Hierarch’s Divine Liturgy in Star Dojran
(
11.04.2005
)
In the morning on the Sunday of Saint John of the Ladder, in the church of Saints Gregory Palamas and Maximus the Confessor in the vicinity of the female monastery of St. Mary Magdalene in Star Dojran, Metropolitan Nahum of Strumica offered a Holy Eucharist to God.
“It is one thing to be constantly watchful over the heart, and yet another to be an episcope of the heart through the mind, which as a president and hierarch offers a rational sacrifice to Christ. Entering the soul of the former, the holy and heavenly fire, as said by one among those who acquired the name Theologian, burns all the filth in it; whereas the latter it illumines to the extent of the perfection they reached. The same fire is also called ‘fire that burns’ (5 Moses 4:24) and ‘light that illumines’ (John 1:9). Therefore some leave from praying as if going out of a hot furnace, feeling relief from certain filth and matter, while others as if illumined by light and clothed in double attire of humility and joy. They who go out of prayer without at least one of these two effects, in fact prayed bodily, not to say like a pharisee, certainly not spiritually. The body that gets in touch with another body is influenced by the latter and changes. How could then not change one who touches with undefiled hands the Body of God?!” (Saint John of the Ladder)
