Philokalia Ministries

St Isaac begins Homily Six like one who will not let us hide from ourselves. He does not admire our efforts nor comfort our vanity. He forces us to look directly at what we are and at what we truly desire. A man who slips into accidental sins, he says, is not wicked but weak. And God allows this weakness to appear so that the conscience is pierced and the truth becomes unavoidable. God does not let the soul rise above these falls before its second birth because He wants us awake rather than respectable. Our failures become a kind of mercy. They expose the illusion that we are strong or self sufficient or spiritually advanced. They ask one question above all others. Do you desire God at all It is a raw question. A frightening question. Yet every stumble presses it deeper into the heart. If we fall and tremble the heart is alive. If we fall and justify ourselves the heart is asleep. Isaac calls that shameless. He says that without fervent faith or fear or chastisement the soul will never truly draw near to the love of God. These are not punishments but the three torches that light the way toward Him. If I resist them I do not want God himself. I want an idol shaped like comfort or control or admiration. Then Isaac turns to the roots beneath the roots. Turbulent thoughts come from gluttony. Ignorance and superficiality come from constant talk. Worry over worldly matters scatters the soul like chaff tossed into the wind. These are not merely moral observations. They are spiritual symptoms. They show us the condition of the heart. I can fast until my stomach twists and keep vigil until my knees ache yet if my thoughts are full of resentment or anxious grasping or the need to preserve my image then all my labors remain barren. The body strains while the passions settle deeper into the mind. Nothing changes because nothing inside has surrendered. Isaac gives an image that cuts to the bone. The man who clings to anxiety or covetousness or the memory of wrongs is like one who sows seed into thorns. He works. He sweats. He prays. He begs God to respond. Yet when he lies on his bed he groans because he cannot reap a harvest. The soil itself has been sabotaged by his thoughts. He fasts and wonders why God does not see. He humbles himself outwardly yet inwardly still clings to his own desires. God answers through the prophet. In the very day of your fasts you do your own wills. You sacrifice your free will to your own idols when you should be offering it to Me. It is one of the most devastating revelations in Scripture. The greatest offering we possess is the free will. And we lay it not on the altar of God but before our own desires. Here Isaac is not simply giving ascetical instruction. He is tearing open the heart to expose its truth. He is asking us to face the one question we spend our lives avoiding. Do you really want God or do you only want the appearance of holiness. Do you want the Kingdom or do you want the feeling of being spiritual. Do you want the fire of God or do you want to protect your own self created identity. Until we answer this honestly all asceticism remains external and fruitless. The early lines of Homily Six are not gentle. They are surgical. They strip away excuses and self deception. They show us that the spiritual life is not perfected by effort alone but by the purification of desire. Not by striving but by surrender. Not by vigils and fasts but by a heart emptied of its own will. I will never know God until I want Him more than I want myself. And my accidental sins are the strange mercy that reveals how much I still cling to myself. Isaac begins with our weakness so that we might finally seek the One who heals. He begins with our falls so that true longing may rise. He reveals our poverty so that desire for God might no longer be a sentence we say but a cry that burns within us. --- Text of chat during the group: 00:05:35 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 169 Homily 6 00:05:49 Janine: Father can you say the name of that book again? 00:06:58 Janine: Thank you..it sounds very good 00:10:39 Janine: I just bought it on Thrift books 00:11:57 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 169, # 1 00:13:55 Una’s iPhone: Review on Amazon: Great Byzantine mystic https://a.co/d/2pt0HfE 00:15:28 Una’s iPhone: Sorry, wrong link 00:15:58 Una’s iPhone: Can’t find your comment. It’s on the book. Here’s the book 00:16:03 Una’s iPhone: https://a.co/d/clx1Saz 00:16:13 Una’s iPhone: Sorry! 00:16:49 Ben: They got scared and scrubbed it! 00:17:23 Vanessa Nunez: Reacted to "They got scared and …" with 😂 00:18:25 Bob Čihák, AZ: What are “accidental sins”? I think of sins as requiring a conscious act of the will. 00:40:07 Erick Chastain: How do you avoid sensory things in the mind as he says you should? 00:44:20 Maureen Cunningham: Kingdom of God  id with in 00:49:11 Julie: I do Fr don’t know how to put my hand up… 00:49:29 Jesssica Imanaka: I worry about my own laziness... devoting a lot of time to prayer and spiritual reading can also carry the danger of acedia for me. 00:49:58 Jesssica Imanaka: As if the parasympathetic nervous system is getting overactivated... 00:51:29 John ‘Jack’: NYS just finally started disallowing cell phones schools; I thought they’re would be more kick back than there was.  Children WANT structure, as do we. Obedience ultimately. 00:55:35 Anthony: The guilt of "jansenism" and the Calvinist work ethic of busyness and production are especially present in America and drives us to take these vices as virtues and drive out willfulness to get what we think is good. 00:57:16 Eleana Urrego: Reacted to "The guilt of "jansen..." with 👍🏼 00:57:34 Jesssica Imanaka: The Divine Office app can help with ribbon placement in the Liturgy of Hours volumes. 00:58:41 Larry Ruggiero: Found a YouTube that entitled The Self-Phone Setup Guide 00:59:18 Larry Ruggiero: It says let us begin by making our phone…BORING 01:06:48 Una’s iPhone: Reacted to "The Divine Office ap…" with 👌 01:09:00 Una’s iPhone: Replying to "I do Fr don’t know h…" It’s under Reactions. It’s a heart icon in my iPhone 01:09:29 Una’s iPhone: Reacted to "The guilt of "jansen…" with 👌 01:12:29 Eleana Urrego: Thanks for the movie recomendation, My family love it. 01:13:05 Joan Chakonas: Lately I have come to realize that there really is no activity or minute in my day when I can’t ask God for help.  I am so vainglorious He is teaching me basically every idea I come up with on my own is vanity and I’m learning to experience peace. 01:14:06 Joan Chakonas: I LOVE the desert fathers 01:14:11 Thomas: It feels as though it would be simplest to be obedient to somebody, if you were to do bodily labors, because the it would be hard for it to be for your will or ego, but what should be done if you couldn’t be immediately obedient 01:16:53 Joan Chakonas: This hour goes too fast 01:17:08 Thomas: It feels as though I can’t trust anything I want to do even if it may technically be good, because I can’t trust what the reasons I give myself for doing these things 01:17:10 Joan Chakonas: Yrs 01:17:13 Joan Chakonas: Yes!! 01:17:33 Maureen Cunningham: Thank You always a Blessing 01:17:37 Jesssica Imanaka: I have to pick up my daughter from extended day care, otherwise another hour would be fine! 01:18:18 Janine: Thank you Father! 01:18:40 Kevin Burke: Thank You Father! 01:19:13 David Swiderski, WI: Thank you Father may God Bless you and your mother. 01:19:35 John ‘Jack’: Thanks Father

There is a remarkable clarity in these sayings and stories a piercing simplicity that both unsettles and consoles. The Evergetinos places before us the most difficult and necessary truth. The evil done to us is not a detour on the spiritual path but the path itself. Wickedness does not destroy wickedness. Resentment never cures resentment. Anger never frees us from anger. Only goodness that is unmerited and uncalculating has the power to unmake what evil intends to build. It is a truth we often admire in abstraction and dread in practice. The Fathers do not theorize about forgiveness. They reveal what forgiveness becomes when enfleshed. A man betrayed unto martyrdom thanks his betrayer for delivering him to blessing. A brother who has been stealing bread from a starving elder receives not reproach but gratitude. The monk who finds his life endangered cries out to warn the very man who led him into danger and would have robbed him. These stories do not soften the challenge but intensify it. The gospel is not a philosophical proposition but a cruciform way of being. And the cross is never abstract. It always has a name and a face and a voice that has wounded us. It is in the seventh story that the Fathers hand us the key for understanding the rest. The one who injures me is not merely an adversary but a physician. The one who slanders or ignores or mocks me reveals the wound of my vainglory. The one who takes what is mine uncovers my greed. The encounter that disturbs my peace does not create the sickness. It unmasks it. To resent the one who exposes it is to reject the medicine of Christ. It is to say to the Healer not this way not through this pain not at this cost. Yet without accepting what is bitter there can be no cure. Such a word lands upon the heart with weight. It does not flatter our natural instincts or offer comforting sentiment. It is a summons to a death of self that cannot be faked and cannot be delayed without consequence. But if these stories demand much they give even more. The elder who kissed the hands of the thief died with the joy of one who knew the road to the Kingdom was paved by the mercy he showed to others. The patriarch who ransomed the man who robbed him knew the sweetness of compassion that does not remember wrongs. The elder who visited his accuser in prison tasted the freedom of one whose heart was no longer governed by injury. There is joy here not the fleeting spark of vindication but the deep quiet illumination that comes when the soul sees that nothing done to us can keep us from the Kingdom if we allow grace to transfigure it. To forgive is not merely to release another. It is to be released. To bless those who curse us is to breathe a different air. To see those who injure us as agents of healing is to discover that the road into God is not guarded by our enemies but escorted by them. The Evergetinos does not give us a map but it reveals the terrain of the heart. It shows that the spiritual life depends less on what happens to us than on how we respond. And in doing so it opens before us not just a path but a promise. Mercy is not only an obligation but a liberation. Love is not only commanded but possible. And the wounds we receive if we accept them in Christ become the very places where the Kingdom dawns. --- Text of chat during the group: 00:01:17 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 321 00:01:23 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Number 2 00:04:20 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Philokaliaministries.org/blog 00:09:55 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 321 section E, # 2 00:12:45 Catherine Opie: Apologies for being late where are we? 00:12:53 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 321 section E, # 2 00:21:21 John Burmeister: are we talking money or a material item 00:25:16 Forrest: The Greek words in the passage for what to give is is μικρὰν εὐλογίαν, which is a literally "small good word."  that, is, a small good blessing. 00:25:49 Una’s iPhone: Simone Weil? 00:26:02 John Burmeister: Reacted to "The Greek words in t..." with 👍 00:26:14 Una’s iPhone: Reacted to "Edith Stein?" with 😁 00:29:18 Maureen Cunningham: Not speaking negative 00:34:51 Maureen Cunningham: The person who oppresses you can be the hammer and chisel to form you into Christ. 00:37:30 Maureen Cunningham: Hanna & Penna 00:38:59 Jerimy Spencer: “The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken.” -C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory 00:38:59 Fr Martin, AZ 480-292-3381: This is a struggle, one of my struggles, to see an offense as Jesus shining a light on my weaknesses or illnesses that He wants me to confess before Him so that He can apply the appropriate medicine. Sometimes I have this insight, sometimes I'm defensive or offended. I remember St. 00:39:20 Fr Martin, AZ 480-292-3381: Anthony said, The truly blessed are the ones who can see their own sins.” 00:58:08 Catherine Opie: Dry bread 01:00:59 Forrest: Rusk (Παξιμάδι) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rusk 01:04:19 Fr Martin, AZ 480-292-3381: It seems when people sin against us, they find themselves in a prison of shame, embarrassment, anger, and so on. Is that what we should do, to pray and strategize how to be as kind or dismissive as we can so that they can focus on their healing and not on how we are feeling about them? 01:05:36 John Burmeister: after coming to class for a couple of months and reading with, there seems to be a lot of thievery between monks. 01:06:15 Forrest: Replying to "after coming to clas..." Well. they made the news, so to speak. 01:06:47 Catherine Opie: Reacted to "after coming to clas..." with 😅 01:08:19 Myles Davidson: Replying to "after coming to clas..." It was not uncommon for people in those early days to enter monasticism to escape problems back home. Perhaps a criminal past 01:09:00 Myles Davidson: Replying to "after coming to clas..." Not all had pure motives 01:09:04 Catherine Opie: Its not thievery its relieving their brothers of materialistic tendencies 01:09:49 Myles Davidson: Reacted to "Its not thievery its..." with 😁 01:10:01 John Burmeister: Reacted to "Its not thievery its..." with 😂 01:11:18 Catherine Opie: This was really good for me to read since my mother just passed away and the covetousness is starting to creep in as we sort things out. I will remember to graciously allow a sibling to be first in line 01:11:33 Myles Davidson: Reacted to "This was really good..." with 👍 01:11:47 Maureen Cunningham: Thank You Blessing. 01:12:01 Jessica McHale: I love the novice conferences! 01:12:04 mstef: Reacted to "This was really good..." with 👍 01:12:06 Forrest: Reacted to "This was really good..." with 👍 01:12:32 Janine: Thank you Father! 01:12:38 Catherine Opie: We cannot hear background noise you end 01:13:17 Bob Čihák, AZ: Thank you and bless you, Father. 01:13:28 Catherine Opie: Thank you God bless 01:13:29 Joan Chakonas: Thank you !! 01:13:32 Jessica McHale: Many prayers! 01:13:40 Catherine Opie: 🙏🏻

St. Isaac speaks as one who knows the earthquake at the root of the soul where pride fractures us from God and humility alone builds a refuge strong enough to endure the storm. His words are not gentle suggestions for the religiously inclined. They are fire. They are rope flung into deep water. They are an indictment of every heart that waits for suffering to discover prayer for temptation to discover the need for mercy for collapse to remember God. “Before the war begins, seek after your ally.” This is the secret. The humbled man begins today when there is no battle when the sea is calm and the sky soft. He builds his ark plank by plank small obediences simple prayers hidden acts of self abasement not because the flood is visible but because he knows it is certain. This is the wisdom of the saints: that peace is the time for labor not repose. The iniquitous drown because they mock preparation. They call upon God after pride has stripped them of confidence. Their throat is tight when they pray because they never bent it before in the dust. Humility is the timber that keeps the soul afloat when the heavens split open. St. Isaac dares to tell us that a good heart weeps with joy in prayer. Not from sentimentality not from sorrow alone but from the unbearable nearness of God. Tears become proof that the heart has softened enough to feel Him. A proud heart however disciplined outwardly prays like a clenched fist. It asks but it does not need. It petitions but does not depend. A humble heart begs like a man drowning and this is why God hears him. “Voluntary and steadfast endurance of injustice purifies the heart.” Here the Saint wounds our sensibilities. He tells us that we cannot become like Christ unless we willingly stand beneath the blow and let it fall without retaliation without argument without self defense. Only those for whom the world has died can endure this with joy. For the world’s children honor is oxygen. To be slandered or forgotten is death. But when the world is already a corpse to us when reputation comfort applause identity have all been buried then injustice becomes not humiliation but purification. Not defeat but ascent. This virtue is rare he says too rare to be found among one’s own people one’s familiar circles one’s comfortable life. To learn it often requires exile the stripping away of all natural support so that only God remains. He alone becomes the witness of one’s patience. He alone becomes consolation. He alone becomes vindication. And then comes the heart of St. Isaac’s blow: “As grace accompanies humility so do painful incidents accompany pride.” Humility is the magnet of mercy. Pride is the invitation to destruction. God Himself turns His face toward the humble not in pity but in delight. Their nothingness is spacious enough for Him to enter. He fills emptiness not fullness. He pours glory into the vessel that has shattered self importance. But when pride rises like a tower God sends winds against it not to annihilate us but to collapse what we build against Him. The humble man does not seek honor for he knows what it costs the soul. He bows first greets first yields first. His greatness is hidden like an ember under ash but heaven sees it glowing. Divine honor chases him like a hound. It is the proud who chase praise and never catch it but the self emptying who flee honor and find it placed upon them by the hand of God. “Be contemptible in your own eyes and you will see the glory of God in yourself.” Not self hatred but truth. Not despair but sobriety. Not rejection of one’s humanity but recognition that without God we have no light no love no breath. When we descend beneath ourselves God descends to meet us. When we stop defending our wounds He heals them. Humility is not psychological abasement but the unveiling of reality: only God is great and the one who knows this sees God everywhere even within his own nothingness. Blessed truly blessed is the man who seems worthless to others yet shines with virtue like an unseen star. Blessed the one whose knowledge is deep but whose speech is soft whose life is radiant yet whose posture is bowed. Such a soul is the image of Christ unadorned unnoticed unassuming yet bearing the weight of heaven within. The Saint concludes with a promise that burns like gold: The man who hungers and thirsts for God God will make drunk with His good things. Not the brilliant not the accomplished not the defended but the hungry. The emptied. The poor in spirit who have thrown themselves into the furnace of humility and come forth with nothing left to claim as their own. This is the narrow way. This is the ark built in silence. To bow lower is to rise. To lose all is to possess God. To become nothing is to become fire. May we learn to bend before the storm begins. May we kneel while grace is still soft. May we lay plank upon plank obedience upon prayer meekness upon hidden sacrifice until the ark is finished and the floods come and we are held aloft by humility into the very heart of God. --- Text of chat during the group: 00:14:51 Bob Čihák, AZ: P 166, para 33, mid-page 00:15:33 Wayne: Avoid it 00:28:46 David Swiderski, WI: There is a quote by St. Augustine I don't fully understand but seems like pride in a virtue. - Often contempt of vainglory becomes a sources of even more vainglory, for it is not being scorned when the contempt is something one is proud of . - Is this the holier than thou type of attitude? 00:43:32 David Swiderski, WI: In this St. Teresa of Calcutta really changed how I saw the world with volunteering at St. Ben's a local homeless meal program. I began to see each person as a potential family member or myself and slowly Christ in each person no matter what they were challenged with addiction or trauma one sees suffering and seeks to heal with a simple smile or kindness but always wish we could do more. It is like my experience teaching the teacher often learns more about themselves and the world than the student by offering service. 00:43:37 Anthony: In my work, I almost constantly work with law breakers. Some feel deep shame. My experiences in Confession of kindness and healing has helped me relate to them and calm them. And it's sometimes led to conversations about other very human topics, like healing that they and all people need. 00:51:36 Erick Chastain: How do you heal when you are an unworthy recipient of that? 00:55:22 Una’s iPhone: When Isaac talks about kissing the head, etc, what might that look like today? 00:55:36 Kimberley A: Just got here .. what page are we on, please? 00:55:54 Myles Davidson: Replying to "Just got here .. wha..." 168 last para. 00:58:11 Joan Chakonas: The longer I live the more  I appreciate the immense privilege I experienced in my childhood with my excellent loving parents.  So many people didn’t have what I had and I think but for the grace of God. 01:01:24 Eleana Urrego: I went to the store and I was mean because of the delay, now I have to confess. =( 01:03:45 David Swiderski, WI: It is interesting I did M&A for a while with a multinational. Some of the best companies did not allow emails with "I" they had to use "we". It seems once there is us and them everything breakdown even in the world. 01:05:39 Kimberley A: What to do when we realize we are so far removed from being this way? 01:06:50 David Swiderski, WI: Reacted to "The longer I live th..." with ❤️ 01:09:26 David Swiderski, WI: Mergers and adquistions 01:09:32 Joan Chakonas: Mergers and acquisitions 01:10:24 David Swiderski, WI: The early church talked of the way not the goal 01:12:34 David Swiderski, WI: I used to shoot archery and was delighted when I learned sin in Greek is aiming in archery. You keep your focus on the bullseye and just with effort and learning to narrow the aim 01:13:03 David Swiderski, WI: Sin=aim 01:13:45 David Swiderski, WI: Sin=missing the mark 01:15:12 David Swiderski, WI: I loved living in Latin America you kiss on the cheek who are close to you and it is a sign of caring. The French no not comfortable with that or the Russians ha ha 01:15:52 Art iPhone: I thought I was in the gay district when I was inTurkey 01:16:06 David Swiderski, WI: Strange the early church was known by a kiss 01:16:09 Ben: Reacted to "Strange the early ch..." with 😆 01:16:11 Eleana Nunez: Reacted to "I thought I was in t..." with 😂 01:16:25 Art iPhone: Reacted to "I thought I was in t…" with 😂 01:18:15 Janine: Thank you Father 01:18:20 Joan Chakonas: Thank you Father!!! 01:18:30 Gwen’s iPhone: Thank you 01:18:30 Art iPhone: Thank you Father! 01:18:30 David Swiderski, WI: Thank you Father and may God bless you and your mother

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. --- 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.

St. Isaac speaks as one who knows the earthquake at the root of the soul where pride fractures us from God and humility alone builds a refuge strong enough to endure the storm. His words are not gentle suggestions for the religiously inclined. They are fire. They are rope flung into deep water. They are an indictment of every heart that waits for suffering to discover prayer for temptation to discover the need for mercy for collapse to remember God. “Before the war begins, seek after your ally.” This is the secret. The humbled man begins today when there is no battle when the sea is calm and the sky soft. He builds his ark plank by plank small obediences simple prayers hidden acts of self abasement not because the flood is visible but because he knows it is certain. This is the wisdom of the saints: that peace is the time for labor not repose. The iniquitous drown because they mock preparation. They call upon God after pride has stripped them of confidence. Their throat is tight when they pray because they never bent it before in the dust. Humility is the timber that keeps the soul afloat when the heavens split open. St. Isaac dares to tell us that a good heart weeps with joy in prayer. Not from sentimentality not from sorrow alone but from the unbearable nearness of God. Tears become proof that the heart has softened enough to feel Him. A proud heart however disciplined outwardly prays like a clenched fist. It asks but it does not need. It petitions but does not depend. A humble heart begs like a man drowning and this is why God hears him. “Voluntary and steadfast endurance of injustice purifies the heart.” Here the Saint wounds our sensibilities. He tells us that we cannot become like Christ unless we willingly stand beneath the blow and let it fall without retaliation without argument without self defense. Only those for whom the world has died can endure this with joy. For the world’s children honor is oxygen. To be slandered or forgotten is death. But when the world is already a corpse to us when reputation comfort applause identity have all been buried then injustice becomes not humiliation but purification. Not defeat but ascent. This virtue is rare he says too rare to be found among one’s own people one’s familiar circles one’s comfortable life. To learn it often requires exile the stripping away of all natural support so that only God remains. He alone becomes the witness of one’s patience. He alone becomes consolation. He alone becomes vindication. And then comes the heart of St. Isaac’s blow: “As grace accompanies humility so do painful incidents accompany pride.” Humility is the magnet of mercy. Pride is the invitation to destruction. God Himself turns His face toward the humble not in pity but in delight. Their nothingness is spacious enough for Him to enter. He fills emptiness not fullness. He pours glory into the vessel that has shattered self importance. But when pride rises like a tower God sends winds against it not to annihilate us but to collapse what we build against Him. The humble man does not seek honor for he knows what it costs the soul. He bows first greets first yields first. His greatness is hidden like an ember under ash but heaven sees it glowing. Divine honor chases him like a hound. It is the proud who chase praise and never catch it but the self emptying who flee honor and find it placed upon them by the hand of God. “Be contemptible in your own eyes and you will see the glory of God in yourself.” Not self hatred but truth. Not despair but sobriety. Not rejection of one’s humanity but recognition that without God we have no light no love no breath. When we descend beneath ourselves God descends to meet us. When we stop defending our wounds He heals them. Humility is not psychological abasement but the unveiling of reality: only God is great and the one who knows this sees God everywhere even within his own nothingness. Blessed truly blessed is the man who seems worthless to others yet shines with virtue like an unseen star. Blessed the one whose knowledge is deep but whose speech is soft whose life is radiant yet whose posture is bowed. Such a soul is the image of Christ unadorned unnoticed unassuming yet bearing the weight of heaven within. The Saint concludes with a promise that burns like gold: The man who hungers and thirsts for God God will make drunk with His good things. Not the brilliant not the accomplished not the defended but the hungry. The emptied. The poor in spirit who have thrown themselves into the furnace of humility and come forth with nothing left to claim as their own. This is the narrow way. This is the ark built in silence. To bow lower is to rise. To lose all is to possess God. To become nothing is to become fire. May we learn to bend before the storm begins. May we kneel while grace is still soft. May we lay plank upon plank obedience upon prayer meekness upon hidden sacrifice until the ark is finished and the floods come and we are held aloft by humility into the very heart of God. --- Text of chat during the group: 00:02:30 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 164 paragraph 29 00:03:03 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: philokaliaministries.org 00:11:37 Ben: Re: Orthodox Saints...if you look you'll often find that many of them are already liturgically venerated by the Eastern Catholic churches - I've even heard that St. Seraphim is actually commemorated by Russian Catholics. 00:12:08 Bob Čihák, AZ: P 164, para 29, at bottom of page 00:12:09 Ryan Ngeve: Reacted to "Re: Orthodox Saints.…" with ❤️ 00:14:16 David Swiderski, WI: We get those random at my job. AI platforms are trying to take IP and data. 00:15:09 Sam: Greetings from Australia and wishing you a happy thanksgiving 🙏 00:15:18 Elizabeth Richards: Reacted to "Greetings from Austr..." with ❤️ 00:27:19 Lilly: The new film 'Man Of God' shows the example of Saint Nektarios blessing all those who convicted him unjustly. 00:30:26 Sr Barbara Jean Mihalchick: Replying to "The new film 'Man Of..." Where is this film available? 00:31:55 Andrew Adams: Replying to "The new film 'Man Of..." Looks like it is included with Prime and can be bought wherever 00:32:04 Gwen’s iPhone: Replying to "The new film 'Man Of…" YouTube 00:32:07 Jesssica Imanaka: It's hard for me to apply this as a parent of a 5th grader seeing middle school dynamics emerge! 00:33:59 David Swiderski, WI: You Tube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldUGahNlMRk 00:35:14 Andrew Adams: Reacted to "You Tube link: https..." with 👍 00:36:15 Ben: Reacted to "You Tube link: https..." with 👍 00:36:48 Elizabeth Richards: I work with dyslexic kids and true identity in Christ is the heartbeat behind my intervention. School is torture for so many of these kids & affects the trajectory of their life! 00:37:04 Maureen Cunningham: I watch a short film On Nigeria  Christian. They have a faith under such pain 00:37:13 Elizabeth Richards: Reacted to "I watch a short film..." with 🙏🏼 00:41:28 David Swiderski, WI: Is this a typo or error in translation? The gold of Ophir is referenced multiple times in the Bible, often associated with immense wealth and divine blessings. It was a place known for its unparalleled riches, supplying gold to King Solomon and other ancient rulers.Biblical descriptions imply that Ophir’s gold was exceptionally pure and highly prized. This aligns with historical records of ancient civilizations refining gold to a high degree. In fact, gold from South Arabia, India, and Africa was known to be of superior quality, often described as "untarnished." 00:46:40 Ben: Even hockey crowds in the late '60's were full of suits & ties. 00:50:52 Elizabeth Richards: Reacted to "Is this a typo or er..." with ❤️ 00:55:52 Adam Paige: Re: “gold of Souphir”, the Septuagint has “Σουφιρ” at 1 Kings 10:11, it’s a variant rendering of Ophir in the LXX according to Wikipedia 00:57:23 David Swiderski, WI: This really echo's my experience. Arrogant, puffed up people in business are always selling themselves and gain a great reward often as in politics.  In doing good in my life I often have been punished but with both I think if it was not to be against what is of this world do I really have and show love. Ie. try to do the will of God. 00:58:17 Thomas: Would a humble person have any idea they were humble, it seems like they wouldn’t, also how do you deal with thoughts that tell you that you are being humble, is it simply to just revile yourself 00:59:10 Ryan Ngeve: Reacted to "Is this a typo or er…" with ❤️ 00:59:36 David Swiderski, WI: If always rewarded can we ever know we truly love and have values or seek the easy way and avoid the narrow path. 01:00:26 Elizabeth Richards: Replying to "Would a humble perso..." It seems humility is to see self as Christ views me- worthy of his love, dependent on Him for EVERYTHING 01:04:14 Vanessa Nunez: Replying to "If always rewarded c…" I think we can still be rewarded but we can recognize that it is not through our own doing but by gods providence, the only thing that WE do is say yes to god. 01:04:42 Elizabeth Richards: Reacted to "I think we can still..." with ❤️ 01:05:21 David Swiderski, WI: Reacted to "I think we can still..." with 👍 01:12:49 Jesssica Imanaka: Dostoyevsky was fascinated by the figure of the Holy Fool. 01:12:52 Elizabeth Richards: "Laurus" by Eugene Vodolazkin is a fantastic novel about a holy fool 01:13:15 David Swiderski, WI: Reacted to "Dostoyevsky was fasc..." with ❤️ 01:13:40 Jesssica Imanaka: Reacted to ""Laurus" by Eugene V..." with ❤️ 01:14:04 David Swiderski, WI: Faith but the saints let the light of the son enter into our lives like the saints in stained glass windows in churches 01:14:55 Elizabeth Richards: Happy Thanksgiving! 01:15:00 Rebecca Thérèse: Thank you🙂 01:15:01 Jessica McHale: Many prayers for everyone! Happt THanksgiving! 01:15:10 Janine: Thank you Father! Happy thanksgiving! 01:15:13 Art: Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! 01:15:14 David Swiderski, WI: Thank you father God bless you and your mother

The Evergetinos gathers these stories around a single, unsettling truth: those who endure injustice with gratitude and refuse to avenge themselves become truly rich, and God Himself becomes their defender. Abba Mark says it simply and without comfort: “He who is wronged by someone, and does not seek redress, truly believes in Christ, and receives a hundredfold in this life and eternal life in the age to come.” The measure is not whether we suffer wrong, but what we do with it. Injustice is assumed. The question is whether we turn it into a weapon or an altar. Gelasios endures theft and humiliation at the hands of Vacatos. He stands his ground about the monastic cell for God’s sake, but he does not pursue his abuser, does not drag him to court, does not stir up others to defend him. He lets God see. And God does see. Symeon unveils Vacatos’ hidden intent, and the man’s own journey to prosecute the “man of God” becomes the road of his judgment. The Elder does nothing, yet everything is revealed. His stillness becomes the place where the truth about both men is made manifest. Pior works three years without wages. Each time he labors, each time he is sent away empty-handed, and each time he returns quietly to his monastery. His silence is not cowardice; it is poverty of spirit. The employer’s house, not Pior’s heart, collapses under injustice. Only when calamity has broken him does he go searching for the monk, wages in hand, begging forgiveness and confessing, “The Lord paid me back.” Pior will not even reclaim what is his. He allows it to be given to the Church, because his life is no longer measured by what he is owed. He has stepped out of the economy of recompense into the freedom of God. The Elder whose cell is robbed twice endures in an even more piercing way. First he leaves a note: “Leave me half for my needs.” Then, when all is taken, he still does not accuse. Only when the thief lies dying, tortured in soul and unable to depart, does he confess and call for the Elder. As soon as the Elder prays, his soul is released. The one who was wronged becomes the priest at the threshold of death. The one who stole cannot die in peace until he passes under the mercy of the man he robbed. Here judgment is revealed as truth entering the heart, and God’s “avenging” consists in turning the wound of the innocent into medicine for the guilty. In Menas, this same mystery ripens into martyrdom. Menas stands literally on bones, his flesh cut away, and chants, “My foot hath stood in uprightness.” His body is mutilated, but his praise is whole. The attempt to silence him only reveals where his life truly rests. In the end even his persecutor becomes a believer and shares his martyrdom. In Menas, injustice is not merely endured; it becomes the final gift by which God crowns His friends. Peter’s discourse with Clement names the inner logic of all this. Those who wrong others, he says, actually wrong themselves most deeply, while those who are wronged, if they endure with love, gain purification and forgiveness. Possessions become occasions of sin; their unjust loss, when borne rightly, becomes the removal of sins. Enemies, for a brief time, maltreat those they hate—but in God’s providence they become the cause of their victims’ deliverance from eternal punishment. Seen this way, those who harm us are, in a hidden manner, our benefactors. Only the one who loves God greatly can bear to see this and respond with love instead of resentment. --- Text of chat during the group: 00:03:52 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 310 Volume II - Section B 00:08:56 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 310 Volume II - Section B 00:10:20 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Philokaliaministries.org/blog 00:18:09 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 310 Volume II - Section B 00:18:15 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: http://Philokaliaministries.org/blog 00:21:46 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 310 section B 00:32:59 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 312 # 2 00:34:19 Anthony: Witholding wages is one of the few sins that cry out to heaven for vengeance. 00:36:12 Forrest: Perhaps in 3 years, God may have given the monk 100 fold already for those lost wages. So when wages were offered, the wages would have been due back to God, not the monk. 00:49:52 Anthony: I believe St Minas was a soldier, no? I think if yes that adds a layer of poetry to the story, he was an athlete greater than his former profession. 00:53:45 Anthony: Synaxarion? 00:55:37 Myles Davidson: Father, can you recommend a good bio of St Philip Neri? 01:06:40 Sheila Applegate: There is a fine line between Christian counsel and judgement of others. 01:09:44 Maureen Cunningham: Your enemy is hammer and chisel t form you to Christ 01:14:31 Erick Chastain: How can one benefit via Christ's medicine of edification those that persecute you if they do not know they are doing so, instead believing that they are doing the good? 01:16:30 Jerimy Spencer: Aloha Father, a Protestant author John Eldredge, described one of the spirits of this age as the age of the offended self, and I think there is something to this, whether solely cultural or also of diabolical, the temptations I find often is to take anything personal or be reminded of some offense and thereby be seduced by the passion of anger, instead of praying for them. 01:33:03 Jerimy Spencer: C.S. Lewis I think, uses the language of “the hammering process” 01:34:18 Maureen Cunningham: Thank you  Blessing to  all 01:34:19 Rebecca Thérèse: Thank you🙂 01:34:35 Janine: Thank you Father

Discover how afflictions serve as divine teachers, drawing souls closer to humility and God. Prosperity often breeds forgetfulness and pride, while God uses grief to lead us back to His mercy. Learn the power of invoking Jesus' name in trials and how suffering fosters dependence on Him. Delve into the transformation of pain into spiritual intimacy and gratitude, and explore the importance of compassionate presence in others' suffering. St. Isaac's wisdom reveals that afflictions can ultimately birth divine sonship.

Dive into a profound exploration of grace and inner peace as monks respond to challenges with unexpected meekness. Witness the stark contrast between worldly justice and the transcendent love embodied by a Libyan monk. Delve into stories of radical detachment, like an elder joyfully giving away his possessions and the miraculous provision that follows. Reflect on how genuine faith transforms responses to adversity, revealing a divine ethos that surpasses earthly logic. Discover how living the gospel goes beyond mere words, embodying a life truly seized by God.

The Evergetinos sets the bar of freedom in a surprising place: anger without cause is not when we flare up over trifles, but whenever we react to any ill-treatment aimed at us. Abba Poimen sharpens the point: even if a brother were to gouge out an eye or cut off a hand, anger would still be without cause—unless he were separating us from God. In other words, the only justified “anger” is zeal for communion with God; all other indignation binds us to the injury and darkens the nous. From this first edge, the text moves to the Christ-likeness of suffering injustice. One who willingly bears wrongs and forgives becomes “like Jesus”; one who neither wrongs nor suffers wrong is merely “like Adam”; one who wrongs is “like the Devil.” The goal is not moral equilibrium but kenosis: to descend into the humility of Christ who “was reviled and did not revile in return.” The Evergetinos then baptizes our imagination with stories. Abba Gelasios’ costly book is stolen; he neither exposes the thief nor reclaims it, but quietly commends the buyer to purchase it. His silence pricks the thief’s conscience more effectively than accusation; repentance follows, and the thief remains to be formed by the elder’s life. Abba Evprepios helps thieves carry his goods; noticing a robber’s staff left behind, he runs after them to return it. Abba John the Persian offers to wash the feet of intruders; shame breaks their hardness more swiftly than punishment. Abba Makarios not only helps a thief load a camel with his own belongings; when the animal refuses to rise, he adds the missing tool and blesses the thief’s going—only then does the camel sit again, until everything is returned. These vignettes train the heart to a habitual non-resistance that is anything but passivity; it is a deliberate, creative meekness that seeks the other’s salvation. Not all the stories end with goods restored. Sometimes the elder simply rejoices to have been counted worthy to lose. One monk prays to be given the chance to imitate such forbearance; when thieves finally come, he lights a lamp, shows them everything, even discloses the hidden coins. He does not wish them to bring anything back. Here dispossession becomes doxology. “We brought nothing into the world” and “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away” are not verses to be quoted at funerals only; they are the grammar of freedom in the face of loss. --- Text of chat during the group: 00:05:09 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 304 Letter E 00:05:25 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: www.philokaliaministries.org/blog 00:10:42 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 304 Letter E 00:14:35 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: https://www.philokaliaministries.org/blog 00:16:03 Bob Čihák, AZ: P. 304, letter E, # 1 00:26:24 Forrest: I am really feeling a great challenge of these writings. Can you help integrate what is in the daily mass readings today: Luke 17:3 "Be on your guard!* If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him."  The paragraphs that we are reading here do not even counsel rebuke. 00:33:05 Kate : Would you say that this habitual non-resistance is necessary for the practice of repentance, the continual turning of the mind and heart to God?  That without this non-resistance, then our repentance is not yet where it needs to be. 00:34:04 Joan Chakonas: Its been my experience that suffering injustice is actually easier than attempting correction or pushing back. 00:34:34 Nypaver Clan: Reacted to "Its been my experien..." with ❤️ 00:36:54 Joan Chakonas: My worst qualities arise when I engage in conflict or corrective confrontation.  I’m working on this 00:38:36 Joan Chakonas: I’m pretty old so I got this perspective from experience 00:39:00 Nypaver Clan: Reacted to "I’m pretty old so I ..." with 😃 00:39:59 Forrest: Reacted to "I’m pretty old so I ..." with 👍 00:40:04 Anthony: I wish we had available St Francis relationship with his family after his traumatic break. There is an account of a story with his brother, but did they all ever reconcile? 00:46:46 Joan Chakonas: The thiefs repentance and sorrow was huge 00:47:28 Joan Chakonas: It came about by the mercy of the elder 01:09:23 Joan Chakonas: God permitted these crimes and the holy mens acceptance are illustrative of His great mercy- no psychic pain in their acceptance.  What great gifts 01:13:02 Forrest: Yes, I am comfortable getting angry at thieves. I have to do hard work to fix that. 01:13:23 Anthony: Your soliloquiy reminds me of St Rocco and St Joseph Laboure 01:16:39 Myles Davidson: St Damien of Molokai living and dying with lepers 01:19:33 Larry Ruggiero: Can you cover next week about someone breaking into your home and doing harm to your wife or children? 01:24:44 Rebecca Thérèse: Thank you☺️ 01:24:46 John Burmeister: thanks father 01:24:51 Janine: Thank you Father 01:24:55 Catherine Opie: Thank you god bless 01:25:01 Joan Chakonas: Goes too fast!!

Exploring the beauty of mercy, the discussion reveals how comforting God's image through our kindness brings Him joy. Illness is framed as a divine remedy, awakening the spirit and preventing sloth. The importance of sharing resources with the needy is emphasized, highlighting the honor in giving freely. Trials are seen as necessary lessons for growth, demonstrating that God's delays teach us about our own shortcomings. Ultimately, suffering is depicted not as punishment, but as a path to deeper communion with the divine.