Spiritual Counsels by Fr. John of Kronstadt

  • The Spiritual Counsels of Father John of KronstadtA book that I have on Ortho­dox his­tory says, in talk­ing about late 19th– early 20th-century Rus­sia, “As the Russ­ian Church neared the time when it would be put to its sever­est test, the grace of the Holy Spirit became abun­dant. Among charis­matic Chris­tians a spe­cial place belongs to Fr. John of Kronstadt.”

    That “spe­cial­ness” is man­i­fest in every page of “Spir­i­tual Coun­sels.” The book con­tains selected pas­sages from his diary, enti­tled “My Life in Christ” which was one of the most pop­u­lar devo­tional books of its time (but now can’t be got­ten, or at least not through Ama­zon. O tem­pora, o mores!)

    I came to love my daily time with the read­ings, and was as sorry to be done with this book as if I were say­ing good­bye to a friend. As the intro­duc­tion states, Fr. John was no monk, scholar or hier­arch, but a mar­ried priest — “an ‘ordi­nary’ priest” — in an undis­tin­guished parish, and his words of advice and coun­sel res­onate with par­tic­u­lar poignancy.

    He espe­cially believed in the neces­sity of con­stant and faith­ful prayer, and the first three sec­tions of the book are devoted to it:

    God desires that we should fre­quently turn to him in prayer, in order to draw to Him­self His chil­dren — who have become hard­ened by sin and have with­drawn them­selves from him — in order to cleanse us and enfold us in His love, in order to show us that he always has some bless­ing for us. Thus do good par­ents act towards evil-natured children.

    The book is made up of quotes of one or two graphs and sep­a­rated into themed chap­ters. They are a pre­cious not only as a help and spir­i­tual aid, but as a kind of icon in print of one of the Church’s can­dles lit in the darkness.

    (Quick dis­claimer: my ver­sion of the book is an older copy that doesn’t have the same cover as this image from Ama­zon, but I’m assum­ing the con­tent is the same.)


    Related posts:

    1. Singing away Fr. John
    2. Prayer request
    3. Fr. John Platko — Mem­ory eternal
    4. Harry Pot­ter — yeah, why not?

    October 2nd, 2005 | Grace | 2 Comments |

2 Responses and Counting...

  • Jim Nel­son 10.02.2005

    MY LIFE IN CHRIST is cur­rently pub­lished by the Holy Trin­ity Monastery in Jor­danville, New York and I just got it a month or two ago from Eighth Day Books (http://www.eighthdaybooks.com/). It is indeed a gem.

  • Grace

    Eureka! Thanks for the tip.

Leave a Reply

* Name, Email, and Comment are Required