CONTEMPORARY MANKIND
Instructions of elder Paisius the Athonite (1924 – 1994)
Our times
The majority of people in our times rush around at high worldly speed. But inasmuch as they do not possess the fear of God, – and “the beginning of wisdom is fear of the Lord,” – they have no brakes, and at such a speed, and with no brakes, they invariably finish up the race in a deep hole. People are extremely upset by difficulties and are, to a great extent, being brainwashed by various influences. They have lost their guideposts and little by little have reached the stage where they no longer have control over themselves.
One can see tempests and great agitation in all the nations. I can now appreciate the torment which the prophets suffered. The greatest martyrs were the prophets! They were martyrs to a greater extent than all the known martyrs, despite the fact that not all of them died a martyric death. This is because martyrs suffered comparatively briefly, while the prophets witnessed the doing of evil and suffered constantly. They cried out and cried out, but the others continued to blow their own horns. And when, due to these others, God’s wrath came down on people, the prophets suffered together with all the rest. But at least in those times men’s minds were limited, and they simply left God to worship idols. Now, when people abandon God consciously, – this leads to the greatest idolatry and paganism.
We have not yet realized that the devil has hurled himself forth to destroy God’s creations. The devil is enraged because the world has begun experiencing concern over the loss of goodness. He is in a frenzy, because he knows that he has little time left to act. He is now behaving like a criminal, who, upon being caught, cries out: “I can’t save myself, they’ll catch me,” – and begins wrecking everything both right and left. The world is burning! Do you realize that? The devil has lit such a conflagration that even if all the firemen were to gather together, they could never extinguish this fire. In a spiritual fire nothing remains undamaged. The only thing left for us is to pray that God have mercy upon us.
The entire world is coming to a single end. Universal destruction. We cannot say: “A window or something like that is slightly broken in the house, let me fix it.” The entire house has fallen apart. The state of affairs has already spun out of control. Only God can do something from above.
We do not have enough living examples in our era
Why does St. Cyril of Jerusalem say that the martyrs of the end times will be higher-standing than all the martyrs? Because previously there were many giants of the spirit, while in our era there is a dearth of living examples, – I am speaking about the Church and monasticism in general. In our times words and books have multiplied, but living experience has become impoverished. We only admire the saints of our Church without understanding how great was their labor. In order to understand it we must labor ourselves, we must get to love the saints and make an effort to be like them. The good God will naturally take into consideration the peculiarities of our times and the conditions in which we have to live, and will ask an accounting from us accordingly. Thus, if we undertake even the smallest spiritual effort, we will be rewarded more than the early Christians.
A spirit of asceticism prevailed in ancient times. Each person tried to imitate the other. Under such circumstances neither evil, nor negligence could hold out. There was an abundance of goodness, there was a spirit of asceticism, and thus a negligent person could not persist in his laxness. He was pulled along by the general stream of goodness. But today, if a person wishes to live honestly, spiritually, – he has a very hard time, there is no place for him in the world. And if he is inattentive, he will roll downhill, he will be carried away by the current of worldliness.
In former times there was an abundance of goodness, an abundance of virtue, there was a sufficient number of good examples, and evil drowned amid the vastness of good. The comparatively small amount of illicitness that existed in the world and in the monasteries was inconspicuous and did not do much harm to people. But what do we see nowadays? There is an abundance of bad examples, while the miniscule amount of goodness that is left is not valued a single jot. In other words, the complete opposite is taking place now: a small amount of good is being drowned in a mass of evil, and evil is at the helm.
If one or several persons possess an ascetic spirit, it is of great help to others, because if a person is perfecting himself spiritually, not only will he benefit from this himself, but also those who watch his endeavors. The same thing happens with a lax person – he influences others in a like manner. And if one person becomes debilitated, and then another, gradually and unnoticeably nothing good is left around us. For this reason an ascetic spirit helps greatly amid the laxness that reigns all around us. We must be extremely attentive in this respect, because modern-day people, unfortunately, have reached the point at which they even accept laws that engender laxness and moral turpitude. Even ascetics are being forced to submit to these laws. Therefore, those who are engaged in spiritual labor should not only not fall under the influence of the spirit of worldliness, but should also refrain from comparing themselves with the people of this world. In comparing themselves to worldly people, Christians begin to feel themselves quite saintly, and proceed to become lax, and as a result they become worse than the ones to whom they were comparing themselves. Our points of comparison in spiritual life should be the saints and not the people of this world. It would be well for us to do the following in regard to every virtue: find a saint who was distinguished by this virtue and read his life very attentively. Then we will see that we have not achieved anything yet, and we will continue our spiritual life in humility. Runners competing in a stadium do not turn around to look at those who are lagging behind, for if they look at the last ones, they will become last themselves. If I try to follow the example of those who are succeeding, my conscience becomes finer, while if I look back at those who are in the rear, I find all kinds of excuses for myself and decide that my own sins are not so terrible in comparison with theirs. I calm myself with the thought that there are people worse than I am. In this manner I choke off my conscience, or in other words, I end up with an unfeeling heart.