Bishop Fotii of Triaditza
Anniversary
of the visit of the Iberon Montreal icon to Bulgaria
In 1995,
my beloved, when brother Joseph – savagely murdered two years later, brought to
us in Bulgaria, to our church, to the temple under construction and to this
holy convent the Montreal icon of the Mother of God, our ever-memorable
Matushka Abbess Seraphima was often saying when word came up for the icon “The icon
is here so we could straighten up our lives; it’s here to call us to begin a correction
of our lives.” The Slavic word 'исправление' (ISPRAVLENIE) means “redress (repair), making good (bringing
back in order), improvement”, but also (it means) “hard work (zealous labor), exploit”.
(Let us remember the beginning of the Troparion of St. Theodor Tyron – вел∙я вер¥ исправле’н∙¯“ [Great are the faith’s works (exploits)...]) And so (spiritual)
reformation is an exploit – an exploit we have to go back to again and again if
we desire to walk in spiritual life as Orthodox Christians.
Whence
does ISPRAVLENIE (spiritual correction) begin? From the awareness of our
sinfulness, of our insignificance, of our poverty, but not just from the awareness,
not just from the mindset, not just from thoughts in that direction, but
[rather] from a feeling – from a spiritual feeling at that. And that feeling is
revealed in the heart according to the measure of our selflessness [dedication],
i.e. according to our willingness to deny ourselves and seek not ours;
according to our willingness to seek God’s in all things – to seek God’s will,
to seek what pleases God, and not what pleases us, our (utter) egotism [SAMOST],
our self-love.
In the whirlwind
of everyday relationships and affairs it is hard, very hard for us to go back
to the awareness, to the thought that we have to work in our heart, to work towards
that selflessness, in order to have revealed in us the feeling of our own poverty,
leprosy, sinfulness, which is the ISPRAVLENIE (correction)’s starting point. And
a sign for whether that feeling is revealed in us and to what measure that
feeling is found in us is the way we endure the attitude of others towards us,
as well as what our attitude is towards the others. The way in which we
perceive the attitude of others towards us is a reliable, solid measure for
whether we have sprouting in our hearts a sense of our nothingness, sinfulness,
poverty. And you know very well from experience how the human heart responds
when someone does what we wish not [to be done], when someone affects us, when
in one or another way someone treads upon our self-love. Here then, in those
moments, revealed is what we actually wear inside [ourselves]. And by those
feelings by these thoughts that shoot up right then – in a flashing instant, in
such trials, we can determine: do we have within us the germ of ISPRAVLENIE
(correction) or not; we can determine the same also by our attitude to others –
what is it, what is our measure towards the others – a holy evangelical one,
wide, full of patience, of willingness for us to endure the other’s weakness, the
other’s manifestation of passion i.e. the other’s disease, that same disease
that we, too, carry ourselves, but perhaps manifested in a different way; or else
– that measure of ours is not holy evangelical, but it is (just) ours, deeply
ours, deeply our own, arranged by our (utter) egotism [SAMOST]. And when the measure
in this sense is ours and not evangelical, then springing out of the heart are
both frustration, and anger, and resentment, or vice versa – depression, gloom,
megrims, (and) God forbid – despair. If we try to treat others with an evangelical
measure, if we try to endure the attitude of others towards us, even when it is
– in man’s (common-day) wording – bad, with evangelical measure again, then that
feeling will begin to sprout in our hearts, which gives growth to ISPRAVLENIE
(correction). And furthermore – upon those who labor in that respect the Lord bestows
comfort, bestows peace so they may taste, make sure that the path they have embarked
upon is correct, that it is the path of God, the path of Christ and not our
own. And then it may well be so that when we are blamed – whether fair or unfair,
when we are reproached, when we are blasphemed – we may have peace in the
heart. Such peace as (the one) we all felt in those most blessed days the
Theotokos autumn Pascha in 1995, when here with us we had visiting the icon – the
Iberon myrrh-gushing icon of the Mother of God. But this is a consolation, a visit
by the Lord, divine mercy of the Heavenly Queen. And then (what)? Then it is
the turn of trials, too, so we may make sure that it takes work and work again
so that our hearts may become a receptacle for at least the germ of the holy evangelical
virtues.
Remember
– any retreat, apostasy from faith included, each and every departure from the
Lord, from His holy will, from the evangelical holy Commandments, starts from
the human heart – exactly from it. The enemies from without are external
enemies and it is quite understandable that they are doing their obscene, repugnant
to God, demon’s work. The worst thing is that quite often the Lord is being resisted
by ourselves and we do this whenever we depart from Him, when we voluntarily open
our hearts to the action of sin, and therefore – also to the action of demons.
Each retreat starts from the heart and in our times of terrible confusion in
the Church we witness this in the tragedy – worthy of Jeremiah weeping, in the
tragedy unfolding in ever larger and larger scales in the Russian Orthodox
Church Abroad. And when that apostasy starts in the hearts – especially of the bishops
and clerics, then the consciences and the hearts of many people faithful to
Christ are being crucified by those same hierarchs and clergy whose hearts have
become a source of apostasy. By saying this, I am not blaming, not judging
anyone. I do repeat: all this is indeed worthy of Jeremiah weeping because one
sees with one’s eyes, one senses internally with what frantic rage the devil
seeks to suppress, to remove from the earth’s face all hearths of true
Orthodoxy. All of us are on that front-line, although we are far from the developments
taking place today in the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, and tomorrow those may
explode who knows where. And so – let us watch over our hearts. And may we
know: this is where that ISPRAVLENIE (correction) starts, about which Matushka [Seraphima]
used to speak with a few words but so wonderfully and with such power. And so, after
her holy prayers, let us bring the altar of the LORD another Isaac by sacrificing
our own hearts. Let us sacrifice them to the LORD into the fire of conscience,
in the fire of self-denial, in the fire of the love for our Savior – Jesus Christ
the Lord, to Whom – along with His Most Pure Mother – Most Holy Theotokos,
glory, honor and worship, now and ever and for ages eternal. Amen.
* The address was made on November 24th
(November 11th, O.S.), 2004 at the "Shroud of Most Holy
Theotokos” convent, Knyazhevo area, Sofia.
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