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Monastic life

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Monasticism

The innermost spiritual sense of Orthodox Monasticism is revealed in joyful mourning. This paradoxical phrase denotes a spiritual state in which a monk in his prayer grieves for the sins of the world and at the same time experiences the regenerating spiritual joy of Christ's forgiveness and resurrection. A monk dies in order to live, he forgets himself in order to find his real self in God, he becomes ignorant of worldly knowledge in order to attain real spiritual wisdom which is given only to the humble ones. (Ed.)

With the development of monasticism in the Church there appeared a peculiar way of life, which however did not proclaim a new morality. The Church does not have one set of moral rules for the laity and another for monks, nor does it divide the faithful into classes according to their obligations towards God. The Christian life is the same for everyone. Next...
 

Emily Dickinson

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Poems by Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

THESE ARE THE DAYS WHEN BIRDS COME BACK

THESE are the days when birds come back,
A very few, a bird or two,
To take a backward look.
 
These are the days when skies put on
The old, old sophistries of June,--
A blue and gold mistake.
 
Oh, fraud that cannot cheat the bee,
Almost thy plausibility
Induces my belief,
 
Till ranks of seeds their witness bear,
And softly through the altered air
Hurries a timid leaf!
 
Oh, sacrament of summer days,
Oh, last communion in the haze,
Permit a child to join,
 
Thy sacred emblems to partake,
Thy consecrated bread to break,
Taste thine immortal wine!                  Next...