On
September 16, 2009, I saw a documentary on
television presenting the life of one of the
indigenous tribes living in the Amazon region. In
Greece we know very little about these tribes: only
that they are ancient, that their ancestors were
wise and brave warriors, with well-organized nations
and noteworthy civilizations, and that from the 15th
century onwards, various white warlords led
armor-clad warriors who came from the sea and who
slaughtered the people of these tribes, ransacked
their treasures, destroyed their cities and
villages, and seized their land. It is on this land
which was seized from the Indians that we now find
all the countries that are on the continent known as
“America”: North, Central, and South.
We
Greeks have gone through more or less the same. We
too had wise and brave warriors, with well-organized
states and important civilizations, and from the
13th century onwards, various white warlords leading
armor-clad warriors came from both land and sea and
slaughtered our people, ransacked our treasures,
destroyed our cities and villages and seized our
land. These warlords had exactly the same flags as
those who destroyed the lives of our brothers, the
natives of America.
From the 15th century onwards, what was left of our
land was seized by other barbarian warriors who came
from the East, whose like our native American
brothers had not confronted. These had likewise
seized our land, even though we constantly revolted
against them, until 1830, when a large portion of it
was liberated, little by little. However, we were
still weak and torn by civil wars among our own
warlords (brave, but not wise ones; fortunately
there were a few wise ones), and so, instead of
becoming truly free and strong, we fell into the
hands of our previous overlords, who placed us under
their authority - not with weapons this time, but
with cunning known as politics and diplomacy.
Even in our day, we are still struggling to free
ourselves and to regain the wisdom and bravery of
our ancestors.
So, my Indian brothers, I think I can understand
your tribulations, enough to address a few words to
you. In a manner of sorts, I am, so to speak, “one
of you”.
In
the documentary that I mentioned previously, I saw
something that deeply wounded my heart: some Indians
were standing on the ocean shore, at the place where
the white invaders had disembarked from the sea and
had planted a giant Cross, just before beginning
their “labour” of exterminating the Indians. The
modern-day Indians told the filmmakers who were
preparing the documentary: “This is the spot where
the white men began to seize our land. The Cross is
the spirit of destruction, the spirit of
extermination. That’s what we have learnt.”
Given that I too have hung a Crucifix on my bosom as
a “protective amulet”, and my temples are full of
Crucifixes (which are far more ancient than the
white men who exterminated the Indians as well as my
people), I would like to clarify to my Indian
brothers two things: 1) what the Crucifix truly
symbolizes and 2) exactly who those white men were,
who had planted the Cross on the seashore and had
incited the Indians to hate it. I beg you to please
listen to me.
I
know that nowadays, most Indians have a university
degree and it is not necessary for me to speak in
simple words, the way I would need to speak to
people who live in the middle of the jungle.
However, I will try to speak plainly, so that my
words can be comprehended by both those with a
university degree and by those who live in the
wilderness. I beg my Indian brothers who live in the
cities and have access to modern technology to
convey the spirit of my words to their brothers (and
my brothers) who live in the wilderness and still
preserve the ancient wisdom and way of life of their
ancestors unadulterated.
1. The
Crucifix and us
Long before the Earth, the mountains, the rivers,
the sea, the trees, the animals, the birds, man,
there were the spirits. Spirits are both good and
bad, luminous and dark; there are spirits that love
people, and others that hate them and try to harm
them. Many of these evil spirits sometimes appear as
benevolent ones and they perform some good in order
to fool people, but eventually cause them even more
harm and make them their slaves forever.
But, even before these spirits, there exists another
Spirit, Who created everything. This Great Spirit is
the One Who created the Earth and all that exists on
it: the mountains, the rivers, the trees, the
animals, the birds, and mankind. However, it is this
same Great Spirit Who had also created all the other
spirits - all the spirits, the good ones and the
(eventually) evil ones.
The Great Spirit is benevolent and luminous, and had
made all of Creation out of an infinite love. And
everything that the Great Spirit had created was
created with goodness. (Even the evil spirits, when
they were originally created, were benevolent.)
Similarly, the first humans who were created were
benevolent, just as every person who is born is
good. But, given that people have been created with
a free will, they are able to choose to remain good
or become evil. This applies to the spirits also,
who can choose to be good or evil. Thus, long before
mankind was created, certain spirits had chosen to
become evil. But the Great Spirit, being full of
love, did not destroy them, but instead allowed them
to live, even though they had stopped loving Him.
However, these evil spirits had tricked the first
humans, and convinced them to stop loving the Great
Spirit. From then on, people distanced themselves
from the Great Spirit; they refused His protection,
and even forgot that He exists. They only vaguely
recalled His existence, in fairy tales and the songs
of their people, but nothing clearer about Him. And
so, they became wicked, they began to fight amongst
themselves and began to worship wicked spirits. But
the Great Spirit had never forsaken them, nor did he
hate them; He always waited for the right moment to
help them.
Now this Great Spirit is not alone. He has a company
of two other Great Spirits, equally Great,
benevolent, and almighty. These Three Great Spirits
are related to each other: the one Great Spirit made
the other two come into existence – NOT by “creating
Them” externally, but by “bringing Them out of
Himself” (to use a human term, which does not befit
spirits as well as it does humans). He did this out
of His infinite love, and thus, the other two Great
Spirits also love the First Great Spirit (Who
brought them into existence) so much, that we do not
regard them as three separate Great Spirits (even
though they are three), but as One, which is
comprised of the company of all Three. There are no
earthly creations that are united with such a love,
so we are not able to fully understand how the Three
Great Spirits can be so united, that they can
simultaneously be Three and One, but we can
understand to a small degree what this means, if we
think on how powerfully love unites people who feel
it.
Thus united (as the Three Great Spirits have
eternally been), the Three of them, as One, created
the Earth and all that exists on it: the mountains,
the rivers, the sea, the trees, the animals, the
birds, man and the spirits and whatever else they
wished to create. They created them, as we said, out
of Their infinite love, in order to share this love
with other beings; and not only this love, but also
Their benevolent energies, which enable Their
creations (when they so desire) to embark on an
actual association with the Great Spirit, Who is
simultaneously a company of Three Great Spirits.
The Greeks call this Great Spirit “Theos” and “Agia
Triada” and those who speak English call Him “God”
and “Holy Trinity”, while all peoples give Him a
name in their own language, at times with a lesser
knowledge about Him and at times with a greater
knowledge.
Anyway, many centuries had gone by, while the
benevolent and wise Great Spirit continued to wait
for the appropriate time to help mankind escape from
the wicked spirits and return (if they so desired)
to the relationship that they had with the Great
Spirit originally. For this purpose, He did
something incredible - something that only someone
with tremendously great love would ever do: One of
the Three Great Spirits was incarnated into a man.
He assumed a human body and soul; He became an
infant by residing in the womb of a pure young girl,
the purest ever to have been born on earth. He was
born to this young girl, breastfed like any infant,
grew up, and, when He reached adulthood, began to
speak of the Great Spirit Who had brought Him into
existence from the very beginning, and Whom he
referred to as “His Father”. And, having shown us
just how much He loved us also and how He identified
Himself with us, He referred to the Great Spirit as
“The Father of us all”.
He
spoke to the people about truth, justice, and love,
and asked them to forgive their enemies and to be
humble. He asked them to love all people - good and
wicked (because no one is perfectly good, to have
the right to despise the wicked); to not be
interested in wealth and glory, but to purify their
heart of hate and selfishness, and to follow Him. He
also healed the sick, the blind and the paralyzed,
and He cast out evil spirits with His great power,
which he eventually imparted to His disciples, so
that they would also be able - by invoking His name
- to perform such marvelous good deeds. But the
wicked people who ruled that land arrested that kind
Teacher (and naturally without believing that He was
the Great Spirit who had become a man); they
tortured Him, and killed Him, by crucifying Him with
nails through His hands and feet, to a wooden cross!
When He died, His disciples took His body and
buried it inside a cave, then hid themselves,
despairing and frightened.
Three days later, however, the good Teacher came
back from the dead and appeared to His disciples. He
explained to them again who He actually was and what
He had come to Earth for, and He instructed them to
travel to the ends of the Earth and to speak of Him
to all the peoples of the world, because all people
are children of the Great Spirit, who created all
things. Then, after he had accompanied them for
forty days, He left, ascending into the heavens.
Ten days later, the Third Great Spirit came down
from heaven, taking on the form of a flame. It
divided itself among the disciples of the great
Teacher and thus filled them with heavenly wisdom,
so that they could understand what the Three Great
Spirits (who are One God) really are, and gave them
courage, so that they might speak of The Three Great
Spirits to all people, no longer fearing the violent
attacks that the evil spirits would direct against
them.
Beginning then, the disciples themselves became
teachers and spoke of all this to as many people as
they could until certain wicked people, under the
power of evil spirits, caught them and killed them
one by one in different places of the earth. Whoever
showed trust in their words (which were the words of
the great Teacher) became their disciples and
learned how to be united with the Great Spirit
through humility and love. There were thousands of
people like this, among many nations, and of all
colours. There are thousands of such people today as
well.
So
the cross, on which the body of the great Teacher
was nailed, became sacred and acquired the power to
expel evil spirits. This is why the disciples of the
Teacher and their disciples, until today (in other
words, ourselves), regard the cross as a symbol of
the love that we must have for others (in other
words, we must offer them love and every possible
assistance and pray for them to the Great Spirit)
and as a charm: we use it as a weapon that wards off
evil spirits. Hundreds of instances have been
recorded where people protected themselves or healed
others from the influence of evil spirits by using
small models of the cross on which the great Teacher
was crucified.
This Great Spirit, which became man and taught love
and was crucified and resurrected, had a human name,
as well: He was called “Jesus”, which, in the
language of the people to whom he was born, means
“God saves”. And, since (even though he was a real
man) He had inside of Him all the power of the Great
Spirit, we call Him “Christ” (anointed with holy
oil, like the kings are anointed). He is Jesus
Christ, and the people who accepted His teachings
and those of His disciples are called “Christians”.
Whatever you think of Christ, whatever you have been
told or believed because of the suffering and the
tragedies of your people, in reality Jesus Christ
was He who taught love and was crucified and
resurrected, in order to once again unite people
with the Great Spirit, our Creator.
For us who follow the teachings of the great Teacher
sincerely (or rather try to follow them, because
very few actually try as hard, so that they might
actually love like He taught it), the Cross is a
dearly beloved object. It is a symbol of love and a
weapon against the evil spirits, not a symbol of
death and destruction.
B. People
who followed Christ’s teaching to the end
Jesus Christ, the Great Teacher, the Great Spirit
that became a man 2000 years ago in order to lead us
closer to God, taught people that they will approach
God and be united with Him when they love everyone,
even their enemies. He did this, by forgiving His
disciple who betrayed Him to his enemies, but also
by forgiving His enemies themselves, when He was
nailed to the Cross (although they probably did not
acknowledge this forgiveness – with the exception of
the centurion Longinus, who later became a Christian
and died for Christ’s sake). But since it is
impossible for a person, on his own spiritual
powers, to reach the point of loving his enemies,
the Teacher left us instructions to ask Him for help
(He always listens to us) in order to acquire such
strength. We call our communication with Him
“prayer”. He also asked that we always remain united
with Him (with the Great Spirit, in other words),
and gave us ways to begin this union. We take on His
good energy, by being baptized in water in the name
of the Three Great Spirits, which constitute One,
Supreme, Great Spirit. By using the names that
Christ taught us, we address the Spirit that gave
existence to the other ones “Father”, the one that
became man we call “Son” (this is Christ), and the
one that came down to the disciples in the form of a
flame we call the “Holy Spirit”. We are baptized,
then, “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Spirit”, and we thus become Christians.
The night before He was crucified, Christ took bread
and wine, conferred upon them His benevolent Energy
(we call it “Grace”, in other words “Gift”), and
distributed them to His disciples. He said to them:
“This bread is My Body, and this wine is My Blood.
Eat and drink these, to commemorate me.” Ever since
then, Christians repeat the same action. A priest,
who has received the Grace of Christ through a
special ceremony, repeats Christ’s action with the
bread and the wine and we Christians eat a small
amount of it, as did His disciples that night. Since
the bread and wine take on the Grace of God, they
are invisibly transformed into the Body and Blood of
Jesus. Thus we are united with Him and we take on
(those who wish to, since there are weak and wicked
people) the power to love all people.
In
this ritual no one sees or tastes flesh or blood,
only bread and wine. We eat bread and wine. But we
know that these two are invisibly transformed into
the Body and Blood of Jesus, because some Christians
who arrived at perfect union with God (we call them
“saints” and they are the teachers of every
generation) saw this transformation with their
spiritual eyes.
For the first three hundred years after Christ, the
great empire that ruled our world at the time (the
Roman Empire) tried to exterminate the Christians,
forcing them to worship various spirits, which were
worshipped by the ancient peoples but which were not
the Great Spirit. They resorted to every kind of
torture to force them. The Christians did not raise
weapons against their enemies, not because they were
not brave, but because they knew that, if they did
what their Teacher told them (to not confront
violence with violence), their souls would go to
live with the Great Spirit, bathed in His light and
receiving His love. Hundreds of thousands of
Christians, men, women, and children, were tortured
to death and gave their lives smiling. And three
centuries after Christ, without spilling blood, the
Christians won: the rulers of the Roman Empire
became Christians themselves.
Of
course, the problems did not stop (evil spirits
always want to take people far away from God, either
through violence or through trickery), but it is not
now necessary for me to continue telling this story.
The more educated of my Indian brothers can find
books from which they can learn details, if they
wish.
From generation to generation there have been
thousands of people who have been perfectly united
with Christ and acquired the great love that He
spoke of. Many of them distributed all of their
property to the poor and kept only the clothes that
they wore. Some even gave their clothes and lived
naked in a deserted place, praying to God. They all
helped their fellow people in whatever way they
could, since their love for Christ made them follow
His example. Those who were most united with God
acquired the gift of performing miracles (to heal
the sick, to expel evil spirits, etc), not by using
magic, but simply by uttering Christ’s name. We
respect and honor all of these people, we speak with
them (they can hear us even after they die and go to
the place of the souls), and we call them “saints”,
in other words, those who are united with God.
Let us mention just a few of them:
Saint Makarios of Egypt was so kind-hearted that,
when a young woman who was pregnant from a secret
lover accused him of being the father, he accepted
her accusation, suffered all kinds of insults from
the local populace, and began working twice as much
in order to support the woman and her child. Later,
when the truth was discovered, he left secretly and
never sought to be vindicated.
In
the fifth century AD, Saint Paulinus, after spending
all his wealth buying and freeing slaves from
barbarian invaders (the Vandals), gave himself up as
a slave in order to free the only son of a widow.
In
1015, when the Russian saints, princes Boris and
Gleb, realized that their wicked brother
Sviatopolkos had invited them to his palace with the
intent to murder them, they went anyway. They
preferred to die rather than force their soldiers to
fight for their sake.
Saint Moses the Hungarian was a slave who preferred
to be tortured for many years and eventually die
rather than become his owner’s lover.
The seven year old saint Ivan Chi Chung, after being
tortured in Peking, China, in the summer of 1900,
full of spiritual power from the Grace of God, said
that it is not harsh to suffer for Christ and simply
asked to be buried near the church where he was
baptized.
Saint Nicholas of Pskof, a “fool for Christ” (he
pretended to be crazy so that people would not
realize he was a saint), stopped the murderous king
Ivan the Terrible in the middle of the street and
offered him raw meat to eat, in order to show him
that the way he was ruling Russia was like eating
people!
Saint Andrew, another “fool for Christ”, on the
night that God informed him would be his last, went
to the street in Constantinople where all the
brothels were located and died there after praying
all night for all the sinful people of the world to
seek God’s Light.
Saint Mary Skobtsova, who helped many people escape
from the Nazis during World War II, was executed in
the Nazi concentration camp of Ravensburg. It was
reported that she changed places with another woman
who was condemned to death, and allowed herself to
be killed in order to save the other woman.
C. The
false “Christians” who killed the Indians
At
the beginning of the eighth century AD, a group of
warriors in Western Europe, along with their king,
who was known as Charlemagne, created another type
of Christianity, changing many of the things that
Christians had believed and taught until then. They
thus created a different “version” of Christianity,
which they wanted to use to conquer Europe. This
different version was essentially a warlike
religion, which was lacking in love and the
compassion of true Christianity.
Two centuries later, the descendants of these
warriors, who had become numerous and powerful, led
their army and conquered the most important
Christian city of Europe - Rome. They evicted the
spiritual leader of the Roman Christians from his
position and replaced him with one of their own.
From then on, they imposed their own form of
Christianity on all the peoples of Western Europe.
They called this form of Christianity the “Catholic
Church”, which was the term used by all Christians
until that time, when referring to the one Church.
They are also called “Roman Catholics”. We, however,
who belong to the ancient tradition of authentic
Christianity, call this version of Christianity
“Papism”, from the leader of the roman Christians,
the Pope. The departure of Rome (and all of the
West) from the original body of Christianity is
called “The Great Schism”. Only ancient Christianity
is properly called the “Catholic Church”, but since
the time of the Great Schism our ancestors have
begun to refer to the original Christianity with the
title of “Orthodoxy”.
The papist kings immediately began to attack the
neighbouring peoples near them and after two
centuries, they also conquered Constantinople, the
capitol of the Christians of Eastern Europe (who are
our ancestors, and who preserved the ancient form of
Christianity that we share with them), destroyed our
churches, raped our women, ransacked our treasures,
stole our land and kept many pieces of it as their
own, for four whole centuries, until they were taken
away from them by barbarian warriors who came from
the depths of the East and knew almost nothing of
Christ.
In
the pursuant centuries, the people of Western Europe
lived in violence, poverty, and fear. And yet the
worst part about this was that those who oppressed
and terrorized them took solemn oaths that they were
“Christians” and they even used the Cross as their
symbol! Good people were deeply saddened, and many
lost their lives (they were killed) trying to defend
justice and truth. Thus many people in Western
Europe came to believe that the Cross was a symbol
of death and evil (just as our Indian brothers do),
instead of a symbol of love and goodness.
In
the fifteenth century, those who could do so took
boats and left Europe, because they could no longer
tolerate the situation. These were the boats of the
white men who landed on the shores of America. But
unfortunately the people who traveled in them did
not remember Christ’s teachings about love and
justice, believing that only gold has value in life.
Thus, when they saw the rich cities of the native
people, their minds were clouded and the desire to
ransack them entered their hearts. Thus the evil
began. Unfortunately, my brothers, you know the
rest.
In
the sixteenth century certain people in Western
Europe created another version of Christianity, in
order to escape from Papism. I believe that this was
a mistake. They should have returned to the ancient,
authentic version of Christianity, Orthodoxy, which
the peoples in Eastern Europe – despite all their
suffering – never lost. This new version of
Christianity was named “Protestantism” (denoting
their protest against Papism). During the next
centuries many white Protestants came chiefly to
North America and fought with the Indians who lived
there. Unfortunately these white men also behaved
barbarously: they exterminated the tribes and stole
their land. Thus, once again Christianity as a whole
was unjustly accused.
Since many Indians are wise, I am sure that they
will understand what I am about to say. In all
nations (among us and among the Indians) there are
good people and there are bad people also. The white
men, who originated in Western Europe and whose
children and grandchildren now live in America and
who are called Americans, are not evil. But the
conditions that have prevailed in Western Europe
since the Great Schism had prevented them from
distinguishing good from evil. What the Indians
suffered at their hands resembles what we suffered,
even though we are Christians, just as our enemies
supposedly are.
Until the twentieth century, people from Western
Europe, who used the cross as a symbol of violence
and death, tortured and killed our people and other
peoples of the East, who guarded Orthodoxy as a
precious treasure, and until today there are many
people who follow Christ’s teachings to the utmost
and become saints. In the second world war, roughly
1,500,000 people were killed in the country now
known as Serbia because they refused to abandon
authentic Christianity and adopt Papism.
D. Why I
wrote this letter
I
wrote this letter in Greek and showed it first to my
brothers (in other words, to my dear friends) who
are Orthodox Christians and who love all people.
Some of them translated it into other languages. My
heart’s desire is for it to be translated not only
into the languages that are spoken by the white men
of America, but chiefly into the languages of the
Indians. Thus it will be able to reach even those
Indians who don’t speak the languages of the white
men, like those who live on reservations, in the
American desert, and in villages in the woods.
I
wrote it for two reasons. First, because I felt
great sorrow when I heard some Indians (with whom we
have so much in common) say on television that they
consider the cross (the symbol of love) to be a
symbol of death and destruction. This, which is an
excusable but terrible mistake, excludes them from
knowing Him who was once nailed to a Cross in order
to save people from evil spirits – the Great Spirit
who became a man, Jesus Christ. And (I speak the
truth) our Indian brothers will never find the
completion of their own civilization and religion if
they do not come to know Jesus Christ, who (along
with the Father and the Holy Spirit, the “nuclear”
Great Spirit) is the Creator of all things, even the
spirits that they worship.
I
do not want to steal that which they have, nor make
them adopt the white men’s way of life. Indeed, at
least half of this way of life is bad. I want them
to remain Indians, wise and brave, to preserve their
historical memory and their civilization, but to
also learn about Orthodoxy, so that they can be not
only wise and brave, but also holy – so that they
can themselves, with their own Indian Orthodox
priests, call upon the Grace of God to enter in them
and their children and dwell there forever.
I
am not a teacher, only a simple and humble student;
a student, though, of the holy teachers of Orthodoxy
of all generations. I do not at all have the wisdom
or the right to advise my brothers what they should
do. I ask them only to learn about Orthodoxy, and
nothing more. I believe that the knowledge of
Christ’s teaching, as it is preserved in the ancient
and authentic Orthodox Christian tradition, is by
itself enough to make them trust and love it.
Chief Seattle’s response to President Franklin
Pierce in 1854, that he could not sell his people’s
land because it does not belong to them but rather
the people belong to it, has become a memorable
piece of American history. In exactly the same time
period, a Greek saint went from village to village
saying exactly the same things to my people, the
Greeks, who had just acquired their “own” state, but
were being ruled by the powerful countries of
Western Europe, who had dazzled them with their
wealth and culture. This saint was called
Christoforos Papoulakos (which means “dear old
man”). The people in power captured him and he died
in prison, but his words influenced our future.
In
1977 the “Message of the Iroquois Confederation of
the Six Nations to the Western World” was presented
at the International Conference of Indian Nations in
Geneva, under the auspices of the Non Governmental
Organizations of the UN. In this message, the
ancient wisdom of the Indians was compared against
the utilitarian and invasive culture of the white
men, the culture that now essentially rules the
whole world and which in reality is only the culture
of the Western white men, not ours. Similarly, the
reproaches against Christianity included in this
message, that “Rome is the real place that it is
modeled after”; that it “de-spiritualized the
world”, and that it “came to prominence with
weapons”, refer to the false versions of
Christianity that were created in the West, not to
ancient Christianity or to Orthodoxy. A few years
earlier, during the second world war, an Orthodox
saint, imprisoned at the Nazi concentration camp of
Dachau, the bishop Nikolaos Velimirovich, sent a
moving message to all the people of Europe, wherein
he too compared the ancient wisdom of the Orthodox
Christians with the culture of the West, the same
culture critiqued by our Iroquois brothers as well
as every wise and thinking Indian.
E. Among
religions, Orthodoxy
Perhaps there are many people, of different
religions, large and small, simple and strange, who
are trying to convince the Indians to follow them. I
am not suggesting a new religion to the Indians, but
rather the oldest one, the one that comes straight
from the creation of the world, from the Great
Spirit who waited thousands of years for the time to
come to reveal it to mankind.
And, ever since we discovered it, many centuries
have again passed until the time came for Orthodoxy
to arrive at the land of the Indian peoples, the
land of America. Unfortunately, it arrived after
Papism and Protestantism; in other words, the truth
arrived after its false permutations; love arrived,
after the violence and the fire.
In
the nineteenth century, thousands of Native
Americans from various northern tribes (such as the
Aleuts) were baptized in the name of the Father, the
Son, and the Holy Spirit and became Orthodox
Christians. Some of them became saints, who are now
honored by us, the white Orthodox people, such as
Saint Peter the Aleut, who heroically endured
torture to the death in California in 1815 at the
hands of Spanish Jesuits, who tried to force him to
deny Orthodoxy and become “Catholic”. Also, Saint
Iakovos Netsetof (1802-1865), a just and wise Aleut
priest, who traveled great distances over the frozen
American north, speaking of Christ and distributing
Holy Communion, the repetition of the last supper of
Christ with His disciples (this is the supreme
religious ritual of Orthodox Christians, which takes
place every week). He also translated some Orthodox
Christian books into the language of his people. In
1979 Saint Olga of Alaska reposed in the Lord; she
was a member of the Yupik tribe – a midwife who
offered a great deal to the people of the local
community and herself became sanctified through her
love towards people and God. You can read more about
her, here:
http://oholy.net/stolga/olga_index.html.
Furthermore, since that time, several true and wise
teachers of Orthodox faith and love have lived on
American soil, spending many years with the tribes
of the American north; they loved them and were
loved in return, and they frequently defended the
natives against all types of white colonizers. Among
them was Saint Herman of Alaska (1836), who settled
on Spruce Island and lived a simple and poor life
there (full of miracles and communication with the
Great Triune God and the good spirits, His angels),
helping the Aleuts as much as he was able. Also,
Saint Innocent Veniaminof (1797-1879), Saint John
Maximovitch the Wonder-Worker (1896-1966), who with
his prayers stopped the typhoons on the island of
Tubabao in the Philippines for 27 months, Saint
Nicholas Velimirovich (1880-1956), and others.
The difference between Orthodoxy and other religions
is this: many religions all over the Earth worship
spirits, and many also recognize the existence of
the Great Spirit and pray to Him, as each one
understands Him. But the ancient, authentic
Christianity, Orthodoxy, suggests not only a
teaching about the Great Spirit or a prayer to Him,
but also the union of a person with the Great Spirit
(which is a company of Three Great Spirits), a union
which the saints achieve through the Great Spirit
who became a man and who always has communication
with people: Jesus Christ.
This is why many people from other religions or from
other versions of Christianity, when they learn of
Orthodoxy, after careful research, leave the
religions that they previously followed and become
Orthodox. But, as one of the most worthy of them,
the holy monk Seraphim Rose (1931-1982), said, “When
you become Orthodox, you don’t lose any of the real
truth that you learned before.”
In
1891, the priest Alexis Toth and along with him
3,614 Catholics from Minneapolis, Minnesota, left
Catholicism together and became Orthodox.
On
January 22, 1984, in Mexico City, the Orthodox
bishop Paul de Ballester (who had become Orthodox in
1953, when he realized that Papism, to which he had
belonged until then, was misguided) was murdered as
he left the church, in which he had celebrated the
great holy liturgy ritual of the Orthodox.
On
May 18, 1985, in the city of Santa Cruz, the
Orthodox priest Ioannis was murdered inside the
church by people who clearly worshipped evil
spirits. After his death, God revealed through
various miracles that he was a saint.
In
1987 a group of 2000 Protestants, along with their
pastors, left Protestantism and became Orthodox, and
over the next years they were joined by many more.
In 1996 the young Russian soldier Evgenios Rodionov
was beheaded after imprisonment and torture lasting
100 days, because he refused to deny Orthodoxy and
follow another religion. After his death, miracles
have shown that he is also a new saint.
The blood of these saints, like the blood of Saints
Ioannis and Evgenios, is added to the blood of
countless other Orthodox who gave their lives in the
twentieth century. We already spoke of the 1,500,000
holy martyrs of Serbia. I will mention only one more
instance: in 1919 at the monastery of Oranki in
Russia, 11,000 Orthodox priests were murdered
because they refused to abandon their faith.
I
will be frank. We Orthodox Christians recognize and
honor the good spirits that were created by the
Great Spirit, we build churches in their honor and
pray to them. We call them “angels” (messengers).
But we do not think that the spirits worshipped by
our Indian brothers are good. We know that the good
spirits recognize and worship the Holy Trinity, and
recognize and worship the Great Spirit that became
man, Jesus Christ. We have countless examples where
the good spirits, the angels, recognize Jesus Christ
as the Great God and offer him worship. They do this
continuously in their own world, where they live.
Thus, every spirit who does not recognize and
worship the Holy Trinity and Jesus Christ cannot be
a good spirit, even if it seems to be.
The “spirit of the world”, which our Indian brothers
recognize and respect (some of them call it “Manitu”,
a name that has become known to white men), seems to
be the Grace of the Holy Spirit, of the “core” Great
Spirit, that created the world, preserves it, and
protects it.
The Orthodox saints live with love for all beings of
the world; many of them live in the forests with the
creatures of the wild; they are their friends and
they communicate with them. However, they do not
worship “animal spirits”, but rather the Great
Spirit who created all the other spirits. With their
prayers and their sacred ceremonies they bring the
Grace (blessing) of the Great Spirit to the
mountains, the forests, the rivers, the cities and
all the world.
It
is not important to us, if someone acquires “special
powers” with the help of spirits. The saints heal
the sick and predict the future with the Grace of
the Father, the Son (Christ), and the Holy Spirit,
in other words of the Great Spirit Himself, and not
with the help of other spirits. Of course, they
honor the good spirits of the angels and the souls
of the saints; they often speak with them, and are
very careful to distinguish the communication of the
good spirits from the traps of the evil ones (in
general we honor all the deceased brethren and
continuously pray to the Great Spirit that they will
all eventually end up in His Light).
Thus, I urge and beseech our Indian brothers to
learn about Orthodoxy, not only reading books and
articles on the internet, but also visiting holy
places in America, like Orthodox churches and
monasteries all over the American continents. Some
such places, among many others, are St Anthony’s
Greek Orthodox Monastery in Arizona and the St.
Herman of Alaska Brotherhood in Platina, California,
while it would certainly be useful to contact Fr.
Peter Gilquist and his colleagues from the
Evangelical Orthodox Mission of the Archdiocese of
Antioch in the USA – those who came to Orthodoxy
from Protestantism in 1987 after organized and
rigorous research.
We
Orthodox Christians are like all people, full of
weaknesses and faults. Not all of us are good. But
even today there are many who apply Christ’s
teachings to the fullest extent and arrive at a
union with Him. There are even obscure, poor people
in neighborhoods of cities and villages who have
reached a great saintliness.
My
homeland, Greece, is today very poor and controlled
by the large multinational companies, like the rest
of the world. Many of us have almost forgotten our
tradition and have adapted to the culture of the
Western nations, which has taken over the whole
world – a culture that has been resisted by the
Indians. Fortunately there are still many of my
people who also resist, as well as some regions that
guard the precious treasure, the culture, wisdom,
and holiness of Orthodoxy. One such a place is the “Holy
Mountain”, Mount Athos (a unique example in the
world), with is located in Greece. There, many
people from many nations of the world have come to
know Orthodoxy and have understood how important it
is for them and for all humanity.
At
this link, you can see the story of an Indian chief
who lived and died as an Orthodox Christian, at the
same time defending his tribe’s tradition. He even
began translating the words of the most holy
ceremony of Orthodoxy into his own people’s
language:
http://www.oodegr.com/english/empeiries/indianos1.htm.
At
this link, you can see the story of an African
American who discovered Orthodoxy and became an
Orthodox priest, thus finding true freedom and the
way to fight for it for the good of his people, our
black brothers:
http://www.mosestheblack.org/.
At
this link, you can see the story of a white American
Buddhist priest, who Christ Himself called to
Orthodoxy, something that he never imagined
possible:
http://www.sfaturiortodoxe.ro/orthodox/orthodox_advices_yoga.htm.
You haven’t learned anything important about
Orthodoxy through this letter of mine. It was only a
humble invitation, full of love, for to you to learn
even more.
I
wish you peace and the Grace of the holy and Great
Spirit, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, to
your hearts. May every just desire of your people,
and of every persecuted people, be fulfilled.
