Romanian Orthodoxy in English (+++++++++++++++++++++ Ioan Calineac)

Repent First, If You Want God to Help You -- Fr. Arsenie Boca

The situation is the following: people pray to God to save them from troubles, and God prays to people to abandon sin. Now, who should listen to whom first? Should God listen to people or should people listen to God?

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I wanted to touch upon the root of suffering which is sin...As I was praying for "the peace of the whole world, the good estate of the holy churches of God", all of a sudden I hear in my inner ear the bitter confrontation: "Don't ask Me to give peace to people, but ask people to change their ways, if they ever want to see peace on earth". Clearly, things are not good.   (Fr. Arsenie Boca, 1910-1989)

Thursday, January 10, 2013

"Anti-System" Movements

The problem is that many of the subjects that are adopted by these currents are actually real and very important (the false threat of terrorism, the murderous lie of global warming, the politics of population reduction, the global systems of surveillance of the Big Brother type, the villainy of the banking - corporate system and the pharmaceutical system, etc.), but once these are monopolized by such currents, they lose their credibility for a great part of the public opinion.

The success of these anti-system, but also (and sometimes) anti-christian currents (Zeitgeist) is explicable only because of the cheap sensationalism that they perpetuate, and the lack of profoundness and critical spirit of the great majority of consumers of "anti-system" productions (who do not spend any effort to verify the "revelations" or the theories that are sold as great secrets -- such as the attack on Christianity in the film Zeitgeist, an idiocy that works only on in-cult people). And, of course, what is more and worse than anything is the fact that these currents address the people (or those parts in every one of us) who, in the absence of a living relationship with Christ, feed from the spirit of this world. 
  
Fragment from article in Romanian: http://www.razbointrucuvant.ro/recomandari/2011/03/11/zeitgeist-de-la-un-film-diversionist-anti-sistem-si-anticrestin-la-miscarea-globala-de-%E2%80%9Dschimbare-si-constientizare-sociala%E2%80%9D-care-se-afirma-si-in-romania

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Man Doesn't Even Know What's Good For Him, Without God's Illumination -- Fr. Dumitru Staniloae

Man cannot do the things he needs to do because he cannot escape the power of the enemy without God's help. Man doesn't even know what is useful for him without God's illumination. So, man's will in itself does not know what to do towards his own good. That is why man prays to God to reveal His will to him, in order to know what to do. Man does not know through himself neither that evil comes from the devil, nor that evil is evil. In his pride, he thinks that everything he wants is good by submitting himself to selfish temptations.

Time Is Not The Ultimate Reality -- Fr. Dumitru Staniloae

If time was the only form of existence, attacked from all sides by death, then you couldn't truly hope for anything, since the hopes for short future pleasures, that pass, do no deserve such a title. "Do not hope for anything and do not be afraid" would be the wisest advice that could be given to man. Anticipate death even from now, become apathetic towards everything, if nothingness awaits for us soon! Or, drown these unpleasant thoughts in the noise of parties, in the forgetfulness of alcoholic dizziness, and the paroxysm of unleashed physical senses!

Yet, no, time is not the ultimate reality! Time is only a phase of life. It is the outer appearance, the appearance of a world that is fallen from the realm of spiritual existence. The man who is capable of spiritual existence doesn't feel time as much. Everybody knows from experience that the happiest moments do not get observed as they pass. To the contrary, great suffering is experienced as a very long time, longer than mathematical time. Time is measured in two ways: according to inner experience and according to mathematical units, and the relationship between the two is very lax.  An hour of mathematical time can sometimes be experienced as many hours, and other times as one second, or simply isn't noticed. That means that eternity penetrates time, invades time and determines the way it flows. (Theologian, Father Dumitru Staniloae 1903-1993)

Friday, January 4, 2013

You are All Sitting and Watching, not Knowing What Awaits You -- Nicolae Steinhardt

Somewhere in the Journal of Happiness, Nicoale Steinhardt was confessing that on August 30th, 1944 he was on the corner of Olari street and Calea Mosilor, together with others, looking at the Russian troops that were entering Bucharest, from Colentina: "I was sitting, too, and watching the tanks. I swear I was not laughing, nor saluting, nor applauding, nor exclaiming; I was simply sitting and watching, just like that. All of a sudden, I feel that someone pulls me by my shoulder and blesses me with an "IDIOT!", pronounced in a clear and emphatic way -- "You are sitting and watching, idiot; you are all sitting and watching, not knowing what awaits you. Look at them laughing, but they are going to cry bitterly, and you the same... Let's go home..."

It was his father, the engineer and architect Oscar Steinhardt, active participant in the First World War, wounded at Marasesti and decorated with the Military Virtue. Far from the naive enthusiasm of those who were seeing in those moments of 1944 the signs of the end of the war, far from the poisoned enthusiasm of the opportunists and occasional profiteers, the jew, Oscar Steinhardt understood that Romania and a great part of the European continent fell from the lake into the marsh, as it is said. After the errors of fascism and nazism, history was about to deliver them another package, totalitarian communism, which would last for a long time.

Saturday, December 29, 2012

Don't Blame it on World Leaders -- Archbishop Iustinian Chira

The people have the leadership. There is a saying: to every nation, God gives the leaders that they deserve...God doesn't punish us, but allows us to do whatever we want! (Archbishop Iustinian Chira in December 2012)

Friday, December 28, 2012

Death Does Not Come Over For a Cup of Coffee, But to Take You Away -- Elder Arsenie Papacioc

In my life, I've seen many people on their death beds. You know that I am over 90. Their screams, their contact with a different world which they knew about, but did not believe in, their knowledge of their own sins that could not be fixed except by coming back into this world... To come back was impossible, though, because death had come to take them away...I've told you this before: death does not come over for a cup of coffee, but to take you away. Death is a reality. And all the dying people that I've seen wanted to live, if only for just one more day.

Know that not in a day, but in a second you can do very much. I repeat, if you don't know how to die and resurrect every day, if you don't consider the great problem of your existence, then you are not going to accomplish anything important towards your salvation. Death is a reality; there's nothing we can do about it. Heaven is a reality, hell -- another reality. If we live without asking ourselves: "What is it with me and these values, with these things that will come?" -- it's a great mistake. Even a holy father said this: if you believe that there is Eternity and you don't do anything about it, you deserve to be locked in an insane asylum.

What is the requirement of a young man who just married his wife? "Why didn't you think about me all day?", isn't it? That is God's attitude towards man, taking into account that man is His creation. "I made you, I gave light to your eyes, a heart and a voice, I show you mercy, I judge you, I give you joy, without Me you are nothing, I can take your life any moment". It is a truth, a certain truth. If you are ignorant and wait for things to fall from the sky, then that is not good.

Man is a superior being, superior to the entire creation. When God made Creation he said it and it was made through a single word.  Man, though, He sculpted, He made him in His image and likeness. Image and likeness, everybody knows, but nobody thinks about what it means. We can be gods through Grace, superior to the angels. Angels have an amazing mission which they accomplish with great, great precision. As a structure, as a finality, man is superior to the angels, man leads the Universe and that's why Jesus Christ became The Son of Man, perfect man; in order to save us, to awaken us.

Jesus brought us more than Adam lost. He brought us the ability to be deified through Grace; He gave us the power to give up sin, to forgive our enemies, to exist as an entity greater than any other. All creation is wonderful, but, in particular, man was created out of a great love that I don't think can be expressed through words. God is something other than what we believe; He is perfect love. He created us just for Himself, not for someone else or something else. He created us so that we can be with Him forever. (Elder Arsenie Papacioc, 1914-2011)

Note: Personally, I don't believe man is literally superior to the angels and that Fr. Arsenie is trying to point out our unique value and infinite potential, as pinnacle or crown of all creation.  Hope I am not wrong.