Fasting and peace

  • Read­ing about one of the saints of the day — Monk Philip of Rabangsk (and no, that’s not a typo. It really is ‘Rabangsk’) — I saw the fol­low­ing lines:

    Philip was said to be extremely strict with him­self and lenient towards the faults of oth­ers. He died peacefully…

    I know that say­ing that a saint died peace­fully is just a way of say­ing that they weren’t mar­tyred. But there’s still some­thing about the first sen­tence that leads one to believe the sec­ond was true. Some­one who would have the grace to apply them­selves unspar­ingly to ascetic labor and yet still be mer­ci­ful and not con­demn oth­ers for their weak­nesses would, I think, die peacefully.

    It’s like the story from the Desert Fathers that Fr. Thomas Hopko recounted in one lec­ture I heard. The story went some­thing like this:

    A monk who was noto­ri­ous in the monastery for his lack of self-discipline was sick and on his deathbed. The other monks were aston­ished that he exhib­ited a saintly tran­quil­ity as the end drew near, and they asked him, “How can you have such peace? You haven’t fasted and prayed and kept vigil and labored as you should have!”

    The monk answered them, “I have peace for one rea­son: I never judged any­one.“

    And the other monks had noth­ing to say.

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    It’s a good thing to reflect upon as we enter into the Nativ­ity fast. It’s a dif­fi­cult thing to fast some­times. But always so much harder, it seems, to be tough on your­self and yet not con­sider it your busi­ness to see if oth­ers are fast­ing as much as you are, or more, or less.

    My rule of thumb is this: I need to make it as hard as I can for myself with­out giv­ing any place to the spirit that would sit in judg­ment if I were to see my brother or sis­ter — or even my priest or bishop — eat­ing a cheese­burger. If I would let some­one else’s fast, or the lack thereof, rob me of peace and give me Phar­iseeism in its place, I might as well order a cheese­burger for myself. At least that way, I’ll know I’m a sinner.

    Fast­ing is hard, or at least it’s sup­posed to be. Get­ting the fast right is much harder, and I’m not really sure whether I’ve got­ten it right so far. (I sup­pose I could ask my priest to show up some­time eat­ing a cheese­burger, just so I can put it to the test?) But it’s good work, the right kind of work. The kind that lets you join the ranks of saints like Monk Philip and die peacefully.


    Related posts:

    1. Inward peace
    2. On silence (again)
    3. Lent and Bright Week and feel­ing bad and feel­ing good
    4. The “Russ­ian Priest”: On self-denial
    5. The Sitka Icon (yet again)

    November 15th, 2007 | Grace | 1 Comment |

One Response and Counting...

  • Mimi 11.15.2007

    I stum­bled over his name this morn­ing myself ;)

    Thank you, I agree, those two things are con­nected. And, I need to con­nect them in my own life.

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