Vessel of Grace: The Life of Saint Paisios the Athonite

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I'm glad this documentary has a good hook, it's what got me to watch the whole thing. Like the guy is fighting voices of the devil telling him to jump off a cliff in the first minute... this might be good...

👍︎︎ 2 👤︎︎ u/UpstairsTeacher 📅︎︎ Jul 11 2020 🗫︎ replies
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Amidst the arid heat and craggy rocks  of the wilderness, a thirty-eight year   old monk sits alone on the edge of deep  ravine when suddenly the devil speaks: “Jump, Paisos — I promise  you won’t get hurt at all.” The monk remains silent, the  tempter does not. Suddenly,   the monk grabs a stone and throws it over  the edge, to which the devil replies: “Even Christ didn’t give an answer  like that. Your’s was better!” “Christ is God,” replies the monk. “Not a  clown like me. ‘Get thee behind me Satan.’” Such was the life of Elder Paisios in the Sinai  Desert, bouts of intense unseen warfare soothed   by visitations of divine grace beyond description.  When we ask, “Who was Elder Paisios?”, his life   on Sinai provides perhaps the best answer.  Paisios had yearned for a life of stillness   and after many years of hearing the call he found  himself living like the desert fathers of old. He lived in poverty and simplicity in  a hermitage high upon the mountain. He   carved icons of the Prophet Moses while  saying the Jesus Prayer. The money earned   from such work he turned into gifts for the  Bedouins — sandals and hats for the children,   clothing and other items for  all those who were in need. On the outside, such great simplicity, and yet  within a constant struggle with the evil one,   much like what he endured the first  two weeks alone at his hermitage: “What I went through up there for fifteen  days, struggling with the tempter — it   defies description, you can’t even imagine! He was  constantly telling me to go down to the monastery,   to see people and visit with them to  be consoled. I’ll just tell you one   thing. For fifteen days, I felt  like I was nailed to the Cross.” And yet the fruit of this struggle  were visitations of divine grace,   much like the one he experienced  on Mount Athos ten years prior: “One night, as I was standing there praying, I  felt something come down from above and totally   encompass me. I felt such joy and exaltation as  my eyes shed tears like water gushing from two   faucets. I physically saw grace and felt it.  Before that, I had many moving experiences,   but this was the first time that something like  this had happened to me. The experience was so   intense and powerful that it supported  me and kept me going for ten years,   until on Sinai, I experienced even  greater states in a different way.” Paisios lived in ceaseless prayer on Sinai,   alone and yet conversing with God for  two years. He shared very little of this   experience. But what could he say really,  other than this, with much simplicity: “I feel,” he said, “something arising  within me like the sweetness of the dawn.” Paisios wished to remain on Sinai the rest  of his life. Yet not many years later he   would be back on Mount Athos encountering  streams of pilgrims who journeyed to his   cell for wisdom and healing. From  his youth he longed to be a monk,   to live in solitude as he was now doing  on Sinai. Was it health problems alone   that caused his return to Athos or did God  have something else in mind for Paisios? From the start, history and the prophetic word  of a saintly elder greatly influenced the life   of Saint Paisios. He entered the world on  July 25th, 1924 in the village of Farasa in   Cappadocia of Asia Minor. His parents prepared  him for an early baptism due to the forthcoming   exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey.  The priest-monk Arsenios — who a year prior had   foreseen the coming exchange — requested that  all unbaptized children of Farasa receive the   sacrament before undertaking such a dangerous  journey. When Paisios’ parents brought him forth,   they declared that they wanted to name him  after his grandfather. Arsenios replied,   “It is right for you to want to leave a boy  behind to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps,   but don’t I want to leave a monk behind  to follow in mine?" He turned to the   godmother and said, "Arsenios  is the name you will give him.” He also inherited the strong character and  rich spiritual tradition of the Christians   of Cappadocia. Their long history can  still be seen in the underground caves   and churches of Κόραμα Valley and can also be  witnessed through the lives of the Cappadocian   Fathers. Even after the fall of Constantinople  in 1453, many martyrs and saints -- like Saint   Arsenios -- came forth from Cappadocia to inspire  and lead the Christians who were living under the   harsh yoke of the Ottoman Turks. Now, just  as Paisios entered the world, his family and   all the Christians of the region were being  uprooted from their homes and possessions. Years prior, just after the end of the First World  War and amidst the ruins of the Ottoman Empire,   a savage war erupted between Greece and the  Turkish Nationalist Movement under the command   of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Many died on both  sides -- including millions of Greek, Armenian,   and Assyrian Christians who were subject  to Turkish ethnic and religious cleansing. The Orthodox Christians that remained in Asia  Minor at war’s end were subject to the 1923   Treaty of Lausanne which made provision for  an exchange of population along religious   lines. Over one and a half million Orthodox  Christians -- including those in Farasa -- were   subject to a compulsory move to Greece in  exchange for a half a million Muslims. One   villager worried that they would have to leave  immediately, to which Arsenios replied, "Don’t   worry. Keep on with what you’re doing, because  there’s another year to go.” He also added,   “When we do arrive in Greece, I will live  for forty days before dying on an island.” One year later, soon after the baptism of  Paisios, the people of Farasa embarked on   the perilous journey to Greece. Elder Paisios  later wrote of how the presence of Saint Arsenios   brought great comfort: ”One can see that while  being in the midst of that human abandonment,   on the road of hardships, holy Father Arsenios  was also united with God and continually   dispensing Divine Grace, making those around  him feel the presence of a divine security." Many arrived in Greece safely and forty days  after, just as Saint Arsenios had foreseen,   he reposed on the island of Kerkyra. Though  an infant at the time, Elder Paisios always   remained sensitive to the plight of refugees  for the rest of his life. But even more so,   the life of Saint Arsenios  had a profound effect on him. "I am deeply indebted to Father  Arsenios" he later wrote,   "both for the name he gave me together with  his holy prayers at the baptismal font,   as well as for the few books of his, on  which I was later weaned as a young boy." Elder Paisios would later write  the biography of Saint Arsenios. The family of young Arsenios settled in  the town of Konitsa in Epiros. It didn’t   take long for Arsenios to begin following in the  footsteps of his namesake. He climbed mountains,   entered caves, always searching for places of  silence where he could fast and pray. For a trade,   he became an apprentice to a master carpenter.  Yet his mind remained always on spiritual things: “From the age of eleven, I read  the lives of the saints, fasted,   and kept vigil. My older brother  would take the books and hide them,   but that didn’t stop me. I would just go  into the forest and keep reading there.” He unwittingly impressed everyone he encountered  due to his reverence and peacefulness. As one   friend remembered him, “He had lively,   expressive eyes, which were so bright  that people called him ‘firefly.'" An important moment in his early spiritual life  came when his friend Costas challenged him with   Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. Shaken by his  friend’s argument that Christ may have been   a righteous and virtuous man but that He was not  God, Arsenios went into the woods and prayed for   God to reveal Himself. After hours of prayer  and prostrations, he collapsed and thought: “Well, even if Jesus were only a righteous  and virtuous man, He deserves my love and   obedience and self-sacrifice. I don’t  want paradise — I don’t want anything.   It is worth making every sacrifice for  the sake of His holiness and kindness.” Just then, with such a humble thought,  Christ appeared to him and said,   “I am the Resurrection, and the life: he  that believes in Me, though he were dead,   yet he shall live.” All his doubt about Christ  being fully God, fully man now disappeared   as through grace he was given to know and see  Christ. The encounter strengthened his faith,   to which he thought, “Come back now, Costas,  if you want to, and we’ll have a talk.” Arsenios now looked forward to  the monastic life with greater   zeal. He visited the chancellor of the  metropolitan of Ioannina to see if he   could become a monk at age fifteen but  was told that he was still too young. Arsenios spent his remaining teens and  early twenties during a tumultuous time   in the history of Greece. On Oct. 28th,  1940, Greece entered the Second World War   when the Italians invaded their country.  A half year later the Germans invaded and   occupied Greece. Over 400,000 Greeks  died during the war, mostly civilians. Soon after the defeat of the Axis powers,  communist insurgents waged a three year   civil war against government forces. Arsenios  entered military service on the side of the Greek   government on April 20th, 1948. He was 23 years  old and served as a radio operator. He worried   about having to kill someone and so just prior to  enlisting he made a vow to the Mother of God: “Let   me suffer, let me be in danger, only don’t let me  kill anyone; and make me worthy to become a monk.”   In return, he vowed to restore the monastery  at Stomio which the Nazis had burned down. He sacrificed for other soldiers — taking the  place of married men on dangerous missions and   volunteering to serve when others needed time  for leave. He displayed extraordinary goodwill   despite harsh circumstances, always  prayerfully and with his mind on God.   His fellow soldiers at first thought him odd but  came to love him. Once, with his unit surrounded,   Arsenios stood wrapt in prayer as bullets whizzed  past him. His friends watched in amazement. Soon,   air support came and relived their position.  Arsenios would later use this incident and   his time as a radio operator as  an example of the monastic life:   “Monks are the church’s signalman. When they  make contact with God through prayer, then God   comes and helps even more.” Arsenios received  his honorable discharge on March 21, 1950. After the war, Arsenios prepared for the  monastic life. He journeyed to Mount Athos   and visited the many hermitages, sketes, and  cells in search of an elder that could teach   him the life of stillness or hesychia, the way  of inner prayer that leads to an experiential   knowledge of and union with God. He was, as his  biographer Hieromonk Isaac called him, “like a   bee darting to fragrant flowers, Arsenios would  rush anywhere he heard there were virtuous monks.” But Arsenios’ first encounters disappointed  him. So he departed for the Skete of Saint Anne,   only to take a wrong turn and instead head  toward the peak of Mount Athos. Suddenly,   an elderly anchorite with a radiant face and  ragged habit appeared before him. “My child,   this is not the path to Saint Anne’s,” he said  before Arsenios even uttered a word. “Where do   you live, elder?” asked Arsenios. “Somewhere round  there,” he replied, pointing to the peak, before   disappearing. The encounter with this luminous  and unknown anchorite greatly impressed Arsenios: Thoughts filled my mind and so  I related the incident to some   experienced elder who told me:  ‘That would have been one of   the righteous anchorites who live  invisibly at the peak of Athos!’” Arsenios didn’t find exactly what he was searching  for on his first visit to the Holy Mountain,   but the experience deepened his  desire to live the monastic life. He returned home to help his father and to provide  for his sisters. But after some time and through   intense prayer seeking God’s will, he once again  journeyed to the Holy Mountain, this time to stay. Arsenios learned from his first visit that he  needed to sprout spiritual wings before living   a solitary life. So he went to the Monastery  of Esphigmenou, a cenobitic monastery where   monks lived in a community under a set of  rules established by the ruling abbot. He   worked in the bakery, chapel, and as a carpenter.  Striving to be a good monk, he learned through   observation. As one monk later said of him,  “He made humble-mindedness and obedience the   foundation of his monastic life and gave himself  over to struggles that reached beyond his limits.” “You know," Paisios later explained to younger  monks, "the whole essence — the secret — of   monastic life is in obedience: cutting off  your will…. then the grace of God comes.” The early work of repentance for a monk is a  time of intense spiritual warfare. Arsenios   battled against his own fallen nature, against  demons, and even the devil himself … of whom   he would only refer to as “the little  trouble maker”and other such names. He   struggled to separate himself from the world  and to purify himself of the passions. This   work of repentance and contrition he  regarded as the chief work of a monk. He would pray and read the lives of the saints,   and especially the Ascetical Homilies of  St. Isaac the Syrian. During this struggle   he advanced from novice to the intermediate  stage in the monastic life, being tonsured   a rasophore monk on March 27, 1954 and given  the name “Averkios” at the age of twenty-nine. Averkios met many grace  filled elders and ascetics,   as he later recorded in his book Athonite  Fathers and Athonite Matters. In all of this,   one can now see how God was preparing Averkios  for his mission to the world. Yet he still   longed for a life of solitude and stillness and  received a blessing to depart in search of it. Averkios' spiritual wings were still sprouting,  so he settled in the monastery of Philotheou,   at that time an idiorhythmic monastery where  the monks lived according to their own rule   of life but came together for the divine  services. As one monk later said, “He was   an exemplary monk — a hard struggler and a great  faster, who made prostrations like a machine gun   shoots bullets.” As another fondly recalled, “His  meekness, kindness, and peaceful character made an   impression on all of the fathers at Philotheou.  During his entire stay there, he never once had   a misunderstanding with the other fathers. He  brought peace to us all, affecting everyone with   his way of life, his character, and his impeccable  behavior toward the fathers. He was ready to   help anyone and everyone. Elder Evdokimos would  point to him and say, ‘Now he’s a good monk.’” Averkios was tonsured into the small schema — the  next stage in the monastic life — on March 3, 1957   and given the name Paisios. Having experienced  the cenobitic and the idiorhythmic life,   he now hoped to experience the solitary  life. But when he sought counsel in prayer   the Theotokos reminded him of the vow he made  before entering the military and directed him   instead to the monastery of Stomio in Konitsa.  He retuned home and for three years labored   at restoring the monastery. He continued in  strict asceticism but also had to deal with   visitors. He did much to help orphans and  the poor, and battled against heretics who   were trying to influence the people. He also  directed the transfer of the relics of Saint   Arsenios from Kerkyra to Konitsa in 1958.  In 1970 they would be transferred to the   Monastery of St. John the Theologian in Sourti,  near Thessaloniki where they remain to this day. The people of Konitsa loved Paisios and urged  him to stay. But his longing for the desert — for   solitude and stillness — finally prevailed once  he completed the restoration of the monastery. “The demon often troubles me, even though I have  drive my flesh to exhaustion,” wrote Paisios in a   letter while on Mount Sinai. This during a week  of intense spiritual warfare where the tempter   troubled Paisios even to the end of the week and  through the divine liturgy on the Holy Summit. “I am grateful to God that He has preserved me —  the battle was so intense.  After this struggle,   the good God — for He has spared me —  deemed me worthy to receive communion   on the Holy Summit.  All that day after  communion, I experienced such joy that   I cannot describe.  I was scattered into  dust from God’s great love and felt His   presence near me.  That is why the enemy, the  devil, had led this intense battle against me,   desiring to deprive me of this spiritual  rejoicing that gave me strength for a long time." Throughout his life, Paisios yearned  for a place of solitude where he   could alone encounter God. This desire to  depart to the desert became reality when   he journeyed to Mount Sinai to live  as a hermit in the Autumn of 1962.   He stayed in the ascetic hermitage  of Saints Galactic and Episteme and,   where he once needed to sprout spiritual wings,  he now soared like an eagle. As he later wrote, “When one departs for the desert, away  from the world and material things,   his heart immediately gathers close to God and,   then, the heart no longer has heartfelt  desires for anything else besides God.” But just as his spirit soared, his  physical body weakened and life long   health problems prompted a return to Mount Athos. Returning to the Holy Mountain, Paisios  settled at the Hermitage of the Archangels,   part of Iveron Monastery, in May of 1964.  Even here the fruit of the desert did not   depart him. He also spent time with elder  Tikhon, his beloved spiritual father who had   came to Mount Athos from Russia in 1908  at the age of 24. On January 11, 1966,   Paisios received the great and angelic schema from  Elder Tikhon at the Hermitage of the Holy Cross. Later the same year, Paisios had  part of his lungs removed. It was   during this time of hospitalization that  he began a long friendship with the young   sisterhood of St. John the Theologian in  Souroti, just outside of Thessaloniki.   The sisters donated blood to which  Paisios was most grateful. He later   contributed materially and spiritually  to their effort to build a monastery. Elder Paisios also found time to dwell in  remote Katounakia, a group of cells on the   rugged and remote southern side of the Athonite  peninsula. At this time, pilgrims began actively   seeking him out and were thoroughly changed by  the encounter. Like the seminary student whose   unbearable problem found immediate relief  through the Elder’s simple advice. As the   student later recalled, “I left full of joy,  convinced that there was a path opening for   me on the horizon. The Elder’s intervention  decisively affected the rest of my life.” At Katounakia, Paisios continued to experience  divine visitations. As he later recalled, “Once,   as I was saying the Jesus prayer in the middle  of the night, great joy welled up within me.   I continued to say the prayer, and suddenly my  entire cell was filed with light. It was white   with a slight tint of light-blue. My heart beat  sweetly. I continued to say the prayer with the   prayer-rope until the sun came up. The light was  so bright! It was brighter than the light of the   sun — the sunshine was nothing in comparison. I  looked at the sun and its light seemed washed-out   to me, like the light of the full moon. I  saw the light for quite awhile. Afterward,   when the light dissipated, and the grace with it,  I couldn’t find any consolation or joy anywhere.   I had fallen from a higher state to a lower  one, so I looked at myself like an animal.” Paisios dwelled now on the heights of theoria —  seeing God’s uncreated light active in the world   around him. Though he continued to struggle with  his physical health, he was fully illumined by   the grace of God and lived as a vessel from which  others could benefit physically and spiritually. Like Theodore from Xanthi, Greece, who began  losing weight and felt greatly fatigued due   to a viral infection. He wrote a letter to the  elder to ask for advice on whether he should seek   special treatment or trust in the providence of  God and his local doctors. Theodore's condition   worsened the next day so he entered the  clinic. After four days of intense pain   his doctors found him collapsed on the floor. But,  as Theodore recalls, things changed a day later: "On Sunday morning I woke up and felt an  indescribable strength in body and soul.   'Yesterday, the doctor told me, 'you were in  awful shape.... I can't explain it at all.’ Theodore fully recovered and several months  later visited Elder Paisios. "How are you,   Theodore?" he asked me. "Are you well now?" I  supposed he was asking because I had written the   letter. "I'm very well," I answered him. "You got  my letter, right?" asked Elder Paisios. I paused,   thinking to myself that I hadn't received any  letters from him. But before I could answer,   he said, "I didn't write you a letter,  but I answered you in my own way." “I felt an earthquake inside me,” Theodore  recalls “and realized that the elder had made   me well by his prayers. ‘Yes, Elder,'  I answered, 'I got it.' I was greatly   moved. After I venerated the icons in the  chapel, I went outside and wept profusely." This, just one of many events recorded by   eyewitnesses and those who  experienced such wonders. In August of 1968, the elder went to the monastery  of Stavronikita to assist with its revival.   He received many visitors and letters there and  remained in contact with his elder Tikhon. Paisios   stayed by his elder’s side until his repose in  September of 1968. After elder Tikhon’s repose,   Paisios moved into the elder’s cell and once  again found the stillness he desired. “Now   that I’ve been freed from the monastery  by the grace of God, and I find myself   in sweet stillness (which is mystical prayer  on its own), I’ll remember you more often,   and even from very far away. I’ll be very close  to you. Pray that I’ll disappear from the scene,   and that other people won’t find me, because  that’s the only way I’ll accomplish my mission.   It’s true: when I hide away, then I feel  myself draw near to the troubled world.” And yet in time, it was the world which  drew near to him as monks and pilgrims   increasingly visited him for spiritual  advice and healing. After eleven years,   the Elder left the Hermitage of Holy Cross for a  hermitage called Panagouda, which is at the foot   of a hill and close to the trail that connects  Karyes with Iveron Monastery. He realized that   pilgrims could more easily visit Panagouda and  so there the he remained for fourteen years. One day a doctor discovered a  tumor behind a student’s eye.   The student and his father visited Elder  Paisios a few days later. “Don’t worry,   it’s nothing,” the Elder said with  confidence. Later the next week,   when the student arrived for surgery, the doctors  discovered that the tumor had disappeared. The accounts of such events are numerous. Through  his prayer the Holy Spirit worked miracles,   wonders, and things beyond our understanding.  In his later years the Elder became an endless   vessel of grace which poured out healings  and wonders to all who sought his counsel.   He bore all this with great love and compassion,  living in our world and yet communing with God. He experienced divine visitations from Christ,   the Theotokos, Saints Arsenios,  Euphemia, and several other saints. The Elder received pilgrims throughout the  day, dedicating the night to God in prayer,   vigil, and spiritual struggle. He slept only  a few hours, using as much of his energy as   he could to help others. Although he  yearned for solitude and stillness,   he humbly accepted his mission to serve others  as he was able. As Hieromonk Isaac wrote,   “God and suffering people became the two  axis around which his whole life revolved.” The Elder had the gift of clairvoyance and  foresight. While meeting with pilgrims he   might comment, “here come three kids” — even  though no one was in sight. A short time later   three kids appeared at the gate. He would greet  pilgrims by name, tell them their life story,   and even answer questions before they were  asked without ever having previously met   them. One man recalls driving the elder  to Souroti when suddenly the Elder said,   “Turn around — there’s a family breaking up right  now.” They drove to a nearby house and found   a couple arguing and dividing their things.  The Elder spoke with them and they made up. The Elder healed people of cancer, heart troubles,  and blindness. One man came to the elder because   his seven year old daughter couldn’t speak.  The Elder prayed for a year. On Holy Friday,   the young girl hugged her father, and spoke  for the first time, “Good Resurrection, dad.” Elder Paisios may have been isolated from the  world but he spiritually tuned in to all that   occurred. Once, two monks on their way to  a vigil stopped by his cell for a blessing.   “Where you’re going,” he said to them, “pray  and tell the others. Something horrible is   happening in Romania — they’re having a civil  war, and a lot of people are being killed.” He   saw the events by spiritual means and grieved  and prayed intensely for the suffering people.  The Elder only knew how to speak Greek.  But, as Fr. Paul Lampros explained,   the elder could still communicate with  foreigners. “I went to see Elder Paisios   with a Spanish man named Daniel. Daniel asked  him a question and before I could translate it,   the elder answered. Daniel was amazed and he  asked me twice, ‘What’s happening? You’re not   translating anything.’ I told him, ‘It isn’t  my fault — he’s answering your questions.’” So   they spoke, Daniel in Spanish and the Elder  in Greek, both understanding each other. Even those not in need of physical healing would  receive a blessing. As one Athonite monk recalled,   “The fragrance that sprang from the  elder was something else. Many times,   when I kissed his hand, I would smell  a supernatural aroma, like myrrh.” As Metropolitan Panteleimon of Xanthi recalled, “I  would hear his words and marvel at his spirit — it   was the Spirit of God speaking through his  vessel. This gradually became a steadfast   interior certainty for me. Elder Paisios became  for me a guide to Christ, an interpreter of the   gifts of the Holy Spirit, a pathfinder for the  road to Heaven and a light in my deep darkness.” The Elder suffered from physical  ailments most of his life. Near the end,   he began to hemorrhage and would occasionally  pass out. He departed his beloved Holy Mountain   for the last time on October 5th, 1993. He  underwent an operation due to cancer at a   hospital in Thessaloniki soon after. During his  recovery he stayed at the monastery at Souroti   and continued to receive visitors despite  his condition and intense suffering. He   bravely endured the extreme pain of his illness  without complaint: “The asceticism I practiced   all these years as a monk,” he said, “hasn’t  done me as much good as my illnesses have.” On July 11th, 1994, he received Holy  Communion for the last time. The next day,   Elder Paisios gave his soul into God’s keeping.  Without announcement, he was laid to rest behind   the Church of Saint Arsenios at the Monastery  of St. John the Theologian in Souroti. When   his repose became know three days later, a large  crowd went to the monastery to venerate his grave. On January 13, 2015, the Holy and Sacred  Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of   Constantinople canonized Saint Paisios,  confirming what was already known in   the hearts and minds of many Orthodox  Christians who either met the elder,   heard stories about him, or had read one of the  many books he wrote about the spiritual life.
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Channel: Trisagion Films
Views: 273,802
Rating: 4.9152298 out of 5
Keywords: saint paisios, paisios the athonite, paisios, trisagion films, athonite, orthodox elders, orthodox, Orthodoxy, Παΐσιος, mount athos, miracles, geronda, tradition, vessel, Grace, life, saint, saints, prayer, praying, God, Church, sacred, worship, icons, education, history, educated, saintly, mountain, Greece, traveling, guidance, ascetic, monk, monastery, monastic, miracle, farasa, asia minor, story, orthodox miracles, clairvoyants, clairvoyance
Id: qVX1HOxrDcw
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Length: 40min 29sec (2429 seconds)
Published: Thu Aug 25 2016
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