Sunday Bulletin - October 11/24, 2010: 22nd Sunday after Pentecost (Holy Fathers of the Seventh Ecumenical Council)
Tone: V
Saints: Holy Fathers of the Seventh Ecumenical Council
Epistle: Galatians 6:11-18; Hebrews 13:7-16
Gospel: Luke 7:11-16; John 17:1-13
Sunday Hymnography: http://www.saintjonah.org/lit/lit_hf7council_pent22.htm
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DATES TO REMEMBER:
*23rd Sunday after Pentecost*
Saturday, October 30:
5:30pm – Vigil
Sunday, October 31:
9:40am – Hours
10:00am – Liturgy
Akathist to St Elizabeth the New Martyr: Wednesday, October 27 at 7:00pm
Coffee Hour Rota: Oct 24 – Tsyganok; Oct 31 – Wilson; Nov 7 – Baird; Nov 14 – Bursac; Nov 21 – Mancuso; Nov 28 - Shaw
Special Parish Council Meeting: Sunday, October 24 during Coffee Hour
Next Parish Council Meeting: Sunday, November 7 during Coffee Hour
Children’s Sunday School: Next class is Sunday, October 24 during Coffee Hour
Adult Sunday School: Next class is Sunday, October 31 during Coffee Hour
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CHURCH NEEDS:
Special Collection: The collection at the veneration of the Cross after Liturgy is for the Building Fund.
Pledge Forms: Need to be completed and mailed to the church or given to Josh Shaw by October 24.
Liturgical Needs: Incense and charcoal from The Unexpected Joy
Your Tithes: Please remember to keep your tithes and donations to the church consistent.
Building Fund: Please remember to contribute the Building Fund on a regular basis.
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PRAYER LIST:
Metropolitan Hilarion & bishops of ROCOR; Bishop George & the brotherhood of Holy Cross Monastery; Archimandrite Maximos & brotherhood of Holy Cross Monastery; Archimandrite Nazarios & brotherhood of Ascension Monastery; Archimandrite Joachim & the brotherhood of St Mary of Egypt Monastery; Fr Christopher & faithful in Uganda; Fr Jean & Fr Gregoire & the faithful in Haiti; Fr Demetrius & family; Igor; Svetlana; Dusan; Rdr. Quartus; Jovanka; Maximos; Martha; Jonathan; Amelia & family; Katherine & family; Nicholas; Gabriel; Tatiana; Cyril & Natalia & the child Elizabeth; Michael & Elizabeth; Soja; Galyna; Olga; Apolinaria; Matushka Anastasia; Andrey & family; Perpetua; Nicholas & Olga & the child Anna; Methodius & Faith; Valentina; Joshua & family; Svetozar & family; Mother Andrea; Soterios; Maria; Jonah; Frevronia; Nikola; Adrian & Catherine; Marina; Najla; Raja
Special Requests: Frevronia (mother of Dan Popoff); Jonah (the brother of Rdr. Quartus); Basil (the brother of Nell Shaw) Nicholas; George (friend of Fr Michael Platanis); Pelagea; Vasily; Vera and child, Oleg; Tatiana; Igor (family members of Polina Yemelyanova); Maria (mother of Vitali Panov); Katerina (mother of Svetlana Tysganok); Victor (father of Olga Altman)
Catechumens: Seraphim; Basil
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Spiritual Rules of a Person Living in the World:
From the Essays of St Ignaty Brianchaninov
The soul of all exercises in the Lord is attention. Without attention all these exercises are sterile, dead. He who wants to be saved must so dispose himself that he ran preserve attention to himself, not only in seclusion but amid distraction itself, into which he is drawn sometimes by circumstances, against his will. Let the fear of God outweigh all other feelings on the scales of the heart- then it will be easy to preserve attention to oneself both in the silence of a cell and amid noise surrounding one on all sides.
Wise moderation in food, lessening the heat of the blood, assists a great deal for attention to oneself; but heating of the blood-just as from unnecessary consumption of food, from forced bodily activity, from the flaming of anger, from a dousing by vainglory, and from other causes, gives birth to a multitude of thoughts and fantasies, in other words, distraction. The Holy Fathers prescribe for the person who wishes to be attentive to himself first of all measured, equal, constant moderation in food (Philokalia, St. Philotheus of Sinai).
On awakening--in the image of the awakening from the dead which awaits all men-direct your thoughts to God, offer as a sacrifice to God the first fruits of the thoughts of your mind, which has not yet accepted upon itself any vain impressions. In silence, very carefully, having done all that is necessary for the body upon awakening from sleep, read the usual rule of prayer, concerning yourself not so much with the quantity of prayer as with the quality of it, i.e. that it be done with attention, and so that because of the attention, the heart might come to life with prayerful compunction and consolation. After the rule of prayer, again with all your powers concerned about attentiveness, read the New Testament, for the most part the Gospels. During this reading diligently note all the promises and commandments of Christ, so that it will be possible to direct your own activity, seen and unseen, according to them. The amount of reading is determined by the person's strength and by circumstances. A reading of prayers and Scripture and likewise ought not to ignore one's obligations for the measured exercise of prayer and reading. Just as extra consumption of food upsets and weakens the stomach, so also the unmeasured taking of spiritual food weakens the mind, gives place there for disgust with pious exercises, brings despair upon it (St. Isaac the Syrian, Chapter 71). For the beginner the Holy Fathers recommend frequent prayers, but not lengthy ones. And when the mind attains spiritual growth, is strengthened and comes to adulthood, then it will be in a condition to pray without ceasing. To Christians who have attained perfect growth in the Lord the words of the Apostle Paul are applicable: "I will, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting" (I Tim. 2:8), i.e. without passion and without any distraction or soaring. What is natural for a man is not natural for an infant.
Enlightened by means of prayer and reading by the Sun of Righteousness, our Lord Jesus Christ, let every man go about his daily work, remaining attentive so that in all his deeds and words, in his whole being, there reigns and acts the all-holy will of God, opened and explained for men in the Gospels' commandments.
If free moments arise during the day, use them for reading with attention certain appointed prayers or certain appointed passages of Scripture, and by them again strengthen your spiritual powers, exhausted by activity amid the vain world. If these golden minutes do not come, one ought to grieve for them as over the loss of a treasurer What is spent today need not be lost the next day, because our heart is easily given over to carelessness, forgetfulness, from which is born dark ignorance, so pernicious to God's work, to the work of the salvation of man.
If it happens that you say or do something contrary to the commandments of God, immediately treat the sin with repentance, and by means of sincere repentance return to God's path, from which you wandered by violating God's will. Do not stagnate outside God's path. Oppose the sinful thoughts, fantasies, and feelings which occur with the faith and humility of the commandments of the Gospel, saying with the Holy Patriarch Joseph: How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God? (Gen. 39:9).
Whoever is attentive to himself must deny himself all daydreaming, in general, no matter how seductive and glittering; all daydreaming is wandering of the mind, outside truth, in a land of visions which do not exist and cannot come into existence, which lure the mind and deceive it. The results of daydreaming are loss of attention to oneself, mental distraction and hardness -of heart during prayer; hence--spiritual sickness.
In the evening, on going to sleep, which is death for the life of that day, examine your actions during the day that has passed. For him who leads an attentive life, such an examination is not difficult, because that forgetfulness which is so characteristic of a distracted person is destroyed due to attention to himself. And thus, recalling all your sins in deed, word, thought and feeling, offer repentance over them to God with the disposition and heartfelt promise of correction. Then, having read the rule of prayer end with divine meditation a day begun with divine meditation.
Where do all the thoughts and feelings of a sleeping person go? What is this mysterious state-sleep, during which the soul and body are alive, but at the same time are in different spheres, alien to the consciousness of life, as if dead? Sleep is just as incomprehensible as death. During sleep, the soul is at rest, forgetting the most brutal griefs and misfortunes of the earth, in the image of its eternal rest; and the body! . . . if it rises from sleep, then without fail it will also rise from the dead.
Great Agathon said, It is impossible to progress in virtue without attention to oneself (Patericon of Skete). Amen.
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Решающий час
Наша постоянная ошибка в том, что мы не принимаем всерьез данный, протекающий час нашей жизни, что мы живем прошлым или будущим, что мы все ждем какого-то особенного часа, когда наша жизнь развернется во всей своей значительности, и не замечаем, что она утекает, как вода между пальцами, как драгоценное зерно из плохо завязанного мешка.
Постоянно, ежедневно, ежечасно, Бог посылает нам людей, обстоятельства, дела, с которых должно начаться наше возрождение, а мы оставляем их без внимания и этим ежечасно противимся воле Божией о себе. И действительно, как Господь может помочь нам? – Только посылая нам в нашей ежедневной жизни определенных людей и определенные стечения обстоятельств. Если бы мы каждый час нашей жизни принимали бы как час воли Божией о нас, как решающий, важнейший час нашей жизни – какие дотоле скрытые источники радости, любви, силы открылись бы на дне нашей души!
- Священник Александр Ельчанинов