The Evergetinos: Book Two - Chapter XL, II

There is a single thread running through these lives and sayings, like a hidden vein of gold through rough stone. It is the fierce and terrifying command of Christ to love those who wrong us, to turn every injury into an open door to the Kingdom, and to see in every enemy the physician of our soul.

In Saint Longinos we see what it means when love has completely displaced fear. He receives the men sent to kill him as honored guests. He feeds them, questions them gently, and when he learns they are to be his executioners, his heart does not recoil. He does not expose them, does not flee, does not calculate how to save his life. He rejoices. He calls them bearers of good things. He sees their swords as the keys that will unlock the true homeland, the Jerusalem on high. The hospitality he offers them becomes the doorway to his martyrdom, and his martyrdom becomes the consummation of that hospitality. He has so fully handed his life to Christ that those who come to destroy him are welcomed as friends.

In Saint Theodora, there is a quieter, but no less burning, heroism. Those who envy her virtue set a trap for her and quietly send her into danger at night, hoping she will be devoured by beasts. God turns the malice back on itself. A wild animal guides her like a gentle servant and later nearly kills the doorkeeper, whom she then rescues, heals, and restores. When the superior asks who sent her into such danger, she protects her brothers and hides their sin. She will not expose them, even when the truth would justify her and reveal their cruelty. She bears their malice in silence and lets grace fall on those who had wished her dead. Her humility is as great a wonder as the miracle.

Abba Motios shows us what reconciliation looks like in a heart that has allowed grace to ripen over time. He has been opposed, wounded, and driven away. Yet when he hears that the very brother who grieved him has come, he does not hesitate. He breaks down the door of his own hermitage in his eagerness to meet him. He prostrates, embraces, entertains, and rejoices in the one who had been the cause of his exile. The one who injured him becomes the occasion of his elevation to the episcopacy. The doorway to deeper sanctity is opened not by separation, but by reconciliation freely embraced.

The conclusion is inescapable and sobering. To keep a grudge is to consent to spiritual death. To hold tightly to injury is to loosen our hold on Christ. Rancor darkens the mind, gives demons room to rest, and drives true spiritual knowledge away, like smoke driving out bees.

Yet the same stories also breathe hope. Every wrong remembered can be turned into prayer. Every face that stirs distress can become the face for whom I beg mercy. Every memory of injury can be transformed into an occasion for thanksgiving, if I accept it as medicine from the hand of Christ. The elders tell me to send a gift to the one who insults me, to pray fervently for the one who harms me, to keep my countenance joyful when meeting those who speak against me, to refuse even the secret delight when misfortune falls on someone who has hurt me.

This is not softness. It is crucifixion. It is the slow, deliberate choice to let Christ’s mind and heart take shape in me, until I can look at those who betray me and say with truth: you are the cause of blessings for me.

If I want to belong to Christ, then I must learn to see every enemy as a hidden benefactor, every wound as a gate, every slight as a purifying fire. The saints do not simply tell me to let go of resentment. They show me how far love can go, and how much is at stake. Between Longinos and those who killed him, between Theodora and her envious brothers, I am being asked to choose which heart will become my own.

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Text of chat during the group:

00:02:49 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Volume II Page 317 Section C

00:03:37 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Philokaliaministries.org/blog

00:08:36 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Volume II Page 317 Section C

00:10:26 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Volume II Page 317 Section C

00:11:21 Myles Davidson: Pope Leo visiting St. Charbel’s tomb in Lebanon recently

00:11:29 Adam Paige: Reacted to "Pope Leo visiting St…" with 😇

00:11:40 Adam Paige: Reacted to "Screenshot 2025-12-02 at 8.35.12 AM.png" with ❤️‍🔥

00:11:49 Janine: The orthodox bible

00:12:20 Janine: Page 534

00:12:39 Janine: It’s the same as our Ukrainian church on weekdays

00:13:15 Janine: That’s tomorrow

00:13:27 Janine: Yes….sundays may be different

00:13:40 Janine: Look in appendix 2

00:16:36 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 317 section C

00:25:15 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 318 last paragraph, bottom of page

00:30:04 Anthony: But it gets worse! Pagans believed a divine punishment awaited people who broke the rules of hospitality.

00:30:40 Bob Čihák, AZ: Replying to "But it gets worse! P..."

Thanks.

00:35:20 Catherine Opie: His faith is such a strong witness to the passion and resurrection of Our Lord.

00:36:24 Maureen Cunningham: How many years was he a Christian

00:36:29 Bob Čihák, AZ: Replying to "His faith is such a ..."

Amen, amen. Thank you

00:36:36 John Burmeister: do we know how long after Jesus death that this took place

00:37:22 Myles Davidson: It must have been extraordinary to have been in the presence of these martyrs in the lead up to their death. No wonder the Church grew in their wake

00:38:18 Catherine Opie: It seems Pontious Pilate ruled from 26-36 AD

00:38:49 John Burmeister: how many of us would, whne our friend said come on over so we could be martyered

00:39:48 Bob Čihák, AZ: p. 320 section D

00:43:28 Maureen Cunningham: Demons had obey, the authority of Christ in her

01:03:43 Jerimy Spencer: Aloha father, I was two courses from getting ordained as an elder in the Nazarene Church but corruption and heresy here in Hawai'i stopped me in my already reluctant tracks. Now as a catechumen in the Greek Orthodox Church some ask me about priesthood, and I still feel air of holiness is too attractive to me. And while the ‘uniform’ is supposed to cause and evoke humility, I would be entirely too tempted to even think and feel it looked ‘cool.’

01:05:50 Anthony: I was thinking lately that maybe part of the scandal of priesthood was the laity expecting priests not to be sinners. But, priests are sinners...as are laymen who might use the scandal to vent feelings or sinful attitude they are keeping pent up. I say this as one who was scandalized and see now how I incorrectly processed the news of the scandal.  I see how scandal was used to prop up other people's longstanding grudges against the Church.  The scandalized helped contribute to the awful situation.

01:06:31 Jerimy Spencer: I can also see a flip side; like wearing an officer’s uniform causes one to stand upright, and likewise could be transformative, like an icon that keeps one looking in the right direction?

01:08:43 Myles Davidson: Reacted to "I was thinking latel..." with 👍

01:09:10 Bob Čihák, AZ: A story in the news was about a man who wore four different disguises in public, one was as a priest. He was humbled, I would guess from the story, by the trusting response some people gave to him.

01:13:52 Catherine Opie: As a therapist for 30 years dealing with many people who had a background of child abuse or sexual abuse perpetrated upon them I can absolutely say that its definitely not just a Catholic priest problem, it is more prevalent in the secular world. I think that it was important to deal with it but the press about it was out of balance in that there are many politicians ets who are heinous pedophiles and there is no press about that. What about child trafficking rings like Epstein? Nothing to see there apparently.

01:16:12 Anthony: Replying to "As a therapist for 3..." 

 Exactly. It is "inconvenient" to really get to the root of the problem.

01:16:21 Catherine Opie: I salute the way the Catholic Church has dealth with this scandal. A friend of mine who was abused in foster care by Catholic priests here in NZ just received an apology and a payout of 100,000 NZD. It was well investigated and they took it very seriously

01:22:39 Bob Čihák, AZ: I'm not at all sorry you got stirred up!!

01:22:41 Janine: Thank you Father

01:22:52 Catherine Opie: Always Fr.