Greek Orthodox Nuns Live Life Of Prayer In Mountains Of Washington
0 Comments Published by georgy on Wednesday, May 28, 2008 at 10:36 PM.
Did you know there's a place in the Pacific Northwest where people only speak Greek, eat Greek food and pray all day for the salvation of the world?
In the pine-dotted mountains just north of Goldendale, Washington, 18 women live in a different time. It's called St. John The Forerunner Greek Orthodox Monastery. Correspondent Anna King lived in the monastery for two days to bring us this story.
Anna King: So I am looking at my phone here and it's about 8:38 p.m. and I am headed to bed because I'm getting up at four in the morning which is when the services start. Umm.
The only thing is that the sisters get up at like 2 a.m. and start doing their own prayers in their own room in prostration before they get up and do services at 4 a.m. so I feel kind of lazy getting up at 4 a.m. but I am going to go to bed now.
SOUND: Cell phone alarm
Anna King: When my cell phone alarm went off at 4 a.m. I was so sleepy I accidently used a tube of face cream as toothpaste. After washing my mouth out and pulling on a long dress and a headscarf, I headed through the dark woods to the chapel for morning prayers with the nuns.
SOUND: Nuns singing
Anna King: These 18 women at St. John sing songs with words and melodies that haven't changed since the Byzantine era. And they live a simple life of rigorous work and prayer. There's no T.V., there's no radio and there's no idle talk. Even as they work or eat they pray to Jesus for their own salvation and that of everyone else.
Anna King: This is Sister Iosiphia.
Sister Iosiphia: I don't think there can be anything more powerful than monks and nuns -- young men and women -- staying up in the middle of the night sacrificing their sleep and their comforts to pray to God for all of the people in the world. Which there are so many various problems and so many various needs that everyone has. I don't think there could be a greater offering to the people and the community than that.
Anna King: Many of the faces I saw peeking out from the black head wraps were young. Iosiphia wouldn't say how old she is but appears to be in her late twenties.
SOUND: Sisters singing
Anna King: This monastery in the mountains is young too. It was started 13 years ago when a local doctor donated his property to the Greek Orthodox Church. Three nuns from Greece came to establish St. John. The rest of the sisters here are recruits. Many of them don't have any Greek heritage, and some are even converted Protestants.
St. John is one of 18 Greek Orthodox monasteries overseen by a Greek priest named Elder Ephraim. The priest-monk has attracted some controversy.
In fact, several Web sites criticize his monasteries, likening them to a cult. But all of the women at St. John say they choose this life. It's a choice generally made soon after high school.
Next to Sister Iosiphia sits Sister Ephraimia. She's wearing nearly identical black clothing. The only bare skin sticking out are their faces and hands. Both say they found the monastery life by themselves.
Sister Ephraimia: Most people probably would say that it's something that starts to grow in their heart little by little and it gets bigger and bigger until you just know that this is what you want to do. It's like the love of Christ grows and grows until you are ready to make that decision.
Sister Iosiphia: Just like how do you know when you want to get married or who you want to marry? It's a mystery. There are millions of people in the world, but something draws you to that life and to that certain person. It's the same thing for us. Something draws us to this life and to a certain monastery.
Anna King: The commitment to be a nun or a monk is life-long. And even Orthodox families can feel frightened or confused when a daughter or son decides to join up.
The nuns typically don't visit their families, but they do have a guest house so the families can come visit them. One of the parents I met there is Donna Young from Wasilla, Alaska. She comes here at least twice a year to visit her daughter who is a nun.
Donna Young: I was really nervous about having her go to take on a really different life than I was used to. I wondered how it would be or how we would relate to each other. But the sisters have made our family feel like this is our home. So we feel really close. When we come here to visit it's just like coming to our second home.
Anna King: This home is a busy one. Visits with family are squeezed in amid chores and prayers.
SOUND: Kitchen noise, peeling onions
Anna King: The sisters receive some donations but they also work to support themselves. This day the nuns peeled tubs of onions to make traditional Greek food to sell in their cafe. They paint religious icons. And they make pastries, soaps and candles to sell on their Web site.
Anna King: But I mean do you guys miss anything from the outside world like waterslides or pizza or you know movies?
Sister Ephraimia: No
Sister Iosiphia: You find the fulfillment here with everything. And like we said it's heavenly joy. And that can't be compared with anything to the joy on this earth which is very vain and temporal. And our joy, our goal is for the eternal joy which we start to feel from here.
Sister Ephraimia: You get a little taste of paradise then what would you want with the world after that. It's like it's nothing. The world is our exile and it's just our journey home to paradise here.
Anna King: The sisters are praying that they will earn enough money to build more spacious housing and a bigger chapel soon. That would create more room for more sisters to join them in their life of solitary work and prayer.
SOUND: Sisters singing second song
Goldendale, WA May 28, 2008 6:20 p.m.
Online Monastery: http://www.stjohnmonastery.org/
There are various forms of persecutions, such as: discrimination and tortures on the basis of gender, religion, fights between the sects of the same religion or church, minority rights, politics, patriotism, distribution of wealth and job opportunities, betrayals, spying and espionage, terrorism and sabotage, and many other types. Our concern here is with regards to the preaching of the Christian gospels that uses only the weapon of non-violence. In the modern context, the family and the secular system are of greater importance for building up a conducive system under the therapy of non-violence. We can neither take up the offensive weapons, nor can we become the pawns of exterminating techniques and brutalities of the oppressors. We should, therefore, carve out a way under the present social and secular system for training the present generation as to how to face the monstrosities of the irreligious pattern of life that has to face the man of perdition soon.
Man and woman have never been equal, nor is there any man equal with another man in his mental and physical prowess, despite both man and woman are equal because their appearance comes closer as they are created in the image of God. Man is created in the image of God who finished His work on the cross of Calvary. The cross is his image because stretching out his hands on both sides makes him a cross; thus he has to carry the cross of sufferings that the Creator perfected it on the cross of Golgotha. It is bitter and painful; the signal for giving a bitter drink at the last moment to Christ finds its culmination in sight also. Jesus finished His life on this plane of betrayal with a ‘loud cry’ that he started at the manger together with the starving animals. There is no proof that He was given with any food during the ordeal between the Last Supper and the bitter drink which he denied on the cross. Jesus’ last food in this world was His own body, the last supper, that He shared it with His disciples. Sufferings and denial of food is the outcome of eating the forbidden fruit. Adam’s tasting the fruit of Sheol is ended up in tasting the bitter drink that He refused to drink, but cut a channel that led Jesus to the Hades where the ‘fruit tasters’ huddled up in the gnashing of their teeth.
Beatitudes
The eighth Beatitude reads like this. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven” Mt.5: 10. While the first seven beatitudes focus on the subjective imperatives for the conquest of Heaven, the last two of them are objective credentials that testify the authentications of persecutions for the entry visa into Heaven. The objective ones or the persecutions are the byproducts of the personal commitments by the person of the first beatitudes that begin with, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven”. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus outlines the character of the ‘sons of the kingdom’ of God. When we practice the first 7 beatitudes in private or in social life, the outcome of persecution is inevitable because the devil is following us to get us trapped. Persecution is a litmus test of the degree of the sincerity of the person who is zealously copying the former spirit of the beatitudes in words and practice. The devil is never silent and idle. Despite Jesus declined to identify Himelf with the Sonship of God openly, the prince of darkness smelt His divinity and tried to test and persecute the unblemished one. Jesus acknowledged this by saying that the Son of man has no place to hide His face from the diabolic ones that run the evil men and his world.
Persecutions
Every animal flees away from death, except some lunatics at times due to their delirious touts, because life is the rarest single commodity that brings thrill to the blood, the reason for Esau to sell his birth right for a dish of soup, King David, the man of God, to get enticed by another man’s wife and Judas to sell the head of his Master for thirty silver coins are only few incidents. Persecutions are of two types: firstly, mentally and secondly, physically. The mental torture has no depths or heights; it haunts the sufferer every moment that becomes a poisoned chalice for him to drink which cannot be spit out. As our inner or physical make-up is still a mystery, no one knows how each episode affects our thinking that control the outer frame.
Distress and tensions tell upon differently from individual to individual, depending on the inner and physical constitution of the sufferer. Jesus’ kiths and kins assumed that He was insane, and those His enemies dubbed Him as a duplicate of Beelzebub who wanted to dynamite the Jewish hierarchy, the reason for them to, some how, get rid of Him. We can make armchair comments about tortures and their pros and cons, yet it is not easy to face them in our flimsy and momentary impulsive emotional dastardliness. Though the Son of Man who became Incarnate to save mankind, He said that He overcame the world and its sufferings, Jn.16: 33; yet whispered at the last moment that trapped Him to His enemies, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me…”, Mt.26: 39. He was overwhelmed by the agony of His physical and mental sufferings because the sufferings of any kind are beyond our imagination and our boundary. To accept the pang of crucifixion that bring a slow and anguishing death in the raw flesh and at the state of immobility on the cross is hard to ponder over the totality of pain and agony. This could be the worst form of torturing an individual; the main reason is that the victim is not able, making excruciating pain.
Various forms of tortures and sufferings
Because nothing is perfect in human life the incongruities that make things worse make a hell out of everything that we transact with, save the momentary pleasure that is accrued. “Happiness in life is an occasional episode in the general drama of pain”, says Thomas Hardy. Jesus came to offer peace to the suffering humanity, but He gave it only through the abdication of His own body. If the body is the root cause of all our sufferings, get out of it even while alive in flesh is the panacea. This again is possible only by rare mystics, a lost species in the wilderness of the modern jungle technology that is just to kill the spirit and soul of man of the doomsday. Despite family life is meant to derive pleasure and happiness, it can invite Hades on earth; listen to King Lear who fathered three daughters and was shunted out to the wilderness and became a lunatic in his loneliness. Murders and looting is the language of social or political cohesion that assassinated Mahatma Gandhi and many other leaders who bargained and gave independence and earthly salvation to mankind.
Religion is another façade that slaughtered countless prophets and messiahs who liberated us from the sloth of sin and sinful mode of life; Jesus is the only one who bought salvation for the soul at the expense of His own blood that is shed by His own children. There is no animal ungrateful like man who sometimes betrays his own father or mother for the sake of earthly gain and power. Tamed animals are loyal to their masters, but look at Judas who was plucked out of his earthly miseries and put in charge of the finance portfolio. ‘You too, Brutus’ is the higher qualifications of that ‘prince of perdition’. Betrayal was the first treachery that we imbibed from the forbidden fruit, a chain of three betrayals: Adam’s betrayal of God and Eve, Eve’s betrayal of Adam and the serpent. Selfishness is the only common language that is common to man. Justification of our actions that cast blame on others is the reason for self-worship which lead to megalomania and utter tragedy at the end. The paradox of creating man in God’s image and becoming a devil by the taste of the fruit of attraction make man as a rare and complex animal. Man is a personified god and at the same time reflects as a devil. Selfishness that eliminates pure love and showing ingratitude that breed apathy destroy the element of Godly love from man. Momentary pleasure and thrill of the flesh make him forget all the good relationship that he owes to others in immeasurable quantity. An ungrateful man lives in fool’s paradise that makes him an incarnation of self-conceit. Such people are never straight-forward and humble. There are 6 billion people in the world; each one of them is a world of his own.
Modern Perplexities
There were not enough room for man to show his naked cruelties in the past, but science and technology opened the vistas to exhibit his totality of his animality in a more robust way because of the improvement of the transportation and communication super knowledge. Modern man has already been converted as a Darwin’s chimpanzee, knowingly or unknowingly, just like Adam lost his heavenly image by the influence of the serpent. Though we are not of chimpanzee breed, we become one like by our auto-suggestion. This is what the modern man of Darwin’s theory changed him to. Even a harmful thought will have an imprint on our own inner image, the reason for religion to teach that we ought to curtail our evil thought that becomes wicked action eventually. The modern man has a different heart and mind that is devoid of mercy, love and mutual affection. Persecutions of various means in various fields of today are due to the main reasons outlined below.
Pre-marital relationship
The immoral traffic of sex has been the major worry ever since the beginning of history, but it became a serious issue when we started it approving it socially and officially. Dating that leads to fornications and many other deviations is an animal way of life which alienates man from the vicinity of God. This has blotted out the complementing duties and responsibilities of alienating the gulf between the male and female, because the false equality of man and woman is an artificial lamination of the present century. As man lost his image and masculinity due to the unholy alliance of dating slavery, woman overturned his world and became his high- command that now harness the family and secular system and even the religious field also. This so-called equality has turned as slavery for both sexes in their routine biological life also; anything superficial will collapse. The sex war that brought excesses on both sides have identified man and woman at logger heads at one another, a sinister trend that was only at its lowest ebb in the natural life of the past. As the boundary between the complementing sexes has dwindled down to zero, the crossbreed culture of bionic masculinity and femininity wiped out the sympathy and love that once existed in our natural life, triggering the animal passion of vendetta and retaliation to flare up. The personality and individuality of a person who is involved in a dating marriage is entirely different from a person who marries without dating. The chemical make-up or the chemistry of the body changes by our thoughts and actions. What he loses is gained by her because of the inner guilt. Two-daggers in one sheath nuclear family culture of today dynamited everything that once our forefathers lived with. When the sense of shame is lost, brutality is the net result of animality. Where there is no open dating, it goes underground that becomes a nursery of various criminal offences and trading of vices. War on sex may be a right recipe for the elimination of war on terror.
Tortures and persecutions in family life have devastated all our sacramental values once we used to cultivate and find consolation with. Divorce, sexual deviations, abortion and adultery are the net outcomes of modern definition of equality. The dating marriage that cut the throat of religious marriage segregated the sexually sub-standard ones to get indulge in same-sex marriage and other profligacy, resulting in from sexual impotence to spiritual impotence. Dating that cave into the disappearance of man’s maleness and woman’s natural humility that is the source of bringing up and fostering family life has really created a monstrous world of atrocities because man is no more in his normal senses that sheds love and mercy all around, because family became a den of woman’s whimsicality. Sex purity is the mother of all goodly things in life; if that is molested once, it triggers into the unchartered ocean of vices that the custodian, devil, takes advantage of. Kama, the blind sex impulse, is the catalytic agent for all other iniquities.
The lax dating life that closes the gulf between the sacred complementing roles or functions of man and woman create a haven of mono sex culture, same-sex relationship that even is unheard among the animal kingdom, embracing all forms of sex promiscuities and amorousness. This is one of the potential reasons for the death of religions and family and civic values. Are animals a better species than the humans that even mates with its female ones, but not the animals, when they are pregnant?
The root cause of all modern problems is the invincible congenital maladies that conflagrate the globe of Cain. I mean congenital problems that include the time of conception and the thinking processes and moods of those specific moments, pre-natal and post-natal conditions of the mind and body; this so-called equality lead us into a state of social anarchy. The innocence of children is due to their sexual purity, despite there are genetic traits of lying and stealing tendency surfaces at times. Mass killing has become a passion that man enjoys in his lunatic states of the present insane world of all the forms of sex and drug mafias. Losing the virginity of our thought, mind and body at the expense of derailing the virginity of our character is the recipe for our disaster. What dating has done is exchanging their Nature-given manliness and humility to one another that works like a boomerang is the curse for most of our problems of today. In St.Peter’s definition, he portrays “woman as the weaker sex”, 1.Pet.3: 7. Now there is no separate identity for man and woman; each claims that one is equal and potent in every other way of life.
Though illicit sex that adulterates the soul and body is the triggering force for all other vices, the pure nuptial pleasure is also the source of the strength and health of our existence after the fall in procreating the species, just as the egg is a perfect food, but when it is rotten it works like a poison. All great men, like warriors, philosophers, religious stalwarts and politicians, of the world are proven to be of sexually high potentially-driven people. If one has to enjoy sex and high life later, one has to control sex in one’s adolescent stage that leads to marriage later. In other words, sex restraint is the vital force that builds our health and character that throw us into a land of bliss. Sex control at any stage in life is the dynamo that recharges into a new life; fasting season is a recipe for washing our body and spirit that potentates our life.
War of the sexes
Eden is in its second birth again here. What a pity, a perfect circle that devastates and fulfills the old prophesies. This is the last social war that segregates for recruiting the sheep from the goats before His coming. When Adam was alone, Eve was in his loin, validating that man and woman are one within the same framework and essence. Despite they were separated by her creation and the taste of the forbidden fruit, they were united as one body by the union of sex. To cut them as two is an abysmal piece of work that is manipulated by the interference of Satan in the end of the days. Hence the Women’s liberation Movement that craves for a false equality is to be treated as a crime against humanity. No other war can exterminate the human species other than the war of sexes. It annihilates the definition of the family that was assigned in Eden which give birth another Paradise on another earth. Prophets and God’s men live ahead of their times, but the vandals and lunatics find it hard to digest what they foretell. Equality of sexes or equality of opportunity has been a myth of the ages, not even between man and woman, but among the same sex and in Nature. If there was equality in Nature, there is no room for the predatory instinct and food chain to claim mastery at every moment.
Yet, the survival of the unfittest is the order of the day, the subnormal or the abnormal conquers and surpasses the normal. When Lucifer claimed equality with God, he fell from his grace and was evicted from his realm; when the bottom overpowers the top, overturning everything in that plane is imperative. The time when the unequal claims equality, the interference of the Prime Mover is a reality both in this plane and in other planes. A global catastrophe that negate the superficial ‘equality’ is imminent for readjustment of the apparent celestial clock, though there needn’t have to be a clock in the sphere of timelessness. There are such silent and violent persecutions that upset the spiritual and biological planes of our existence, eventuating in not able to live a life of what God assigned in the beginning. Persecutions, persecutions everywhere and in everything, as every rhythm of life, physically and mentally, turned upside down. Persecutions from within and without the family; the sanctity of the family has only become a paranoid concept of dating values.
Thirst for power
Accusing others and absolving ourselves is the result of dawning of ‘nakedness’ to our first parents. Finding faults with others is the safety valve that tries to overpower and subdue others. Cain who murdered Abel for offering a better Sacrifice to God is the father of tribal wars that is a legacy which he inherited from Eden. These tribal wars that are manifested in multifarious ways during our days are led by a super tech life of machines and weaponries. Human bombs, Bramastra’ that cost nothing has proven to be the most efficient weapon that the superman has invented, while every nation squandering billions of dollars for their defense budget and terrorism threats. Ruling over others is a predatory instinct of animality, the reason for the same is: “it is better to reign in hell than serve in heaven”. There are many kinds of wars, though the most conflagrating latest one is the sex war, the tentacles of which suck the blood of each individual and the web of the society at large.
Territorial ambition
Controlling others and showing our might and glory is a lust of the flesh. Roman Caesar, Alexander’s Greek empire and the Western colonialism are all monumental examples, but the wind blows to different directions beyond the control of man. Sprouting of great empires and collapsing eventually due to internal sophistications is a vanity of this plane of life. War that costs millions of lives and billions of dollars is an inevitable ingredient of persecutions. Who won’t cry out at the sight of women and young ones who meander around and shed tears due to the immeasurable atrocities of the wars and other cruelties? Economic wars are the groundwork of territorial or international wars.
Wealth amassment
A super life of materialism and a power game that bring everyone under our armpit has been the passion of life from the very beginning. This is called exploitation that manifests in very many forms and types. The reason for the disappearance of the great empires has been due to the internal corrosion that carries humanism and materialism which kills the glow of the other plane from us. The plundering of the fossil wealth that only could bring social and religious imbalance and anarchy is left to the last phase of human history.
Religious fanaticism.
There is nothing in the world that can beat and conquer the religious blindness from man. Religion and language play a great sentimental malady in our upbringing and life activities. People die for this ‘identical twins’ that whet their spiritual and earthly passions for kindling any carnality. Religion that moulds man and his morals is the most essential appetite in life, but if uncontrolled it will destroy the individual and his surroundings. The militant religions and their faith code go to extremism that wipes out the simple and innocent spirituality from our day to day life. It is preferable to be an agnostic than a radical extremist who kill oneself and many others spiritually and bodily by their self-conceited hypocrisy. These self- righteous ones inject poisons into others for any kind of monstrosities and violence. Jesus loved and helped the downtrodden and the misled, and was not in the good book of the religious hierarchy that blinds the simple and ignorant. As they found it that it was impossible to get rid of Him, they used all underhand methods that is the language of the derailed minds which bridle the social and religious higher places.
Herod, the king of the Jews, grabbed the position by bribing the Roman Caesar, despite he was of the Edomite blood. Pilate, the Roman Governor, realized that the heavenly Lamb as innocent, yet failed in his duty of protecting the Saviour from the hands of the malefactors, because his covetable job and position was important in his life. The Jewish religious sects that fought for their supremacy found that Jesus was a stumbling- block for their misdemeanors. The high priest validated his creed that it was better for one man to die for the sake of the majority. This world is only meant for the scoundrels and the mediocre that oscillates between the two extremes, just for fishing in troubled waters.
Torments
Despite there was no certain norm set in persecuting Jesus, they used every form that was in their schedule because they couldn’t make a glimpse into the realm of Jesus’ world due to their spiritual apathy. While He spoke in terms of the Heavenly code of faith and ethics, they judged Him on the basis of this despicable, carnal plane of overpowering others by deceit and religious bullying. He spoke in terms of His mystical body; they mistook it as the Jerusalem Temple. He didn’t say a lie when He stated that He was the son of Abraham, while He is his Father. The jealous ones couldn’t comprehend and penetrate between the concrete and the abstract truths, despite the abstract miracles that they wanted to witness which come from the invisible top layers, just as the moderns hyperboles in the abstract vistas of scientific and high -tech miracles, yet he attributes everything to the concrete realm by ignoring the unseen mysteries. The lunatic mob of today find exhilarations in their life of the flesh, forgetting that these inventions and discoveries are made by the intellectual or religious elites who travel in the frequency of cosmic time. The modern moral imbeciles enjoy all these new plastic and metallic products that radiate poisoning their mind and body, without making any contributions or shaking a single finger, just like the dog scavenges with the human excreta. All the socio-economic, religious and political Satanism of the high-tech culture that hardened the hearts of, like that of the Pharaoh, are the reasons for people to ignore Godly affections and persecute the obliterated species of religiously and morally thinking individuals; they will be singled out and hunted out by the egoistic and sensually motivated villains. This is applicable in the religious abstracts that the meaning of which is oblivious even to the ritual performers and moral architects.
God sends His special messengers for redirecting the derailed majority from time to time, so that He wants a remnant to be saved at the end of the day. Persecutions either bodily or mentally are extremely painful and unbearable, yet for the Kingdom of God some forgo the pleasures and ephemeral glory that dash through the torments inflicted by the crowd belonging to spiritual anarchy. All the prophets and apostles carried the yoke of afflictions that was inflicted by the common mass that has no feeling of affection or mercy; all the tortured ones dreamt for a life of Heavenly Jerusalem and wait in procession in the mid-air, so that we also queue up for the procession for the Last Judgement. It is bitterly painful to pass through the clouds that the clouts create and laughing about; they don’t realize now that they will be tortured eternally by the dark fiends, once when they are in their hands after this sojourn. Fools don’t learn from the wise, whereas the ordinary become wise by seeing the foolhardy acrobatics of religious groundlings. Don’t torture others because we also will be tortured, unless repented and absolved, million times than we have made the injuries on others.
Satan made a gleeful laughter and left the scene, thinking that he had nailed Jesus on the cross and defeated Him, but the everlasting truth is that it was the devil that was in effect nailed down on the cross, overturning the antique bond that stood against mankind with its legal demands, Col.2: 14. A trinity of power-mongers, Pilate, Herod and Chiapas, is there to chase and augment the woes of the faithful at all times. This will multiply at the end of the time because of the haunting of Satan on everyone in an ever-increasing degree with the help of the triune autocrats that control the globe, Eph.6.10-24. We should know that we are the citizens of a luminous, alien nation of another solar system. When there are persecutions, think that they are the necessary tools in weaving the white garment of incorruption, therefore, rejoice in the Lord. Those who suffer for the chaste faith and righteousness will have a reward in the next life, not for ones who do wrongs and suffer.
We also become witnesses of experiencing that the divine or moral law that is undercurrent in everything in this plane also that the torturers too will be the victims of brutal tortures now or later. Jesus’ prayer, “Forgive them because they do not know what they are doing” is not for a simple show; really they didn’t understand the mystery of His passion and death due to their utter spiritual darkness. Truly we have to pray for our persecutors, as they are eclipsed by the spiritual blindness that is the result of a life of humanism, bohemianism, atheism, religious extremism, materialism, and being the darling children of deluxe life of high flying super life of modern Machiavellianism. Pray for the persecutors for their ignorance and fanaticism that betray their pure conscience. Pray for the persecuted, bashed and raped ones who are crying for help during the final hour of technological darkness that blackens the sun and the moon and the stars. Passive or stoic suffering is not the method of the acceptance of the torturing; we have a duty to make them realize them that they are engaged in dirty malevolent works; hence a sort of reaction is needed like Jesus calling Herod a fox and His other retorting means for trapping them. Let the light of true understanding brighten their life.
By
Prof E S John, Australia (Contributing Editor)
In the belief that this is the place where God appeared to Moses and gave him the Ten Commandments, pilgrims have come to visit Mount Sinai in an unbroken line since the fourth century. Despite its remote setting, the craggy giant has attracted Christians of all sects who make the difficult journey to see the bible's holiest mountain.Mount Sinai is also of religious significance to Muslims, who believe this was where Prophet Mohamed's flying horse, Al-Boraq, descended from heaven. Mount Sinai, also known as Mount Moses, therefore holds a big and important place in the hearts of all Egyptians.
At the foot of the mountain is another place of pilgrimage: the Greek Orthodox Monastery of St Catherine, one of the oldest Christian monasteries in the world and home of the biblical burning bush. The basilica was built in 530 by Emperor Justinian at the site of an earlier chapel founded by St Helena, mother of Constantine the Great. The monastery's long existence and priceless, virtually-intact collections of icons and manuscripts can almost certainly be attributed to the safety of its location, tucked away in the barren rocky landscape of South Sinai.
In 2002 the site was described on the World Heritage List as "mixed property, cultural and natural", which means that the monastery and the area around it were on the list. The area encompasses almost some 601 sq km within the 5,750 sq km-area of the St Catherine's National Park.
On 18 April, the forecourt of the Coptic Museum was the stage for the telling of the history of Sinai and its stupendous monuments of nature, archaeological sites and recent discoveries. In the course of the special evening Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), announced that the Greek government had offered Egypt a grant of LE2 million to help restore St Catherine's Monastery. The money will go towards developing the surrounding area and converting it into a destination with up-to-date facilities for tourists.
Hawass added that during the upcoming archaeological season, which will start in September, excavation work will take place in the area around St Catherine's in the hope that it will reveal more about the history of Sinai.
The first steps to conserve the natural and cultural features of South Sinai were taken back in 1996, when the St Catherine National Park was declared under the management of the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency (EEAA) and the commission of the European Union. The aim then was to conserve the area by laying down certain rules for visitors. These included respecting the sanctity of the land; protecting its large variety of flora and fauna (some unique to Sinai); and prohibiting the removal or interference with wild animals, plants or rocks. The aims were prudent, but they could not be fully implemented because controversy arose on the question of responsibility.
All natural reserves in Egypt, which differ in kind, are run by the EEAA, which has voiced concerns about the advisability of privatisation. However, some newspapers at that time called for privatisation, claiming that the government could not control all the reserves and that investors under the supervision of the EEAA were necessary.
At that time, according to Law 102/1983, the EEAA, in cooperation with various ministries and governmental bodies, was the only authority responsible for running natural reserves. The EEAA accused the private sector of aiming at gaining quick profits without giving much care to the nation's natural wealth.
As the controversy raged, the monastery's Greek Orthodox monks found their haven of tranquillity falling more and more under threat. There was no control of the area around the monastery, which was rapidly being developed to meet tourist demands. The Al-Salam Hotel, Morgan Land, St Catherine's Village and the Zeitouna Camp sprang up, followed by several cafés. The monks, naturally, resented their loss of privacy. They made an effort to control the movement of pilgrims, limiting visiting hours and giving access to carefully- controlled areas within the monastery complex. But then a modern highway was built, and an airport, and tourists and pilgrims began to arrive in their thousands, in groups of 30 to 50, several times a day -- and on every day of the year that the monastery was open.
So many tourists climbed the 2,629m-high Mount Sinai that its sacred peak became littered with soft drink bottles and cans, plastic bags and other refuse. The fertile lower reaches of Mount Catherine -- the highest peak in the Sinai peninsula, named in honour of the monastery's patron saint -- became depleted of the desert herbs and reeds which provided nutritious feed for camels and goats. Its summit was treated with ill- respect by adventure travellers. But fortunately, since it was a World Heritage Site, a stop was put to the controversy and a management and protection plan was set in motion by the minister of culture, the SCA, the governorate of South Sinai and the monastery authorities themselves.
The area of South Sinai described on the World Heritage list encompasses the Monastery of St Catherine and Justinian's basilica, the Church of the Transfiguration: the Chapel of the Burning Bush, the most sacred part of the monastery; the mosque near the belfry which stands as evidence of the protection of the monastery by the caliphs of Egypt and the monks' tolerant attitude to Islam; the old refectory, situated south-east of the basilica; the Library and the Icon Collection; and Mount Sinai and Mount Catherine.
During the celebration Hawass awarded scientist Farouk El-Baz, research professor and director of the Centre for Remote Sensing in Boston, with a gold medallion for his dedication to the restoration of archaeological monuments, and his studies on Khufu's solar boat and its removal from the Giza Plateau to the Grand Egyptian Museum.
A documentary film on Sinai and its monuments was screened, while a concert of classical music performed on piano and cello rounded off the event.
Roman Catholic Journey to Orthodoxy (Story Two)
0 Comments Published by georgy on Monday, May 5, 2008 at 9:20 PM.
Baptized Roman Catholic, later becoming an Episcopal priest and missionary, and three years ago having been received with his family into the Holy Orthodox Church, he is a zealous Orthodox missionary and evangelist currently preparing for ordination to priesthood at Saint Tikhon’s Seminary, South Canaan, Pennsylvania.
Maximus has been involved in various church ministries including Foundation Park –a ministry for the poor, Strike force –strength ministry for teens, and Fellowship of Christian Athletes . He served three years as head counselor at Mid-Atlantic Teen Challenge , a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program for teenagers. In addition, as part of his Masters degree at Regent University, he spent three dynamic summers ministering in Germany, the United Kingdom and Africa in connection with the evangelistic ministry of Christ for all Nations.
After graduation in 1990, Maximus was invited to join the ministry of “Christ for all Nations,” (CfaN) as an associate evangelist. He moved to Kenya, East Africa, and eventually lived, traveled and ministered in nineteen African nations and eventually led evangelization efforts in various parts of the world including India, Philippines, Russia, and Madagascar.
In 1997, Maximus became part of the “Minus to Plus” evangelistic project in North America – a ministry of CfaN dedicated to placing an evangelistic booklet about the cross of Christ into every home in North America. He became Executive Director of the multi–million dollar project as well as Executive Director of the U.S. branch of the Christ for all Nations ministry, placing 10 million booklets into homes across North America, meeting and working with the top evangelical church leaders across North America.
After working with thousands of churches from various denominational backgrounds in the international evangelistic campaigns, Maximus eventually grew in his convictions about sacramental and liturgical traditions as he studied church history. The most helpful materials were the teachings and traditions of the Orthodox Church.
As a first step, Maximus took sacred vows as a deacon and later a priest in the International Communion of the Charismatic Episcopal Church. Over time, as a result of his extensive ministry in Eastern Europe , it became increasingly clear that God was calling him and his family to become members of the Orthodox Church. Since then, Maximus, his wife Susanne, and four children have been received into the Orthodox Church in America and are active members of Saint Nicholas Cathedral in Washington D.C.
Today, Maximus is the president and founder of the evangelistic mission “Gospel to all Nations” (GTAN) – an evangelistic ministry in the process of fully coming under the auspices of the Orthodox Church. GTAN is grounded in the historic faith and church of the past, but striving into the future to reach the world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It fosters unity and cooperation between various church denominations while witnessing the richness and fullness of the apostolic faith of the Fathers, and is an equipping force for the saints in regards to evangelism and missions. Lastly, it hosts Gospel campaigns to non–Christians: Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and general un–evangelized people and has a particular interest in reaching the least evangelized nations of the world.
Maximus has preached Gospel campaigns in 39 nations, face to face with millions of people. Meetings have ranged from five people, to five hundred thousand people in a single service, as in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. Noteworthy, is the fact that multitudes of people from the Muslim faith have converted to Christianity in both North Africa and Central Asia as a result of these numerous campaigns, held from Mali to Kyrgyzstan.
Over the past few years, the ministry has hosted campaigns and conferences in various cities in Russia, Ukraine, Byelorussia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Sri Lanka, Burma, Armenia, Pakistan and Cuba. One unique outreach was in historic Armenia, in the city of Sevan , where from a population of approximately 10,000 people, up to 7,000 people attended the largest service. In the evenings, multitudes of people, including all the local prostitutes , responded to Maximus' words for repentance and church attendance, while during the day, a conference was hosted with up to six hundred people from local churches - attending daily teaching and discipleship.
In September 2006, Maximus completed an extremely fruitful mission trip to Sakhalin Island, preaching in churches, public meetings, orphanages, monasteries, by radio, TV, and newspaper interviews, working together with Bishop Danyyl of Sakhalin and also Archbishop Mark in the city of Khabarovsk, mainland Russia. Between the 24th of September and 2nd of October he did evangelistic work with Archbishop John, the bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church in charge of missions and evangelism, and is teaching in their seminary and preaching in the city of Belgorod, Russia.
Maximus successfully completed five mission trips this summer. He is now enrolled at St. Tikhon’s Seminary in South Canaan, PA, to which he commutes. Please keep him and his family in your prayers. He wife, Susanne, delivered their fourth child in October.
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Source:http://www.pravmir.com/article_151.html
