St Silouan: On Love for One's Enemies

Icon of St Silouan (Sept 24)
by Fr Andrew Tregubov 

Today is the feast of St Silouan, who came to love and pray for the whole world, and whose teachings on loving our enemies present us with a great challenge.

The world does not understand what love is. But the saints, because they are united to Christ, do grasp the mystery of love. Even love for one's enemies.

We must love our brother, our neighbor, our enemy. Yet one cannot love evil itself, one cannot love falsehood, for to do so would be to affirm it, to say "Amen" to it, and thus to wrongly and mistakenly give it validity, power, enthronement in the hierarchy of values.

The saints understand this, the difference between loving my neighbor, the person right in front of me, and honoring what he stands for. I must love my neighbor, even if he is my enemy, even if he has dressed me in an orange jumpsuit and is sawing my head off with a serrated blade because of my love for Jesus Christ. "Father forgive him, for he knows not what he does!"

I must forgive him because what he does to me is evil. I cannot say that the evil is not evil. I cannot honor the evil, for by doing so I dishonor the good. I cannot honor the lie without dishonoring the Truth. But I can and must love and forgive the person himself.

The saints understand that we must stand for Truth. It was his confession of the Truth for which Jesus was condemned and crucified.

And the high priest stood up in the midst and asked Jesus, saying, �Do You answer nothing? What is it these men testify against You?� But He kept silent and answered nothing.
Again the high priest asked Him, saying to Him, �Are You the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?�
Jesus said, �I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.�
Then the high priest tore his clothes and said, �What further need do we have of witnesses? You have heard the blasphemy! What do you think?�
And they all condemned Him to be deserving of death.

� Mark 14:60-64 

Jesus said, "I AM." Ego Eimi, in this simplest statement, equating himself with "He Who Is." Jesus speaks the Truth for He is the Truth, and He cannot deny the Truth, for then He would be a liar. John presents this confession of Jesus in a different context, in Jesus' discussion with the Jews.

Jesus said to them, �If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; nor have I come of Myself, but He sent Me. Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me. Which of you convicts Me of sin? And if I tell the truth, why do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears God�s words; therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God.� [...]

Jesus answered, �If I honor Myself, My honor is nothing. It is My Father who honors Me, of whom you say that He is your God. Yet you have not known Him, but I know Him. And if I say, �I do not know Him,� I shall be a liar like you; but I do know Him and keep His word. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.�
Then the Jews said to Him, �You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?�
Jesus said to them, �Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.�
Then they took up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.

� John 8:42-47, 54-59

Now consider this powerful quote from Yuri Maximov, close friend and co-laborer with New Priest-Martyr Daniil Sysoev, who was killed by a Muslim group for showing the falsehood of Islam and converting 80 Muslims to Christ in the Orthodox Church:

Among those who call themselves Orthodox, I have met such strange people who say that Fr. Daniel should not preach to Muslims, that one must respect their religion, and that there is no benefit from his preaching. But Fr. Daniel thought, as did the Lord, the Apostles, and all the saints, that one must respect mistaken people but not their mistakes. Truth is one, that which contradicts and negates truth is a lie, and respect for a lie is contempt for the truth. (Source) 

My Muslim neighbor, even if he is my enemy and wishes to cut off my head, is still created in the image of God. Jesus died for him just as He did for me. I must love him, for, as St Silouan teaches, "Our brother is our life." But if I truly love him, will I not wish for him to know Jesus Christ and be saved from the spiritual deception and darkness of Islam? 

Yes! This is love, that we should wish for and pray for Muslims to have eternal life, "That they would know Thee, the only True God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent," for "there is no other name under heaven given by which we must be saved" (JN 17:3, ACTS 4:12).

Love AND Truth. This is the Way of Jesus Christ, the saints, and of St. Silouan. This is the Faith which can remove mountains. Lord help us to grow in such Love and Truth in Your Likeness!

From 'The Life and Teachings of Elder Siluan'
by Bishop Alexander (Mileant) and Natalia Bufius; Translated by Anatoly Shmelev:

Bishop Alexander, in his wonderful condensed work on St Silouan, relates the Saint's teaching:

"Our brother is our life," taught the Elder. Through Christ�s love all people are accepted as an indivisible part of our own personal eternal being. The commandment to love your neighbor as you would yourself, he begins to understand as something other than a mere ethical norm; in the word "as" he sees not an indication of the level, or measure, of love, but a sign of the ontological commonality of being. 

"The Father does not judge, but has given judgment to the Son... because He is the Son of man" (John 5:22-27). This Son of man, the Great Judge of the world, on Judgement Day will proclaim that "the one among the smallest of these" is Himself; in other words that the being of each individual is held in common with Him, and is included in His own personal being. All of humanity, "all of Adam," he has taken into himself and has suffered for all of Adam. 

After the experience of the torments of hell, after God�s admonition to "Keep his mind in hell," it became a habit of Elder Siluan to pray for the dead suffering in hell. But he prayed also for the living and for future generations. His prayer, which was not bound by temporal limits, erased any trace of the transient features of human life, and of enemies. 

He was given in the sorrow of the world to distinguish between those who experienced God and those who did not. It became unbearable for him to consider that people could languish in the depths of darkness. 

Once a hermit-monk said to him that "God would punish all atheists. They will burn in an eternal flame." It appeared to give this monk satisfaction that they would be punished by eternal fire. But Elder Siluan, with some worry, asked, "Tell me please, if you are placed in Heaven, and from there you see how others burn in hellish flames, would you remain detached?" "What can you do � it�s their own fault," countered the monk. The Elder, filled with sorrow, answered, "Love cannot accept that... Everyone must be prayed for."

Obviously, we can insert "Muslim" and "Jihadist" in the place of "Atheist" above, and the point is clear for us...

And indeed, he prayed for everyone; to pray only for himself became a foreign concept. All people are disposed to sin, and all are stripped of God�s glory (Romans 3:22). For Siluan, having been exposed to the glory of God and having been denied it, the very thought of such denial was too heavy to bear. His soul languished in the consciousness that people live without knowing God and His love, and he prayed with great prayer that the Lord through his inscrutable love should allow them to know Him. 

Till the end of his life, despite waning strength and sickness, Siluan continued to sleep for only brief spells. He had much time for individual prayer, and he remained in prayer constantly, changing its form to fit circumstances. He prayed especially strongly at night, before the matins. That was when he prayed for the living and the dead, for friends and enemies, for the entire world.

St Silouan himself writes as follows:

Christ prayed for those that crucified Him: "Father, count not this sin against them; they know not what they do." Archdeacon Stefan prayed for those who stoned him so that the Lord would not judge this sin against them. And so we, if we wish to retain grace, must pray for our enemies. 

If you do not find pity on a sinner who will suffer in flames, then you do not carry the grace of the Holy Spirit, but rather an evil spirit; and while you yet live, you must free yourself from his clutches through repentance. 

Whoever wishes to love the Lord must love his enemies and be without spite; then the Lord will give you to glorify Him day and night, and your mind will forget the world; and if it should return and remember, then it will pray diligently for the world. 

This is how the saints lived, for the Spirit of God taught their souls to pray for others. 

The Lord loves us greatly, despite our sins, as long as we seek humility and love our enemies. Whoever does not love his enemies cannot achieve peace, even if he were placed in Eden.

Bishop Alexander continues:

As wise and learned and fine-looking as a person may be, if he does not love his enemies, i.e. any other person, he cannot reach God. And the opposite is also true, however simple a person may be, and poor and ignorant, but if he carries within himself that love, then "he is with God and God is with him." The Elder maintained that it was impossible to love one�s enemies outside of the One True God. The carrier of such love is a participant in eternal life, and he carries within himself an undeniable witness of this. 

He is the abode of the Holy Spirit, and knows the Father and the Son through the Holy Spirit, knows them with a true and life-giving knowledge, and in the Holy Spirit he is a brother and friend of Jesus Christ, he is the son of God, and close to God in grace. 

The Lord condensed all the law and prophets into two brief commandments (Matthew 22:40). And during the last supper, before His path to death on the cross, said to the Apostles, "There is no greater love but that a man lay down his life for his friends," adding, "You are My friends... I call you friends because I have told you all that I have heard from My Father" (John 15:13-15). Thus in these few words was said everything. And without them all the laws, prophets, cultures, are nothing. 

In order to remain in the love of God, it is necessary that anger and "hate" be multiplied to their limits, but they must be directed at the sin that lives inside me, at the evil that acts within me, within me, not within my brother.

In the Akathist to St Silouan, we find praises for his teaching that we must love our enemies:

OIKOS IX 

Even the most eloquent of orators are unable to describe the power of thy love, O all wondrous father Silouan; for with tears thou didst thirst to extinguish all enmity and disorder among men and to reconcile everyone unto God, crying out to the Master of the world: �O Lord, I yearn to be Thine, and to crucify myself with Thee for the whole world, that all may be saved!� And to the brethren thou didst cry out: �My children, pray for thine enemies, for they are our brethren, our life; and only the devil is the enemy of peace.� And guided by thee toward brotherly love and love of mankind, we cry out to thee: 

Rejoice, thou who in thy goodness didst make thyself like Christ on Golgotha;
Rejoice, thou who didst crucify thyself for thine enemies, not through thy hands, but thy heart and soul!
Rejoice, thou who carest for thy neighbor and didst not lose the beauty of grace filled stillness;
Rejoice, thou who, loving thy neighbor, didst acquire the power of unceasing prayer!
Rejoice, thou who through fasting and prayer didst utterly deflect the darts of the evil one;
Rejoice, thou who hast taught us to overcome the evil wiles and machinations of the devil!
Rejoice, thou who, laboriously grinding thy flesh in the mill of Christ, like sacred grain, didst sweeten thy heart with prayer;
Rejoice, thou who with the bread of life didst abundantly feed the workmen of the garden of the Queen of heaven!
Rejoice, O father Silouan, inextinguishable burning of love in thy prayer for the world!

May the Lord draw us to Himself, and grant us His Grace through the Holy Spirit, so that we too may love our enemies, even as we reject that false religion which commands hatred, killing and destruction.

Time to tell the Truth about Islam

"Islamic radicals have a very good case that their version of Islam is truer to the original than the moderate version. The proper way to undermine their ideology/theology is not to cast doubts on their interpretation of Islam, but to cast doubts about the truth of Islam itself."

by William Kilpatrick, The Turning Point Project � August 30, 2015

The important thing about a religion, said C.S. Lewis, is not whether it makes one feel good, but whether it is true. This observation came to mind while reading a recent piece by Rev. James Schall, S.J., titled �Speaking Honestly about Islam.�

Schall suggests that we haven�t been telling the truth about Islam because to do so violates the feel-good principle that currently rules Western societies. According to the feel-good principle, self-esteem is the highest value. And therefore every person, culture, and religion has an inalienable right to feel good about oneself/itself.

People hew to the Islam-is-peace line because they don�t want to give offense and also because they don�t want to be accused of a hate crime. It�s a well-founded fear. In many Western societies, numerous individuals�and some of them very prominent individuals�have been put on trial for the crime of criticizing Islam: Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant in Canada, Geert Wilders in the Netherlands, Lars Hedegaard in Denmark, and Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff in Austria, to name a few. In several cases, the defendants were informed that truth was no defense. The accuracy of their criticism, they were told, was beside the point (the point being that they had said hurtful things).

Honesty is the best policy, according to the old maxim, but many Western governments have adopted a deliberate policy of prevarication in regard to Islam. Hardly a day goes by when some Western leader or other isn�t explaining away the latest jihad attack as having nothing to do with Islam.



It�s not that leaders are doing nothing about the problem of jihad. A number of European countries have belatedly launched deradicalization programs aimed at countering jihadist ideology. For example, UK Prime Minister David Cameron recently announced a five-year plan to defeat Islamic extremism.

The trouble with these programs is that they can�t let go of the lie. The central feature of most of these initiatives is the enlistment of moderate Muslims in a campaign to convince potential jihadists that Islam has nothing to do with jihad (or else to convince them that jihad, correctly understood, is nothing more than an interior spiritual struggle).

This puts the Muslim leaders who are willing to sign up for such campaigns in a difficult spot. They are in essence trying to defend a largely indefensible position. While it�s true that Islam can be practiced peacefully (and, thank God, that�s the way most Muslims practice it), that can only be done by ignoring some of Islam�s fundamental teachings. As Fr. Schall observes, �it is senseless to pretend that a jihadist vision is not found in the Qur�an.�

He continues:

What has to be faced by everyone is not the �violence� of Islam, but its truth. We may not �like� a jihadist view of the Qur�an. But we denigrate the dignity of ISIS and other violent strains in both Sunni and Shiite branches of Islam that clearly see that their interpretation of Islam has legitimate roots in the Qur�an, in Islamic history, and in the judgment of many authoritative commentators.

To some extent, Schall is playing the devil�s advocate. He does not really believe in the dignity of ISIS, but he does suggest that their beliefs are honest. What is the basic attraction that draws young men and women to Islamic movements? Schall replies that the main motivation is the perception that the Qur�an is true. Most jihadists wage jihad because they believe that is what Allah wants them to do.

Moderate Muslims and Cafeteria Catholics

A campaign based on the dubious notion that Allah does not command jihad is a hard sell. Both sides�the moderates and the radicals�can quote scripture to defend their positions, but the jihadists seem to be able to quote it much more extensively and convincingly. Many of the moderates are akin to cafeteria Catholics. They have a family or cultural attachment to Islam, but they don�t have a thorough knowledge of their faith, or any great desire to follow all its commands. They have a more Westernized and subjective understanding of Islam than their fundamentalist brethren, and are inclined to say things like �That�s not my Islam� when condemning jihadist violence.

In other words, for some moderate Muslims, Islam is more of a personalized construct�a religion made in the image of their own subjective inclinations. The comparison to cafeteria Catholics is useful because it helps us to better understand the relation of the moderate Muslim to his religion. The liberal Catholic is accepting of abortion and same-sex marriage and so he is convinced that the Church will eventually come around to the same position. The truly moderate Muslim would never resort to violence and so he convinces himself that his religion must therefore be a religion of peace. In short, the moderate Muslim adheres to what author Stephen Kirby calls �fantasy Islam.�

Because it�s based in fantasy, the whole effort to convince jihadists and would-be jihadists that Islam is a religion of peace seems doomed to failure. Granted, many Western leaders don�t really believe what they�re saying and look upon their anti-radicalization projects merely from a pragmatic point of view. But even looked at from a purely practical standpoint, it�s doubtful that a strategy based on such a massive lie can succeed.

Muslim leaders, of course, are caught in a bind on this issue. On the one hand, they need to please their Western hosts; on the other hand, they can�t afford to repudiate large parts of Islamic scripture and tradition. But Western leaders and opinion-makers have fewer constraints. They might consider telling the truth for a change. It might prove in the long run to be a much better strategy than the current self-defeating one. Islamic radicals have a very good case that their version of Islam is truer to the original than the moderate version. The proper way to undermine their ideology/theology is not to cast doubts on their interpretation of Islam, but to cast doubts about the truth of Islam itself.

That may seem like an impossible undertaking, but one thing that works in favor of the truth-telling strategy is that, despite their violence, many jihadists do seem to be truth-seekers. There is abundant evidence from their letters, diaries, blogs, Facebook pages, and last testament videos that they believe they have discovered what God truly wants them to do. For this reason, they may be more likely candidates for conversion to a higher truth than many a lukewarm Muslim.

The Turning Point Project is dedicated to educating Catholics and other Americans about the threat from Islam by arming them with the information and analysis necessary to meet the challenge.  Learn more here...

This article originally appeared in the August 30, 2015 edition of National Catholic Register.

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