Wounded By Love by Saint Porphyrios was recommended to me by a monk at Holy Cross Monastery in Wayne, West Virginia. As a new believer, a big part of my faith was to avoid the pain of eternal punishment, but this book helped me understand that it’s better to love God as a son instead.
Exhaust yourself for God
Every physical and spiritual task which does not involve pain, toil and trouble never bears fruit for the person who engages in it, for the Kingdom of Heaven is taken by violence and the violent lay hold of it’—‘violence’ here meaning the laborious exercise of the body in everything.
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Before complaining about your bodily exhaustion, start praying, because when you complain grace departs and you are left with your own strength. If you say “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me’ three times, you continue joyfully. God sees you and stretches out His hand to help you. From that moment on, true communion with Him commences.
During the summer of 2019, I thought it would be impossible for me to tour the United States by car while also holding weekly speaking events. The endeavor far surpassed anything else I’ve attempted, but since I conducted the trip in the name of God, I believe He gave me energy I did not know I had. Funnily enough, after the trip was over and I had hardly any work to do at all, I felt more tired and weak than while I was conducting the tour.
Put blame on yourself
On every occasion when something happens to you, place the blame on yourself. Pray with humility and don’t seek to justify yourself. If, for example, you find yourself the object of enmity, pray with love so that you pour love over the enmity. If you hear a slander against you, then pray and be careful, because ‘the noise of murmurings shall not be hidden.’ The slightest murmuring against your neighbor affects your soul and you are unable to pray. When the Holy Spirit finds the soul in this state it does not dare to approach.
Attaining humility
When you arrive at such a degree of humility and you compel the grace of God to dwell within you, then you have gained everything. When you have attained humility, when you have become a captive of God—a captive in the good sense, that is, a vessel of divine grace—then you can say along with Saint Paul, ‘it is no longer I who live; Christ lives in me.’
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We should address ourselves to God in the manner of a humble servant with a voice of entreaty and supplication. Then our prayer will be well-pleasing to God. Let us stand devoutly before the Cross of Christ and say: ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.’ That says everything.
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…God is infinite; God is a mystery; God is silence. God is infinitely hidden, but everywhere existent. We live in God, we breathe God, but we cannot sense His greatness, His providence. He frequently conceals the actions of His divine providence. But when we acquire holy humility, then we see everything and experience everything. We experience God openly and manifestly and we sense His mysteries. Then we cannot but start to love Him. And that is something which He asks for. It is the first thing which He demands for our own happiness, as He says, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind’; this is the first and great commandment.
Accepting Christ
Christ stands outside the door of our soul and knocks for us to open to Him, but He doesn’t enter. He doesn’t want to violate the freedom which He Himself gave us. The Book of Revelation says this in so many words: ‘Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone will hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and I will dine with him, and he with me.’ Christ is courteous. He stands outside the door of our soul and knocks gently. If we open to Him, He will enter us and give us everything—Himself—secretly and silently.
This is how Christ dealt with me. He began tapping on my door in early 2019, ready to help me, but for one month I fiddled around, not sure if I should open the door or not. And then finally when I did open the door, He embraced me and changed my life.
Living with Christ
When you find Christ, you are satisfied, you desire nothing else, you find peace. You become a different person. You live everywhere, wherever Christ is. You live in the stars, in infinity, in heaven with the angels, with the saints, on earth with people, with plants, with animals, with everyone and everything. When there is love for Christ, loneliness disappears. You are peaceable, joyous, full. Neither melancholy, nor illness, nor pressure, nor anxiety, nor depression, nor hell. Christ is in all your thoughts, in all your actions. You have grace and you can endure everything for Christ. You can even suffer unjustly. You can endure injustices for Christ, and indeed with joy. Just as He suffered, so you too can suffer unjustly. Did you choose Christ in order to avoid suffering? What does Saint Paul say? I rejoice in my sufferings. This is our religion: for our soul to awake and love Christ and become holy, to give herself over to divine eros.
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Those who desire and crave to belong to Christ and who abandon themselves to the will of God become worthy. It’s a great thing, all-important, to have no will. The slave has no will of his own. And it is possible for us to have no will of our own in a very simple manner: through love for Christ and the keeping of His commandments.
Some men tell me, “Roosh, you’re getting old. You really have to hurry up and find a wife. Have you thought about going to Armenia or maybe Ukraine? You can meet a girl in those places.” There is no need. When you have Christ, you have enough. You can live alone in the mountains and go days without talking to another person yet remain content because you can see God everywhere, even in the trees and birds. With Christ comes fulfillment, and anything that can be added to me from this point on would be sent by Him for my salvation. He can send me a faithful woman, a friend who is in need of help, or the ability to make a meal for my neighbor—I accept his gifts without question, and do not lament what I perceive as a lack. If Christ did not give it to me, it cannot be something I should regret not having.
Living without Christ
When someone is empty of Christ then a thousand and one other things come to fill his soul: jealousies, hatreds, boredom, melancholy, negativity, a worldly frame of mind and worldly pleasures. Try to fill your soul with Christ so as not to have it empty. Your soul is like a cistern full of water. If you channel the water to the flowers, that is, to the virtues, you will experience true joy and all the thorns of evil will wither away. But if you channel the water to the weeds, these will grow and choke you and all the flowers will wither.
Modern society is constructed to keep you away from Christ no matter which way you turn. Even most churches, which are supposed to glorify and worship Christ, do not have Him. They blaspheme Him through false teachings and gay flags. Evil forces of this world have molded everything to block God from your life, but in my case and others who have found Him, they have not been successful enough.
God wishes all to be saved
You wish for everyone to find salvation, light and sanctification and for everyone to enter in the Church.
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No one should wish to be saved alone without all others being saved. It is a mistake for someone to pray for himself, that he himself may be saved. We must love others and pray that no soul be lost, that all may enter into the Church. That is what counts. And it is with this desire one should leave the world to retire to a monastery or to the desert.
I used to get schadenfreude when my enemy faltered. “Serves you right for attacking me in the past!” Now I aim to pray for them. I can no longer celebrate when a man falls into the pit. No one deserves to suffer for eternity merely for humiliating me or hurting my feelings.
Engaging in sin makes you confused
Sin makes a person exceedingly psychologically confused. And nothing makes the confusion go away—nothing except the light of Christ. Christ makes the first move: Come unto me all you who labour. Then we accept this light with our good will, which we express through our love towards Him, through prayer, through our participation in the life of the Church, and through the sacraments.
The irony is that the more confused a person is, the more sure they will seem. A woman will be so convinced of her abortion that she will brag about it online and encourage other women to do the same. A man will be so convinced of his life of fornication that he will boast of his conquests and teach you how to do likewise. I could argue that today I have more to be sure of, but I’m more hesitant to dispense advice to others. I don’t want to give guidance that could end up inadvertently hurting someone’s spiritual development.
Do not despair
It is not healthy to be excessively downcast on account of your sins and to turn with such revulsion against your evil self that you end up in despair. Despondency is the worst thing. It is a snare set by Satan to make a person lose his appetite for spiritual things and to bring him into a state of despair, inactivity and negligence. In this state a person is unable to do anything and is rendered useless. The person says, ‘I am sinful and wretched, I am this, I am that, I didn’t do this, I didn’t do that… I should have done that then, now it’s too late, nothing can be done… I’ve wasted my life, I am unworthy…’ He is brought into a sense of inferiority and consumed by fruitless self-reproach. Do you know what a destructive thing that is? It is pseudo-humility.
I can admit that I am hard on my past, but how can I not be when I was a fool for so long? Yet I do believe God has forgiven me for my sins, and so I steer away from despair or despondency. My salvation is in my hands based on what I do today.
Loving your neighbor is loving God
Love towards one’s brother cultivates love towards God. We are happy when we secretly love all people. Then we will feel that everyone loves us. No one can attain to God unless he first passes through his fellow men. ‘For the person who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?’ We need to love and sacrifice ourselves selflessly for everyone without seeking recompense. A love that seeks something in return is selfish. It is not genuine, pure and sincere.
Atheists have ailing souls
No one can deny that Christ is the fullness of life. Those who deny this truth are soul-sick and possessed by an evil spirit. They deny that which they are lacking. And so the devil finds their soul empty and enters in. And just as a child is deeply traumatized if he is deprived of his father and mother in his life, so too, and much more so, is the person who is deprived of Christ and His Holy Mother.
Repentance is not possible without grace
For the soul to repent it must first be awake. It is in this awakening that the miracle of repentance occurs. This is where human will plays its role. The awakening, however, is not something that rests only with the individual man or woman. The individual on his own is unable to bring it about. God intervenes. Then divine grace comes. Without grace a person cannot repent. The love of God does everything. He may use something—an illness, or something else, it depends—in order to bring a person to repentance. Accordingly repentance is achieved through divine grace. We simply make a move towards God and from then onwards grace supervenes.
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If there are not the preconditions for Christ to enter into us, repentance does not come. The preconditions are humility, love, prayer, prostrations and labour for Christ. If the sentiment is not pure, if there is no simplicity and if the soul is moved by self-interest, then divine grace does not come. In that case we go and confess, but we don’t feel relief.
Grace is a gift and God decides when to give it. You then make a decision whether to accept the gift or not. I was given this gift at 39 years old when I was beaten by the world and no longer had any options to save myself. For the first time in my life I prayed for help, and then I received help.
Prayer
We shouldn’t blackmail God with our prayers. We shouldn’t ask God to release us from something, from an illness, for example, or to solve our problems, but we should ask for strength and support from Him to bear what we have to bear. Just as He knocks discretely at the door of our soul, so we should ask discretely for what we desire and if the Lord does not respond, we should cease to ask. When God does not give us something that we ask for insistently, then He has His reasons. God, too, has His ‘secrets’.
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In our prayer we should ask only for the salvation of our soul. Didn’t the Lord say, ‘Seek first the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added to you?’ Easily, without the slightly difficulty, Christ can give us what we want. And remember the secret. The secret is not to think about asking for the specific thing at all. The secret is to ask for your union with Christ with utter selflessness, without saying ‘give me this’ or ‘give me that’. It suffices to say, ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.’
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I never ask for God to reveal something to me, because I don’t like asking Him. I believe this is contrary to His will, that it is not polite and that—even worse—I am coercing Him. But I say the prayer ‘Lord, Jesus Christ, have mercy on me’ in a supplicatory tone and then I abandon myself to Christ. Whatever He wills. Whatever He Himself reveals.
When praying for myself or others, I used to ask God for specifics—to help me with finding a mountain home or to help a friend with his money problems—but how do I know what is God’s specific plan for each individual? Now I ask God either for mercy or the endurance to get through a specific trial (assuming it is His will for me to get through the trial). When you ask for mercy instead of specific outcomes, you ensure that God treats you with love and compassion in a way that preserves your salvation, since it’s very possible that attaining something you desire may lead to condemnation. If you ask me to pray for you, I’ll ask God to have mercy on you. His will be done, whatever that may be.
We cannot fix ourselves without Christ
Without Christ it is impossible to correct ourselves. We will not be able to detach ourselves from our passions. On our own we cannot become good. ‘Without me, you can do nothing.’ However much we try, we will achieve nothing. There is one thing we must do, and that is turn to Him and love Him ‘with all our soul.’ Love for Christ: this is the best and sole remedy for the passions.
It is possible for a non-Christian to do a good deed, since the Gospel is written on our hearts, but it will often come with sinful baggage. Someone will claim that they give to charity, but they do it as a public display. I spoke the truth about men and women, yet applied that truth in an immoral way. To do good without harming oneself or others, you must be in communion with God. Otherwise, you will null out the good you’re doing with other sins that you will not even be aware of.
Turn to Christ when evil comes to you
Things are simple and easy in the spiritual life, in the life in Christ, as long as you possess discernment. When something bothers you—a seductive thought, a temptation, an assault—ignore all these things, and turn your attention, your eyes, to Christ. He will then take over the task of raising you up. He will take you by the hand and will give you His divine grace abundantly. All you need to do is make a tiny little effort. The human contribution in all this represents only a millionth of a millionth part—a slight inclination, that is. Take a step in God’s direction, and in a split second divine grace will come. As soon as you think of it, the Holy Spirit will come. You don’t do anything. You just move in that direction, and divine grace comes immediately.
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You won’t become saints by hounding after evil. Ignore evil. Look towards Christ and He will save you. Instead of standing outside the door shooing the evil one away, treat him with disdain. If evil approaches from one direction, then calmly turn in the opposite direction. If evil comes to assault you, turn all your inner strength to good, to Christ. Pray, ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.’ He knows how and in what way to have mercy on you. And when you have filled yourself with good, don’t turn any more towards evil. In this way you become good on your own, with the grace of God. Where can evil then find a foothold? It disappears!
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You don’t become holy by fighting evil. Let evil be. Look towards Christ and that will save you. What makes a person saintly is love—the adoration of Christ which cannot be expressed, which is beyond expression, which is beyond… And such a person attempts to undertake ascetic exercises and to do things to cause himself to suffer for the love of God.
Many Christians want to “fight evil” and eradicate it from the world, but is that God’s will or their will? God permits evil and sickness in this world for our spiritual benefit, so the most likely consequence of fighting evil is bringing yourself closer to it. As long as this world exists, evil will exist.
All sheep need a shepherd
If you are going to occupy yourself with prayer of the heart exclusively you must have the guidance of a spiritual father. Prayer of the heart is impossible without a spiritual guide. There is a danger of the soul being deluded. Care is needed. Your spiritual guide will teach you how to get into the right order for prayer, because you don’t get in the right order, there’s a danger of your seeing the luciferic light, of living in delusion and being plunged into darkness, and then one becomes aggressive and changes character and so on.
Whenever I speak with men who are going it alone without the Church, they have a buffet of beliefs gathered from multiple sources (philosophy, gnosticism, New Age, Buddhism, etc.). The end result is that they formed their own religion with them as Pope, and they defend their unique position with an exceedingly high level of pride.
Your faith is progressing if you desire less from the world
In the eyes of God, the married and the unmarried person are the same, provided they live in accordance with the commandments of God and provided they live the life of God. Chastity, lack of possessions and poverty, which are the virtues of the monk, are to be found in a person’s heart. Someone may be a virgin as far as the body is concerned, but be like an inveterate whore as far as the soul is concerned on account of his malice and passions. Someone may own a dozen houses and yet in his soul be liberation from material things and live like someone who owns nothing. On the other hand, someone may be poor in an external sense, but not be free of possessions internally. It is not the quantity of possessions that makes someone propertied or unpropertied, but the attachment of the heart.
How to treat those who attack you
When someone injures us in whatever way, whether with slanders or with insults, we should think of him as our brother who has been taken hold of by the enemy. He has fallen victim to the enemy. Accordingly we need to have compassion for him and entreat God to have mercy both on us and on him, and God will help both. If, however, we are filled with anger against him, then the enemy will jump from him to us and make a mockery of us both. A person who condemns others does not love Christ.
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And if you see a brother troubled by passions, do not hate him. Hate rather the passions that are assailing him. And if you see that he is being tormented by desires and habits from former sins, have even greater compassion on him, lest you also fall into temptation, since you are made of matter that easily turns from good to evil.
Use prayer to help others change instead of words
In our missionary endeavor we need to employ a very delicate manner so that people accept what we are offering, whether it be words, books or whatever, without reacting negatively. And something else: use few words. Words often provoke irritation. Prayer and living example find resonance. Living faith moves people, regenerates them and changes them, whereas words alone remain fruitless. The best form of mission is through our good example, our love and our meekness.
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And when sometimes I see that someone is heading for disaster in his life, I can do nothing about it. I point it out to him a little, but he doesn’t understand. I can’t intervene strongly and compromise his freedom. It’s not an easy matter.
Has it happened to you that you knew the exact solution to someone’s problem, and yet when you relayed the solution, the person completely ignored you or outright attacked you? Words don’t work on a hard heart. The person simply wants a material reward or solution, and anything you say which blocks their immediate satisfaction will be shot down. This is also the case with bringing people to God. It can be obvious to me that a person is suffering from their worldly pursuits, but if I were to tell them that they need God, they would attack me or say I’m “too religious.” By now, everyone close to me knows that I’m a believer, so it’s just a simple matter for them to ask me how to seek help from God, but if they are still of the world they will insist on asking for a worldly solution instead that doesn’t get to the root of the problem.
The providence of God
God is love; He is not a simple spectator in our life. He provides and cares for us as our Father, but He also respects our freedom. He does not pressure us. We should have our hope in God’s providence and, since we believe that God is watching over us, we should take courage and throw ourselves into His love and then we will see Him constantly beside us. We will not be afraid that we will make a false step.
Raising children
Become saints and you will have no problems with your children. The sanctity of their parents releases the children from their problems. Children want to have saintly people at their side, people with lots of love who will neither intimidate them nor lecture them, but who will provide a saintly example and pray for them. You parents should pray silently to Christ with upraised arms and embrace your children mystically. When they misbehave you will take some disciplinary measures, but you will not coerce them. Above all you need to pray.
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It is not sufficient for the parents to be devout. They mustn’t oppress the children to make them good by force. We may repel our children from Christ when we pursue the things of our religion with egotism. Children cannot endure coercion. Don’t compel them to come with you to church. You can say, ‘Whoever wants can come with me now or come later.’ Leave God to speak to their souls. The reason why the children of some devout parents become rebellious when they grow up and reject the Church and everything connected with it and go off to seek satisfaction elsewhere is because of this pressure which they feel from their ‘good’ parents. The so-called ‘devout’ parents, who were anxious to make ‘good Christians’ of their children with their human love, pressurized their children and produced the opposite result.
What to do when you’re sick
…pray a great deal [when you’re ill], but for God to forgive your sins and to give you strength to love Him and to give yourself to Him. Because the more you pray for the illness to leave you, the more it adheres to you, winds its tentacles around you and squeezes you, and becomes inseparable from you. If, of course, you feel an inner human weakness, then you may humbly entreat the Lord to take the illness from you.
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Don’t pray for your health. Don’t say, ‘O Lord, make me well.’ No! Rather say, ‘Lord, Jesus Christ, have mercy on me’, with selflessness, with love and without expecting anything. ‘Lord, whatever Your love desires…’ Only in this way will you act from now on, loving Christ and our brothers and sisters. Love Christ. Become saints. Throw yourself into becoming friends with Christ, into His love alone, into divine eros.
Without this book, I’m certain I would have embarked on a more legalistic form of Christianity, where I simply follow the rules so that I’m not punished, but Christ is so much more than a stern headmaster. God made us out of love and so wants us to fully experience that love, which is enough for us to face any evil or suffering that comes our way. Wounded By Love was important in helping me realize this essential component of the Christian faith.
Learn More: Wounded By Love by Saint Porphyrios on Amazon
divine eros? really?? should have used the word “agape” instead. eros relates to the carnal sexual love that a man and a woman may feel for each other.i dont think that God desires you that WAY,roosh
though there’s a scipture that says that “God lusts for us”
James 4:5 Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy?
anyways, i’d rather think of the love of God as agape the most sublime and deeper love that exists from God for his creatures
also the orthodox looks for ascetism which is unbiblical
Without ascetism their is no sacrifice so no spiritual growth.
Amen, Mozart.
show me a bible verse that says that you have to beat yourself in order to enter heaven.
note that mortifying the desires of the flesh is not the same as ascetism
also not all pleasure is evil,
do you feel pleasure when you eat?
drink a cup of something that you like?
watch a beautiful scenery at the beach or the mountains?
reading a good book or watching a movie?
or even have sex with your wife?
did you know that the apostle paul taught that married people should be almost always united in the bed with the exception of mutual accordance if they want to fast and pray for a short time?
martin luther tried ascetism and failed and so all these monks that the orthodox follow. understand this everyone is a sinner by nature and whether you like it or not you are going to screw up and the monk that you follow or pastor will do so too
the only one perfect is jesus christ
not st theodore
st benedict
or pastor mike
people wont be wholly sanctified until the resurrection of the dead. meanwhile santification and justification is a daily routine of the believer and this is done not by your deeds but the grace and will of god.
any good deeds that you do is because god has prepared it for you before the foundation of the world.
you people dont understand what the gospel is. i tell you what? the thief on the cross went to paradise after recognizing who jesus christ was not because he did anything
btw,in that story of the crucifixion of the lord. you can see by typology a picture of how many people will be saved!
the taught just came in now, glory to God!
For by grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. (Ephesians 2:8)
yes its by grace but the orthodox as the catholics thinks that they can add or substract to the gospel of jesus christ by doing good deeds, penance,self beating (which goes agaisnt scripture, because god promises that if you mistreat your body he will destroy YOU)prayers to the saints etc etc
none of this is biblical, none of the church fathers or the apostles practiced this
they didnt pray to mary!
nor postrate to icons or idols made in the image of jesus(weird that none of them draw a picture of the lord huh? think about that for a minute)
tell me of an apostle that beated himself just to not to sin? even jesus when he was on the earth never praticed ascetism because he drank and ate with publicans and prostitutes (without sinning of course)
later on he died for our sins,so its tetelestai (its finished)
Jesus fasted in the desert for 40 days and 40 nights and did battle with the temptations of Satan. He also did not take up a wife and engage in sexual relations. So yes, He did practice asceticism.
Jesus had a unique calling.
Yet so did others throughout the Bible (i.e. John the Baptist, other prophets etc.) Fasting is also recommended elsewhere, and Paul himself said that celibacy is preferable if one has the gift of God to engage in it. These acts are not salvific in themselves, but can aid in drawing one closer to God with the right mentality, and are exercises and aids in running the race.
Catholics don’t pray to Mary.
“even jesus when he was on the earth never praticed ascetism”
Except for fasting for 40 days and 40 nights in the desert.
Both Catholic and Orthodox Christians pray to the Vigin Mary.
Hail Mary,Â
Full of Grace,Â
The Lord is with thee.Â
Blessed art thou among women,Â
and blessed is the fruit
of thy womb, Jesus.Â
Holy Mary,Â
Mother of God,Â
pray for us sinners now,Â
and at the hour of our death.
Not to her, through her.
Its a greeting and a prayer for intercession. We prayer for her intercession, but she is not the object or deity of the prayer.
What about John the Baptist? If he wasn’t an ascetic, who was? He lived in the wilderness, dressed simply and ate locusts and honey.
What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he hath faith, but hath not works? Shall faith be able to save him? And if a brother or sister be naked, and want daily food: And one of you say to them: Go in peace, be ye warmed and filled; yet give them not those things that are necessary for the body, what shall it profit? So faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without works; and I will shew thee, by works, my faith.
–James 2 14-18
This passage is why Martin Luther called James “an epistle of straw” and did not consider it Scripture. Works righteousness defies every other book of the NT.
Not so. James merely fleshes out what is already pointed out elsewhere: that good works are the fruit/evidence of salvific faith.
I can say “I love my wife.” But if I beat her to within an inch of her life every night after coming home from a night of sleeping with other women, and abandon her for months at a time, only returning to mooch off of her in some fashion, I am a liar. In the same way, I can say “I am a Christian.” But if I unrepentantly still do drugs, fornicate with women every weekend, lie, steal, and am cruel and mean to others, all on a consistent basis, I am a liar. As that same epistle says “even the demons believe and tremble.” Yet ultimately actions speak louder than words or merely acknowledging something on a purely intellectual level.
Yes, we are saved by grace through faith, and not of works so no one may boast, but don’t forget what comes immediately after that famous verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. – Ephesians 2:10
And don’t forget who is ultimately at work when we work:
So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. – Philippians 2:12-13
Martin Luther did and said some good things. He also did and said some terrible things. He is not infallible. His opinion on James is one area in which he falls short.
As someone who has spent his whole life in Orthodox churches, it’s without a doubt that the Orthodox have a works-oriented view of salvation.They do not believe in salvation by faith, as the Protestants do. Orthodox Christianity is highly ritual-oriented also. There are many aspects to Orthodox Christianity that are not even mentioned in the New Testament (praying to the Virgin Mary), or even forbidden by the New Testament (worshipping icons). Nonetheless, I attend the Orthodox Church with my family because of its positive aspects, including the emphasis on prayer, fasting and self-denial. Ultimately, my advice is to pursue the interpretation of Christianity that best suits your interpretation of the Bible. I think in the end, we will be quite surprised at who is in heaven. Certainly, there will be Christians of all denominations.
but the orthodox calls protestants “anathema” or “heretics” because they believe the bible!
its true prayer is important and so its fasting both are biblical but like you said they have gone the way of the pharisees adding stuff to christianity that should have never been there in the first place
praying to icons, meditating with beads, praying to saints….obviously something went wrong there when the apostles never taught any of these save by praying and fasting and abstaining from fornication and from blood (strangled) offered to idols
Your are a heretic and you know nothing of other faith traditions. Spoken like a true apostate evangelical.
We don’t pray to Saints. We pray through Saints. Its called intercession.
Icons are not idols. Where does it say not to (venerate) icons? Jesus came in body and in spirit, people saw him. If they saw him, why would we forbid Him as an icon? I don’t think Orthodox Christianity has works-based salvation. It is moreso that from our faith, we are inevitably called to do good works.
The icons that are frequently worshipped throughout Russia and Ukraine are of the canonized saints. To me, that is doubly dubious. Not only is the wooden portrait not of Jesus, but it is of a sinner determined by other sinners to be a special saint. In Ukraine (a country I am intimately familiar with), these wood icons are not merely venerated. They are worshippd as holy, without exaggeration. Crowds of thousands of people will gather at a particular church when it is announced that a particular icon is arriving from another city or country.
Go to the Pulpit & the Pen, or join with Steven Anderson.
Thank you, Roosh. As these writings have helped you, you sharing them helps others. I pray Lord God have mercy on you, may His will be done!
A top rabbi in Jerusalem is rebuked after saying Torah law prescribed the death penalty for gays, le$bians, feminist activists and Karens.
How do you all pray? Not praying for specifics is something I need improve on. This is why I like these two prayers from Saint Faustina. One of the hardest things to submit fully.
“O Jesus, stretched out upon the cross, I implore You, give me the grace of following faithfully the most holy will of Your Father in all things, always and everywhere. And when this will of God seems to me very harsh and difficult to fulfill, it is then I beg You, Jesus, may power and strength flow upon me from Your wounds, and may my lips keep repeating – Your will be done, O Lord (…) O most compassionate Jesus, grant me the grace to forget myself that I may live totally for souls, helping You in the work of salvation, according to the most holy will of Your Father…†(Diary, 1265)
“O Jesus, I want to live in the present moment, to live as if this were the last day of my life. I want to use every moment scrupulously for the greater glory of God, to use every circumstance for the benefit of my soul. I want to look upon everything from the point of view that nothing happens without the will of God. God of unfathomable mercy, embrace the whole world and pour Yourself out upon us through the merciful Heart of Jesus†(Diary, 1183).
https://www.rooshv.com/how-i-pray
you dont need a formula. just pray whats in your heart and God will listen to that
the only formula that is biblical is the Lord’s prayer
Some of us have a tough time getting started. Seeking a brother or sisters help is a good thing? Did you find Faith by only reading the Bible, or did you observe others who had been at it longer?
Thank you for this article Roosh!
Thank you for sharing – your site is one of the few bright spots on the internet, in my view.
B. Leviticus 20:10-16
16 If a woman approaches any animal and lies with it, you shall kill the woman and the animal; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.
The Bible commands thee to put the modern anti-male and dog-shagging feminist woman to death.
23 By the time Lot reached Zoar, the sun had risen over the land. 24 Then the Lord rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the Lord out of the heavens. 25 Thus he overthrew those cities and the entire plain, destroying all those living in the cities—and also the vegetation in the land. 26 But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.
27 Early the next morning Abraham got up and returned to the place where he had stood before the Lord. 28 He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, toward all the land of the plain, and he saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace.
29 So when God destroyed the cities of the plain, he remembered Abraham, and he brought Lot out of the catastrophe that overthrew the cities where Lot had lived.
Beautiful article. Living in the spiritual world beats the material world. No comparison. I’m glad you’re doing well!
Side note: Trump won. Can’t wait to watch his inauguration. You’re keeping the morale up with your awesome tweets. My mom is now following you. #momsforroosh 😄
Thanks for your writing, Roosh, it is helpful. May God bless you.
Since it seems that a lot of readers here are converts or “returners” to Christianity, often after similar pattern of stumbling like that of Roosh or myself, I wanted to ask two questions I’ve been struggling with.
After falling from faith in my teen years due to garbage arguments of New Atheists and effeminacy of priests in my parish, after years of “truth-seeking”, sin and desperation, by God’s grace all the roads (reason, heart, life events etc.) have been leading me back to God (my baptismal church is Roman Catholic) for these past few years. There is no doubt in my mind anymore when it comes to God’s existence, His providence and His love for us, and I hope I’m sincere when I say that I want to give each day of my life over to His will. What I’m still struggling, though, are two things, one of them fundamental:
1) J’.Q. Having read enough of Talmud and having studied enough of history and social engineering, I can’t seem to shake off that suspicious feeling when I read the Old Testament, small part of which reads like a glorious religious text, but the other part reads… like a racist, narcissistic political program of world domination – all that stuff about usury, jealousy, deception, killing, etc. does not gel with the notion of a wise and loving God to me and makes me suspicious. Has anyone struggled with this and can point me to some commentary on this?
2) Jesus Christ. I know that this is the core of the faith, but I still have trouble accepting it, I still refuse to believe without inserting my hand into the wound, so to speak. I see that the words and deeds of Jesus are true and righteous (as opposed to, say, those of Muhammad). What has brought you to accept Jesus? Is it historical evidence? Is it some mystical/personal feeling protestants talk about? While I continue to pray for discernment, any pointers on this question will be appreciated.
Be well.
1. The Old Testament is very hard to read. You will need to be guided through it. You have to view it as all things that God had to do and allow to prepare both the Jews and gentiles for Christ. These podcasts may help:
https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/hopko/reading_the_old_testament
https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/hopko/scandal_and_the_old_testament_part_1
https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/hopko/sex_lies_and_the_old_testament_part_2
https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/hopko/lies_and_deceipt_in_the_ot
https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/hopko/war_and_violence_in_the_ot
2. I did write about it here: https://www.rooshv.com/how-i-turned-to-god
Have you talked to an Orthodox priest? They can answer your questions much better than me.
If the book was titled something like “On Sanctification,” I would agree with 95 to 99% of it. Although the author eventually describes a more biblical form of acquiring the Holy Spirit near the end, for most of the book he mashes up the Holy Spirit with Sanctification in a manner that is not scriptural. I read a similar work by Innocent of Alaska titled “Indication of the Way into the Kingdom of Heaven,” which also describes the Holy Spirit in a parallel fashion.
The point is that the Holy Spirit is sealed within and dwells in you, making you a temple of God. When you sin, you grieve it, it convicts you and transforms you to conform to Christ’s image all the more if you obey. If the manner in which Innocent and Porphyrios describe the Holy Spirit were indeed how the Holy Spirit worked, your body would be a revolving door: the Holy Spirit perpetually going in and out of you as you sin and repent innumerable times a day.
I’m sorry, but no, the Holy Spirit and Grace are not some skittish cat that runs away as soon as it hears a loud noise.
I must apologize for this post. After reading the article and investigating the book, it led me on a path to reading through “On Acquiring the Holy Spirit.” I wanted to respond to that book, and for some reason, it was on my mind when posting this, and I did not realize until much later what I had done. I profusely apologize for the mistake I have made in posting the wrong response to the wrong book in a moment of rashness, and any confusion it may have caused.
This is Christianity from the point of view of a monk, who lives in social isolation. The beauty of Christianity is its diverse interpretations and demonations, that each have their own unique interpretation of a faith that has basic, common precepts. But the fact is that the Europeans would not have conquered America ascribing to this passive, pacifist view of Christianity. Nor would we have defeated Hitler. Nor would we have policemen using necessary brute force to maintain order in our violent cities. Nor would a married man be able to rein in his foolish, out-of-control wife. Nor would a father be able to spank his children on the rare occassion they need it. Every Christian has to interpret the Bible in his own way and walk the path of life that most conforms to his interpretation. For some, it’s being a monk. For others, it’s being a solider or police officer.
Judges 21:15b “…every man did what was right in his own eyes.”
That is what you describe. “The beauty of (Religion) is its diverse interpretations and demonations, that each have their own unique interpretation of a faith that has basic, common precepts.”
You describe perennialism and relativity. If A disagrees with B, then A is not B, and both cannot be true. How does one know which interpretation is true when they contradict each other?
The New Testament is full of contradictions. It doesn’t take away from the truth of Jesus. Certain verses are appiled to certain situations by different people and different ways. I don’t see anything wrong with that. The Bible doesn’t have to be scientific. The experience of God is full of contradictions. Anyone who has been married a long time understands this. There are times you have contempt for your wife, and other times you feel love for her. There are times you need to lead, and there are times where you have no choice but to let her lead.
imagine that they want anyone to be a monk!
not possible, God doesnt call everyone to be one. just be a repentant sinner and that’s enough
god put in each human the type of faith according to their capacity
the parable of the talents illustrates this point perfectly!
“You don’t become holy by fighting evil. Let evil be. Look towards Christ and that will save you.” There are many New Testament verses that contradict this view. And this runs entirely counter to the entire spirit of Western civilization and, by extension, Protestantism. This attitude clearly reflects the Eastern roots of Orthodox Christianity. Passivity is an eastern value. Eastern Europe. The Middle East. Asia.
Your analogy is totally agenda driven and without factual basis. It’s the western church that is feminized. Anthony Pouls wrote a great book on bridal mysticism that entered the western church in the high Middle Ages. I don’t get why Roosh V, who once advocated all this red pill macho Mumbai jumbo, has stood down and allowed evangelicals to incessantly post false propaganda. Step up Roosh, and boot them off, or join the calvinists over at the Pulpit and the Pen. Young evangelical men are fleeing feminized churches.
Evangelicalism is false and evil heresy!!!
only heretic here is YOU
YOU WHO WORSHIP IDOLS,PRAYS TO “THE SAINTS” AND ADD TO THE WORD OF GOD FOR SOMETHING THAT WAS PERFECT AND ENOUGH WHICH IS THE DEAD,BURIAL AND RESURRECTION OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST
WITHOUT FAITH IS IMPOSSIBLE TO PLEASE GOD
BECAUSE THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH!
As evangelicalism falls, so falls evangelicalism. The ancient church will remain steadfast long after evangelicalism is imploded and mostly gone.
WHAT ANCIENT CHURCH? IT HAS BEEN 2 000 YEARS OF CHRISTENDOM AND BOTH THE CATHOLIC AND ORTHODOX CAME TO BE WAYY AFTER THE APOSTLES DIED
BEING OLD DOESNT MEAN ANYTHING IF YOU GOT IT WRONG
Evangelical fallacies! Sola Scriptura and Sola Fide all unscriptural inventions of a rogue German monk. The ancient church flourished throughout Asia Minor and into Western Europe long before evangelicals ever walked the earth. 1,500 years of church history, and seven ecumenical councils, did not disappear after the deaths of the apostles, then resurfaced in Northern Europe 1,600 years later, or resurfaced in the 18th century revivalist movement, or today when one accepts Jesus Christ as his/her personal lord and savior, and now there’s a fire insurance policy, as the evangelicals falsely teach. All false evangelical heresies. All false! Millennial evangelicals are abandoning their faith and traditions and becoming NONES in droves, like from the Southern Baptists, or some are reinventing themselves and distancing themselves from the politicized, agenda based proselytizing, Jack Chick tracts, Steven Anderson, Pulpit and the Pen hateful and vile heresy, and hateful combativeness like is being exhibited in your post and the other blinded evangelicals that have rudely invaded a site not to their liking. I see few others going on evangelical posts and denouncing evangelicals. While entertainment based mega churches fall, and evangelicalism implodes further into emergent churches, the path left will be like what’s happened to liberal mainline Protestants. The First Amendment guarantees me the right to worship as I see fit. The Second amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear arms. I once feared progressive liberal Protestants as an infringement on these rights, but now I much more fear a theocracy from zealous fanatical evangelicals, and persecution as was seen in the 16th century catholic genocide by the Protestants in England. But for me, your words are flatulence in a whirlwind and big talk. I slug it out with oeople like you daily, and I’ve lived now well up into my 60s. I may well meet you on a field of battle one day, sir, but my knee shall never bow to false heretical evangelicalism.
“..now I much more fear a theocracy from zealous fanatical evangelicals, and persecution as was seen in the 16th century catholic genocide by the Protestants in England.”
“I may well meet you on a field of battle one day, sir, but my knee shall never bow to false heretical evangelicalism.”
Sir, with all due respect, if you believe this, you have not been paying attention. The trend has not been towards Evangelical theocratic persecution of Catholics, but rather a radical ecumenism between Evangelicals and Catholics that has also been catalyzing a Leftward/Modernistic drift for both parties (just look at the U.S. Supreme Court: almost all of the conservative justices are Catholic.)
I could write an essay on the various New Agey and occultic garbage making it’s way into Evangelicalism. However, if you think that Catholicism is a bulwark against this, or that all that has to be done is to get rid of Frank the Hippie Pope and all will go back to normal, you’re in for a rude awakening. The rot in your church is far deeper than just a Liberal Pope du jour.
For example: your church does indeed has good translations like the Douey-Rheims and the RSV-2CE, as well as Study Bibles like the Didache Study Bible, put out by Ignatius Press, that have a perspective of sincere faith and respect for the sacredness of scripture. But your church also puts out and endorses Bible translations like the NABRE, NRSV-CE, the three different Jerusalem Bibles, and even the Old Testament portion of the NCB, and Study Bibles, especially, the ironically titled “The Catholic Study Bible” put out by none other than Oxford University Press, that push forward Higher Textual Criticism. A direct attack on the divine inspiration and inerrancy of scripture.
Then there’s the speeches on climate change/global warming I’ve heard at Catholic School graduation ceremony. Upset students being told their gay friends are not going to Hell, because God made them that way, and He doesn’t make mistakes. The fact that individuals like James Martin have not been defrocked yet. Not to mention the latest version of the Nostra Aetate affirms that Jews can go to heaven without Jesus, Muslims worship the same God, and other questionable concessions that allow non-believers wiggle room into heaven (though they try to wave this away by saying these statements are “non-dogmatic”, even though they are clearly put out and endorsed by the church.
You could write about just as much damning rot in Evangelicalism and Orthodoxy. The bottom line, is that regardless of our doctrinal slap fights, someone or something clearly sees us all as a threat and is trying to take us out via infiltration and corruption.
It is not interdenominational warfare that you should fear. It is a coming false Anti-Christ unity that should give you pause and concern.
Interesting how with evangelicals there’s always triggered Ad hominem attacks. Go to the Pulpit & the Pen. More your style.
“In our missionary endeavor we need to employ a very delicate manner so that people accept what we are offering, whether it be words, books or whatever, without reacting negatively. And something else: use few words. Words often provoke irritation. Prayer and living example find resonance. Living faith moves people, regenerates them and changes them, whereas words alone remain fruitless. The best form of mission is through our good example, our love and our meekness.”
While I can understand where this line of thinking is coming from, the fact is, and this is from personal and second-hand experience as well, few words with mostly a focus on good character is not entirely in line with how Christianity spread. Yes, good character and example is good, important and biblical; but if you focus on it overmuch to the exclusion of words and apologetics, and especially preaching the Gospel, don’t be surprised if you’re not exactly converting people left and right.
A paraphrase of what an open-air preacher once said to a Christian who opposed his methodology, says it best. One time, said street evangelist was evangelizing to a crowd. He wasn’t being rude, arrogant, disrespectful, offensively provocative, or Westboro-esque in any fashion. He was simply preaching the Gospel and answering questions and objections, and this was enough to offend people and get some hecklers here and there. A young Christian approached him, and politely expressed his concern for his manner of winning converts, and espoused the same “win over people with our good example, love, meekness, etc.” In the Neo-Evangelical circles and such, this concept of trying to spread the gospel in a very indirect and passive way is often referred to as “planting seeds” or “lifestyle evangelism.”
The evangelist, basically said to the concerned young Christian: “I don’t have time to make friends. They could go to Hell tomorrow. You could spend 10 years building up a relationship with someone; being the nicest most exemplary friend you could possibly be. Even after all that, if you then proceed to tell them the plain and simple Gospel, there’s a good chance they’ll still walk away from you in seconds flat.”
Scripture also bears this out. You will not find a place in the Word of God which goes something like “And thus, the prophet/apostle/Jesus spent 5/10 years in a relationship with so and so. Only then, after establishing their trust, and being sure that they would not scare them off, did the prophet/apostle/Jesus finally tell them the Truth of God.” No. Whenever you see a prophet, an apostle or Jesus preaching the Word of God or the Gospel to someone, they cut to the chase fairly quickly and in a straight forward manner. Yes Jesus dined with the tax collectors, but he didn’t go bowling with them every Tuesday for weeks on end before telling them the Good news. And yes, when said figures preach the Truth of God, sometimes they win people over, but often times they suffer immensely for it. They made people uncomfortable, offended, angry, and yes: irritated. They even got attacked and killed. We are literally told to expect this. The entire book of Acts is a decisive repudiation of passive and indirect “lifestyle evangelism.” Roosh, your very site is a repudiation of this style of “evangelism.” Your articles aren’t inoffensively “planting seeds,” hoping they’ll take root later. You tell it like it is with no apologies.
Here’s a good video that outlines the flaws of “planting seeds”/”lifestyle evangelism” (and honestly how insane and self-defeating the concept of trying to get the Gospel to people, without actually preaching the Gospel, is.):
https://youtu.be/Su7Bz4OWMxc
Also keep in mind: Christianity does not have a monopoly on niceness and goodness of character. Yes, we have it in a more true Godly sense, but the average natural man is not going to be able to discern between a nice and pleasant Christian, and a nice and pleasant Mormon, or a nice and pleasant Buddhist, etc. What ultimately sets us apart is the Gospel and the Word of God, which never returns void; whether it wins souls or hardens hearts.
I was reading General George S. Patton’s speech to the third army and it totally sounds like Trump. He even looked like Trump!
I was an atheist and a nihilist until your transformation along with the pro God arguments of Peter Hitchens opened up my mind to Christianity. In truth as I am approaching 40 years of age I already felt empty inside after a lifetime following the idea that we are merely primates on a rock in the middle of nowhere and this is all a big accident and I was searching for something more before I came across your works. I had already turned against materialist culture and was looking for answers in philosophy.
So far my endeavours into Christianity have shown me that there is another choice which provides adherents with eternal love, support and comfort as opposed to the emptiness of Atheism.
My problem is that I have a left over Atheist feeling which tells me that in believing in God I would be engaging in self delusion in order to escape the perils of the human condition.
“My problem is that I have a left over Atheist feeling which tells me that in believing in God I would be engaging in self delusion in order to escape the perils of the human condition.”
That’s Satan trying to seduce you with pride. Quite a few Atheists derive a twisted sense of pride from believing that they are “better” than others because they have the “strength” to face the so-called “ugly truth” of the “meaninglessness and absurdity of life.” Yet more often than not, they’re just miserable people who try to kill time with hedonism or listless apathy.
Not only that, but the “ugly truth of Nihilism” does not bear up under scrutiny. Whether it be the fact that everything, from the perfect soccer kick, to the distance between stars can be calculated by a precise mathematical formula. Or the fact that for existence to have begun in the first place, the first unmoved mover absolutely had to be a personal being capable of making a choice, otherwise nothingness would logically persist:
https://youtu.be/hEgwp9z1978
Or the fact that if our mind was not designed, and we don’t have a soul but are just moist robots obeying our DNA programming and the electrical signals in our brains that all just kind’ve happened because reasons, it is impossible to trust anything we think (not to mention the whole freewill not existing at all part):
https://youtu.be/YBQjs41uabg
https://adam4d.com/naturalist-freethinker/
“The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.â€
― Werner Heisenberg
Thank you for your response. I will watch those videos.
Roosh, your content has brought light in a particularly dark time for me.
Thank you.
God bless.
âœï¸
Thank you for sharing your journey. It’s helpful and edifying.
Im so glad to hear thst u r a born again believer. I too accepted Christ’s forgiveness and mercy last year and now Im on a faith journey. To God be the glory!
Amen and Amen.
This is Arminianism and “free will” nonsense. There is no “good news” or grace in this gospel. Also, surrendering your will is a good way to be abused by others. You must have strong boundaries to resist and overcome all the evil in this world. Put on the full armor of God instead.
I think there’s a lot of good to be gleaned from this article. Though I must admit, besides what I have critiqued already, this one line from Roosh concerns me a bit:
“My salvation is in my hands based on what I do today.”
While we are indeed called to be participatory and not sit on the sidelines, ultimately it is God who is at work in us, and it is His finished work on the cross the saves us. Not our own efforts. Salvation is not in our own hands based on what we do, but rather in God’s hands based on our obedience:
“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” – John 14:15
Hi Roosh,
I am reading your blog and although the material is interesting, I am questioning whether your conversion to Christianity is legitimate or a temporary fad. As part of your repenting, have you considered refunding the money you charged for all your books and other materials on picking up and having sex with women? Wouldn’t that be the Christian thing to do?
Peter