Where to start churching. Introduction

Currently, a large number of people who have understood in their minds or felt in their hearts that God exists, who are aware, albeit unclearly, of their belonging to the Orthodox Church and who want to join Her, are faced with the problem churching, that is, entering the Church as a full and full member.

This problem is very serious for many, since upon entering the temple, an unprepared person is faced with a completely new, incomprehensible and even somewhat frightening world.

Priests' robes, icons, lamps, chants and prayers in an obscure language - all this creates in the newcomer a feeling of alienation in the temple, leading to thoughts about whether all this is necessary for communication with God?

Many people say: “The main thing is that God is in the soul, but going to church is not necessary.”

This is fundamentally wrong. Popular wisdom says: “To whom the Church is not a Mother, God is not a Father.” But in order to understand how true this saying is, it is necessary to find out what the Church is? What is the meaning of Her existence? Why is Her mediation necessary in human communication with God?

The rhythm of Christian life

PriestDaniel Sysoev

Let's start with the simplest. Each type of life has its own characteristics, its own rhythm, its own order. So a newly baptized Christian should have his own rhythm and type of life. Firstly, the daily routine changes. Waking up in the morning, a Christian stands in front of the icons (they are usually placed on the eastern wall of the room), lights a candle and a lamp and reads morning prayers from the prayer book.

How to pray according to the text correctly? The Apostle Paul writes that it is better to say five words with your mind than a thousandtongue (1 Cor. 14:19). Therefore, the person praying must understand every word of the prayer. St. Feofan advises starting by analyzing part of the rule, praying with these words, and gradually adding new prayers until a person begins to understand the entire rule. During prayer, you should never imagine saints or Christ. This way you can go crazy and become spiritually damaged. We must carefully follow the words of the prayer with our minds, forcing our hearts to remember that God is everywhere and sees everything. Therefore, it is more convenient to keep your hands pressed to your chest during prayer, as the liturgical Rules say. We must not forget to protect ourselves with the sign of the cross and bow down. They are very good for the soul.

After morning prayers, they eat prosphora and drink holy water. And they go about their business. Before sitting down to eat, a Christian reads the Lord's Prayer:

Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, as it is in Heaven and on earth. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, just as we forgive our debtors; and do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

And then he makes the sign of the cross over the food with the words: "In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." After the meal, we do not forget to thank the Lord:

We thank Thee, Christ our God, for Thou hast filled us with Thy earthly blessings; Do not deprive us of Your Heavenly Kingdom, but as You came among Your disciples, Savior, give them peace, come to us and save us.

It is worthy to eat as you truly bless Thee, the Mother of God, the Ever-Blessed and Most Immaculate and the Mother of our God. We magnify You, the most honorable Cherub and the most glorious without comparison Seraphim, who gave birth to God the Word without corruption. (Bow.)

During the day, Christians try to keep God in mind all the time. And that's why we often repeat the words: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” When it’s hard for us, during temptations, we turn to the Mother of God with the words:

Virgin Mary, Rejoice, O Blessed Mary, the Lord is with You; Blessed are You among women and blessed is the fruit of Your womb, for You have given birth to the Savior of our souls.

Before every good deed, we ask God for help. And if it’s a big deal, then you can go and order a prayer service at the church. In general, our whole life is dedicated to the Creator. We consecrate houses and apartments, cars, offices, seeds, fishing nets, boats and much more in order to receive grace through this. If you like, we create an atmosphere of holiness around ourselves. The main thing is that the same atmosphere is in our hearts. We try to be at peace with everyone and remember that any task (whether work, family, cleaning the apartment) can serve both for salvation and for destruction.

In the evening, before going to bed, we read prayers for the coming sleep, asking God to keep us through the night. Every day we read the Holy Scriptures. Usually a chapter of the Gospel, two chapters of the Epistles of the Apostles, one kathisma of the Psalms (but the amount of reading is still determined individually).

Every week we fast on Wednesday (remembering the betrayal of Judas) and Friday (remembering the Calvary torment of Christ) and observe major fasts (Great, Petrovsky, Assumption and Nativity). On Saturday evening and Sunday morning we are always in church. And we try to take communion at least once a month (and the more often, the better). Before Communion, we usually fast for three days (so, if we take communion once a month or less, and if more often, then we determine the measure of fasting together with our confessor), we read the rule from the prayer book (three canons: penitential, the Mother of God and the Guardian Angel, as well as the Consequence to Holy Communion). We make sure to come to the evening service, confess our sins, and come to Liturgy in the morning on an empty stomach.

It is very useful to find a confessor for yourself - a priest who helps us go to Christ (but in no case to ourselves - beware of false spirituality!). There is no need to rush to the first priest you meet. Confess to different people, pray, and if you have a heartfelt understanding with someone, then he, gradually, he can become your spiritual father. Just find out first whether his life is pious, whether he follows the Fathers of the Church, whether he is obedient to the bishop or not. It is also advised to look at how he performs worship. Reverence before the face of God will tell you whether he can help you come to Christ. Ask your confessor for an explanation based on Scripture and the works of the Holy Fathers, and then follow their advice. This should be done not because you don’t trust him, but because you need training, which is impossible with blind obedience.

From the book of Priest Daniil Sysoev “Why haven’t you been baptized yet?”

MY FIRST PRAYERS

Prayer to the Holy Spirit

Heavenly King, Comforter, Soul of truth, Who is everywhere and fulfills everything, Treasure of good things and Giver of life, come and dwell in us, and cleanse us from all filth, and save, O Good One, our souls.
Prayer to the Most Holy Trinity

Most Holy Trinity, have mercy on us; Lord, cleanse our sins; Master, forgive our iniquities; Holy One, visit and heal our infirmities, for Thy name's sake.

Lord's Prayer

Our Father, who art in heaven! Hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, as in heaven and on earth. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, just as we forgive our debtors; and do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

Symbol of faith

I believe in one God the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, who was born of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, true God from true God, born, uncreated, consubstantial with the Father, to Whom all things were. For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human. She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried. And he rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures. And ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father. And again the coming one will be judged with glory by the living and the dead, His Kingdom will have no end. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Life-Giving One, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified, who spoke the prophets. Into one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins. I hope for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the next century. Amen.

Virgin Mary

Virgin Mary, Rejoice, O Blessed Mary, the Lord is with You; Blessed are You among women and blessed is the Fruit of Your womb, for You have given birth to the Savior of our souls.
Worthy to eat

It is worthy to eat as you truly bless Thee, the Mother of God, the Ever-Blessed and Most Immaculate and the Mother of our God. The most honorable Cherub and the most glorious without comparison Seraphim, who gave birth to God the Word without corruption, we magnify Thee as the real Mother of God.

CHURCH ETIQUETTE

Before entering the Temple, you should make the sign of the cross and bow three times.

To do this, in order to correctly make the sign of the cross, the thumb, index and middle fingers of the right hand are connected in such a way that their ends are folded evenly, the other two fingers - the ring and little fingers - are bent to the palm. With three joined fingers we touch the forehead, stomach, right shoulder, then the left, depicting a cross on ourselves, and lowering our hand, we bow.

You should come to the service in advance in order to calmly, without fuss, enter the Temple and be a participant in the service from the beginning to the kissing of the Cross. First you need to approach the festive icon lying on a lectern in the middle of the church: cross yourself twice, bow and venerate, that is, kiss the Holy Icon and cross yourself and bow again.

You must enter the Temple quietlyand reverently, as into the house of God. Noise, talking, walking, and even more so laughter offend the holiness of the Temple of God. In the temple, men of any age remove their hats and must stand on the right, while women pray with their heads covered with a scarf, being on the left side of the Temple. When entering and leaving the Temple, you must cross yourself three times and bow at the waist towards the altar. We bow with prayers: “God be merciful to me, a sinner,” “God, cleanse me, a sinner, and have mercy on me,” and “He who created me, Lord, forgive me.”

In health or death notes, only names and only baptized people are written. The Church does not pray for the unbaptized. Names neededwrite in full, in the genitive case.

In the Temple we can pray for ourselves, for our family and friends, for their health or repose. To do this, you need to approach the desired icon. When placing a candle in front of the icon of this or that saint, you need to be able to turn to him with prayer, request, and gratitude. Approaching the icon, cross yourself, gather yourself mentally and say to yourself: "Holy Father ( saint's name), pray to God for us." Then light a candle, venerate the icon with the same words and, standing in front of the icon with a lit candle, say your prayer. Who knows, maybe read the troparion. When lighting a candle for yourself or someone else, you can pray like this: "Holy servant of Christ and father ( saint's name), help me, a sinner, in my life, beg the Lord to grant me health and salvation and forgiveness of my sins, help my children. ..” etc. When placing candles in front of different icons, especially during services, try not to walk throughout the Temple, as this distracts the worshipers.

The Church has rules of conduct during congregational prayer. When the priest overshadows those praying with the Cross or the Gospel, an image or with the Holy Gifts, everyone crosses themselves, bowing their heads. When he overshadows with candles, blesses with his hand or censes, you should not be baptized, you just need to bow your head.

Before communion, everyone bows to the ground and stands up, saying to themselves: “Behold, I come to the Immortal King and our God.” In front of the Holy Chalice, the hands are folded crosswise on the chest, with the right hand on top of the left. This replaces the sign of the cross, since you cannot cross yourself in front of the Chalice before and after communion, so as not to accidentally touch it and spill the Holy Gifts. When approaching the priest, they say their name. Having received communion, everyone kisses the edge of the Chalice. After this, a little warmth is received: diluted wine and a piece of prosphora, which are on a separate table. After communion that day, people no longer kneel.During the liturgy, one usually kneels three times: when the consecration of the Gifts occurs (from the exclamation "We thank the Lord" until the end of singing “I’ll sing for you” ), when the Holy Chalice is brought out for communion and when the priest overshadows the people with the Holy Chalice with the words: “Always, now and ever and unto ages of ages.” When the priest censes in our direction, reads the Gospel, pronounces the words "Peace to all" , it is customary to bow your head. At the end of the liturgy, believers go to venerate the Cross, which the priest holds in his hand, and kiss it. TO repose without bowing:

• In the middle of the six psalms on “Alleluia” - three times.
• In the beginning "I believe"
• On vacation "Christ our true God"
• At the beginning of the reading of Holy Scripture: the Gospel, the Apostle and proverbs.They cross themselves with a bow from the waist:
• When entering and leaving the temple - three times.
• With each petition, litanies.
• With the exclamation of the clergyman giving glory to the Holy Trinity
• With the exclamations of “Take, eat”, “Drink from it all” and “Yours from yours”, “Holy to saints”
• With the words: “The most honest”
• With every word: “Let us bow down,” “Worship,” “let us fall down”
• During the words: “Alleluia”, “Holy God” and “Come, let us worship”,
• at the cry of “Glory to you, Christ God,”
• before leaving - three times
• On the canon on the 1st - 9th song at the first invocation to the Lord, the Mother of God or the Saints
• At the litia, after each of the first three petitions of the litany, there are three bows, after the other two, one bow.Cross themselves with a bow to the ground
• During fasting, when entering and leaving the temple - three times
• During Lent, after each chorus to the song of the Mother of God “We magnify you”
• At the beginning of the chant: “Worthy and Righteous”
• After “We’ll sing for you”
• After “It is worthy to eat” or Zadostoynik
• At the cry: “And grant us, Master”
• When carrying out the Holy Gifts, with the words: “With the fear of God” and a second time - with the words: “Always, now and ever”
• In Great Lent, at Great Compline, while singing “Holy Lady,” at every verse; when reading “Virgin Mother of God, rejoice” and so on. at the Lenten Supper - three bows
• During fasting with the prayer “Lord and Master of my life”
• During the fast, during the final singing: “Remember me, Lord, when you come in Your Kingdom.” Just three prostrationsHalf bow without the sign of the cross: With the words:
• "Peace to all"
• "The blessing of the Lord is upon you"
• "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ"
• "And may the mercy of the Great God be"
• At the words of the deacon: “And forever and ever” (after “For art thou light, our God”) It is not necessary to be baptized:
• While reading the psalms
• In general, while singingYou need to cross yourself and bow down at the end of the singing, and not at the last words. Prostrations to the ground are not allowed:
• On Sundays,
• in the days from Christmas to Epiphany,
• from Easter to Pentecost,
• on the days of the Transfiguration and Exaltation (on this day there are three prostrations to the Cross). Bowing stops from the evening entrance until “Grant, O Lord,” at Vespers on the very day of the holiday.

SACRAMENTS

• Baptism. A symbol of a person’s entry into the Church. It is performed according to the faith of the person being baptized (adult) or according to the faith of the baby’s parents. This is the only sacrament that can be performed not only by a priest, but (if necessary) by any layman. Baptism is performed with water (a symbol of the washing of the spirit), but if absolutely necessary, snow or sand can be taken.
• Confirmation. The mystery of the descent of the Spirit of God on a newly baptized member of the Church. Usually performed immediately after baptism.
• Repentance. The sacrament of reconciliation of a sinner with God through confession and permission given by the priest
• Eucharist, or communion. Participation in the eternally occurring Last Supper of Christ. The Eucharist is the incarnation of Christ under the guise of bread and wine, the reception of which means participation in the redemptive mystery.
• Blessing of oil, or unction. A sacrament performed on the sick for their healing
• Marriage. The sacrament of the sanctification of married life...
• Priesthood, or ordination. The sacrament of the transfer of apostolic grace from bishop to bishop and the right to perform sacred functions from bishop to priest. There are three degrees of priesthood: bishop, priest, deacon. The first performs all seven sacraments, the second - everything except ordination. The deacon only assists in the performance of the sacraments. Patriarch, metropolitan, archbishop are not a rank, but only different forms of episcopal service.

CHURCH CALENDAR

HOLIDAYS

Twelfth Moving Holidays
Entry of the Lord into Jerusalem- Sunday;
Easter- Sunday;
Ascension of the Lord- Thursday;
Day of the Holy Trinity(Pentecost) - Sunday.

Twelfth Immovable Holidays
Epiphany- January 6/19;
Presentation of the Lord- February 2/15;
Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary- March 25/April 7;
Transfiguration- August 6/19;
Dormition of the Blessed Virgin Mary- August 15/28;
Exaltation of the Holy Cross- September 14/27;
Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary into the Temple- November 21/December 4;
Nativity- December 25/January 7.

Great Holidays
Circumcision of the Lord- January 1/14;
Nativity of John the Baptist- June 24/July 7;
Holy Chief Apostles Peter and Paul- June 29/July 12;
Beheading of John the Baptist- August 29/September 11;
Protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary- October 1/14.

Church reckoning is carried out according to the old style. The second date indicates the new style.

POSTS

There are four long fasts a year. In addition, the Church established fast days - Wednesday and Friday - throughout the year. One-day fasts have also been established to commemorate some events.

Multi-day posts
Lent- pre-Easter, lasts a total of seven weeks. Fast strict. Very strict weeks- first, fourth (Worship of the Cross) and seventh (Passion). During Holy Week, fasting ends after the liturgy on Holy Saturday. According to custom, they break their fast only after Easter Matins, i.e. on the night of Holy Resurrection.

Great Lent is associated with a rotating circle of holidays and therefore falls on different dates in different years, depending on the day of Easter celebration.

Petrov post- before the feast of the holy apostles Peter and Paul. Starts on All Saints' Day (Sunday after Trinity) and continues until July 12 in the new style. This fast changes its duration in different years, because it depends on the day of Easter celebration. This post is the least strict, ordinary.

Dormition post- before the feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God. It always falls on the same dates: August 14-28 new style. This - strict fast.

Christmas (Filippov) post- begins the day after the celebration of the Apostle Philip, always falls on the same days: November 28 - January 7 new style.

One-day posts

Wednesday and Friday- throughout the year, except for continuous weeks (weeks) and Christmastide. Fast ordinary.
Epiphany Christmas Eve- January 5/18. Fast very strict(there is a folk custom on this day not to eat until the star).
Beheading of John the Baptist- August 25/September 11. Fast strict.
Exaltation of the Holy Cross- September 14/27. Fast strict.

Very strict post- dry eating. They eat only raw plant foods without oil.
Strict fasting- eat any boiled vegetable food with vegetable oil.
Regular post- in addition to what they eat during strict fasting, they also eat fish.
Weakened post(for the weak, on the road and eating in canteens) - they eat everything except meat.

HOW TO CORRECTLY REMEMBER THE DECEASED.

The custom of remembering the dead is already found in the Old Testament Church. The Apostolic Constitutions mention the commemoration of the dead with particular clarity. In them we find both prayers for the departed during the celebration of the Eucharist, and an indication of the days on which it is especially necessary to remember the departed: third, ninth, fortieth, annual Thus, the remembrance of the departed is an apostolic institution, it is observed throughout the Church, and the liturgy for the departed, the offering of the Bloodless Sacrifice for their salvation, is the most powerful and effective means of asking the departed for the mercy of God.

Church commemoration is performed only for those who were baptized in the Orthodox faith.

Immediately after death, it is customary to order a magpie from the Church. This is a daily intensified commemoration of the newly deceased during the first forty days - until the private trial, which determines the fate of the soul beyond the grave. After forty days, it is good to order an annual commemoration and then renew it every year. You can also order longer-term commemorations in monasteries. There is a pious custom - to order commemoration in several monasteries and churches (their number does not matter). The more prayer books there are for the deceased, the better.

Days of remembrance should be spent modestly, calmly, in prayer, doing good to the poor and loved ones, and thinking about our death and future life.

The rules for submitting notes “On repose” are the same as for notes “On health”

Memorial services are served before the eve. Kanun (or eve) is a special square or rectangular table on which there is a Cross with a Crucifix and holes for candles. Here you can put candles and put food for remembrance of the dead. Believers bring various foods to the temple so that the ministers of the Church will remember the deceased at a meal. These offerings serve as donations, alms for those who have passed away. In former times, in the courtyard of the house where the deceased was, on the most significant days for the soul (3rd, 9th, 40th) funeral tables were set, at which the poor, homeless, and orphans were fed, so that there would be many people praying for the deceased. For prayer and, especially for alms, many sins are forgiven, and the afterlife is made easier. Then these memorial tables began to be placed in churches on the days of the universal remembrance of all Christians who have died since the ages for the same purpose - to remember the departed. The products can be anything. It is prohibited to bring meat food into the temple.

Memorial services for suicides, as well as for those not baptized in the Orthodox faith, are not performed.

But in addition to all of the above, the Holy Church at certain times creates a special commemoration of all fathers and brothers in faith who have passed away from time to time, who have been worthy of Christian death, as well as those who, having been caught by sudden death, were not guided into the afterlife by the prayers of the Church. The memorial services performed at this time are called ecumenical.
On Meat Saturday, before Cheese Week, On the eve of the remembrance of the Last Judgment, we pray to the Lord that He will show His mercy to all the departed on the day when the Last Judgment comes. On this Saturday, the Orthodox Church prays for all those who have died in the Orthodox faith, whenever and wherever they lived on earth, whoever they were in terms of their social origin and position in earthly life.
Prayers are offered for people “from Adam to this day who have fallen asleep in piety and right faith.”

Three Saturdays of Great Lent - Saturdays of the second, third, fourth weeks of Great Lent— were established because during the presanctified liturgy there is no such commemoration as occurs at any other time of the year. In order not to deprive the dead of the saving intercession of the Church, these parental Saturdays were established. During Great Lent, the Church intercedes for the departed, so that the Lord forgives their sins and resurrects them into eternal life.

On Radonitsa - Tuesday of the second week of Easter— with the departed they share the joy of the Resurrection of the Lord, in the hope of the resurrection of our departed. The Savior Himself descended into hell to preach victory over death and brought from there the souls of the Old Testament righteous. Because of this great spiritual joy, the day of this commemoration is called “Rainbow”, or “Radonitsa”.

Trinity Parents' Saturday- on this day the Holy Church calls us to commemorate the departed, so that the saving grace of the Holy Spirit may cleanse the sins of the souls of all our forefathers, fathers and brothers who have departed from time immemorial and, interceding for the gathering of all into the Kingdom of Christ, praying for the redemption of the living, for the return of the captivity of their souls , asks “to rest the souls of those who have departed first in a place of refreshment, for it is not in the dead that they will praise Thee, Lord, those who exist below in hell dare to bring confessions to Thee: but we, the living, bless Thee and pray, and we offer purifying prayers and sacrifices to Thee for our souls.”

Dimitrievskaya Parents' Saturday- on this day, commemoration is made of all Orthodox slain soldiers. It was established by the holy noble prince Demetrius Donskoy at the inspiration and blessing of St. Sergius of Radonezh in 1380, when he won a glorious, famous victory over the Tatars on the Kulikovo Field. The commemoration takes place on the Saturday before Demetrius Day (October 26, old style). Subsequently, on this Saturday, Orthodox Christians began to commemorate not only the soldiers who laid down their lives on the battlefield for their faith and fatherland, but along with them, for all Orthodox Christians

It is imperative to remember the deceased on the day of his death, birth and name day.

When a person is looking for the possibility of becoming a church member, when, having been baptized in infancy, he realizes at some period of his conscious life the need for communication with God, the need to know the Truth, then he begins to look for the path to God, the path to the Church.

Very often on this path he encounters quite serious obstacles and temptations. And, sometimes it seems that a person could bypass most of these obstacles and more safely achieve a result if he had in front of him some kind of guide to action, “instructions” describing the steps, steps, after passing each of which, he will achieve the goal with minimal losses. And if such an instruction, such a recipe for churching is possible, maybe it’s worth forming it then?

Okay, let's try to create such an instruction, a universal list that can suit almost everyone. I would like to immediately make a reservation that the order that we are now drawing up is, unfortunately, not always observed in real life. All people are different, everyone has their own path to God, and each person begins this path with a different amount and knowledge, and experience. Therefore, it is quite difficult to propose some kind of universal scheme for churching.

A person can begin his journey in the Church with that step, which in our list will be the second, and the third, and even the sixth. The fact is that each step is taken in parallel with others, they complement each other and will be incomplete outside the general context. But since you and I have set ourselves the task of finding exactly the “ideal instructions”, a universal model, then, in my opinion, it will look something like this.

The very first thing, the first step for a person who decides to become a church member, should be familiarization with the Holy Scriptures. The Holy Scriptures contain the Old and New Testaments, and I would recommend starting your acquaintance with reading the New Testament. The Old Testament is quite difficult and not easy to understand. Having started reading the Bible from the Old Testament, a person can, so to speak, “get stuck” in it, get tired, tired of endless facts and changing events, and ultimately leave reading and thereby not reach the main thing - the New Testament. This is evidenced by the numerous negative experiences of those who began to independently read the Bible from the Old Testament. It would be better to read the Old Testament when there is an understanding of who Christ is. After studying the New Testament, the Old Testament will be clearer and more interesting to read.

Another point that a new believer should pay attention to is that it is better at this first stage to read the New Testament not in the Synodal translation, but in a retelling, with explanations, interpretations, maybe even with illustrations, so that the reading is not boring, but entertaining, interesting, in one breath.

A fairly good literary text of the New Testament is contained in the book The Law of God - this is a common book that can be bought in every temple. In addition to this, there are many other authors who interestingly present the events of the Gospel story. This is the “Gospel Story” by Theophan the Recluse, and Archpriest Pavel Matveysky, and many other authors.

Unfortunately, we sometimes have to observe a sad phenomenon when people seem to be already quite churched, regularly attend Sunday services, confess, receive communion, and yet they know very little of the Gospel history or have never read the New Testament in its entirety. Nowadays, many who consider themselves Orthodox do not even have a Bible at home, and sometimes they confuse it with a prayer book and think that the Bible is a collection of prayers. This attitude towards the study of the Holy Scriptures among the “Orthodox” is very sad, especially when you see how well various sectarians know the Bible, while in our country this essential, I would say, fundamental side of spiritual life remains neglected.

Why is it so important to read the Holy Scriptures? If a person decided to draw closer to God, wanted to give God a place in his life, he must clearly understand who Christ is. As the Apostle Paul says: “How can we call on Him in whom we have not believed? How can one believe in One whom one has never even heard of?” (Rom. 10:14). Therefore, how can we believe, go to services, pray, fulfill the commandments of that God about whom we don’t really know anything?

Each person, of course, has certain concepts about Christ, but often this knowledge is either distorted or incomplete. Even reading the New Testament itself can bring a person closer to God. I would like to give you the memories of our contemporary, Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh, about the effect his acquaintance with the New Testament had on him.

When the future metropolitan was 14 years old, he lived with his parents in France. One day he heard a conversation about Christianity by a prominent theologian, and this is how the bishop himself describes his impression of it: “He spoke about Christ, about the Gospel, about Christianity..., bringing to our consciousness everything sweet that can be found in the Gospel, from which we would have flinched, and I flinched: meekness, humility, quietness - all the slavish qualities for which we are reproached, from Nietzsche onwards. He brought me into such a state that I decided... to go home, find out if we have the Gospel somewhere in our house, check and be done with it; It didn't even occur to me that I wouldn't end it because it was so obvious that he knew his stuff.

Mom turned out to have the Gospel, I locked myself in my corner, discovered that there were four Gospels, and if so, then one of them, of course, should be shorter than the others. And since I didn’t expect anything good from any of the four, I decided to read the shortest one. And then I was caught; Many times after this I discovered how cunning God is when He sets His nets to catch fish; because if I had read another Gospel, I would have had difficulties; There is some kind of cultural basis behind every Gospel. Mark wrote precisely for young savages like me - for the Roman youth. I didn’t know this - but God knew, and Mark knew, perhaps when he wrote shorter than others. And so I sat down to read; and here you may take my word for it, because you can’t prove it.

I was sitting, reading, and between the beginning of the first and the beginning of the third chapter of the Gospel of Mark, which I read slowly because the language was unusual, I suddenly felt that on the other side of the table, here, stood Christ. And this feeling was so striking that I had to stop, stop reading and look. I looked for a long time; I didn’t see anything, I didn’t hear anything, I didn’t feel anything with my senses. But even as I looked straight ahead at the place where there was no one, I had a vivid consciousness that Christ was undoubtedly standing there.

You see what a revolution in the soul can be generated by reading the Holy Scriptures. One cannot remain indifferent to what the Lord says in the Gospel; while reading this amazing book, one cannot help but love Christ, not want to be with Him, to have fellowship with Him. This is where the desire to live according to His will is born, and the determination to fulfill His commandments appears. This is where it all begins, because without faith and love for Christ, all further steps will be meaningless. This, in my opinion, is the surest and best step from which one should begin one’s path within the fence of the Church.

The second step is prayer. You need to learn to pray. Here two aspects can be distinguished - home prayer and public prayer, which is performed in church during divine services. And they must go in parallel - you need to go to church for worship, and accustom yourself to pray at home.

You need to buy yourself a prayer book. This is often where the beginner encounters a difficulty. This is the Church Slavonic language of our worship and prayers. The easiest and fastest way to make this language more understandable for yourself is to acquire a small dictionary of Church Slavonic words. It is enough to remember the ten most frequently occurring words to make Church Slavonic texts understandable. Moreover, the Church Slavonic language is very similar to Russian. As a rule, the more often we pick up a prayer book, the deeper and clearer the texts of prayers become for us.

If we talk about the scope of the prayer rule, then from the very beginning you can set yourself a small rule. The main thing is to accustom yourself to pray attentively and not to get distracted by your thoughts. It is very important that this, even a small rule, be followed every day without any concessions to one’s busyness and laziness.

And if we take, for example, the prayer rule recommended by St. Seraphim of Sarov?

This is my attitude towards the rule of Seraphim of Sarov. It seems to me that it is not as simple as it seems at first glance. We often forget that Rev. Seraphim of Sarov said this rule to do three times a day, and not twice. And at the same time, mentally say the Jesus Prayer and “Most Holy Theotokos, save us.” And if we perform it only in the evening and in the morning, and thus shorten it, then this is no longer the rule that St. Seraphim gave.

Therefore, I would advise beginners to accustom themselves to reading morning and evening prayers. Maybe not completely, but read them. These are very ancient prayers, deep in content. Their authors are great saints, such as Macarius of Egypt, John Chrysostom, Basil the Great. And we must, as early as possible, introduce ourselves to the wealth of prayer that the Church possesses; from the very first steps we must not deprive ourselves of this true treasure.

Gradually, over time, maybe even months, you need to increase this rule to the best of your ability, remembering the advice of Theophan the Recluse: do not tie the rule to the number of prayers, it is better to allocate a certain amount of time for prayer and how much time I can manage during this time read with attention without haste, I’ll read as much as possible. And it is better to increase not the number of prayers, but the time devoted to the prayer rule.

You get up in the morning, you need to run to work, but you know for sure that you can devote seven to ten minutes to prayer without any fear of being late, so get up and read as many prayers as you can read in these ten minutes. When you do this constantly, the language of prayers will become more understandable and easier, prayers will begin to be memorized and prayer will become much easier. The main thing is to pray with attention and without distraction. This is the only prayer God hears. And all “reading” without attention, as St. says. Theophan the Recluse insults God, it’s like giving Christ a stale crust of bread.

In relation to church and conciliar prayer, you need to start at least small. You can remember the words of the Savior: “He who is faithful in a little will be set over much.” According to the commandment of God Himself, we must “work six days, and devote the seventh day to the Lord your God.” Sundays and also special holidays, of which there are not so many throughout the year, are mandatory for attendance at divine services.

And so, “starting small”, at first you can stand at the service not completely: half an hour, an hour. But this period of “peeping” into services should not drag on for long. For some, this lasts a lifetime and is generally what is called “going to church.”

If a person just limits himself to entering a church like this: they ordered notes, lit candles and what else to do here, it is unlikely that he will move along the road to churching. Public worship is social because everyone participates in it. There are no “spectators” implied here. And to be a full-fledged participant, you need to understand the meaning of what is happening, know the sequence of the service. Pointless service is unlikely to bring great results.

A Christian must pay significant attention to this aspect of his church life. Now there is appropriate literature that will help make the service understandable, and attending divine services interesting and deeply meaningful.

And here we move on to the third step, which is closely related to the previous one. When starting to attend church and services, you need to partake of the Sacraments of the Church. Anyone following the path of churching must choose a day for Communion. You need to start preparing for Communion gradually, and at the same time clearly understand that there are rules of preparation that must be followed.

Some people, unfortunately, do not know about these rules; they come to receive communion without an empty stomach, having had breakfast, without having fully served the Liturgy (I am generally silent about the fact that even on the eve of the day of communion one must be at the evening service) without knowing at all that how to prepare for this Great Sacrament.

Just recently a man was baptized, and he made me very happy that he prepared for Baptism in advance. He read a book about the Sacrament of Baptism, even had some understanding of the Creed, and knew that he himself must read the Creed at Baptism. And it’s very good when people take such important moments in life seriously.

You also need to prepare for Confession in advance; you need to prepare at home, and not while waiting for your turn in front of the lectern. You need to think: “What sins do I have? What should I repent of?” Difficulties arise when we do not see our sins or forget them, and sometimes it seems that there are no sins and there is nothing to say - in this case, I recommend turning to the relevant literature.

We have a widely distributed brochure “To Help the Penitent,” and there is a book by Ioann Krestyankin, “The Experience of Constructing Confession.” All these books contain basically a list of sins that are most common among all people. Using this list you need to check your conscience - you will definitely find something in relation to yourself.

If you are afraid that when you approach confession and are confused, you will forget everything you would like to say, then you can write out your sins on a piece of paper in advance, and on this piece of paper, with such a cheat sheet, peeking or reading the written sins from it, confess.

Sometimes you can come across such a judgment that this practice of writing down sins on paper and reading from this sheet is not correct. And churchgoers often recommend that newcomers not do this. How correct is this reasoning?

To be honest, I have not heard such a judgment among people. Well, to each his own, whoever feels better will confess that way. At this point, there is, of course, another extreme, when such a piece of paper, covered with writing, is thrust into the priest’s hand: “Father, read it.” The priest reads it and that’s it - the confession is over. There is no need to tell the person himself anything. This can be observed in some churches, but it seems to me that this is not an entirely healthy phenomenon in our church practice.

Confession itself implies a verbal revelation of sins to the priest. After all, it is not for nothing that in the prayer that is read by the priest before confession, there are such words, “You Himself, as the Good and Benevolent Lord, have been pleased to resolve these servants of Yours.” What does it mean? This means that everything that these people say in words, You, Lord, resolve and forgive these sins. Therefore, the piece of paper is only a help and a hint. It happens that people know their sins so much that they don’t need any cheat sheet, these sins are always before their eyes, and their conscience constantly reminds them.

There is another good practice, which is most often used by people who are already more churchgoers, who confess regularly, and in the interval from Confession to Confession, a person writes down the sins committed and does this not the day before, but during this entire period of time. If you remember something, write it down, if you see some flaw in yourself that you hadn’t noticed before, write it down before you forget, and the paper will preserve what you wrote down until Confession.

Are there any sins of a person that he must, without hesitation, tell at his first confession?

Confession is a sacrament at which all confessed sins are forgiven. Therefore, you need to take advantage of this opportunity and talk about everything that is, and not divide into what is paramount and unimportant, what to tell today and what to tell tomorrow. This may even be a profanation of confession - what kind of repentance is this, incomplete, fragmentary?

But there are times when a person is not ready to immediately tell something at the first confession. Such a person may reason: “I won’t tell you yet, but I’ll tell you when I’m ready for it.”

This approach, of course, is not correct. In the Sacrament of Confession, not only are sins forgiven, but the Lord also heals our infirmities with His Grace so that we do not repeat these sins. Sometimes it happens that, going to confession, a person thinks: “I will, of course, confess this sin, but I know for sure that I will commit it anyway.”

And here it is necessary to give place to the action of God, so that the Lord will help man. A person did not approach confession with the firm intention of leaving sin, he thought that he would continue to commit the confessed sin, but after confession the Grace of God touched the heart and a determination appeared after all not to commit the confessed sin, and the soul itself began to speak differently. Then he himself will sometimes be surprised - there seemed to be no readiness, but now it has appeared, it has become easier, the Lord has given through the Sacrament greater strength to fight sin.

Repentance is not only human, it is also a Divine action, an action of Divine grace. Because only God can free us from our sins. Desire and work are required on our part, and liberation of a person from passions is a task only within the power of God. Therefore, we need to give God the opportunity to intervene in our lives and change something in it.

Only in the Sacraments of the Church can we receive this healing Divine grace, and therefore we must approach them as often as possible, for outside the Sacraments there can be no Christian life.

Another side of churching is closely connected with the Sacraments of Confession and Communion. Let's call it the fourth stage. Over time, you need to find yourself a spiritual leader, a mentor who, with his wise advice and prayer, will guide you through the church field. Maybe you won’t find such a priest right away, and maybe not even in the first years of your church life. Here you need to search the way a bride is chosen. Take a closer look, chat, don’t rush after the first one you come across. God grant that he be a man of great conscience, spiritually sober and prudent.

In addition, by visiting a temple, a person gains friends and acquaintances, through whom they also join the Church. This is an important moment - to join the church environment, so that here too you can find your brothers who can be of help, who can advise and help. After all, some issues that especially relate to small things, for example, church etiquette, can be resolved by asking advice from a more experienced parishioner.

The next, fifth step is attending Sunday school for adults. If there is such a school at the temple or classes are held with a priest, then you should definitely take this opportunity and sign up for these courses, go and listen. Even in small and village churches, priests find time to organize such a school at the church. This is also an important step in churching.

The sixth stage can be noted as pilgrimage trips. On a pilgrimage trip, a person communicates in a church environment, with believers, touches live some pages of church history, and through this he learns a lot. By prayerfully visiting monasteries and monasteries where the saints labored, he acquires new prayer books and heavenly patrons. Many aspects of church life are revealed in a new way on such trips. Pilgrimages to holy places give new strength and impressions.

Another of the most important steps is initiation into reading. It is very difficult to lead church life without reading church literature. Even if a child grows up in a believing family, but with age he does not acquire new knowledge, without reading or being interested in anything, then there is a danger that, upon entering adulthood, he will simply leave the Church, because his childhood faith, based on reading in his distant childhood, a children's Bible, will not be able to answer the adult questions that arise. Therefore you need to read. Read according to age and interests. There is an abundance of literature in our time. For every taste, as they say. If you are interested in learning about the history of the Church, please do so. If you are more interested in theology, there is a huge choice here. If you like stories about ascetics of piety, read the lives of the saints.

I would advise a beginner to read, as I already said, first of all, the Law of God, the interpretation of the Gospel, the lives of saints, so that the examples of holy ascetics inspire them to Christian life, and help them stay in the church environment. And gradually we must introduce ourselves to the works of the patrists, first, perhaps, to the books of modern fathers, then going further and further into the centuries, turning to the works of earlier ascetics. It is more expedient to gradually combine all this with churching - it will be difficult for a person with little church to read the serious patristic works, because the questions that are raised in them will simply be difficult to understand and uninteresting to them. You need to captivate yourself and interest yourself in reading. And then move on to serious literature.

What kind of serious literature is this?

I mean, of course, patristic literature. It’s bad if our home library contains only “The Law of God” and “First Steps in an Orthodox Church.” We must gradually introduce ourselves to the rich patristic heritage of the Church. The works of such ascetics as Theophan the Recluse, Ignatius Brianchaninov, and Abba Dorotheus should be reference books. Find out from priests and friends what book would be useful and interesting to read. Our church also has a library - you can come and consult.

In addition to books, there is a huge selection of audio material on the Internet. Lots of lectures and conversations. I would advise beginners to listen to some recordings of lectures by Alexey Ilyich Osipov, professor of the Moscow Theological Academy. I would highly recommend listening to his lecture entitled “The Essence of Christianity” in the first edition of his audio CDs. All this is quite accessible on the Internet.

Father, I have another question: when a person becomes a church member, at first it sometimes becomes very difficult for all his relatives. A special period begins - when unbridled agitation begins, born, of course, from the most sincere emotional manifestations. How can one take care of oneself so as not to cause harm to others with such a state, and not push them away from Orthodoxy?

In our country, even the very word “neophyte” is firmly associated with unbridled preaching to everyone and everything, imposing one’s churchliness and religiosity. This, of course, is also a big mistake that needs to be avoided, but at the same time not to go to the other extreme - to be embarrassed to cross yourself, to be afraid of what they will say about you, to take these opinions into account too much. Everyone has to go through this, face the fact that those around them begin to point fingers, reproach, laugh, and try to hurt. This happens to many people, you need to overcome it and endure it.

There is also no need to immediately force all of our households to immediately strive for the churchliness that has appeared among us. It’s impossible to force, but you can slowly introduce, introduce. Often parents are sad that their children do not go to church and know nothing about faith. When you ask at what age they themselves came to the temple, they say that they themselves came at a far advanced age, and there was a time when they also did not believe and lived the way their children live now. This must be understood - everyone has their own time even to come to God. Do not impose your churchliness with such insistence as to arouse in a person disgust or even hatred for every word about God.

You need to act wisely. For example, a mother drags her daughter to church and repeats this to her every day, and her daughter will soon develop an allergy from such a sermon. Why do this? Isn’t it more correct to choose the right moments when a person is ready to perceive? For example, some joy happened - to tell my daughter: “Go to church, light a candle, thank God.” And maybe she will go. Some kind of grief happened - “Go to confession, take communion - the Lord will manage everything.” At certain points in life, you can approach a person with this topic, but you need wise reasoning about when it is best to do this.

Also, you don’t need to think that I converted, started going to church, which means that everyone else is now worse than me, and I am higher than others. You also need to take into account the infirmities of your family. Much depends on what position the believer occupies in the family. If this is a schoolchild, then he cannot, for example, order the whole family to fast. He eats what his mother cooks for him. Of course, if mom meets halfway and agrees to cook him lean food, that will be good. But if mom doesn’t agree to this, fasting is accompanied by scandals and constant troubles, then you have to be patient and eat what mom cooks, and fast to the extent that you can. Refuse, for example, from watching TV, from some products that he himself can refuse without problems. And such a fast will be more useful and pleasing to God than one that is accompanied by quarrels and mutual alienation.

Father, could these seven steps or steps you have outlined have any fundamental differences for people of different age groups? Or is this still a universal “instruction”?

I think this is a fairly universal list of steps that will work for most. It happens, of course - and most often - a person begins his churching not with reading the Holy Scriptures, not with studying the New Testament, but with Communion or meeting believers. The scheme I have proposed is the most convenient from my point of view; it will make a person’s path to church membership more natural. Although churching can also begin with a pilgrimage - if a person finds himself somewhere on a trip with Orthodox Christians, he enters a church, looks at the way of life of the monastery, he becomes interested, and has a desire to read something. Sometimes churching can begin with some other book - not with the New Testament, and the remaining steps will come later. Any of these steps can be the first - reading literature or attending Sunday school.

Concluding our conversation about churching, I would like to talk about one misconception that often reigns in the minds of our compatriots. They say something like this: “What does the Church have to do with it? I have my own personal relationship with God. Where did they get the idea that only in the Church and through the Church can one be saved? No! Churching is not my topic.” I will not polemicize on this topic in the context of our conversation now. I will only quote the words of the saints of the first centuries.

“We should not seek the truth from others,” says Saint Irenaeus of Lyons (2nd century), “it is easy to borrow from the Church, for in it, as in a rich treasury, the Apostles put everything that belongs to the truth. Where the Church is, there is the Spirit of God, there is all grace.”

Hieromartyr Cyprian of Carthage (III century): “Whoever does not listen to the Church is not a son of the Church, and to whom the Church is not a mother, God is not his father.”

Blessed Augustine (IV century) says: “Only he is saved who has Christ as his head, and only he who is in His body, which is the Church, has Christ as his head.”

It is important to understand that Christianity is not just a moral religion that teaches a person exclusively goodness and a virtuous life. Christianity is, first of all, life, which is possible only within the Church, within a single church spiritual organism, through participation in the Sacraments, participation in divine services - only through this can a person join God and become an heir to His Heavenly Kingdom.

Submit a church note (commemoration)

Brothers and sisters, now you can order requirements from the list offered to you right here on the website

Nowadays, the development of information technology makes it possible to submit memorial donations remotely. On the website of the Holy Resurrection Church (old) in Vichug, such an opportunity also appeared - submitting notes via the Internet. The process of submitting a note takes just a few minutes...

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Peace to you, dear visitors of the Orthodox island “Family and Faith”!

WITH Today we will look at an important question of spiritual life: where to start your churching?

A person’s churching begins from the minute he realizes that he cannot continue to live God’s life. It is at these moments that a revaluation of a person’s life values ​​occurs, and he realizes that real, real life is possible only in the Bosom of the Church, only according to the Gospel Word, only with God and only for God.

When a person realizes that without living faith in God and without God’s help it is simply impossible, difficult and meaningless to live, then he begins to look for the path to God. And, probably, the very first and most correct steps of a new Christian on the path to churching is attending church services.

In the Temple of God, while attending church services, you can be imbued with grace and ask the Lord to direct yourself to the true path. At first, the words of the service, and even the service itself, may be incomprehensible. But gradually, day after day, month after month, the service will become clearer and clearer, more familiar and necessary. After all, it is there, in the Temple of God, among praying fellow believers, that you can strengthen your faith and like-mindedness, with fellow Orthodox Christians like yourself.

In addition to going to Temple, a new Christian should become familiar with the Sacraments of Confession and Holy Communion. To do this, you need to find out the schedule of services of the Temple whose parishioner you want to become, then you need to find out when the priest of this Temple accepts Confession (as a rule, this happens at an evening service).

It is good to purchase brochures on preparation for Confession in the church store, which describe those sins to which a person is especially prone. At home, you should read the brochures you bought, take a blank sheet of paper and write a detailed list of your sins, which you will subsequently read to the priest at the Sacrament of Confession.

The second step on the path to churching is the responsible observance of fasts, both multi-day and one-day ones. If a person intends to seriously change his life, “for strait is the gate and narrow the way that leads to life, and few find it” (Matthew 7:14) and to follow the narrow and strait path to salvation, then he must seriously and approach such an issue as fasting with responsibility. If a person has serious illnesses, he can take the priest’s blessing to relax his fast, but if he is healthy, then, for the sake of the Lord, he will be happy to fast!

You should not try to study the Holy Scriptures at home, focusing only on your mind. As St. Fathers of the Church - this is very dangerous, since the enemy of our salvation can easily confuse us and lead us astray.

The Holy Scriptures should be listened to in the Temple during services (Gospel, Psalter, Apostle, etc.), or you should enroll in a Sunday parish school for the Law of God (if your Temple has one). Of course, at home you can and should read the Holy Gospel, and the Psalter, and the Acts of the Apostles, and the Lives of the Saints, but you should not try, at first, to understand anything from what you read, since the Lord does not immediately make a person wise, but only later .

When taking the first steps on the path to God, you should not be afraid and fear that you will not succeed. Our first steps in the Temple are like the first steps of a baby. When the baby takes his first step, he feels the support of his dear and beloved mother, whose hands are always ready to catch him if he suddenly stumbles and falls. Likewise, a person, taking his first step on the path to God, is invisibly supported by God Himself, who is ready at any moment to extend a helping hand to us, to pick us up and not let us fall.

Therefore, you should never be afraid that you won’t understand something or will do something wrong. Yes, you don’t yet know many of the intricacies of church life, but you have a head on your shoulders, and, therefore, soon you will learn everything, much that is not clear will become clear, everything will fall into place. This is comparable to how you start learning something: be it advanced training, a new job, a new profession. At first, everything seems alien and incomprehensible, but with time and effort, everything turns out to be not so complicated, understandable and even interesting.

Likewise, church life is difficult and incomprehensible at first, but if you are serious about achieving your goal, if you take a serious and responsible approach to the issue of changing your life, then, with God’s help, everything becomes simple and clear.

The main thing is to want, and the Lord will help!

START

QUESTION:Where should a modern person who has believed in God and is aware of his belonging to the Russian Orthodox Church begin his “churching”?

ANSWER:First of all, every Orthodox Christian must have faith, know and understand fundamentals of the doctrine of the Christian Church and try with all our might live by faith.

In order to have faith It is not enough to put on a pectoral cross, go into a church and light a candle there, being confident that you are already “Orthodox”.

Our Lord Jesus Christ repeatedly denounced even His disciples, witnesses of His numerous miracles, of lack of faith, who themselves performed many miraculous deeds with the Power of the Holy Spirit received from Him.

“Truly I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed and say to this mountain, “Move from here to there,” and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.” (Matt. 17.20.)

True Faith is the Gift of God. And this Gift is given to those who sincerely, “from the bottom of their hearts,” long to receive It.

"Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you." (Matt. 7.7.)

But in order for a thirst for acquiring Faith to settle in a person’s soul, that person must force to realize that the question of God, of Faith is not just a question of “life and death,” but of Eternal Life and Death.

Obviously, any person, at least once in his life, has thought: who am I, why do I live, is there anything after death?

Unfortunately, most people are not looking for an answer to these questions, but, absorbed in worries about their “daily bread,” and some about a new “Mercedes” or other luxury items or necessities, they try to erase them from their consciousness or put them off for “someday.” Then ".

The scary thing is that this “later” may not come. The soul of a person, living only with the worries of “This age”, under the burden of sins accumulated throughout life, suffocates and dies, becomes incapable of perceiving spiritual phenomena, incapable even want know God. As sad as it may be, the number of such “dead souls” is increasing catastrophically in our time.

Those who do not drown out the meek voice of the soul, yearning for separation from its Creator, sooner or later face questions about God: does He exist; if there is, then what is He; which church has the correct doctrine about Him?

And if a person sincerely wants to receive answers to them, without being embarrassed by his surroundings, national or any other prejudices, then God, seeing the pure desire of his heart, certainly reveals Himself to him, giving him the opportunity to know the Truth and join Christ, who is: "The Way and the Truth and the Life." (John 14.6.)

It is also necessary to take into account that by following the path of the mind, through analysis and reflection, especially considering the modern amount of information available to everyone, you can quite quickly come to the understanding that God exists.

But remain with this rational, fruitless knowledge.

The main instrument for knowing God is the human heart, a heart that suffers, seeks, and languishes in the absence of Grace.

And, if it is not filled “over the edge” with base passions, envy, malice, voluptuousness, there will always be a tiny “living” piece in it, capable of feeling God, containing His Love, becoming the beginning of the Salvation of the soul.

An example of this is the thief crucified on the cross “on the right side” of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is how the Gospel tells about it:

“They led two evildoers with Him to death. And when they came to a place called Skull, there they crucified Him and the evildoers, one on the right and the other on the left. Jesus said: Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing. And they divided His clothes, casting lots.

And the people stood and watched. The leaders also mocked them, saying: He saved others; let him save himself, if he is the chosen Christ of God."

“One of the hanged villains slandered Him and said: if You are the Christ, save Yourself and us. The other, on the contrary, calmed him down and said: Or are you not afraid of God, when you yourself are condemned to the same thing? And we are condemned justly, because We accepted what was worthy according to our deeds, but He did nothing bad. And He said to Jesus: Remember me, Lord, when You come into Your Kingdom! And Jesus said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”(Emphasis added) (Luke 23.32-36,39-43.)

This is the power of God's Love for His creation!

In the last minutes of his life, the robber’s conscience awoke: he pitied the Crucified One innocently, and the Crucified God forgave him all his sins and was the first to admit him into Paradise!

The Merciful Lord will forgive us all our sins,

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How to come to God and find faith

Very often a person who grew up in complete denial of faith in God thinks about it, trying to take the first steps in this field. How to come to God, gain faith in his power, how to plant a spark of love in your soul and today we will talk in parables.

Parables are small literary works in the form of a story or narration, in which deep life wisdom or moral instruction is concentrated, concentrated under the guise of a simple everyday story or allegorical fable.

How to come to God. Parable "The First Step"

One man came to Guru Ramanuja with a request:

Help me come to God.

Ramanuja looked at him and asked:

Tell me, have you loved anyone?

Love doesn't interest me. I left everything worldly. I want to come to God!

“Think again,” suggested Ramanuja, “and tell me, have you never loved either a woman or a child?”

I'm telling you, I'm not an ordinary layman. I am a person who wants to know God. Everything else doesn't interest me. I didn't love anyone.

Ramanuja sighed sadly.

I don't know if I can help you. A person who does not know what it means to truly love cannot find the path to God. Learn to love - this will be the first step to God. When you learn, come again. You ask me how to climb the stairs from the penultimate step to the last, and you still need to be able to put your foot on the very first one!

How to become a believer. Parable “If faith has no love”

If faith does not have love, then is it FAITH? How often in everyday life we ​​observe hypocrisy, hypocrisy, soulless adherence to the rules established by people. At the same time, people themselves have long forgotten about this, and believe that the Lord gave them.

When a person was still a child, his grandmother always told him: “Granddaughter, when you grow up big, you feel bad in your soul - go to church, it will always be easier for you there.”

A man has grown up. And life somehow became completely unbearable for him. He remembered his grandmother’s advice and went to a certain temple.

And then someone comes up to him: “You’re holding your hands wrong!” The second one runs up: “You’re not standing there!” The third one grumbles: “He’s not dressed like that!” They shout from behind: “You’re baptizing yourself incorrectly!” And then one woman came up and said to him:

Man, you’d better leave the temple, buy yourself a book about how to behave here, and then come in.

A man came out of the temple, sat down on a bench and cried bitterly. And suddenly he hears a voice:

Why are you, my child, crying?

The man raised his tear-stained face and saw Christ. Speaks:

God! They won't let me into the temple!

Jesus hugged him:

Don't cry, they won't let me in either.

Agree that the moral of the above parables is extremely clear. After all, this is often what happens in life. The basis of faith in God is love. Without learning to love, it is difficult for a person to love God.

Sometimes, we people are proud that we are believers, churchgoers, we try to keep all the commandments of God, we read prayers morning and evening... but how often we do not understand simple everyday things and are far from merciful... focusing on little things, attaching importance to external things .

Cultivate in yourself sparks of love for your loved ones, for everything around you, and then your soul and heart, filled with love, will gain faith.

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