How can we understand prayer, and how can we pray for a contemporary person (according to the ascetic tradition of the Church) It is difficult to talk about prayer, it is anything but a simple topic, sometimes one even does not know what to begin with although there is much literature on prayer. Unwittingly one feels how right was an unknown elder who once said a joke: “No one can talk about prayer... 

Basing himself on the legacy of St Ignatius of the Caucasus, Alexey Ilyich Osipov, the well-known Professor of the Moscow Theological Academy, reflects on the issues of spiritual practices in Eastern and Western Christian traditions, as well as the place of the book The Way of a Pilgrim in Christian spiritual life. Hieromonk Adrian (Pashin): Alexey Ilyich, your booklet on the Jesus Prayer was published... 

“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven” (Ecc. 3:1) The holy apostle Paul, warning us not to spend time in vain, lawfully instructs us to use each minute of our life wisely: “See then, – he says, – that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.” In talking about “redeeming the time” the apostle... 

Source: St. Vladimir’s Russian Orthodox Church   It is difficult, very difficult, for infinite and eternal life to enter the narrow human soul and the even narrower human body. The imprisoned inhabitants of earth stand with suspicion before everything that is beyond here. Imprisoned in time and place, they cannot bear-whether on account of atavism or inertia-anything beyond time, anything... 

Source: Saint Silouan Orthodox Church           Passages from Saint Silouan the Athonite compiled by Jean-Claude Larchet. Originally published in “In Communion” (issue 8, Pascha 1997).     Although it is natural and usual to love those who love us and to do good to those who do good to us (Mt 5:46-47; Lk 6:32-33), to love our enemies is distasteful to... 

Source: Saint Gregory Palamas Greek Orthodox Monastery           Taken from the book “Orthodox Psychotherapy” by Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos       When a person rises from bodily knowledge to the soul’s knowledge and from that to spiritual knowledge, then he sees God and possesses knowledge of God, which is his salvation. Knowledge... 

We must make clear when and how the Christian life truly begins in us to see whether we have within ourselves the beginning of this life.   If we do not have it we must learn how to begin it, in so far as this depends on us.   It is not yet a decisive sign of true life in Christ if one calls himself a Christian and belongs to the Church of Christ. Not everyone that sayeth unto Me,... 

Translated by Elena Chikisheva Edited by Maureen E.       Fear evil like fire. Don’t let it touch your heart even if it seems just or righteous.  No matter what the circumstances, don’t let it come into you. Evil is always evil. Sometimes evil presents itself as an endeavor to God’s glory, or as something with good intentions towards your neighbor. ... 

Source: Orthodox America     Born in 1829 from pious parents of very modest means, St. John was quick to learn the power of prayer. As a child he was a slow learner, but one night after fervently praying for God’s help in his studies, he suddenly felt as if he were violently shaken, as if “the mind opened up in his head.” From then on he became a good pupil, graduating... 

Source:  Saint Mary of Egypt Orthodox Church     III. HOW NOT TO READ THE HOLY FATHERS ENOUGH HAS BEEN SAID to indicate the seriousness and sobriety with which one must approach the study of the Holy Fathers. But the very habit of light-mindedness in 20th-century man, of not taking seriously even the most solemn subjects, of “playing with ideas”—which is what scholars...