St. Philaret of New York: Guidelines for Orthodox Christians

Guidelines for Orthodox Christians

http://www.roca.org/OA/53-54/53d.htm

Guidelines for Orthodox Christians

1. Remember, you are a son (daughter) of the Orthodox Church. These are not empty words. Remember the commitment this entails.

2. Earthly life is fleeting; one is hardly aware of the swiftness of its passing. Nevertheless, this transient life determines the eternal destiny of your soul. Do not forget this for a moment.

3. Try to live piously. Pray to God in church, pray to God at home--fervently, with faith, trusting yourself to God's will. Fulfill the holy and saving precepts of the Church, her rules and commandments. Outside the Church, outside obedience to her. there is no salvation.

4. The gift of words is one of God's greatest gifts. It ennobles man, lifting him above all other creatures. But how this gift is now misused by a corrupt humanity! Safeguard this gift and learn to use it as befits a Christian. Do not judge, do; not speak idly. Avoid like fire bad language and seductive conversation, do not forget the words of our Lord and Saviour: "By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned" (Matt. 12:37). Do not indulge in lying. Holy Scripture sternly forewarns: "The Lord shall destroy all them which speak a lie" (Ps. 5:4).

5. Love your neighbor as yourself according, to the Lord's commandment. Without love there is no Christianity. Remember, Christian love is SELF-SACRIFICING, and not egocentric. Do not miss an opportunity to show love and mercy.

…6. Be meek, pure and modest in your thoughts, words and deeds. Do not imitate the profligate. Do not take their example, and avoid close acquaintance with them. Have no unnecessary dealings with unbelievers-unbelief is infectious. Observe meekness and propriety always and everywhere, avoid becoming contaminated by the shameless habits of today's world.

7, Fear vanity and pride; run from them. Pride caused the highest and most powerful angel to be cast down from heaven. Remember, 'thou art earth and to the earth shalt thou return...' Deeply humble yourself.

8. The fundamental task in life is to save one's soul for eternity. Keep this as the most essential task, the main concern of your life. Woe to those whose indifference and neglect bring their souls to eternal ruination.

May the Lord bless you and help you.

Audio

"And here is something to which I would like to draw your attention to – something about which very many do not think about. Father Archimandrite Constantine, whom probably many of you know, the reposed editor of the journal “Orthodox Rus’”, a profound Christian mind, considered that the most terrible among all the achievements of the communists was that the communists created their own false-church, a soviet church which they shoved onto the unfortunate people in place of the genuine Church which went underground into the catacombs. Do not think that I am exaggerating or that Father Constantine was exaggerating!

Once, in the year 1918, a Pan-Russian Church Council was held. At this Council, the entire Pan-Russian Church together with its first holy hierarch, Patriarch Tikhon ANATHEMATIZED, excommunicated from the Church not only the theomachists and godless ones themselves, but also ALL THOSE WHO WOULD COLLABORATE WITH THEM."

~St. Philaret of NY

St. Philaret speaking (in Russian) against MP

audio 1½ minutes

https://app.box.com/s/ki1x0vx8obex3kszzor13idqj5d40yj2

Prayer to St. Philaret

O our Saintly father Philaret, God chosen confessor of recent times, true Orthodox hierarch, guide, upholder and dependable intercessor before God for all true Orthodox faithful, standing and praying for them before God’s altar: implore our ever benevolent God to forgive us our sins and wash them away through our repentance. Through your prayers, save us from calumny of the godless and endow us with a fear of God, so that we may remain faithful children of Christ’s True Church to the end. Strengthen us in the confession of our Faith, so that we will not be frightened of persecution or suffering, and should we suffer for our Orthodox Faith, grant us strength not to reject Christ and not to accept the mark of the accursed antichrist.

In not hiding your labours and enduring extreme conditions for the sake of True Orthodoxy, we extol and propagate your good works:

Glorifying the Royal Martyrs and the new Russian Confessors of Orthodoxy; for giving all true Orthodox Christians a true Apostolic succession; for anathematizing ecumenism that is the heresy of all heresies, and maintaining the rightness of authority through the unwavering truth of Christ’s words.

We lay before you our prayer for your help, blessing and intercession, and at all times beseech your prayers for us.

Do not cease to utter prayers to the Lover of Man God for the small flock of true Orthodox Christians, and may He grant peace to his Church, and may He deliver Her from heresies and schisms. May He also deliver us from the darkness of sin and lusts, from the clandestine snares of the sly antichrist, and may we remain steadfast unto death in confessing our holy Orthodoxy, so that in the end we may without condemnation receive Communion of the Lord’s Holy Flesh and Blood from true clergy. And at the close of our lives, may we secure mercy and clemency from the Lord, Who created us and gave us life and made us what we are, and to Whom is due every glory, praise, honour and adoration, with the eternal Father and Holy Spirit, now and ever, and to the ages of ages.

Amen

PRAYER

O Hierarch of Christ Philaret, with contrition of heart we glorify thee and entreat thee. Having boldness before the Holy Trinity, One in essence and undivided, intercede that the Russian Church not be divided: that the Lord keep it from being cut asunder, as St. Mark of Ephesus plead; may He save it from ruptures in its body, as prayed the Hierarch Philaret of Moscow; and may He preserve also the lot of thine episcopate, the Russian diaspora, scattered among the nations, instructing them in the Orthodox Faith, bearing unfeigned witness to the truth, confessing the faith of the holy fathers, preserving the language of Saints Methodius and Cyril in the order of the divine services, and celebrating the feasts of the Church of Christ as of old.

Through thy prayers, may the Lord grant the wisdom of serpents and the purity of doves to His hierarchs, apostolic love and prophetic zeal, the patience and sympathy and total forgiveness of Christ. That He confirm the pastors in care for their spiritual children, teaching them to flee the attractions of this fallen world, that He enrich their knowledge with the glad tidings of the Gospel, keep their hands impartial to filthy lucre, direct their feet to preaching the Gospel of peace, preserve their hearts in purity. That He grant monastics the spirit of obedience, chastity, self-restraint, observing the monastic rules, confirmed in nonpossessiveness. And to the people of God, the infants, young boys and girls, men and women and the aged may He grant health of soul and body, the spirit of faith, the spirit of love, the spirit of loyalty to their Orthodox faith. And for all of us to acquire blessedness and inherit the heavenly Kingdom. Amen

QUOTE

... But the Most Blessed Metropolitan Philaret said:

You have probably heard many times how there are many most sublime, beautiful and seemingly Christian words being said about everyone joining together into one faith, one religion. But remember, what lies behind this is precisely indifference towards truth. If a person valued truth, he would never agree to this. It is precisely because everyone is little interested in truth and wishes only to make things simpler and more convenient even in matters of the faith, this is why they say that everyone must unite", i.e. each person must admit that his faith is not the truth, and only when all these truth-less faiths combine into one, then somehow truth will emerge. Brethren, let us fear such indifference toward the truth. Our Lord Jesus Christ clearly indicates to us in Revelations how terrifying indifference toward the truth is. He speaks to the Angel of the Church of Laodiceans:

"I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot ( lukewarm - you do not treasure the truth) I will spue thee out of My mouth." This is expressed more severely and strongly in the Slavonic text: "I will vomit you out of My mouth", just as an organism expels something truly repulsive and harmful to it.

Metropolitan Philaret NY (1986)

source:

http://metanthonymemorial.org/VernostNo83.html

QUOTE

A man who does not express a desire to link himself to the latest of the saints (in time) in all love and humility owing to a certain distrust in himself, will never be linked to the preceding saints and will not be admitted to their succession, even though he thinks he possesses all possible faith and love for God and for all His saints. He will be cast out of their midst, as one who refused to take humbly the place allotted to him by God before all time, and to link himself to that latest saint (in time) as God had disposed.

St. Symeon the New Theologian