The Catalog of Good Deeds

Prayer is good. I hope you’ll pray after you read this article.

I hope you’ll surrender your heart to God at least temporarily. Let Him enter your heart so that you could calm down and chill a little. I would like you to perceive this state as a spa center of some sort. A spa for your soul.

We’re talking about relaxation of your soul. Calm down. Don’t say anything. Keep calm. Transform yourself. A friend of mine told me, “When I return from Mount Athos, I feel calm for ten days! Instead of being nervous all the time, strange things happen! Whatever happens at home, I remain calm, serene, and quiet. My wife is surprised, too. ‘What’s going on with you? Why aren’t you nervous?’ she asks.” That’s the effect of prayer that changes you from within.

It is because you’ve become one with God. It’s because you’ve become a different person. You are “rebooted”. There are people who attempt to “reboot” themselves with alcohol. You are restarted by prayer.

In contrast to them, you don’t lose your mind and logical thinking. You are made stronger. You don’t need wine, tsipouro, whiskey, or cognac—only the Holy Spirit. You enter an altered state of mind where you see and you don’t see at the same time. You hear and you don’t hear at the same time.

People tell you about their problems that make them anxious or irritated. You look at them with different eyes and from a different vantage point because you’ve touched the mystery and depth of prayer. You’ve dived into the place where there is no commotion. You’ve learned the meaning of the world of Christ. You aren’t troubled by the things that used to bother you a lot. Well, I think if I continue, it will annoy you. Enough. Thank you for your love and for the prayer of love that you will begin to pray with. Pray for yourself, too. And for those who love you. And for those whom you don’t actually love. And for your dearest one. And for the rescue of your marriage. You can pray for me, too, if you want to. May the real prayer unite us all.

Someone asked me, “How do I know that everything is fine with me if I stay in the Church? I see many people who are close to Christ, who go to church, who are baptized, who pray and take part in worship, who perform their social functions well, but they don’t change… or they even get worse sometimes. I notice it everywhere in the world around me. I would like to see a different picture in the church. Father, please tell me how can I be sure that everything is fine with me?”

Here is my answer: There aren’t any unequivocal signs because everything is in God’s hands. The changes that occur are concealed, mysterious, and hidden. The crowd cannot see them.

Some clues are evident, though. Only you and God know what happens inside your soul. It’s invisible. However, everyone can see how you treat your husband or wife, your children, and your neighbors.

Fragment of "Marriage Has Its Challenges"

by Archimandrite Andrew (Konanos)

Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds

Source: https://pravlife.org/ru/content/arhim-andrey-konanos-o-tom-chto-proishodit-v-glubinah-nashey-dushi

Here’s a quick quiz for you.

1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.

2. Name the last five Heisman trophy winners.

3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America contest.

4. Name five people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer prize.

5. Name the last five Academy Award winners for best actor and actress.

6. Name the last five year’s worth of World Series winners.

How did you do? Me either! The point is, none of us remember the headliners of yesterday. These are no second-rate achievers. They are the best in their fields. But the applause dies. Awards tarnish. Achievements are forgotten. Accolades, awards, and certificates are often buried with their owners.

When I was in college, I remember the University of Arizona baseball coach, Jerry Kindall, speaking to a Christian group I was with. He was an excellent major league ball player in his day. He pulled out his World Series ring and showed it to us. He said there was a time in his life when he almost sold his soul to be able to obtain that ring. It meant everything to him. As he was preparing to speak with us that night, he had to search high and low to find the ring. He finally located it in his sock drawer underneath a pile of socks!! His point was simply that giving our lives to gain the world’s treasures really amounts to nothing. Even if we gain the treasure it will mean nothing in a very short time. He went on to say that the real treasures we need to strive for are the ones we lay up in heaven. These come from our relationship with God and our relationship with those around us.

Now this can easily be applied to our personal lives or our work! Have you ever observed someone “selling their soul” to make the next rung on the ladder of success? Promotions and titles also get buried with their owners. Even if they make it, the cost to their lives… especially their inner selves… can be so very great. The change can be slow, but family and friends begin to see it or at least feel the change. No matter how much a person might think they can live one life at work and another at home… there is really only one life that each of us lives. It is similar to the person who thinks they can appear one way at Church and yet live another way the rest of the week. We are all simply one person… living one life. The relevant question in this article is “Where are we laying up our treasure?”

Here’s another quiz. See how you do on this one:

1. List a teacher who aided your journey through school.

2. Name a friend who has helped you through a difficult time.

3. Name a person who has taught you something worthwhile.

4. Think of a person who have made you feel appreciated and special.

5. Think of someone you enjoy spending time with.

6. Name a hero whose story has inspired you.

Easier? You bet! The lesson? The people who make the biggest difference in your life are not the ones with the most credentials, the most money, the most awards, or the best promotions. They are the ones that care! And just as true: You make the biggest difference in other people’s lives not because of your credentials… or money… or awards… or promotions… but rather you touch their lives because you truly care about them!

Jesus has the final word on where we put our treasures: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-21)

By Fr. Stephen Powley

Source: https://upwordglance.com/2016/10/19/where-will-your-treasures-end-up/

Metropolitan Anthony (Pakanic) gives his advice on how not to get lost in this world.

After the Fall of Adam and Eve, we live in a tragic world separated from God by our own choice.

That dreadful choice and the evil that accumulated throughout the world’s existence have brought us to our current condition.

Everyone either accelerates the global estrangement from God or helps to bring the world closer to God. We are responsible for what is going on today. Our excuses like “I have nothing to do with it,” “I’m just a victim,” “It’s them who are to blame” won’t fly. The offenses, envy, and rage that have accrued inside our hearts serve the darkness and cause all the dreadful and inhumane phenomena in this world.

We are Christians. This is the only saving straw that makes it possible for each of us to get saved and to change the world.

Indifference isn’t a Christian trait. “Ye are the salt of the earth,” Jesus said. Therefore, we are able to enforce God’s truth in this world by the power of our faith and to carry the light of Christ. If our faith is inert, no one needs it. It’s like salt that lost its savor, good for nothing but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men (Matthew 5:13). Unfortunately, judging by the news, most of us forget about it, otherwise there wouldn’t be so much evil in the world.

The light of Christian faith would dispel darkness, fill up the space and transform it. It isn’t the case. Why?

We’ve got to open the hidden windows and doors of our inner house—to open our hearts as wide as possible by making them generous and loving—to make our eyes able to see and our ears able to listen—if we want to be filled with the light of Christ.

First of all, we’ve got to understand what Christ tells us. True understanding of His words and His divine teachings is possible only if we do our best to live like Jesus, that is, abide in His Body, the Church.

Only if we participate in the Divine and saving Sacraments of the Church, will we be able to maintain our connection with God, and that connection will become the source of immortal life for us. Consequently, we will be able to hope for the proper discernment of His Divine words and for faithfully preserving His teaching.

We’ve got to listen to the words of Christ with utmost attention, to look for the Savior and find Him. Gospel parables aren’t just far-fetched stories. They occur daily and repeat in our lives until we get to their core and absorb their meaning.

Did we show mercy toward our neighbors while asking the Lord to be merciful toward ourselves for serious wrongdoings and grave errors?

Did we forgive other people’s debts when we received forgiveness of our own debts? Did we act like the merciless debtor who, having been forgiven a lump sum, didn’t have mercy on another person who owed him?

Did we Christians become the yeast that ferments the world? “If twelve people (Apostles—editor’s note) were enough to ferment the whole universe, consider how bad we are if, in spite of the fact that there are so many of us, we cannot convert the remaining souls—we who would easily ferment a thousand of worlds!” Saint John Chrysostom exclaims.

Do we use our hard-earned money for a good cause or have fun and accumulate it like the notorious wealthy man? Do we waste our power and time in vain, forgetting about spiritual riches and needs? Do we turn our backs on the eternity?

Does our faith bring fruit every day? Do we fulfill the commandment? Aren’t we like the fig tree that grows in a vineyard and doesn’t bring fruit for three years in a row? God comes looking for our fruit but when He doesn’t find it, He orders to evict us from this life.

If our actions don’t carry the mark of eternity—the infinite God’s depth—they will scatter like dust as soon as the Lord puts an end to our earthly existence. Our numerous actions will be regarded futile because they aren’t deep enough to be allowed into the eternity.

Orthodoxy is not just a narrative about God. Orthodoxy means living in God. It’s the connection between God and human, when God descends to the human and the human gets the chance to ascend to God, i.e., achieve theosis.

This is the aspiration of our God-revealed religion.

Jesus Christ established the Church so that the people clad in His Spirit would transform the world and shine His light into it.

He called us Christians into the world, which drowns in its sins, like sheep in the midst of wolves (Matthew 10:16). It means that we must guard our purity and love, faith and truth. We must trust God and obey His redeeming will no matter what.

If we don’t preserve the spirit of Christ in this world, we are smeared by participation in this world’s affairs and aren’t in any way different from it. We can get saved and change the world only with God’s mercy.

May our faith be proactive! May our hearts be merciful! May our souls avoid everything that doesn’t contain this spark of love and eternity. Only if we abide in the Spirit of Christ, can we oppose evil and serve the Lord and His Church.

Only in that case will we stay on the side of light that casts away darkness.

Recorded by Natallia Goroshkova

Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds

Source: https://pravlife.org/ru/content/kak-opredelit-s-kem-my-so-svetom-ili-tmoy

“Don’t resist evil,” “do good in return for evil,” “bless those who curse you”… These biblical verses have baffled us and made our selfish souls afraid multiple times, haven’t they? Frankly speaking, it’s so far over our heads. Seeing how negligent we are towards our loved ones, we need to rewrite the commandments, “Don’t resist good” and “bless those who show mercy towards you.” This is the ABC of moral culture and respect; an instruction for those who lag behind and cannot cope with the curriculum.

There are many people who are pleasant to deal with only while everything is fine. Do they really deserve praise? Isn’t it natural that people act nicely when everything is okay? One has to be a good person even when everything goes wrong, right?

I recall my friends’ family who were so courageous as to give birth to many children in the 1990s. That decade was a difficult time in Russia. They literally didn’t have enough to eat. Their children seldom ate candies. They were happy when they managed to buy a pair of boots or even a pack of diapers. They couldn’t even dream of the things that we can easily afford today, such as household appliances or new furniture for the children’s room. Workers weren’t paid for half a year or more. Breach of trust and blatant lies became the norm for the emerging “wild market”. Their family barely survived thanks to random gigs, pickled food, and other tricks to make ends meet.

My friend was distressed when he ran into another case of ill luck or someone’s dishonesty. He had to rack his brain thinking how to feed his growing family. His attempts to earn some money sometimes failed, and their family budget was getting more and more strained. His young wife had to pull the weight of the everyday household chores while being overburdened with little kids. How surprisingly pleasurable it was to witness her talking her husband out of his sad thoughts and urging him not to worry but instead wait and be patient during the hard times.

It is a simple story with a straightforward lesson, you might say — and you’d be right. However, doesn’t it often happen that the head of the family, the breadwinner, when faced with a similar situation, is caught in the crossfire? He has problems at work and immediately there are unpleasant talks and arguments at home? His wife grabs at every opportunity to show her discontent, to remind her husband of his missteps and failures since the beginning of time. She beats up the person who is already wounded. She makes him resist, defend himself and justify his actions, and sometimes to counterattack until they both are too tired and too confused by the endless explanations, causes, and effects.

“That which is falling, deserves to be pushed” — this barbarian and immoral phrase coined by Friedrich Nietzsche isn’t declared openly but is often present in people’s relationships de facto. Without noticing it, you hit another person when he’s the most vulnerable and where it hurts the most — the only reason for it being your dissatisfaction with what you’ve got and your desire to have more because you keep thinking “I am entitled to it” or “Everyone else has it, but I’m missing out.”

We’re not talking exclusively about money here! Let’s say, a child falls ill, she has problems at school, or a neighbor’s water pipe was damaged and the water ended up your precious kitchen furniture. The whimsical and comfort-loving beast inside us is looking forward to such accidents. That one crisis is instantly followed by another one: the husband and the wife lose their temper. They become irritated and want to criticize one another. It happens exactly when the circumstances call for the need to support one another!

Now tell me please: Isn’t it silly to damage your relationship with the person you love right in the middle of some unpleasant event? Is it a good way to solve your problems? Do you expect to feel better after all that? Being patient and staying together is merely the most sensible thing to do. It’s inexplicable and weird that people damage their relationships, become inefficient and don’t demonstrate even those positive qualities that they used to have. It is silly and naïve that they try to blame the other person.

It is hard to remain a good person when something doesn’t go according to your plan…

Contemporary people are hard to please. They don’t lose their temper only if everything is fine. Any divergence from their initial plan disrupts the equilibrium. Any adversity may lead them to waive their obligations. Any non-fulfillment of their desires threatens to kick off a chain reaction of their painful rethinking of everything in the world. Only God knows how far the people who are influenced by these fluctuations can go!

In fact, our times aren’t particularly difficult. Circumstances vary, but if you look back into the past, even the more recent past, there have been more difficult times, haven’t there? Internal instability encroaches on us simultaneously with an unparalleled improvement of living conditions and a veritable revolution of comfort. We are conquered by a multitude of pleasant trifles that accompany each of us from dawn till dusk. Why is our willpower less reliable than it used to be? Strangely enough, the more one gets, the less satisfied one becomes. Our society appears to be the princess on a pea, who can’t tolerate even the slightest discomfort. Our immunity to failures is too weak: every failure to accomplish our plans and expectations threatens to destroy the bubble of “societal optimism” and cause an epidemic of mutual frustration.

What would happen to those who are unsettled by weather or less-than-perfect cappuccino foam, if they were miraculously sent into the aforementioned 1990s? It’s fairly easy to guess, isn’t it?

There are few things about our time more disgusting than lack of stamina and courage and almost complete absence of people who are easy to deal with, rain or shine. People who you can lean on. People who don’t re-consider their responsibilities all the time. People who remain true to themselves. People who know both how to be abased and how to abound: both to be full and to be hungry, as Apostle Paul says. People who are happy not only when they get something pleasant but always, in spite of the most peculiar and tricky situations.

“Don’t resist evil,” “recompense good in return for evil,” “bless those who curse you”… Yes, it’s so far over our heads. Let’s try at least not to add evil to evil and to remain good even when things go wrong.

In other words, let’s not increase entropy. There’s enough entropy in this world already!

By Andrei Rogozansky

Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds

Source: https://foma.ru/davay-possorimsya-ob-odnom-iz-samyih-uyazvimyih-mest-sovremennyih-brakov.html

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Archimandrite Andrew (Konanos): What Goes on Deep Inside Our Souls?

Where Are We Laying up Our Treasure?

Praying Both with Mind and Body: St. Theophan the Recluse on Prayer

The Holy Lance: What Happened to the Spear of Longinus?

How to Determine Whether We Are on the Light Side or the Dark Side?

Let’s Quarrel: One of the Most Vulnerable Aspects of Contemporary Marriage

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Search This Blog

featured Slider

Archimandrite Andrew (Konanos): What Goes on Deep Inside Our Souls?

Where Are We Laying up Our Treasure?

Praying Both with Mind and Body: St. Theophan the Recluse on Prayer

The Holy Lance: What Happened to the Spear of Longinus?

How to Determine Whether We Are on the Light Side or the Dark Side?

Let’s Quarrel: One of the Most Vulnerable Aspects of Contemporary Marriage

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