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Some thoughts on Humility

By Fr Antonios Kaldas

Original post By Fr Antonios Kaldas blogsite, 26 Jul 2007

Someone once told me that trying to knock over the sin of pride is like trying to knock over a ball. If you push it over from any direction, it is still standing. I think what that means is that pride is a very resistant sin indeed. So here are a few recent thoughts on the subject…

When we fall into other sins, it should make it easier to overcome the sin of pride. After all, what have I to be proud of when my weakness and disgrace is laid bare before my very eyes? Yet strangely, sometimes we don’t see it that way. Sometimes the pride is so resilient within us that we think something like: “Yeah, sure I messed up, but I’m still better than so-and-so! He messed up much worse than me!” Or perhaps: “Ok, so I made a mistake. I know I’m not absolutely perfect, but I’m still pretty close!” Then of course, there’s the old favourite, Buck Passing: “It wasn’t my fault I messed up – it was him/her/them. They made me do it!”

The Desert Fathers often encourage us to always place our sins before our eyes. This is not meant, I am sure, in the morbid way it is sometimes understood. It is not meant to ‘beat us down’ and make us feel miserable about ourselves. The Desert Fathers actually had a pretty healthy sense of self-esteem that could bear with this burden of sin, but their self-esteem was built on different foundation to most of us. One of my favourite sayings is the Father who described his spiritual battle thus:

Whenever I become proud, I think of my sins and I say to myself, there, what have you to be proud of you awful sinner? And whenever I fall into despair because of my sins, I say to myself, yes, but God still still loves me!

What a beautifully balanced personality! His self-esteem does not come from the kind of things we use for self-esteem, like our abilities or achievements, the kind of job we do, the size of our house, the gadgets we own or comparing ourselves to others. This happy man builds his self esteem on something that he can never lose – the love of God for him. But there is an added benefit to this way of thinking: that is there can be no pride in this self-esteem. Think about it. Can he take any of the credit for being loved by God? God does not love him because he is saintly (God sees all his sins, hidden and manifest), nor will God be impressed by his achievements or talents (where did he get them in the first place?). God doesn’t care about the latest gadget, and He isn’t impressed that you are clever enough to get one. In fact, you can’t impress God no matter how you try. The only reason God will love you is because He is Love. And that makes all the difference.

It isn’t easy, learning to think like this. We find it so much more secure to cling to our little bag of self-admiration, and we constantly seek for new things to boost our ego. It makes us feel better about life; there is no doubt of that. But in the long run, it is fighting a losing battle. A human being and his/her abilities is just too fragile a base to support our self-esteem for long. Sooner or later, we will have to face up to the fact that we are faulty, mixed up and terribly fallible. And when that kind of self-esteem comes crashing down, it’s pretty ugly.

If you think about, it is a pretty wise investment in the future to start working on this now. Better to begin transferring all my self-esteem stocks to the Bank of God, before the Bank of Me comes crashing down to earth.

Original blog found at- http://www.frantonios.org.au/2007/07/26/some-thoughts-on-humility/

Eternal Summer

By Sandra; Co-written with Makrina

Original post by Becoming Fully Alive blogsite, 12 Sep 16

Sometimes we think that we are in need of a perfect home with everything neatly in place to show hospitality. And sometimes we think we need a perfect heart that has it all together to invite someone in and build that home. But there are homes we build with our friends not with hands but with conversations of openness and honesty, with the comfort to be as we are, who we are, where we are now. With all our sins and struggles and all our questions and doubts. Sharing death and grief, sex and desire, our needs, deepest inadequacies and regrets. We uncover the demolition in our hearts, unafraid of displaying the rubble, unafraid of leaving the keys to the doors we’ve always locked for someone else to walk in. In the face of each other’s rubble, there is no space for judgement, only the realisation that we all stand on the same levelled ground, a holy ground, where our pain and our struggles are communally felt, without measure, without degrees. Hospitality is the fearlessness to offer others a key into your warzone, and the fearlessness to choose to be present with another.

Many of us were raised strictly associating spiritual growth with the attendance of bible studies, worship evenings, quiet time and locking our bedroom doors in prayer. But there is spiritual growth at 2am at the back of a pickup truck, with seven hearts drawn in laughter and in love. There is growth in 6am swims through the river and in sharing water shoes when the rocks become too harsh beneath your feet. There is growth in conversations over eggs benedict and in sharing the words of people who have previously hurt and condemned us, and the relationships that have left us feeling less than who we are. There is growth in reconnecting with old friends and learning the hearts of new ones, because where there are people, there is God, and that is where we grow and self discover. There is growth in the daily victory of waking up and trying, trying, and trying again. There is growth in struggling through loss to believe that God is good, and there is also growth in firmly believing through the tragedy that God is good.

When we let God out of the man-made spiritual boxes we have created, we need not look far or deep or wide to see His face, but to the heart next to us to realise that He is here. For long we have found Him in foreign mission fields and in retreats, yet now we are awakened to find Him in His people, the church, the home that is built without hands.

After years of living under the weight of expectations and who we “should” be, many of us have locked so many doors of our hearts away for the fear of being known, for fear of being perceived as not spiritual, as not a man or woman of God. When we have tasted the condemnation of a community, labels that silences us, our fears can only be rational and our walk becomes heavy. We were never called to pretend a false state of perfection. We were created in the image of Community for community. A community that is real, that moves from individualism to a place where we can reach out and ask why we’re created in a fallen world or why it’s so hard to hear God’s voice sometimes.

We all naturally gravitate to the community that will accept us for all we bring to the table, so we find ourselves projecting the finished product of ourselves that we believe our community desires so that we can find our home. All the while we live with the fear of truly being known and found out. We live in fear that one day someone will tear down the door to our demolition and see the truth; to see our addictions and the tears that keep us up at night. But Christ was always interested in the real authentic version of ourselves. Christ was never interested in the finished product more than He was in our journey to wholeness. And community was only ever meant to be a place without fear. A place where all we ask is to see with loving eyes, instead of with defence or judgment, the person before us. All of the wonder, grace and godliness lying in the demolition that is yet to be restored. We hope in the yet to come but we love and live the now of each other – no matter how much is taken apart. Hospitality is loving without the need to put it all back together. And hospitality never demands an invite. It waits, it loves, it is patient.

“Maybe we’re all just shiny balls of light inside human machines. Maybe we’re all trying desperately to convince others that the noise they hear coming out of our mouths is an accurate reflection of the intentions of the shiny ball of light inside the machine. Maybe it screams, “I am real in here, I am real in here, I am real here.” Maybe the light inside me just wants to know, if you’re real too.”

-Iain Thomas

Original blog found at- https://www.becomingfullyalive.com/eternal-summer/

The Stranger

By Fr Antonios Kaldas

Original post By Fr Antonios Kaldas blogsite, 13 Sep 2007

The little boy walked out of the classroom and on to the crowded school playground. Everywhere he looked, he could see kids. Kids chatting away happily. Kids playing games excitedly. Kids chugging down sandwiches ravenously. Lots of happy, contented, comfortable kids … except one.

The little boy walked slowly across the playground, hoping that someone would say something to him. They didn’t. He stopped to watch a soccer game optimistically, hoping someone would invite him to join. They didn’t. Finally, awkwardly, he reached a bench by the fence under a tree. He sat down, alone, and began to chew on his lunch, trying all the time to look as if he was deep in thought, and sitting alone by choice.

Of course, he wasn’t.

Have you ever had an experience like this? If you have, then you probably grew up with a fear of being the outcast. you will understand perfectly the horror of the kind of situation I have just described. There’s no doubt about it: being the stranger, the outcast, must be one of the worst experiences in the world.

Or is it?

There was one Outcast who didn’t seem to mind very much. He sort of hung around with other outcasts and strangers, until He sort of made His own little circle that every stranger could feel a part of. This new circle was well outside the normal ‘in crowd’, and most of those in the in crowd smirked and then wondered, and then grew jealous and decided to squish it. But the nice thing is that although they thought they squished it, it is still growing bigger.

Even now, strangers and outcasts are finding this society of outcasts, and being welcomed with open arms. In fact, most people don’t ever find their way into it until they are outcasts and strangers. Which means that you generally don’t get in unless you’re pretty down and out, at the end of your tether, on your last legs, and any other metaphor you can think of.

Funnily enough, we spend most of our lives pretty much trying to avoid joining this group, and thus never get to meet it’s wonderful Founder. We invest a tremendous amount of effort and time into fitting in and making ourselves feel at home. We do this in a hundred different ways. We are doing it when we laugh at that crude joke, or let ourselves get so attached to that electronic gadget, or feel that we are part of the furniture at work.

I learned how to be a stranger at a young age when my family had to move from the house I had grown up in. I loved that house! On the last day, I even secretly gave the wall a kiss to say goodbye (I was pretty young). I learned that day that it is painful to be too attached to any material thing on this earth, because sooner or later, you are going to have to lose it, and then it would feel like you are losing a part of yourself. Better not to let it become such an important part of yourself in the first place!

But you have to be attached to something. No one can live their life in a sort of free fall! Every single one of us has to belong somewhere. Enter the Stranger. The nice thing about Him is that He will never disappear on you. Never. Ever. When you feel you belong to Him, you feel like you don’t need to belong to anything else. You have your identity, you know who you are, you know where your house is (and your treasure and your heart also).

… and we too who are sojourners in this world, keep us in Your faith, and grant us Your peace until the end …

Original blog found at- http://www.frantonios.org.au/2007/09/13/the-stranger/

Trial and Temptation

Trial and Temptation

By Monica

Original post by Becoming Fully Alive blogsite, 17 Oct 2017

The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.” Exodus 16:3

The Greek word ‘peirasmos’ means both a trial and a temptation. The fathers of the church used them interchangeably and I am beginning to understand why.

When everything turns out to be nothing like you expected, it is much easier to despair, to fall into self- pity, and to ignore God, in favour of getting lost in a never- ending introspection.

When it feels like I’m stumbling around in the dark wilderness and the thistles are scratching at my feet, when even walking becomes difficult and the narrow road just seems too hard. Like Gomer, who cried out for the old oil and drink she once had, and the Israelites who cried out for the meat of Egypt.

I was tempted to take a sip of the soothing ointment of the world, that I know to be poison.

‘I will go after my lovers, who give me my food and my water, my wool and my linen, my olive oil and my drink.’ Hosea 2:5

Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” Exodus 14:12

For the first time, I am realising why in the midst of Job and his friends talking about suffering and God, Job stands and promises to make a covenant with his eyes not to look upon a woman. For as many times I had read Job, I had never noticed how misplaced that seemed… until it was too familiar to ignore.

Maybe I was never listening when they said in times of tribulation, you must be even more vigilant for temptation.

Distracted by the walls of my city crumbling, my own house has been left unguarded.

‘Your own vineyard you have not kept’. Songs of Solomon 1:6

Oh heart you have forgotten that the only real danger in this world is sin.

“For I have not stopped saying and I will not stop saying that there is only one thing truly distressing, and that is sin. Everything else is dust and smoke.” St John Chrysostom

Maybe it’s one of the devil’s favourite games to keep us wrapped up in our own problems that we forget to ask… When I am squeezed, what is coming out? When I am squeezed… I am no longer deceived. Sweet lemonade or bitter lemon?

I am realising that for years I was saying words, words that were so easy to say. But now I am being called to live. To put into practice the endless preaching. In time, perhaps I will learn to say with Moses that these words are ‘not just idle for you, they are life’ (Deuteronomy 32:47)and by them I will cross over into the Jordan. I will cross over to new heights I know He wants to take me.

In the meantime, I am struggling through the labour pains, I am so anxious to give birth to something beautiful, but I must learn to wait patiently and know that in an INSTANT, God is able to do exceedingly abundantly more than I could pray and ask for.

“Stop beseeching this or that person for help, and running after shadows – for this is what human assistance amounts to – instead ceaselessly beseech God whom you serve simply to give a nod and in a moment of time everything is brought into proper order” St John Chrysostom

Now if, while a man is walking in the path of righteousness, and is making his way toward God… he encounters in this path some afflictions of this sort, he must not turn aside from his way. Rather, he should accept whatever it is joyously, without scrutiny, and give thanks to God, because God has sent him this gift. That is to say, because he has been deemed worthy to fall into temptation for His sake, and to become a partaker of the sufferings of the prophets and the apostles, and of the rest of the saints who endured tribulations for the sake of God’s path, whether from men, from demons, or from the body. For without the bidding of God it is impossible that tribulations should be permitted to arise; but they occur so as to be for a man the cause of righteousness -St Isaac the Syrian

For it is not God’s good pleasures that those whom He loves should live in ease while they are in the flesh -St Isaac the Syrian

Original blog found at- https://becomingfullyalive.com/trial-and-temptation/

Focus Quote: Staying Connected

Staying Connected

Striving toward a life of Unceasing Prayer

Focus Quote

“We are not commanded to work, keep vigil or fast without ceasing, but we are commanded to pray without ceasing. For prayer purifies and strengthens the mind which was created to pray and to fight the demons for the protection of all the powers of the soul.”
Evagrius Ponticus

St Paul calls us to ‘unceasing prayer’. How are we to understand how to do this? Are we always to have a word to God on our lips and minds or is this impossible and too hard-line a task? Could, perhaps, prayer take multiple forms?

There are two traditions for understanding this teaching (along with Romans 12:12 “be constant in prayer”). The first is mentioned by Origen (c.184-253 AD):

“Now, since the performance of actions enjoined by virtue or by the commandments is also a constituent part of prayer, he prays without ceasing who combines prayer with right actions, and becoming actions with prayer. For the saying “pray without ceasing” can only be accepted by us as a possibility if we may speak of the whole life of a saint as one great continuous prayer.”

Importantly, he also writes “Of such prayer what is usually termed ‘prayer’ is indeed a part.” This is to say, that although my life has become a prayer, this doesn’t exonerate me from performing ‘actual prayer.’ In fact, one could perform ‘actual prayer’ always. This is common among monastics (though we are all called to an ascetic life and so this doesn’t exclude lay persons from participating). This is commonly accomplished by constant recitation of a short prayer, the most famous of which is called the Jesus Prayer: “Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” Another, made common by St John Cassian (360-435 AD), is “Come to my help, O God; Lord, hurry to my rescue.” Both are good interpretations. Perhaps we who are weak should strive to live out the latter interpretation via the former.

WHAT’S YOUR WAITING STYLE?

Originally seen on Fr Anthony’s blog (11 March. 2020)

“The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him. It is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.” (Lamentations 3:25-26)

I HATE WAITING! I’m not alone am I? We all hate waiting don’t we? Raise your hand if you’ve done any of these in the past week…

Honked at the car in front of you the second that the light turns green if they don’t start moving immediately?
Put a plate of food in the microwave for 30 seconds and then stopped it after 27 ½ seconds – unable to wait any longer?
Pushed the elevator button 15 times while waiting for it come – somehow thinking that if you push it more, it’ll come faster (makes perfect sense in our heads doesn’t it?)

WE HATE WAITING! We hate waiting at the grocery store. We hate waiting in traffic. And we hate waiting on God.

It seems like such a waste of time, doesn’t it? Life would be soooooo much better if we didn’t have to wait. If we had WHAT we wanted WHEN we wanted it. Right here…right now… no waiting. Give it to me NOW NOW NOW!!!

If that’s how you feel sometimes, take comfort in knowing that you are not alone. Impatience is the plague of our generation – it’s the fruit of living in a fast food, instant coffee, on demand world. We all struggle with it. And we see its ugly fruit all over our lives – in the form of worry, anxiety, complaining, negativity, fear, and a general lack of peace.

Unfortunately for us, God likes waiting. It’s one of His favorite tools to use in making us better people and more like Him.

“See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. You also be patient.” (James 5:7)

Like a farmer, God is trying to produce a harvest in our lives. He’s trying to give His children good things and produce in them fruits worthy of a child of the King. And as a farmer, He produces those fruits by planting seeds – not full grown trees. And seeds take time to produce fruit.

In other words, a farmer knows that FRUIT REQUIRES WAITING. No waiting = no fruit. It’s that simple.

Examine your own life. Surely there isn’t a soul out there today who isn’t waiting on God for something? An answer to a prayer…a solution to a problem…a light to shine in the midst of a dark dark situation. We’re all waiting for something.

The question isn’t WHAT you’re waiting for, but HOW you’re waiting for it?

Are you waiting patiently – as a farmer knowing that it will take time to produce fruit?

Or are you waiting impatiently – like the maniac pushing the elevator button 15 times thinking that the more he pushes it, the more the little elevator elves inside will realize that he’s really in a hurry and bring the elevator faster?

The prophet Jeremiah says that our waiting on God should be characterized by hope and quietness:

“The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him. It is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.” (Lamentations 3:25-26)

How are you waiting? Patiently or impatiently? Quietly or complainingly? With hope or with despair? It might just be that HOW you’re waiting will impact HOW LONG you’re waiting as well.

(read that sentence again and let that one sink in – it’s pretty deep)

I just read a nice quote the other day that said that “even when our problems are over our head, they’re still under His feet.” No doubt about that. That’s the spirit that should characterize our waiting.

How would you characterize your “waiting” style? How do you think God feels when He sees His child (YOU) waiting in that way?

(c) Fr Anthony Messeh (2020). What’s Your Waiting Style? by Anonymous. Available at http://www.franthony.com/blog/whats-your-waiting-style.

WHO IS YOUR SAUL/PAUL?

September 15, 2017

Originally seen on Fr Anthony’s blog (15 Sept. 2017)

Today’s guest post comes from Bradley – a graduate of George Mason University’s School of Conflict Analysis & Resolution, who currently works for the government and volunteers in his community. Bradley is also a proud member of St. Timothy & St. Athanasius church in Arlington, VA who has guest posted before. You can follow him on Facebook as well. If you too are interested in guest posting on my blog, please visit my Guest Post guidelines for more info.

“By day the banished sun circles the earth like a grieving mother with a lamp.”

Even for those of us that seek to avoid it, these days it seems the brokenness of the world is inescapable. We are divided in our nations, our communities, and even our families. Old wounds reopen, buried grievances resurface, hidden tragedies are revealed. The way we communicate and engage with each other is changing faster than we can process.

Every debate seems like a matter of survival, everyone who sees the world differently can seem like the enemy, every fight must be won decisively and in an instant, and we feel tasked with defending what is good, just, and right. And often, in the momentum and noise of such things, I don’t stop to ask, “Lord, what would You have me do?”

Cormac McCarthy, writer of the words above, is known for imagining beautiful, but bleak landscapes. The quote is pulled from a book depicting a father and son trying to survive in an American wasteland after some catastrophic event. McCarthy is known for trying to capture our most dark parts, but often leaves his readers with little hope when his narratives end. We as Christians are called to see this darkness, and, armed with justice and mercy, to walk into real stories like these, humbly, beside our God (Micah 6:8).

When God writes, like McCarthy, He doesn’t ignore brokenness; but instead, using ordinary and broken, He finishes the story with redemption. When God writes the story the sun is not banished, it is His rejoicing champion (Psalm 19:5). When God writes the story he reminds us our grieving mother is not only holding a lamp, but interceding for us, each day. And more than that, he reminds us that we too are His champions; we too are given light (Matthew 5:14-16).

It is easy to live like Saul’s trip to Damascus was just a nice story. I consider how few times I have prayed for individuals, candidates, neighbors I like—much less those I find myself in conflict with—I wonder, “Do I really believe God changed Saul or can change me? Do I really believe that Christ was light at the beginning, that light humbled Saul, and that light was entrusted to him and to me?” Do I really believe 22 verses: a flash of light, a question, and a second chance, the world forever changed (Acts 9:1-22).

This change does not come easy. We need only look to the Apostles themselves to see that, even full of the Spirit, they still faced disagreements, still had to confront each other’s humanness. I can’t imagine what it would be like to have to listen to Saul—because I can’t bring myself to call him Paul—as he tells me how I should live when I know he gave the blessing for my cousin to be murdered.

As a black man, I imagine it would be similar to hearing a homily on stewardship from a former Neo-Nazi—why should I, have to listen to him. But as the Body of Christ, we are not given a choice in believing in the redemptive power of God’s love or new creations (Ephesians 4:20-24).

I lose sight of the big, world changing—often less tangible, less visible—miracles God has given us. I take for granted Christ calling us the Body (1 Corinthians 12:12); that among all the gifts, miracles, God has entrusted us with, the greatest is love (1 Corinthians 13:1-13). I read love is patient and kind, and imagine how romantic this is to hear recited at engagements or in Nicholas Sparks novels, and I lose sight of its power.

But it is powerful. As a black man that has spent much of his life in parts of the world and country where being a black man is not always a great thing, I have learned to love—and be loved—by those I once thought were my enemies. It is scary, because it does not always “work” predictably. If I only curse someone, I know how that will turn out. But love opens up an entire universe of possibilities that can end in heartbreak, pain, or things more beautiful than we can imagine.

To conclude, a challenge and question to myself and the reader: Who is your “Saul/Paul?”

Pick someone from Facebook, someone delusional, someone hate-filled, someone your dumb neighbor voted for, and pray for them. Don’t pray for their worldview, but pray for them. For their child with cancer, for their dog they have to put down, for their anxiety and depression, for their abusive father, for them to see the light—not as you see it, but as God would have them see it; and then, if we’re feeling really bold: how can we be love and light to them?

(c) Fr Anthony Messeh (2018). WHO IS YOUR SAUL/PAUL? by Bradley. Available at http://www.franthony.com/blog/who-is-your-saulpaul?rq=who%20is%20your%20saul.

A Subtle Snare

By Fr Antonios Kaldas

Originally seen on Fr Antonios Kaldas blog site, 11 June 2012

“There have been men before now who got so interested in proving the existence of God that they came to care nothing for God Himself … as if the good Lord had nothing to do but exist! There have been some who were so occupied in spreading Christianity that they never gave a thought to Christ. Man! Ye see it in small matters. Did ye never know a lover of books that with all his first editions and signed copies has lost the power to read them? Or an organiser of charities that had lost all love for the poor? It is the subtlest of all the snares.”

CS Lewis. The Great Divorce.

We live in an age of knowledge and of great power, and the individual citizen today can do things that the most powerful of heads of state could only dream of fifty years ago. This power brings with it opportunities unimagined, but also a raft of new temptations, or rather old temptations adapted to new situations (is there ever anything new under the sun?)

Today, I can sit in my living room and order a rare book from London or read a paper written by a scholar in Zurich at the click of a button. I have access to a marketplace of ideas that is so huge its very size smothers me if I stop to think about it. For the curious mind, this is intoxicating! How easy to lose oneself in an ocean of stimulating knowledge and new ideas! How wonderful to acquire new understanding, to see old things in new ways, to penetrate the depths of ignorance and shine the light of comprehension upon their previously dark treasures!

Apologetics is a marvellous revelation for those whose mind is so inclined. We drink the heady mead of rationality and find that the logic of this world points to its Creator! How wonderful! How sweet! And yet, apologetics is only medicine for the doubting soul; and no one can live on medicine alone. One needs heavenly bread and living water. Apologetics points the way, it heals the wounds of confusion, but then it is time for the daily bread of communion with the existent to carry out the process of nourishment.

Service in the house of the Lord is honourable and fulfilling. It provides the servant with a deep sense of belonging and achievement, whatever the nature of that service may be. I am doing something good for the Lord! Yet it is so easy for that “for the Lord” to turn quietly into “for me”. The very satisfaction and fulfillment one derives from service can become in itself an end, usurping its proper role as a means for the crucifixion of the ego and the losing of the self in the ocean of love that is God. And soon, God Himself is forgotten.

Intoxication is a dangerous thing. It has a life of its own, and unless it is tamed and subdued to the will, it will take over in its own right. It is so easy for us to fall into the trap of mistaking the means for the end. So simple is this trap that one wonders how anyone could ever fall into it all, and yet, it daily claims its thousands and ten thousands of victims. The quote above from CS Lewis’ imaginative little classic describes this temptation perfectly. If the devil cannot keep you away from doing good, he will engross you in it and turn it into a lust. Yes, even serving God can become a sinful lust.

We are all susceptible. The priest and the deacon are susceptible to being so caught up in the beauty of the tunes of the service that they forget the One whom those tunes honour. The Sunday School or Youth servant can be so engrossed in lessons and activities that they lose sight of the Friend to whom they are supposed to introduce those they serve. The person praying in her room behind a closed door can become so concerned with fulfilling her duty to pray this prayer and that prayer that she can no longer see the Lord listening to her empty words with sadness.

And the subtleness of this pernicious trap is that it doesn’t look like a trap. From the outside, it looks for all the world as though you are doing everything right; more than right in fact. How many empty vessels like this are praised constantly in our churches for all the wonderful work they are doing? Which only goes to reinforce this cycle of emptiness.

“From the outside” – that’s where the illusion lives. The solution, on the other hand, is to be found on the inside. In the solitude of one’s heart, in that place where the heart is laid mercilessly bare and naked before God, where truth can no longer be hidden and pride has no substance to give it form, there is where a person awakes from his false dream to the reality of God.

And there, one discovers the true purpose for which intoxication was invented by God. Here is the addiction that truly adds life instead of taking it away. It is the intoxication with the Lord of Joy and Love, of which all earthly intoxications are just shadows and corruptions, cheap and nasty imitations that take away life rather than bestowing it. When one is intoxicated with the love and joy of God, every ‘drug’ loses its attraction. There is no longer any danger of mistaking the means for the end.

Original blog available at- http://www.frantonios.org.au/2012/06/11/a-subtle-snare/

Who Is My Enemy?

By Monica

Originally seen on Becoming Fully Alive blog site, 26 Nov 2015.

I believe in a common humanity. Practically, that means that we are not individuals, but persons who are in relationship with each other. Most importantly, it means that there is a common thread that is stitched through the bone and sinew of us all; a knot anywhere, affects us all. As Martin Luther King once said,“We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”

Beyond race, culture and religion, we are all made in the image and likeness of God. We all possess frail hearts, we all desire to love and be loved. We all long to find safety and belonging in the world. We all hurt and we fear, we stumble into awkward moments, into our own chaos and anger. We are the same beneath these beautiful layers of skin and confusion. We are all the same kind of broken. And in our broken, common humanity, redemption desires to tell the tale of us all, because there is no one beyond grace.

Yet how many people have we deemed unworthy of grace? How many souls have we too easily condemned?

“Enemy” is a strong word. Strong enough to make us distance ourselves from it and deny that it plays a part in our lives. But when Christ spoke of enemies, he spoke simply; an enemy is someone who stands in the way of our freedom, dignity, our capacity to grow and love, someone who attacks us or our country. An enemy most commonly exists within the person whom we are avoiding.

When the lawyer spoke to Jesus asking how he was to enter the kingdom of heaven, He answered him simply; “love your neighbour as yourself.” But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbour?” (Luke 10:29). Though the words of the Bible are clear and simple, just like the lawyer, we seek justification. Love my enemy? Who is my enemy? Surely Jesus didn’t mean ISIS, surely He didn’t mean the human responsible for my deepest hurts?

But what if the ones we name offenders can be freed to love?

‘They are people who, if loved, helped, and trusted, can in some small way recognize their faults and their brokenness and can grow in humanity and in inner freedom.” -Jean Vanier

What if humanity rose up to forgive? Like the sacred hearts of Katja Rosenberg, Antoine Leiris and Arturo Martinez. What if we extended forgiveness regardless of our hurts and our rights, and followed the sacred Word that brings all healing? For us to forgive, we must yearn for unity and peace, yearn for the oneness to be united in mind, in heart and in spirit. If we love and desire for all to be free to bear fruit, we will be a people heavy for forgiveness. We will live full and whole that we are no longer driven by our desire to be filled and prove ourselves worthy but we will yearn for the growth of all people in peace and in unity. To be a peacemaker, we must make peace with ourselves and we must make peace with those around us. We must believe that we are all a part of the suffering. We have all hurt and been hurt. When we point out darkness, we must remember to point back at our own souls. It is not easy to see beyond our own suffering, sometimes it is blinding. It is not easy to accept forgiveness or to forgive; it is a struggle.

‘ When we dare to care, then we discover that nothing human is foreign to us, but that all the hatred and love, cruelty and compassion, fear and joy can be found in our own hearts. When we dare to care, we have to confess that when others kill, I could have killed too. When others torture, I could have done the same. When others heal, I could have healed too.’ -Henri Nouwen

The truth is our enemies can often tell us a lot more about us than our friends can. The way we respond to our enemies will tell us the true state of our hearts; if we are hearts walking in forgiveness or if we walk in resentment.

Prayer for my Enemies

“Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless and do not curse them. They, rather than I, have confessed my sins before the world. They have punished me, whenever I have hesitated to punish myself. They have tormented me, whenever I have tried to flee torments. They have scolded me, whenever I have flattered myself. They have spat upon me, whenever I have filled myself with arrogance. Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them. Whenever I have made myself wise, they have called me foolish. Whenever I have made myself mighty, they have mocked me as though I were a fly. Whenever I have wanted to lead people, they have shoved me into the background. Whenever I have rushed to enrich myself, they have prevented me with an iron hand. Whenever I thought that I would sleep peacefully, they have wakened me from sleep. Whenever I have tried to build a home for a long and tranquil life, they have demolished it and driven me out. Truly, enemies have cut me loose from the world and have stretched out my hands to the hem of your garment. Bless my enemies, O Lord.

Even I bless them and do not curse them. Bless them and multiply them; multiply them and make them even more bitterly against me: So that my fleeing will have no return; So that all my hope in men may be scattered like cobwebs; So that absolute serenity may begin to reign in my soul; So that my heart may become the grave of my two evil twins: arrogance and anger; So that I might amass all my treasure in heaven; Ah, so that I may for once be freed from self-deception, which has entangled me in the dreadful web of illusory life. Enemies have taught me to know what hardly anyone knows, that a person has no enemies in the world except himself.

One hates his enemies only when he fails to realise that they are not enemies, but cruel friends. It is truly difficult for me to say who has done me more good and who has done me more evil in the world: friends or enemies. Therefore bless, O Lord, both my friends and my enemies. A slave curses enemies, for he does not understand. But a son blesses them, for he understands. For a son knows that his enemies cannot touch his life. Therefore he freely steps among them and prays to God for them. Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them.”

–Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic

Original blog post available at- https://becomingfullyalive.com/who-is-my-enemy/

Discontentment with Prayer

By Fr Antonios Kaldas

Originally seen on Fr Antonios Kaldas blogsite, 27 June 2012

It strikes me that many people in the Coptic tradition spend a lot of their lives being discontented with their prayer life. “I don’t pray enough”; “I don’t focus”; “I don’t feel much”.

Now there’s nothing wrong with desiring a deeper, more genuine dialogue with God. What is more important to our being than this? But it is also true that human nature is to shy away from things with which we are discontented. They make us feel bad, and so we avoid them if we can. Hence the struggle that many face to pray. It is not that they do not wish to be with God – it is that in their minds, prayer has become solidly attached to an uncomfortable feeling of failure or guilt or vague restlessness, a tone that makes them avoid prayer whenever possible.

This has to be one of the cleverer tricks of the devil to keep those who sincerely desire the presence of God away from experiencing it. Imagine the opposite. Imagine if prayer were instead attached to feelings of joy, peace and love. Who in their right minds would avoid that?

The question then becomes how one is to rescue prayer from the muddy negative attitudes that so easily encrust it and hide its true beauty. Here are some musings from a fellow struggler…

Don’t think of prayer as a duty. Duties are things we just have to do, whether we like it or not. Prayer just shouldn’t be like that in a relationship of love. Imagine how a wife would feel if her husband felt that spending time with her was a duty.
Don’t watch the clock. Don’t count the words. Let it be a natural thing. Here I am, and here is God. Let us meet. He is in me and surrounds me. God is here. Who needs a clock?
Enjoy your prayers. Sweeten them with your favourite tunes. Pray with a smile on your face. Rejoice that you have the opportunity to connect with your Creator.
Focus on God, not yourself. Who do you think about when praying? It is so easy to be focused on oneself – God help ME. God forgive ME. God change ME. These are not bad prayers, it’s just that if these are the only prayers you pray, that’s a pretty one-sided relationship. Try to forget the ME sometimes and just focus on HIM. It is in losing ourselves that we find our true selves. The best way to see yourself is reflected in the loving eyes of Christ.
Don’t get bogged down in repeating the same things mechanically every day. Sure, there are some things we need to share with God every day, like expressing our gratitude and confessing our sins. But every day brings new things to be grateful for, and new sins to confess. Your own inner life is constantly changing every day, so share that dynamic life with Him who never changes. He is your rock, your immovable point of reference in a confusingly liquid world.
Study the formal prayers. Many people go through their whole life having only ever encountered the formal prayers like the tasbeha, the Agbia and the liturgy in “quick mode”. In other words, they only ever use their words in praying them at normal speed. But you can’t really get into the deep meaning of those prayers at this speed. You remember your English lessons at school (with at least some fondness, I hope)? Reading a poem the first time often only gave you a vague sense of what it was about, but it was only when you read through again more carefully, stopped to think about individual phrases and how the whole thing hangs together, discussed it with teacher and classmates, and wrote your interpretations of it that your really discovered its profound meaning and beauty. Formal prayers are no different. If you want to enjoy them, then study them, think about them, discuss them and write about them. Then every time you pray them at normal speed, they will mean so much more.
Every thought is a prayer. Remember that God is He “in whom we live and move and have our being”. Every thought you think is visible before God, and therefore every thought you think is a kind of prayer, if only you realised it. Realise it! The person who constantly shares their inner life with God throughout the day finds it so much easier to pray when they shut off all distractions to focus solely on that dialogue with God. Indeed, prayer becomes something you crave, for you find the distractions annoying and rejoice when you can escape them and be focused. (Of course, that may just be my male brain talking – women are so much better at multi-tasking!)

I genuinely believe that there is nothing sweeter in this life than those times when we connect with the Infinite, Eternal, All-loving I AM; the sole and perfect Truth from which all reality flows. Or on another level, we connect with the loving Father who cares for us with such minute care that He even counts the hairs of our heads. How could we ever allow negative feelings attach to such a beautiful experience?

Original blog available at- http://www.frantonios.org.au/2012/06/27/discontentment-with-prayer/#more-648