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Dedicated to sharing the life, teachings, and spiritual lineage of Hieromonk Seraphim Rose of Platina and promoting his veneration and glorification (canonization) by the Orthodox Church
Today the Orthodox Church commemorates Righteous Abel, the first martyr in the history of mankind.
Commentary from Fr. Seraphim Rose on the sacrifices of Cain and Abel (Genesis, Creation, and Early Man, p. 292)
I have always regarded evolution, in all its ramifications, as an important part of the “American modern” intellectual baggage which I left behind when I became Orthodox, and it never before occurred to me that any aware Orthodox Christian would regard it as an unimportant, especially now when may scientists have abandoned it (purely on scientific grounds), when the pseudo-religious presuppositions of its supporters are so evident, and when it is so much bound up with masonry-ecumenism and the whole pseudo-religious modern outlook.
-Fr. Seraphim Rose, letter April 5/18, 1973
The Word “Anathema” and its Meaning by St. John Maximovitch
“Anathema is not final damnation: until death repentance is possible.
‘Anathema’ is fearsome not because the Church wishes anyone evil or God seeks their damnation. They desire that all be saved. But it is fearsome to stand before the presence of God in the state of hardened evil: nothing is hidden from Him.”
-Orthodox Life, March-April 1977
The heart of Orthodoxy is prayer; and I may truthfully say that before I found Orthodoxy I never had the slightest idea of what prayer was or what power it had. Often, of course, one is cold in prayer; but I have known times, both by myself and with others, of truly warm and fervent prayer, and of heartfelt tears of repentance: and I have known the joy of seeing my prayers answered. Thus encouraged I, feeble and unworthy, have been bold to speak to our Lord and to His Mother and His Saints (I have known no one who prays to the Saints with such faith and fervor as Orthodox believers), and their guidance in my life is as real to me as my own breathing.
-Eugene (Fr. Seraphim) Rose to his friend Alison, July 15, 1963
The Great Fast, Our Exile
by Eugene (Fr. Seraphim) Rose
https://www.orthodox.net/greatlent/by-the-waters-of-babylon-the-great-fast-our-exile.html
Update on Fr. Ambrose (Alexey) Young
Please support him with prayer, and financially if possible
https://www.givesendgo.com/GADND
https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2010/02/meatfare-sunday-sunday-of-last-judgment.html
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Today we celebrate the feast of St. Nazarius of Valaam.
St. Nazarius sent the first missionaries to America, including St. Herman of Alaska, deeply lived the Hesychastic life, and translated the Philokalia into Slavonic.
Fr. Seraphim Rose was tonsured on the day of his repose.
https://orthochristian.com/81732.html
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https://youtu.be/d2MC2iLhelQ?si=BOlB_wfMnNj82mcE
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“Alas, though we build churches, we do not fully appreciate what takes place within them. We do not value the freedom of being able to pray in these churches and of living with all the fulness of grace of church life, without which there is no salvation.”
-Archbishop Averky, The Just Shine Like the Stars, p. 37
One should nourish the soul with the word of God: for the word of God, as St. Gregory the Theologian says, is angelic bread, by which are nourished souls who hunger for God. Most of all, one should occupy oneself with reading the New Testament and the Psalter, which one should do standing up. From this there occurs an enlightenment in the mind, which is in the mind, which is changed by a Divine change.
-St. Seraphim of Sarov, Spiritual Instructions
Beware. No matter how “right” you may be on various points, you must be diplomatic also. The first and important thing is not “rightness” at all, but Christian love and harmony. Most “crazy converts” have been “right” in the criticisms that led to their downfall; but they were lacking in Christian love and charity and so went off the deep end, needlessly alienating people around them and finally finding themselves all alone in their rightness and self-righteousness. Don’t you follow them!
Fr. Seraphim Rose, letter dated June 5/18, 1979
The ideology behind ecumenism, which has inspired such ecumenistic acts and pronouncements as the above, is an already well-defined heresy: the Church of Christ does not exist, no one has the Truth, the Church is only now being built…. And if all “Christian” bodies are relative to each other, then all of them together are relative to other “religious” bodies, and “Christian” ecumenism can only end in a syncretic world religion. This is indeed the undisguised aim of the masonic ideology which has inspired the Ecumenical Movement, and this ideology has now taken such possession of those who participate in the Ecumenical Movement that “dialogue” and eventual union with the non-Christian religions have come to be the logical next step for today’s denatured Christianity.
-Fr. Seraphim Rose, Introduction to Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future
Some thoughts on the Protestant Reformation from Fr. Seraphim Rose
-Orthodox Survival Course, Lesson 3: The Renaissance
Letter to a man interested in becoming a monk in Platina
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Original audio from Fr. Seraphim Rose
https://youtu.be/_YdLbabNNK4?si=SnYrZ-BDVbCCzdM1
Vestments of Fr. Seraphim Rose at the St. Michael the Archangel Orthodox Church in Huntsville, Alabama.
Fr. Gregory Shultz, the parish rector, was given these vestments by Fr. Damascene Christensen some years ago. Fr. Gregory said he has worn them a few times and that the last time he wore them he felt spiritually uplifted for about a week after.
Before Lent begins, please forgive me and us all for our sins against you in thought, word, and deed. May God forgive and have mercy on us all, and grant us all a profitable Lent!
-Fr. Seraphim Rose to Fr. Alexey Young, Meat-fare Saturday 1981
The Second Coming of Christ will be unmistakable: it will be sudden, from heaven (Acts 1:11), and it will mark the end of this world. There can be no "preparation" for it—save only the Orthodox Christian preparation of repentance, spiritual life, and watchfulness.
-Fr. Seraphim Rose, Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future, p. 179
https://youtu.be/7JhwBsGTLnk?si=5vvo9Iq4vYYjG9Pk
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“Thus, not troubled by any slanders or false rumors, let us manfully stand in the truth. Decisively rejecting all compromises with falsehood, all modernism and libertine rationalism on questions of faith, all innovations contrary to the spirit of our Holy Faith, let us believe and confess as did the apostles' successors, the holy martyrs, the holy universal teachers and hierarchs, the venerable ascetics…”
-Archbishop Averky, The Life and Works of Archbishop Averky: Volume 1, “Preserve the Orthodox Faith Handed Down To Us By the Holy Prince Vladimir”, p. 43
Our spiritual life is not something bookish or that follows formulas. Everything we learn has to become part of our life and something natural to us. We can be reading about hesychasm and the Jesus Prayer, for example, and begin to say it ourselves—and still be blind to our own passions and unresponsive to a person in need right in front of us, not seeing that this is a test of our Christianity that comes at a more basic level than saying the Jesus Prayer.
-Fr. Seraphim Rose, Orthodoxy in the USA, talk given in Jordanville, 1979
Fr. Seraphim Rose on a key difference between the Publican and the Pharisee:
The Papal idea, based on the corrupt modern principle of spiritual self-satisfaction, is either to give a special "dispensation" from the standard (an idea which has already entered some Orthodox jurisdic-tions), or else to change the standard itself so that the believer can fulfill it easily and thereby obtain a sense of satisfaction from "obeying the law." This is precisely the difference between the Publican and the Pharisee: the Orthodox man feels himself constantly a sinner because he falls short of the Church's exalted standard (in spirit if not in letter), whereas the "modern" man wishes to feel himself justified, without any twinge of conscience over falling short of the Church's standard.
-“Towards the “Eighth Ecumenical Council’”, The Orthodox Word, Nov-Dec 1976 (#71)
Why do men learn through pain and suffering, not pleasure and happiness? Very simply, pleasure and happiness accustom one to satisfaction with things in this world, whereas pain and suffering drive one to seek more profound happiness beyond limitations of this world.
-Blessed Seraphim of Platina
Fr. Seraphim Rose asked St. John Maximovitch a question he had been pondering: “Nearly all the peoples of the earth have had the Gospel preached to them. Does this mean that it’s the end of the world, as the Scriptures say?”
“No,” replied St. John. “The Gospel of Christ must be preached in all tongues throughout the world in an Orthodox context. Only then will the end come.”
Do Orthodoxy Christianity and rock music mix well together?
From Fr. Seraphim’s Life:
Fr. Seraphim saw this “plastic” approach to religion most graphically when a young pilgrim, having spent time at another monastery in America, came to Platina talking all about elders, hesychasm, Jesus Prayer, true monasticism, and the ascetic wisdom of the Holy Fathers. One day Fr. Seraphim saw him walking around the monastery singing rock songs, snapping his fingers and bouncing with the rhythm. Surprised, Fr. Seraphim asked him if he didn’t think this might go against all his interest in spirituality, but the young man just shrugged his shoulders and replied: “No, there’s no contradiction. Whenever I want spirituality, I just switch on the Elder” — meaning that he could take out his rock tape and put in a tape of his Elder giving a spiritual discourse. The fact that this young man could compartmentalize his life like this, Fr. Seraphim understood, showed that something was missing in the basic formation of his soul.
“One who is converted to Orthodoxy straight from ‘rock’ culture, and in general anyone who thinks he can combine Orthodoxy with that kind of culture — has much suffering to go through and a difficult road in life before he can become a truly serious Orthodox Christian who is capable of handing on his faith to others…. The world’s best culture, properly received, refines and develops the soul; today’s popular culture cripples
and deforms the soul and hinders it from having a full and normal response to the message of Orthodoxy.”
-Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and Works, Ch. 96 “Forming Young Souls”
The icon at the top of the “roof” of the outdoor chapel and resting place of Fr. Seraphim’s relics: The Meeting of the Lord in the Temple
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