Priest Pavel Serzhantov | January 23, 2025
As a priest, this is not the
first time I have encountered an astonishing phenomenon. For example, a woman
who has worked at the church for many years approaches me with a question:
“May I submit commemoration slips
for the repose of my father? I was told very emphatically that, since my father
drank and died without repentance, no commemoration slips whatsoever may be
submitted for him.”
For years, she had been
submitting commemoration slips in the hope that this was a beneficial
intercession by the Church for her unfortunate father, that intercession at the
Liturgy meant more than her prayers at home for her parent… And now someone had
shaken her confidence with an “irrefutable” argument:
“Your father lived in
drunkenness. That was his choice. He never turned to God before his death and
did not receive the Church’s ministrations before his repose. Therefore, you
have no right to include his name on a commemoration slip. We should not pretend
that he was a churchgoing person.”
Logical? Logical… but there is
something flawed in this reasoning.
There is a certain logic and
lawfulness here, but no love. There is justice, but a lack of understanding
that God is above justice. And so we end up with a kind of flawed reasoning.
Christianity is the religion of love. If love is lacking in Christian reasoning,
that is a serious problem. This needs to be examined. After all, the Pharisees
had similar reasoning: strict and firmly held notions of the Law of God, but a
limited understanding of God’s mercy. The Apostle Paul, who himself came from a
Pharisaic background, struggled against this ancient failing: “For Christ is
the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Rom.
10:4–6).
If we believe in Christ, then we
recognize that legalism does not make a person righteous. Only the love of
Christ gives every sinner hope for the forgiveness of all sins. And this love
reasons differently, not in a legalistic manner. I remember how elderly priests
used to instruct us:
“It is better to show mercy and
be mistaken than to fail to show mercy and be mistaken.”
These words were once spoken by
Archpriest Valentin Radugin, [1] but he was not the only one who followed such
a principle in life. Love and mercy are above legalism. Even in Old Testament
times, this understanding of God and His people was known. That is why Christ
says to those who adhere strictly to the Law: “Go ye and learn what that
meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice” (Matt. 9:13).
Where are we to learn this? In
the Book of the Prophet Hosea, God says: “For I desired mercy (חֶסֶד), and
not sacrifice” (Hos. 6:6). Biblical scholars in various countries have
discussed at length how difficult it is to translate the word חֶסֶד (hesed).
Translating it into Russian is not particularly difficult, unlike translating
it into certain other languages. The Russian concept of “love” has the meanings
of “mercy” and “compassion” firmly embedded in it. This is how peasants
understood love: “If someone has compassion for you, it means he loves you.”
The Lord desires mercy-compassion-love toward our neighbor, not sacrifice—that
is, merely fulfilling a clearly defined set of obligations based on justice
toward God and our neighbor. According to the legalists of all nations and all
ages, “The law is harsh, but it is the law” (Dura lex, sed lex). But
priests who served during the painful years of persecution knew something
different from their own experience: we must not be heartless legalists; we should
not impose the strictest demands on parishioners and occasional visitors to the
church and, if they fail to meet those demands, drive them out of the church
without mercy.
…Let me also cite an
authoritative and convincing statement. St. Theophan the Recluse writes to
Archimandrite Macarius (Sushkin):
“You ask about commemorating
sinners who remain in sin and do not abandon it. I think there is no harm in
commemorating them, and you should do so without the slightest hesitation. The
Lord came to save not the righteous, but sinners. And prayer to Him on their
behalf is pleasing to Him. Prayer… also draws the very person for whom prayers
are offered toward prayer and repentance, acting upon the soul through the
sympathy between souls.” [2]
Someone might object: “Your
reference is not relevant here, because St. Theophan is speaking not about the
dead, but about the living.” I agree, but let us consider carefully the
reasoning behind his spiritual counsel. The Saint writes about those who live
in sin and do not abandon it. By sin, he clearly means not some minor failing
in the spiritual life, but a sin systematically repeated and firmly entrenched
in a person’s way of life—that is, a grave sin. To put it plainly, mortal sins
fall into this category. Such a person is alive in body, but his soul is
already dead, because his spiritual life has been destroyed by sin. From a
worldly perspective, he is a living person. From a spiritual perspective, he is
dead. It was about such people that the Saviour spoke those fearful words: “Let
the dead bury their dead” (Luke 9:60). Thus, it turns out that there are
people who, though alive, are as good as dead. Therefore, the words of St.
Theophan concerning commemoration for the health of the living could also be
applied to commemoration for the repose of the departed.
What does the Saint write? There
is no harm in commemorating sinners who have not abandoned their sins. This is
his firm conviction, indeed his advice (“do so without the slightest
hesitation”), and not merely the Saint’s private opinion. But how can this be?
After all, it would seem dangerous for a pious person to associate closely with
sinners. The Pharisees reproached Christ because He did not shun sinners who
had defiled themselves with grave sins. Yet He came to save not the
self-righteous “righteous,” but sinners. The legalists of old sincerely
regarded themselves as righteous men (tzaddikim) and sages (hakhamim).
They were not ashamed to call themselves by these titles and gladly accepted
them from others. All this sprang from vainglory. The subtle and grave passion
of vainglory drives a person to perform acts of piety and adopt an “especially
pious” way of life. The thought of his own piety delights the Pharisee’s heart.
All that remains for the Pharisee is to add acts of ostentatious piety to this
self-satisfaction, and he can enjoy a daily dose of sweet flattery from those
who notice his devoutness and praise him for it.
Yes, intercessory prayer is
pleasing to the Lord—not only prayer for those who are active members of the
Church, but also for hardened sinners. Such is the conviction of St. Theophan.
And the Saint believes that such prayer will not bring misfortune upon the
person offering it. Incidentally, I have heard it said many times that it is
dangerous to pray for an unrepentant sinner—one may get into trouble, and
demons may attack. Moreover, this was presented as spiritual discernment based
on experience, rather than mere speculation. I believe that one can indeed get
into trouble—but only if one offers intercessory prayer for a sinner with a
sense of spiritual superiority over him: “I am praying him into salvation.”
Sometimes there is even an underlying conviction: “I have already prayed myself
into salvation, and now I am praying my father into salvation.” In other words,
once again, it is vainglory and conceit that bring misfortune and expose a
person to danger, not intercessory prayer itself.
We have now come to the
mysterious words of St. Theophan. He says at the end:
“Prayer… also draws the very
person for whom prayers are offered toward prayer and repentance, acting upon
the soul through the sympathy between souls.”
Only the general meaning of these
words is perfectly clear: prayer draws down God’s mercy upon the sinner and
upon the person praying for him. Through such prayer and God’s mercy, the
sinner may come to repentance and begin to pray. Apparently, the person about
whom Fr. Macarius wrote to St. Theophan had ceased praying to God and was
living in sin without repentance. What is mysterious here is the expression
“sympathy between souls.” What does it mean? Apparently, it refers to some
immaterial connection between one person and another: what one person
experiences and feels is, to some extent, communicated to the other. As a
result, even the obstinate sinner, in time, begins to experience and feel an
attraction toward prayer and repentance.
In the history of the Church,
there are known examples of such intercessory prayer rising to extraordinary
heights of boldness before God, while remaining humble. One striking example
was given by Venerable Silouan the Athonite. He lived at a time when persecutions
of the Russian Church had already begun, and some of his fellow Athonite monks
refused to commemorate the godless persecutors in their prayers. During those
years, Elder Silouan would recount an example from the lives of the saints:
“Venerable Paisios the Great
prayed for his disciple, who had denied Christ and married a Jewish woman,
asking the Lord to forgive him. And the Lord was so pleased with this prayer
that He Himself wished to console His servant, and appeared to him and said:
‘Paisios, why do you pray for one who has denied Me?’ But Paisios replied:
‘Lord, Thou art merciful; forgive him.’ Then the Lord said: ‘O Paisios, thou
hast become like Me in thy love.’ So pleasing to the Lord is prayer for one's
enemies.”
Wondrous and glorious is our Lord
Jesus Christ!
Intercessory prayer is needed by
those who “live ungodly lives,” in sin—and members of the Church have always
prayed and continue to pray for them. We ourselves also need intercessory
prayer: in the future, someone will commemorate us without attempting to
anticipate God's judgment or condemning us to eternal torments. In our present,
everyday life, intercessory prayer raises the Christian's soul step by step in
love for God and neighbor. Those who understand this look for opportunities, or
ways, to offer prayer for a sinner and to persevere in interceding for him.
Those who do not understand it look for reasons to refrain from such prayer.
Should we refrain?
NOTES
1. See the
article about Archpriest Valentin Radugin published on our website: https://pravoslavie.ru/121201.html
2. Archimandrite
Macarius was the abbot of the Russian Monastery of St. Panteleimon on Mount
Athos. St. Theophan’s letter to him is dated August 20, 1888. It was first
published two years ago, and the original letter is preserved in the archives
of the Russian Monastery of St. Panteleimon on Mount Athos. See: Chronicle
of the Life and Writings of St. Theophan, Recluse of Vysha, 1815–1894, in 6
volumes, Vol. V: 1879–1888. Moscow: Publishing House of the Moscow Patriarchate
of the Russian Orthodox Church, 2022, pp. 883–884.
Original Russian
source: https://pravoslavie.ru/166618.html
Greek
translation: https://entoytwnika1.blogspot.com/2026/10/blog-post_17.html
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