A Christian must be courteous to all. ( St. Nektarios of Aegina )

A Christian must be courteous to all. His words and deeds should breathe with the grace of the Holy Spirit, which abides in his soul, so that in this way he might glorify the name of God. He who regulates all of his speech also regulates all of his actions. He who keeps watch over the words he is about to say, also keeps watch over the deeds he intends to do, and he never goes out of the bounds of good and benevolent conduct. 

The graceful speech of a Christian is characterized by delicateness and politeness. This fact, born of love, produces peace and joy. On the other hand, boorishness gives birth to hatred, enmity, affliction, competitiveness, disorder and wars.

St. Nektarios of Aegina

Why God wants us to Love Him ( St. Nektarios )

But why, someone may ask, does God demand for man to love Him so rigorously?

 Saint John the Evangelist answers this very critical question in this manner:
because[he says]“God is love.”
Thus, as love, He wants us to love Him;
so that by loving Him, we may in turn be loved by
Him. “For love is born of God and knows God. 

He who does not love does not know God, for God is love (1 Jn. 4:7-8).

Since God is love, this is why He wants us to love Him. Confirming that God is love and that He loves mankind immensely.

Saint John the Evangelist states:  

“In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him” (1 Jn. 4:9).
What measure of love exists greater than this love? Who can any longer remain uncertain concerning God’s love? 

And what is more:
we never sought this love; rather, it was
God Himself Who voluntarily showered us with this love. “and this is love,”observes the
Evangelist,“not that we loved God, but
that He love us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins”(1 Jn. 4:10).

Therefore, this is the reason God asks for
love: because He loves us, He wants us to love Him so that we may “have life, and have it more
abundantly” (Jn. 10:10).
For, “in Him was life, and the life was the light
of men” (Jn. 1:4).

 God wants us to love Him so we can remain in Him (vid. 1 Jn. 4:12-13).
Because whoever remains in Him remains in life,
and he possesses eternal life (vid.1 Jn. 4:16).

 God thus asks for us to love Him not because He wants to receive something from us, but
in order for Him to give to us.
What immeasurable love! How necessary it is

indeed for man’s life, salvation, and well-being!

St. Nektarios

http://www.stnektariosmonastery.org/en/index.php

  

A Christian must be courteous to all. . . .( St. Nektarios )

A Christian must be courteous to all. His words and deeds should breath with the grace of the Holy Spirit, which abides in his soul, so that in this way he might glorify the name of God. He who regulates all of his speech also regulates all of his actions. He who keeps watch over the words he is about say also keeps watch over the deeds he intends to do, and he never goes out of the bounds good and benevolent conduct. The graceful speech of a Christian is characterized by delicateness and politeness. This fact, born of love, produces peace and joy. On the other hand, boorishness gives birth to hatred, enmity, affliction, competitiveness, disorder and wars.

St. Nektarios of Aegina

Attention is the first teacher of truth and consequently absolutely necessary ( St. Nektarios of Aegina )

Attention is the first teacher of truth and consequently absolutely necessary.

  Attention rouses the soul to study itself and its longings, to learn their true character and repulse those that are unholy. 

Attention is the guardian angel of the intellect, always counseling it this : be attentive. 

Attention awakens the soul, rouses it from sleep... Attention examines every thought, every desire, every memory. Thoughts, desires, and memories are engendered by various causes, and often appear masked and with splendid garb, in order to deceive the inattentive intellect and enter into the soul and dominate it. 

Only attention can reveal their hidden form. Often their dissimulation is so perfect that the discernment of their true nature is very difficult and requires the greatest attention. One must remember the saving words of the Lord: "Be wakeful and pray that ye enter not into temptation." He who is wakeful does not enter into temptation, because he is vigilant and attentive.

St. Nektarios of Aegina

Atheism is a mental disorder ( St. Nektarios )

Atheism is a mental disorder: it is a terrible ailment of the soul that is difficult to cure. Atheism is a passion that severely oppresses whomever it seizes.
It holds in store many misfortunes for its captive, and becomes harmful not only for him but also
for others who come into contact with him.

Atheism denies the existence of God. It denies that there is a divine Creator of the universe. It denies God’s providence, His wisdom, His goodness, and, in general, His divine qualities. Atheism teaches a falsehood to its followers and contrives false theories concerning the creation of the universe. It professes, as Pythia upon a tripod, that the creation is an outcome of chance, that it is perpetuated and preserved through purposeless,
random interactions, that its splendor transpired spontaneously over time, and that the harmony, grace, and beauty witnessed in nature are inherent
attributes of natural laws. Atheism detracts from God, Whom it has denied, His divine characteristics, and, instead, bestows them and His creative power to lifeless and feeble matter.

Atheism freely proclaims matter to be the cause of all things, and it deifies matter in order to deny the existence of a superior Being, of a supreme, creative Spirit Who cares for and sustains all things.
On account of disbelief, matter becomes the only true entity; whereas the spirit becomes non-existent.

For atheism, the spirit and the soul are egotistical inventions of man, concocted to satisfy his vainglory. Atheism denies man’s spiritual nature. It drags man down from the lofty height where he has been placed by the Creator’s power and grace, and lowers him amongst the rank of irrational animals, which he accepts as ancestors of his distinguished and noblelineage. Atheism does all this in order to bear witness to the words of the Psalm:
“Man, being in honor, did not understand; he is
compared to the mindless animals, and is become like unto them” (Ps. 48:20).

Atheism detracts faith, hope, and love from the
world, these life-giving sources of true happiness for man, it expels God’s righteousness from the world, and denies the existence of God’s providence and succor.

Atheism accepts the laws that exist in nature, yet denies Him Who has appointed these laws. Atheism seeks to lead man to an imaginary happiness; however, it abandons and deserts him in the middle of nowhere, in the valley of lamentation, barren of all heavenly goods, void of consolation from above, empty of spiritual strength, bereft of the power of moral virtue, and stripped of the only indispensable provisions upon the earth: faith, hope, and love.

Atheism condemns poor man to perdition and leaves him standing alone as prey amidst life’s difficulties. Having removed love from within man, atheism subsequently deprives him of the love from others, and it isolates him from family, relatives, and friends.

Atheism displaces any hope of a better future and  replaces it with despair.
Atheism is awful! It is the worst of all spiritual illnesses!
This tripod was a bronze altar at Delphi, in ancient Greece, upon which the priestess of Apollo named
Pythia sat to utter oracles.

St. Nektarios

"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." ( St. Nektarios of Aegina )

It is evident that unbelief is an evil offspring of an evil heart; for the guileless and pure heart everywhere discovers God, everywhere discerns Him, and always unhesitatingly believes in His existence. When the man of pure heart looks at the World of Nature, that is, at the sky, the earth, and the sea and at all things in them, and observes the systems constituting them, the infinite multitude of stars of heaven, the innumerable multitudes of birds and quadrupeds and every kind of animal of the earth, the variety of plants on it, the abundance of fish in the sea, he is immediately amazed and exclaims with the Prophet David: "How great are Thy works, O Lord! In wisdom Thou made them all." Such a man, impelled by his pure heart, discovers God also in the World of Grace of the Church, from which the evil man is far removed. The man of pure heart believes in the Church, admires her spiritual system, discovers God in the Mysteria, in the heights of the theology, in the light of the Divine revelations, in the truths of the teachings, in the commandments of the Law, in the achievements of the Saints, in the very good deed, in every perfect gift, and in general in the whole of the creation. Justly then did the Lord say in His Beatitudes of those possessing purity of the heart: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."

St. Nektarios of Aegina

How mistaken are those people who seek happiness outside of themselves.... ( St. Nektarios of Aegina )

How mistaken are those people who seek happiness outside of themselves, in foreign lands and journeys, in riches and glory, in great possessions and pleasures, in diversions and vain things, which have a bitter end! In the same thing to construct the tower of happiness outside of ourselves as it is to build a house in a place that is consistently shaken by earthquakes. Happiness is found within ourselves, and blessed is the man who has understood this. Happiness is a pure heart, for such a heart becomes the throne of God. Thus says Christ of those who have pure hearts: "I will visit them, and will walk in them, and I will be a God to them, and they will be my people." (II Cor. 6:16) What can be lacking to them? Nothing, nothing at all! For they have the greatest good in their hearts: God Himself! 

St. Nektarios of Aegina

Happiness is a pure heart, for such a heart becomes the throne of God. ( St. Nektarios of Aegina )

How mistaken are those people who seek happiness outside of themselves, in foreign lands and journeys, in riches and glory, in great possessions and pleasures, in diversions and vain things, which have a bitter end! In the same thing to construct the tower of happiness outside of ourselves as it is to build a house in a place that is consistently shaken by earthquakes. Happiness is found within ourselves, and blessed is the man who has understood this. Happiness is a pure heart, for such a heart becomes the throne of God. Thus says Christ of those who have pure hearts: "I will visit them, and will walk in them, and I will be a God to them, and they will be my people." (II Cor. 6:16) What can be lacking to them? Nothing, nothing at all! For they have the greatest good in their hearts: God Himself! 

St. Nektarios of Aegina