ΤΗΕ ROLE OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH
The
need for guidance by an experienced spiritual father
Whatever
we do, we must never
do it based on ourselves. We have to ask, we must have a spiritual
leader. He is the one who will show us how to make progress in
prayer. Not to mention, this spiritual father is the first one to be
cured in advance. Beware! He cannot be just anyone.
We
must find a spiritual leader, who is (spiritually) cured, one who
knows the healing method of the Church by experience and not only by
the books. Generally, those who have lived in the monasteries and
practiced honest obedience to an Elder know this particular healing
method. And I say this not because I lived in a monastery (and still
do), but because this healing method is especially and almost
exclusively preserved in the monasteries and not out there in the
world!
Married
or unmarried spiritual father?
It
is totally wrong to think “I
am a married person, and I should and will go for guidance to a
married spiritual father, who lives in the world, because he should
know better.”
What
is it that he
should have known better? Do you imply that the unmarried ones have
not been raised in a family, and do not know what’s going on there?
But
the point is not to know what’s going on and what’s not. The
point is to know how to heal the other person, to know how to purify
one’s soul, one’s noetic energy! Being a spiritual father, you
should be able to inspire and help the person under your guidance to
be purified, cooperating with the Dιvine Grace, because, if you have
not done this already to yourself (by the Grace of God), you cannot
show this to another person. Moreover, if people do not want to be
cured in the first place, and just come to you for an opinion,
despite your help and all your useful words, they will,
unfortunately, simply not do what’s needed, they will not be
purified.
Many
people regard the Mystery of the Holy Confession as a simple
(psychoanalytic) discussion, and the spiritual father as a person who
just happens to possess human knowledge more than they do. Since they
do not believe that he is being illumined by the Holy Spirit at this
very moment of the confession process, they do not humble themselves
to the “first will” of the spiritual father. Either because of
ignorance or because of pride, they miss out on the help they would
receive from the energy of the Holy Spirit, Who is actually the One
conducting the Mystery. This way, those people degrade the Mystery
down to the level of a simple conversation or exchange of opinions,
and, hence, in each occasion they seek for a conversationalist
spiritual father, whom THEY regard as more experienced (or obviously
more convenient toward their sinful passions).
Another
false distinction is between “strict” and “lenient” spiritual
fathers. Like in medical practice, where there is no such thing as a
strict or lenient doctor, but either physicians-healers or
charlatans, so it is in the case of the spiritual fathers: There are
those who offer an effective healing treatment and those, still
uncured themselves, who don’t!
f. Savvas Agioreitis
To be continued...
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