jesus Christ. If there isn’t the Crucifixion scene on your cross (e.g. if it’s someone else’s gift or if you were baptized with that cross), I don’t think it really matters. What you should care about is treating it as a sacred object and being aware of what you wear on your neck.

A cross must be a cross, so that anyone who looks at it should be able to see that it’s a cross and not a pendant, not a toy, not a pin. The Lord warned, “For whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he shall come in his own glory, and in his Father’s, and of the holy angels” (Luke 9:26). If you’re an Orthodox Christian and you go to church and take communion, how can you be ashamed of your cross? A Christian must be faithful to Christ and not cheat on him. You can hardly regard those who are attracted to many things at the same time and carried away by fashion trends as Christians. Those who want to wear pendants, should buy pendants and leave crosses to those who really care.

Women often wear bracelets composed of many small icons. Should we regard them as acceptable or not?

There are so many products in church stores nowadays. There are dozens of various ladankas, medallions, bracelets, bottles of oil consecrated no one knows where and no one knows by whom, etc. Frankly speaking, I’m skeptical about things like those. You can’t replace the cross with anything else. It’s our primary sacred object. When people wear a bracelet with images of twenty-five saints, what do they do it for? Can’t they pray to their favorite holy intercessors at home? If you regard that bracelet as a charm, are you really a Christian? It’s pure paganism.

Years ago, I used to see a whole iconostasis around some people’s necks: several crosses, medallions, and something else. Today, it’s not the case anymore. This is another case of Orthodoxy mutating into paganism. Pagans believe that the more gods you worship, the better covered you are. You simply need more gods and more rituals. The Orthodoxy is different. We have only one Savior, Jesus Christ, and only one Cross. You shouldn’t wear twenty icons and ladankas around your neck. You’ve got one Cross—a sacred object, which Jesus washed with his blood. What else do you need?

It is not the cross itself that protects us. It’s the Lord. It’s our faith. Jesus Christ says, “According to your faith be it unto you” (Matthew 9:29). If one cross isn’t enough for you, then you have little faith. Even if someone tears a cross off your neck or if you lose it or break it, it doesn’t mean that you’re left without God’s protection.

The Cross is the symbol of our faith. You shouldn’t panic if you lose it. If something happens to your cross, go to a church store and buy a new one. A cross is not a charm or an amulet. Your new cross will be as powerful as the one you lost. Don’t be afraid! If you lose your cross, go and buy a new one, then have it consecrated and wear it. May the Lord save you!

Recorded by Yekaterina Shcherbakova
Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds

Source: https://pravlife.org/ru/content/mozhno-li-vmesto-natelnogo-kresta-nosit-medalon-s-ikonoy

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