Archpriest Andrew Phillips
Today's feast was instituted in 1918, at a time when the terrible persecution of the Church had begun in Russia. It was considered that the people under the Soviet yoke had, as never before, to turn to the saints for intercession, protection, indeed, mere survival. As we now know, the number of martyrs of the Soviet yoke probably exceeds the number of martyrs throughout the world in the first three centuries of persecution of the Orthodox Christian faith. The whole country became the battleground of good against evil, spiritually, the centre of the world.
Archimandrite John (Krestiankin)
The historical flow of Russian life has been varied: there were times of thunderous activity, there were lulls, and even complete halts. The river of Russian national life that gave birth to saints flowed in the given direction; this flow, however, was sometimes rapid and fruitful, sometimes slow, and sometimes so quiet that it was hard to tell whether it was flowing forward or backward. And now, 1,000 years later, we can mark the main periods of Russian religious history from the time of St. Vladimir to the present day.
St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov)
Rating: 8,2|Votes: 5
Confession requires decisive self-denial. It must be triumphant. It must be made as if in the open arena, before all mankind, before angels, saints, and fallen angels, before the gaze of earth and heaven. For we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men (1 Cor. 4:9), as the Apostle Paul says of himself and the rest of the Holy Apostles.
Igor Zybin
The brothers avoided telling these secrets, fearing the spirit of vainglory. If the Holy Spirit wants to help a person to fast, then it is a miracle of God. But sometimes He abandons us, so that we might live in humility, for we also need the earthly. He who never gets upset when someone scolds him feels these joys very strongly.
Rating: 1,3|Votes: 4
In the new covenant of the Messiah, the Passover event takes on its new meaning as the celebration of Christ's death and resurrection, the "exodus" of men from this sinful world to the Kingdom of God. And in the New Testament as well, the Pentecostal feast is fulfilled and made new by the coming of the "new law," the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples of Christ.
