Miracles are not just the great, earth-shattering events that impress us with the supernatural power of God manifested in them. Miracles are also the small, delicate events that show the very close care of the Mother of God towards us, the unworthy ones.
Do miracles still happen today?
Watch this video and you will find out!
Enjoy!
Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and forever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us! Amen.
Some of you asked me to tell you a useful word, and I promised them I would say a useful word that they are not expecting.
We have a problem with telecommunications at the skete. Please pray for us! We want to put in optical fiber because it is very difficult with the telephony, we are in a very deep valley, which is why it is also called “Lacu” Skete, meaning “of the pit.”
So, in order to solve these problems that mainly elderly fathers have, but not only, with communications, we decided, with the gift of the Mother of God, and with the help of some of our friends, with their donations, to put in optical fiber. So today, I was down at the skete, because our cell is at the highest point amongst those of the skete, that’s why I say I was down at the skete, at the kiriako, at the central church of the skete.
And there, I spoke of this problem of telecommunications which, with the gift of God, the Mother of God helped me to know a little bit about, as to describe the problem to the fathers of the skete.
Yes, I spoke very briefly, I described the problem to the fathers, they agreed of course, because it is one thing to not know about telecommunications and it is another to be a spiritual person as the fathers at the skete are, even if they do not know telecommunications. On the other hand, I am not a spiritual person, but sometimes I know a little more about this problem.
And I finished and I was going out. When I go outside, I meet someone unknown to me. He said… What did you say?
Pilgrim: “Christ is risen, Father!”
“Christ is risen, Father Theologos!” And I say, glory to the Lord! Truly He is risen! Where are you from? “From Austria…” something like that. He was very familiar, a love relationship was born between us, only to find out that they had just come from Prodromos…on foot. Right? Actually from Morphonou on foot, from Prodromos they had a car, the car brought them to Morphonou, and from there they came on foot to the skete to meet us.
We met, we got acquainted. So brethren, the possibility of me being at the skete, and of those who are looking for me to find me is a very small possibility, you should know, of 1 percent. So it’s from the Mother of God. Because first of all, all fathers are at their cells everyday. We are at our cells. And not only that, in the morning, we all have obediences.
So today was the first time since I came to Lacu Skete, the first time I was down there on a regular day and went to the kiriako. Do you understand? At the Assembly of Abbots.
And right at the moment I went out, as I said… Leonard waited for me outside and the man had come all the way from Austria. Yes, so with all his group he came from Austria.
Well, this is a miracle of the Mother of God, you should know, brethren! It is a miracle of the Mother of God, through which the Mother of God shows her extraordinary care towards the pilgrims of this place. And things don’t stop there. Because they wanted to come to our cell and how could they get to our cell? I had just gone outside and we set out slowly to show them the way to our cell, on the path.
We get to the cell of Father Stefan and there we rested a little bit. And they wanted to enter the store. At that moment we meet someone else, Marius, “Lord help us, Father Teologos!”
Lord help us! I didn’t know who he was; an extraordinary man, he’s right here with us. Where do you come from? “Well, from Toronto.” He told me this as if he had come from the intersection on the right, like from 5 meters away. It’s phenomenal.
An extraordinarily noble and distinguished gentleman.
“What do you want?” [I asked], “Well, I came to get to the cell, to your holiness.”
So think about it: if the meeting with Leonard and his group from Austria, from a parish in Austria, was of a 1% probability, the probability of meeting with Marius who was looking for me and wanted to come to our cell was 0.1%. So again a miracle of the Mother of God!
In Marius’s case, we know why this miracle of the Mother of God happened. It’s about his virtue, of course, but first of all, it’s because of his wife’s prayers. His wife prayed a lot for him to meet me and to come to the cell.
Good. And things do not stop there. So the care of the Mother of God does not stop there! Because we get going slowly, slowly on foot… Marius had told me that due to his age it was very difficult to walk, he even stopped. I thought that he’d be able to get there on the path. Although the path is quite difficult too — as you saw, guys. It is much simpler than on the road, but it is still difficult.
And Marius was walking slowly, slowly on the road and I say — Mother of God help us! Help us, have something happen! Brethren, there is a small section on which we have to go on the road so that we get to our cell. How long is it for? Five minutes? Something like that — five minutes.
Okay, in these five minutes, Father Siluan from our cell comes with the car. So everything went very smoothly, brethren!
So if we talk about a 1% possibility to meet Leonard, a possibility of 0.1% to meet Marius as well, let’s say there’s a 0.5% possibility that Father Siluan, precisely in that five-minute period when we were on the road, would come and take Marius who because of his age found it difficult to come with us even if we had climbed the path.
So why do I tell you all these things? First of all, so you can see that miracles happen to this day. For you to see that miracles are very beautiful things, they are not bombastic, they are not terrible, like “Wow — we’re terrified!” Rather we say, “Wow!” because of their beauty, of their cuteness.
Do you see how cute the Mother of God is? That is, how she arranged all things like a housekeeper! The Holy Fathers say that the Mother of God is like a mother hen who sits on the Holy Mountain and takes care of all the pilgrims who come to the Holy Mountain.
And after that, I was thinking on the road to give them something sweet, or a breadstick or something… and… because think about it, they’ll go back to Prodromos on foot, which is a very tough road from here. I say this for those who do not know, it will be a few hours of walking. Of course, they are thinking that they will find a car. Note bene that in the Holy Mountain, cars are very rare. But the Mother of God takes care, as can be understood. Yes, the Mother of God takes care.
Great and I, being very merciful, went and found them a small pack of breadsticks. Breadsticks, why? Because they are salty and help maintain water in the body.
But the guys can smell, while here at the table, you do not smell it on camera, but they can very well, since we are right next to it, the kitchen of Father Elefterie, which smells extraordinarily of fish. And I go to Father Elefterie and I say, “Look, this is the matter, there are four pilgrims…” “Oh” — says the father — “I made 20 fish, bring them [the pilgrims] to the table!”
So the Mother of God cares for them in a scandalous way, I would say. But not for their virtue, but effectively for the mercy and for the love of the Mother of God towards us. Do you understand? It is very important. And of course also for their great virtue that they have, I do not want to say now in public so as not to….
That’s it! ” So I want to emphasize again, that the Mother of God helps! Pray to the Mother of God, as she helps us! Have your wives pray, as there is great strength in the prayer of the husband for the wife and of the wife for the husband. And again, trust in God! Be in the Church because if you open yourself to God, you open yourself to the Mother of God, see how the Mother of God made food, especially today, as for a feast — trout. You see the smell that is wafting over here.
And when I told them that they don’t have a blessing to leave if they do not eat, one of them even said, “Father with such blessings, Glory to God!”
So have courage, put your hope in God, because the good God does help, and you see a miracle that is live. We are actually talking about 3 miracles. So first, meeting Leonard and his group, Father Marian — a very good father from Austria, [meeting] Marius, and of course, the car that came for Marius. And there’s more. Marius’s departure will also be settled, because he came like this… he has neither accommodation nor anything.
Please don’t come without accommodation to us because we cannot accommodate you! You should know that we have very few places. But for those who pray, and who have worthy wives, and if he also prays, it can be solved!
The Mother of God solves everything, do you understand? That’s very important, and this is what I want you to keep in mind. The power and effectiveness of prayer in everyday life. And that there are miracles to this day. Do not think that miracles are like… I don’t know, a rabbit comes out of a hat or… what can I say, all sorts of these…
These are the miracles! Do you understand? Let the good God help us and come to the Holy Mountain because we need to recharge our spiritual batteries.
“My wife prayed for me too.” (pilgrim)
“And for me!” (pilgrim)
Your wife! … Yes? – Really? Well, it seems like it’s the wives, yes… Yes, yes, yes. Because you must know that while there were twelve great apostles, big and strong and great… it was the myrrh-bearers that were at the cross. The myrrh-bearing women.
So because of this, women pray much more and it’s good, and I really ask the ladies who are watching us: pray for your husbands, pray for your family, as your prayer has great, great power! For your children!
On the other hand, there is the great danger for the ladies — that is, if they don’t listen, they can have a sort of commanding spirit in the church, and that is not good. So we must take care that, on the one hand, the man is the leading presence and the woman is the comforting presence, as St. Dumitru Stăniloae himself says, citing the Holy Fathers.
So the woman prays, the woman — please forgive me for saying this, but this is in the tradition of the Church: the woman doesn’t teach others so much. And if you look at your wives, who are spiritual wives, you will see that they do not have a leading character, but rather a comforting character. That is, they take care of the home. And woman should do this: take care of the home. Not constantly nagging every five minutes. Forgive me for saying this on the channel.
But because we praised the ladies and women very much, now we have to humble them a little, to tell them the other side, that they still have to listen to the head of the family. Of course, when the husband is also in accord with God’s will.
Now, do not say that the husband is not in agreement with God’s will, because these are clear cases when the husband drinks and so on. But in most cases, however, there must be this harmony in the family, and that comes mainly from the humility of the wife [humility] which is full of grace and spiritual nobility. Do you understand?
We are not talking about obedience as a slave, but we speak of obedience as a lady, as a queen. And we need to have this balance in the family. And if there is love in the family, there is everything. If there is no love in the family, there is absolutely nothing. Absolutely nothing. Do you understand?
As someone said — if there isn’t love, there isn’t anything.
And here, again, I turn to the men. Brethren, you must know that the man must first of all give love, he is the one who gives, the woman always receives. And if the man does not give love, the woman withers away. It is very important.
And the main gesture of love, the main proof of love which cannot be lacking, is paying attention, giving them your time. We need to give our time to our wives. We need to pay attention to our wives.
Brethren, come on, let’s put aside the career, the money, the news or the good Lord knows what else, and let’s rediscover the beauty of our wife, the beauty of our family, the beauty of our children. Let’s say: “How beautiful my family is! How beautiful my wife is!” Do not say that she has flaws. I know she has flaws. Do not look for those. It’s not good. Let them pass. Let’s see the beautiful part!
Any person… you know, people are so beautiful. And you see, the Savior Himself; He did not come to judge the world, He did not come to reveal the sins of men. God came and gave them time, He said, “What do you want me to do for you? To heal you, what do you want me to do for you?” And people said — this and this and that.
The Savior did not say to them, “Well, you are asking me to heal you because you have so many sins and so on.” Do not dig out each other’s faults… But rather let’s see how to solve the problem.
My wife and I must always be together, and my children and I together against the problem, and not the problem and I against my wife, or the problem and I against my children, or I against the children with their problem.
But we will always ally with each other, we will unite between ourselves, within the family — as best we can. Don’t say to the other, “Why did you do that?” He also knows that he was wrong. Let’s see how we can do things better! It is very important.
As we were discussing at one point on the road with the father and the others: Brethren, we must learn to be silent. We must learn to listen to the other. And when I say listen, I don’t mean to listen to our wife so that we may catch her in a mistake and show her that she was wrong. Or vice versa, on the husband — that “Yes, you did it too…!”
Brethren, let’s listen to the other and see what he has to say! Of course, it doesn’t mean we have to idle talk, but when one has something to say, let’s listen to them a little bit and then we’ll see that the other is someone very beautiful. Very beautiful! Beyond, of course, certain faults since we all have our faults. Do you understand?
We need to offer others our time. Of course we, as monks, have a lot of pilgrims, and that’s why we talk to many, and it’s difficult to give time to each one separately. Or on the site, we have a lot of comments, we have a lot of emails. Brethren, please do not call! We actually cannot answer the phone because it would mean spending a lot of time. By messages, by email… and we ask forgivenes to those to whom we cannot answer because there really are a lot of them.
But you who are in a family don’t have as many thousands of people to answer. You have the darling of your heart, you have the one dear to your heart with whom you are married. Do you understand?
And because of this, you should concentrate all your attention there. Do not let your attention wander to God only knows what. It is very important.
Because of this, always potentiate love and then the Mother of God will work miracles with you. Like how the Mother of God worked miracles with these pilgrims. That’s what I wish for you: to have a happy family! And that comes from our disposition for love, our disposition for prayer our disposition for openness to God.
That’s it, brethren.
Let the good God help us! Christ is Risen!
Truly, He is risen! (pilgrims)
Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us! Amen!
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