Metropolitan Anthony (Pakanich) on how we can fight the schism.

People ask me: there are tens, or even hundreds of times more schismatic religious in the UOC. Why can’t we take back the temples we have seized?

Indeed, if we take into account the total strength of our Church, we could quickly return all the seized property to ourselves.

But what would be the cost of resolving this issue? How much would be the tears and the blood.

There are people who, because of their convictions, didn’t come to the true temple of God. Yes, they are wrong. But they are not our enemies.

Those who don’t understand us are not our enemies. They, like us, are citizens of our fatherland. And the Lord expects their admonition and return.

The Church protects the soul of every person, but above all, we must protect those people who are members of our Church.

The Gospel and the experience of the life of the Church show that only love can radically change a human.

No external forces, no matter what they are conditioned, are not able to make a human merciful, patient and loving. Only when a human feels Divine love, manifested most often through people, he/she becomes a religious.

In addition, history shows that temporary defeats are always the key to great victory.

Let us recall the state of society after the October Revolution of 1917. Then a small group of people came to power, and it would seem that it was worth the majority to organize and destroy all this.

But by Divine Providence a different fate was prepared for the Church. Yes, it was a very terrible period of devastation and death, betrayal and imprisonment. But this became, as a result, the pledge, the seed of the true revival of the Church of Christ.

The church is not strong when everything is colorful with us, in the glitter of gold and we are showing off on television. The church is strong when we are saved, when we are in an internal struggle with ourselves. Only then the Spirit of God dwells in us and we become the true temple of God, which no one can destroy. No one can take it away.

The Holy Apostle Paul writes: nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:39).

This must be achieved, this must be desired and everything must be done so that the temple of our soul is clean, filled with the grace of the Spirit of God.

Recorded by Natalia Goroshkova