Mental health and relationship to God

[ChristopherK]

Reading about autism I came across a reference which essentially stated that in "tsarist Russia" it was believed that autists had chosen their condition for religious reasons at an early age. They would go around in rags, disregard social conventions and laws and be called holy fools (I am paraphasing).

I think the article was mixing the concept of a Fool for Christ with that of a "holy innocent" (i.e. somebody who is without sin and therefore holy?). The article with the link is reproduced below - if anybody could correct in German on wikipedia, it would be appreciated.

The article did raised some questions in my mind, which I would like to ask:

What is the attitude of the Orthodox Church towards people who have mental problems/defects from birth or early childhood (as opposed to people whose mental problems are a result of their passions)? For example, what if a child is autistic and cannot interact with the world as we do? What if the child can never develop mentally to be able to speak, communicate, pray, etc. but causes harm to others because it does not understand what it is doing?

Could one say that such children and adults are without sin and in that sense also "holy"? Should one should rejoice having such a child, for the child itself, although it may suffer in this world, can be saved because of its utter faultlessnes; and does this person not also present an avenue towards redemption by being a "burden" to those around?

Are there any particular Orthodox saints who are known to help in case of mental illness? Are there any Orthodox support groups, books, etc. around this subject matter?

Your thoughts would be appreciated.

The original text from http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autismus:

Es gab zu verschiedenen Zeiten unterschiedliche Vorstellungen über die Entstehung von Autismus. Im zaristischen Russland etwa glaubte man, dass autistische Kinder als besonders religiöse Menschen zur Welt gekommen seien und dass diese sich freiwillig für ein Leben jenseits aller Konventionen entschieden hätten. Aus überlieferten Berichten weiß man, dass Autisten in Lumpen durch den russischen Winter liefen, ohne sich vor der Kälte zu schützen. Sie sprachen selten, ihr Verhalten erschien merkwürdig und sie missachteten Gesetz, Ordnung und soziale Regeln. Man nannte sie deshalb „heilige Narren“ und glaubte, dass in ihrem Verhalten göttliche Botschaften verschlüsselt seien. (Lit.: Frith 1992, S. 49-51)

[Baroness]

This is a great post, ChristopherK - thank you. I've often wondered how the church views people with mental disorders too. I actually worked in a counselling service (not as a counsellor though) for two years, so came across varying people with all kinds of issues and disorders. It was a very difficult and challenging job, and after two years, I actually left as it was putting my own health on the line. But working there certainly opened my eyes, and made me wonder if people who have mental disorders - who have not been born with them, and it has developed due to use of drugs and such - like people with schizophrenia (excuse the spelling) ... is it really a disorder, or is it something more spiritual like in the Bible?

I'm tending to lean more to the fact that it's spiritual - much like the man whom Jesus met - "Legion" - the one who had many demons, and Jesus cast the demons out and sent them to the pigs. I mean people who have schizophrenia, have multiple personalities, so in essence could be called "Legion" too, if you know what I'm getting at.

Sorry this isn't worded very well, but I didn't know how to quite express what I'm thinking. Anyway, I wonder what the church thinks too about such things.

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Christopher K.,

The description of "autists" in tzarist Russia sounds a little more like a description of schizophrenic behaviour than autism as such. Having said that, in the 19th century it was thought that childhood autism was a form of early schizophrenia. Psychiatric categories of mental health do change, and are for the most part primarily diagnostic tools rather than definite disease entities. Your question about what constitutes holy folly (and what mental illness) is a fascinating and important one. It seems to me that here the collaboration of a mental health expert and a theologian is necessary in order to offer some sort of satisfactory reply. To what extent, for example, is virtue virtuous if it is not born of conscious struggle? And to what extent are people with severe mental disability not culpable before God? These are truly important questions, but the answers are obviously not simple, and probably need to be looked at on a case-by-case basis.

One famous Orthodox book which addresses mental health somewhat is "Orthodox Psychotherapy" by Hierotheos Vlachos, although I find it to be more a way of presenting Orthodox teaching, rather than a work of genuine integration across disciplines. There is an interesting website on Orthodox Psychotherapy from another perspective here (http://www.orthodoxphotos.com/readings/psychotherapy/). Again, this is a field that in my own humble opinion needs more work and further refinement, but holds a lot of promise.

In Christ
Byron

[Olympiada]

Dear Friends

I am wondering how depression and post traumatic stress disorder fit into this thread of mental health and relationship to God. Does anyone have any favorite resources in this area to share? I can share mine if anyone is interested. Has anyone given this any thought?

In Christ
Olympiada

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Olympiada,

I don't know if anything much has been written about depression or PTSD as mental health disorders and relationship to God from an Orthodox perspective. I am aware of two books, one called "Depression" by an Orthodox cleric from Light&Life books, and another with the same or a very similar title from St Herman of Alaska press. The St Herman of Alaska book is a small treasure, filled with sayings from the Fathers which relate to depression; I haven't read the other book.

Surely depression though, ultimately relates directly to the "thought" called accediae (Grk akidia) or dejection, and is also perhaps the "ungodly sorrow" spoken of by St Paul. PTSD may be harder to understand from a Christian perspective, but as far as I know there are warnings in the Fathers also against the unproductive remembrance of past sins.

This is just by way of starting a conversation on the two interesting topics you raise; I hope to hear from others who may be able to say more...

In Christ
Byron

[Olympiada]

Dear Byron,

Do you know Greek? Thank you for giving me the Greek word. I think you are right on the money on your analysis of dejection. Why I was reading that in the Philokalia last night, about dejection! And I also have that book by friends at the Saint Herman of Alaska Brotherhood.

About PTSD again I think you are right.

But in both instances I want to caution you in laying the blame on the sinner. Often when a person is victimized say by child abuse and or domestic violence, they develop depression and post traumatic stress disorder as a result. They were victimized. They are not at fault. So to put the blame on the sinner is counter productive and makes the condition worse.

I think I am more trying to understand from a patristic perspective how these conditions are formed in the human mind.

In Christ
Olympiada

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Olympiada,

I do speak Greek! I am half-Greek Cypriot, and live in Cyprus. What's your background?

Alas, once again I fear you have misunderstood me; I am by no means "laying blame on the sinner" either in domestic violence or child abuse or PTSD. I know very well that the last thing people who have been victimised need is victim-blaming. And I don't think a person who has been unfortunate enough to have been victimised in these ways is a "sinner" anyway...

However, this brings to light a general question I have that goes out to the whole forum, especially theologians and clergy: in the field of mental health, the line between 'victim' and 'perpetrator' is often drawn very sharply, for obvious practical reasons and to avoid precisely the danger of victim-blaming. However, this interpretation of things can set up an unhealthy black-and-white mentality in patients, who as a result come to view themselves as having no responsibility at all in their predicament. In doing so, they might come to think of themselves as pure victims, and identify with the victim-role so much that they then continue to enact this scenario in their lives, repeatedly entering an abusive pattern of self-destruction with a complicit other.

My question is: how does another's sin affect us? More specifically, I have heard that one of the canons of the Church states that if a boy has been molested, he is unclean for a period and shouldn't have Holy Communion for that time. This MAY BE HEARSAY - I can't remember where I heard it, or who I heard it from. However, it does raise the question of how the sin of another may pollute us.

Obviously, in the case of a mental illness like depression or PTSD, both of which can indeed be the result of abuse, the sin is clearer: it is the sin of responding to another's sin (the abuse) in a sinful way (e.g. by despairing, or by fear). Of course once again issues of conscious / unconscious response enter the picture, since depression and PTSD are not conscious choices. However, in Orthodoxy I know that we ask pardon for sins we have committed "knowingly or unknowingly" precisely because we recognise that sin is not only what we consciously commit. In a previous thread Fr Raphael I think brought up the excellent yet tragic example of a priest, who by killing a person in a car accident is also then barred from the sacraments for a very long period if not indefinitely. It seems to me that "sin" is not just what evil we knowingly commit with our conscious consent, but also the various ways in which we dare to harm or upset the glorious world God has placed in our care; and of course harming another person ranks up there with the very worst.

So is there a "polluting effect" of being in a sinful situation, even as the victim? Or is it perhaps that we are not only called to repent for our own sins, but also for the sins of others? I remember how impressed I felt by the holiness of Fr Paisius of the Holy Mountain, when I read that he took upon himself all sin, everybody's; and considered it his personal fault that there was anyone committing sin in the world. Of course I'm talking here about conditions of sanctity far beyond anything I, as an unrepentant sinner, could even remotely begin to imagine. But for the sake of theoretical knowledge at least, can someone throw some light on these issues from their own perspective?

In Christ
Byron

[Fr. George Morelli]

Christ is in our midst! As usual I prefer to start with the disclaimer that I am not a theologian, but a priest-psychologist. I will say I never expected to see the legalistic nuances (I would expect from the Latin Church) on an Orthodox website…. I have found as an Orthodox priest of 33 years and psychologist of 38 years the most Christ like ability to practice the love of Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ in our Church….and yet still take into account the necessity of scientific understanding of God’s creation. Because we are made in God’s image we are called to use our intelligence to understand His creation, even the physical laws that govern mental operations” neuropsychology etc. …Thus we today have a greater (than in the past) understanding of what is voluntary versus involuntary etc.…I have found so pastorally and psychologically helpful the simple terms mentioned in previous posts to the Prayer of St. John Chrysostom: “..forgive my transgressions both voluntary and involuntary, of word and of deed, of knowledge and of ignorance…”. Clinically and pastorally this is so helpful because it helps us point to our hearts … which is where as Jesus said Himself: all good or evil comes from. So instead of a legalistic approach of legislating the degree of culpability as would Western courts, Insurance Companies or Canon lawyers, we simply have to look at and cleanse our hearts. It is de facto obvious that someone who is a victim has a different “heart” or ‘nous’ then the perpetrator of some abuse. To be a passive recipient is simply to acknowledge the fallenness of mankind and to grieve over it and if one were the recipient of sin (abuse) to grieve over it as one would grieve over any sin any of our brothers or sisters in Christ would grieve over the sin of another. One example (the citation escapes me) one spiritual father talking to a monk said (paraphrase) ‘What would you say if you were in paradise, looking over those in hell?” The monk answered “They deserved it” The spiritual father was much grieved: The monk should have been grieved himself that anyone would turn against God and pray for God’s mercy even on them…. In my simple view as a priest-clinician we can share this grief especially if we are the involuntary victims of sin, more so if we voluntarily sin ourselves. …. To ask for forgiveness is to ask for forgiveness for all …only God can judge our hearts … if a penitent goes to his/her Father Confessor and discloses his/her heart with sincerity then the sin is forgiven. Voluntary or involuntary, knowledge or ignorance broadcasts our hearts … May God have mercy on us ….in the forgiving Christ’s name …FrGeorge

[Marie-Duquette]

Father George,
PEACE of Christ!

Human beings are human beings becoming persons, I believe, and suppose that you believe the same not only as a priest, but also as a psychologist! We all have wounds in need of healing!

It surprised me that you would state your opening sentence as such in post # 38: <font color="ff0000"> &#34;I never expected to see the legalistic nuances &#40;I would expect from the Latin Church&#41; on an Orthodox web site&#34;</font><font color="000000"> What do you think that Jesus Christ expected to find here on earth when he was born? Why do you think that He cried over Jerusalem?

I find that your remark, forgive me for pointing it out, just continues the &#34;FINGER POINTING&#34; that is often on this web site .. that is &#34;finger pointing at the Latin Church!&#34; If we are to &#34;live in this world as not being of it&#34;, &#34;passing among them unseen&#34;, as Jesus says and demonstrates in the Gospel, what are we to do, as Orthodox Christians who are learning our Faith, even though we have received it to the fullest?

As St. Silouane states &#40;paraphrase&#41; &#34;Keep our mind in hell and despair not!&#34; We are all sinful beings on this earth, Orthodox as well as non-Orthodox, and this as a result of the &#34;FALL&#34; and that has nothing to do with what is called the Latin Church, nor the Orthodox Church, but with the fateful event that happened in the beginning, at the &#34;FALL&#34;; and, we all inherit it&#39;s effects and the suffering that this &#34;FALL&#34; entails.

Thank God that in His Loving-mercy, He sent His Son Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh into our midst. He is very, very present even while we humans try &#34;to sift out the chaff from the wheat&#34; in our lives, especially during these &#34;modern times&#34; when there seems to be more &#34;chaff than wheat&#34; at the harvest.

Life is a growing process for each of us; and that according to where each of us is coming from! Compassion and Mercy are so very needed today, during this time of &#34;darkness and turmoil&#34; around us. And, as you so well know, Father, we all need to look to a re-newed coming of Christ in our midst, don&#39;t we?</font>

Respectfully in Christ Jesus,
marie_duquette

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Maybe it's my monastic background but the words of Christ that "by their fruits ye shall know them" keep coming to mind especially in regards to the posts of Fr George & Byron. As Fr George wrote:


To be a passive recipient is simply to acknowledge the fallenness of mankind and to grieve over it and if one were the recipient of sin (abuse) to grieve over it as one would grieve over any sin any of our brothers or sisters in Christ would grieve over the sin of another.

This I also believe strongly is a good benchmark of where we are at spiritually in terms of any real or perceived wrong in regards to another. The Lord we should firmly remember commands us to forgive and love those who have offended us. This is so central to our Christian life that it is rightly said without this effort we do not even have a real Christian life. In fact it is through this that we gradually enter the New Life Christ bids us to and which the world does not know.

Of course all of this gathering the fruit of forgiveness takes much time and effort. At the beginning we need to focus on fighting angry thoughts & feelings. This struggle is terribly difficult because the thoughts & feelings cry out for their measure of satisfaction. Only as we find our peace in Christ will these thoughts and feelings subside & then we begin to see what the life of mercy is which Christ has called us to. But without a doubt before we experience our resurrection in this regard we must first take up our cross.

Of course 'abuse' as specific acts of violence towards others is a fact that must be taken into account. Just as we are not called to be in a destructive situation beyond our capability and call this martyrdom so there are situations we must withdraw & protect ourselves from.

Between unheard of levels of depravity in human relationships & new categories to express this we are just learning. However from within Orthodoxy there is increasing concern about the use of the categorisation of 'abuser-victim'. I don't know that there is a final verdict yet but the unease seems to arise over how this category appears to be based on an idea of suffering which is not Christian or is even anti-Christian. We begin to think that the 'victim' as it is defined in this way will never come to the attitude Fr George describes above, "and if one were the recipient of sin (abuse) to grieve over it as one would grieve over any sin any of our brothers or sisters in Christ would grieve over the sin of another."

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Fr. George Morelli]

“..forgive my transgressions both voluntary and involuntary, of word and of deed, of knowledge and of ignorance…”. Clinically and pastorally this is so helpful because it helps us point to our hearts … which is where as Jesus said Himself: all good or evil comes from. So instead of a legalistic approach of legislating the degree of culpability as would Western courts, Insurance Companies or Canon lawyers, we simply have to look at and cleanse our hearts.......To ask for forgiveness is to ask for forgiveness for all …only God can judge our hearts … if a penitent goes to his/her Father Confessor and discloses his/her heart with sincerity then the sin is forgiven. Voluntary or involuntary, knowledge or ignorance broadcasts our hearts … May God have mercy on us ….in the forgiving Christ’s name …This was and is the &#34;heart&#34; of my message ... I am not finger-pointing [the definition of finger-pointing is: The act of blaming someone for something; the imputation of blame.] .. in fact the heart of my message is not finger-pointing but love and forgiveness, which is pastorally and clincially useful. My reference to &#34;western courts etc&#34; is simply a statement of fact not of blame. &#40;The Eastern vs Western approach::according to my experience disclosure and healing of the heart vs &#39;legalistic&#39; approaches&#41;. I believe I have a perfect right and obligation to say this. The &#39;heart&#39; vs &#39;externals&#39; is the center of Our Lord&#39;s message. If misunderstood, I apologize for my contribution to &#39;conflict&#39; &#40;if so percieved&#41; and as I said in my original message I &#34;grieve&#34; over it. The reason I am responding to this now is not to prolong or escalate or personalize anyone or any issue but based on our Holy Spiritual Church Fathers and Mothers, understand Our Lord&#39;s teaching, as they understood it from their &#39;hearts&#39; ...and this is the heart of my response . Fr Raphael in #821 post got the message completely ... Thank you Father .. ..... in the healing Christ&#39;s name.....FrGeorge

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Fr George,

Greetings! You write:


So instead of a legalistic approach of legislating the degree of culpability as would Western courts, Insurance Companies or Canon lawyers, we simply have to look at and cleanse our hearts.

I entirely agree that "cleansing our hearts" is what we have to do, both from a psychological and (though I'm less qualified to speak about it) from a spiritual point of view. I'm sorry, however, if I gave the impression I was trying to legislate or determine degrees of culpability as one might in a courtroom. My question was really a much broader one, about the nature of sin, and whether it may be considered "infectious" in some way.

You then write:


It is de facto obvious that someone who is a victim has a different “heart” or ‘nous’ then the perpetrator of some abuse.

Is this so? Can you say a bit more about what you mean here - it genuinely sounds interesting. What about the fact that a large percentage of abusers have themselves been victims of abuse, and the fact that a lot of victims go on to abuse others in various ways?

Perhaps, Fr George, you are saying much the same thing that Fr Raphael later clarifies when he writes:


However from within Orthodoxy there is increasing concern about the use of the categorisation of 'abuser-victim'. I don't know that there is a final verdict yet but the unease seems to arise over how this category appears to be based on an idea of suffering which is not Christian or is even anti-Christian.

I for one am glad to hear there is concern about this in Orthodoxy, as it would for one thing raise the sort of dialogue that one encounters between Christians and non-Christian mental health experts to a different level (mostly here in Cyprus I encounter negative stereotyping on either "side"). One of the things about Christianity which is so difficult for myself as a beginner to remember, yet so wonderful at the same time, is that it not only requests we do not seek vengeance, but it asks us to forgive those who wrong us, and more - to love them! The sort of spiritual detachment required of the peron who weeps over their abusers' sin as though he/she were weeping for the sins of the world, is truly "not of this world". As a psychologist, I find it hard to imagine such tears not containing a large dose of resentment and pride, but as a Christian I must believe it is possible. Thank you Fr George and Fr Raphael, for reminding me once again of this simple and great Christian truth.

In Christ
Byron

[Fr. George Morelli]

Byron Christ is in our midst! In the context of brevity I did say &#34;It is de facto obvious that someone who is a victim has a different “heart” or ‘nous’ then the perpetrator of some abuse.&#34; Possibly this should be dealt with in more detail. I was initially talking abstractly and in general principles. The true judge, God himself, reads hearts and sees and knows all, although he has granted this as a partial gift to some of our holiest, spiritual fathers and mothers of the Church. With no reading of an individual persons &#39;heart&#39; someone who is an &#34;active&#34; abuser is on the face of it different from the &#34;passive&#34; recipient. In dealing with a specific &#39;case&#39;, the individual abuser and victim has to be considered. Of course the different types of abuse are factors also. As a psychologist I presume you know types. For others, there are four types: Physical, &#40;hitting, battering, etc.&#41;; Sexual, &#40;forcible intercourse, inappropriate touching, glancing etc.&#41;; Psychological &#40;calling someone by demeaning terms &#34;You idiot, looser [actually mild, often far worse] & Neglect &#40;legally, denying, food, shelter, education, and necessary care [I pray we Orthodox would also have a &#39;spiritual&#39; category, but of course this would never be endorsed by the state unless it were part of a legal separation or divorce decree]&#41; Each of these types is different in terms of how they are &#34;missing the mark&#34; or &#34;illness of the soul&#34;, the two major ways we look at sin. &#40;But as the Holy Fathers teach us every sin is a departure from God&#41;. The recipient&#39;s of abuse response is part of the complex interaction. Abstactly, this recipient, is passive and blameless. In real life, the reaction of the recipient may be much different. Once again it is the state of the heart of the recipient that is critical. So many possible states of heart could exist, hate, resentment, forgiveness, prayer for the abuser. So the recipient of abuse can be a pariticipant in the sin in their own way. However to grieve over the brokenness of mankind and the resultant sin by the prayer of asking forgiveness &#40;with sincerety of heart&#41; for all sins, voluntary, involuntary, with knowledge or with ignorance is thought, word or deed has come out of the God inspired wisdom given to our holy fathers and mothers who sensed all these complexities. The words: &#34;voluntary ...etc&#34; are general each, person would have to put in their own specific thought, word and deed and if hopefully they have a spiritual father or mother tell him or her. I believe this also touches on the second part of your question on whether sin becomes infectious. The answer is it can be very infectious: by esclation and generalization of abuse, my modeling, by scandal, by hypocracy, by continuation of ommission &#40;neglect&#41; and in the victims or observers, by hate, vengence, loss of faith, hope and love, lack of forgiveness, striking back etc.&#40;Literally a book could be written here.&#41; I have dealt with victims of all types of abuse pastorally and clinically. The expression &#34;hate the sin but love the sinner&#34; is a general theme guiding my interactions. The victim suffering has to be validated and their pain understood. Any abuse has to be labeled as such and acknowledged as wrong. However anger is a spiritual &#40;and psychological&#41; cancer. Healing cannot take place until in the depth of the victim&#39;s heart they can truly say &#34;Father forgive them for they know not what they do.&#34; Is this easy? No! But hate kills &#40;spiritually and psychologically&#41; all around us. No one has ever embarked on spiritual and psychological healing until they reach the point of working on &#34;forgiveness&#34; ----while still recognizing the &#34;horror&#34; of whatever abuse they received. Once again I want to say that this cannot be done &#40;in my judgement&#41; without Christ. In dealing with these victims, I attempt to have the victim use the entire life of Christ, all of what happened to Him, all of His teachings and the teachings of the Fathers, who by God&#39;s grace had a special understanding of the meaning of these teachings in the healing process. It is not of this world as you say. But is this not exactly Our Lord&#39;s words to us: Be in the world but not of it.. This cannot be understood in terms of the world, but all I can say is once this becomes part of the &#34;heart&#34; it is perfectly understandable &#40;given our limited capacity&#41; and a certain beauty emerges which words cannot express. Such victims may be granted a different understanding of God&#39;s love, once it indwells in them, not granted to persons who have never suffered abuse. &#34;Acquire the spirit of peace and a thousand souls will be saved around you.&#34; St. Seraphim of Sarov

[Fr. George Morelli]

To all: I want to apologize for the few typos in my last post … I did a copy to MS Word to do a spell check … nothing came up ….I closed and saved the document …I just reopened it in and found various errors ….sorry … I should have done my original on Word then Copy to the posting site …..my error … in Christ ..Fr George

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Fr George wrote:


However anger is a spiritual (and psychological) cancer. Healing cannot take place until in the depth of the victim's heart they can truly say "Father forgive them for they know not what they do." Is this easy? No! But hate kills (spiritually and psychologically) all around us. No one has ever embarked on spiritual and psychological healing until they reach the point of working on "forgiveness" ----while still recognizing the "horror" of whatever abuse they received. Once again I want to say that this cannot be done (in my judgement) without Christ
This I think is extremely important and that healing comes gradually and in stages. As Fr George says at the beginning we have our own pain and anger before us to deal with. We must struggle with this for a long time before this subsides and only in Christ can we accomplish this. But even recognising that such thoughts and feelings are our enemies and then wrong- ie sinful- even this first step in fighting the turmoil inside is often very tough.

Only after this fiery path has been travelled will real healing begin- then the path opens up to compassion and forgiveness. Not that we automatically can be in the company of those we have suffered from- each case is different & there are those we can never approach again- but forgiveness can often work in a more indirect fashion.

In any case as Fr George said none of this can be accomplished outside of Christ. For our work at the end of the day always has an element of taking up our cross and humbling oneself.

This I think is a crucial difference between an Orthodox & 'abuser-victim' perspective.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Fr George,

I am sincerely moved by what you&#39;ve written. Thank you for highlighting with such clarity and grace the process of forgiveness in Christ - you have even drawn my attention to the special gift there may be in transcending our experiences with His help.

I&#39;m sure I will be reading your post and responding to it again.

In Christ
Byron

[Fr Seraphim (Black)]

I would like to thank ChristopherK for beginning this thread. Wonderful things have been said. I would like to high-light two of them.
God granted me to know Fr. Paisios of the Holy Mountain. He lived just up the hill from me, and I often visited him. His spiritual state and utterances on this matter are pure Orthodox wisdom.
I am a disciple of Father Sophrony &#40;Sakharov&#41; and hopefully a spiritual grandson of Saint Silouan of the Holy Mountain. Even, hopefully, some sort of disciple of Father Sophrony, to qualify the matter.
Saint Silouan and Father Paisios speak from the Holy Spirit on this subject.
However, it is absolutely imperative to be clear when discussing the &#39;fall.&#39;
Yes, certainly, I live under the conditions of the fall and struggle with that dialectic daily.
But the historical time of Christ and the words He spoke and the present historical decisions of the Roman Catholic Church are not the same. Nor can the Orthodox Christian Church, in whichever manner we stumble along, disagree with the statement of Father George regarding the legalistic nuances of the Latin Church. It is not finger-pointing. It is a sad reality.
Saint Silouan, as Father Paisios wept continuously for all people of the earth. But from Father Sophrony I can say without the slightest doubt that Saint Silouan held the view that regarding other confessions one begins by pointing out the good and then gently the absence.
Father Paisios and Saint Silouan and hosts of others were granted tears for the people of the earth, that they come to know that Jesus Christ is God.
Any deviation in the understanding of the Holy Trinity will invariably affect one&#39;s spiritual struggle and life.
It is the understanding of the Orthodox Church that the Roman Catholic Church has deviated. This is one reason, that is, Trinitarian Theology, why we have not been officially in communion since 1054.
But this is getting away from ChristopherK&#39;s concern. I have also worked with persons who labour under great mental difficulty. Father Paisios supplies the answer. But to find that asks what Our Lord Himself asked in Luke xiv:26.
To quote from Father Sophrony: &#39;The Staretz&#39; message is gentle, often affectionate one, healing the soul, but to heed it requires great and ardent resolution - to the point of self-hatred &#40;cf. Luke xiv:26&#41; - quotation from &#39;Saint Silouan the Athonite, by Archimandrite Sophrony &#40;Sakharov&#41; pgs. 267-8.

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Fr Seraphim,

Fr Bless! You wrote:


I have also worked with persons who labour under great mental difficulty. Father Paisios supplies the answer. But to find that asks what Our Lord Himself asked in Luke xiv:26. To quote from Father Sophrony: 'The Staretz' message is gentle, often affectionate one, healing the soul, but to heed it requires great and ardent resolution - to the point of self-hatred (cf. Luke xiv:26)

Could you say a bit more? Are you connecting Luke 14:26 with Fr Paisios' teaching regarding taking upon himself all sin? How does this relate to working with people with mental illness?

In Christ
Byron

[Olympiada]

Dear Community Members,
I find this whole thread &#42;highly&#42; disturbing. My post yesterday got rejected, I discussed with Dr. Steenberg, I am going to try again.

Ok, let&#39;s take someone who is suffering from depression or post traumatic stress disorder. They have already broken. They do not have the strength to drive all blames into one self, as the Buddhists do, or practice self-accusation as the Orthodox do. Note Buddhists and Orthodox do the same thing, but that is another topic. At any rate, for somebody who has been given something &#42;more&#42; than they can handle, they break down. They need. Professional help. They need to place responsiblity where responsiblity lies.

For example, for sexually active &#42;children&#42; the responsiblity lies with the adults. Period. End of story. In fact the person suffering from the results of childhood sexual activity &#42;will not&#42; get well until they place responsiblity where responsibility lies, with the adults.

Another thing, still using the example of childhood sexuality activity. This causes children to feel powerless, especially if they were taken advantage of by another person. Often times a person carries this feeling of powerlessness into their adult life and it colors &#42;all&#42; their relationships. Unless this adult recognizes that they were in fact &#42;powerless&#42; as children, they will not get well.

I am dismayed at how ignorant the church seems to be in dealing with the effect of childhood maltreatment. &#42;Quite disturbed&#42;. There is not a thing that one of you has said that resonates me in regards to this.

[Fr. George Morelli]

Olympiada ... Christ is in our midst! I have to leave my office I would like to give you a quick preliminary answer and a fuller one later in the afternoon when I return. We have a holy tradition of Spiritual Mothers and Fathers who not only as part of what they do &#34;take on the sin&#34;. ...Please look at www.ocampr.org (http://www.ocampr.org) .... Here we offer & integrate orthodox spirituality with scientific clinical interventions. I just completed an article on Abuse ... I will send out to all after I get editorial feedback which should be later today. .... responsibility and accountability &#40;with clinical intervention&#41; and healing &#40;also with the church as a hospital &#41; for all is central ....in Christ ....FrGeorge

[Arsenios]

Olympiada writes: &#34;There is not a thing that one of you has said that resonates me in regards to this.&#34;

There is a fine line in the center of this discussion that perhaps might prove fruitful, and that is the one that divides the event[s] of childhood from the child&#39;s actions in response to them. Not to downplay the traumatic nature of the events, but to empower, in pop-psychological terms, the child...

We are born to be broken, and some of us start earlier than others in the more horriffic parts... Many are butchered in the womb itself... So that we can take responsibility as children for what we do and did about what happened to us, without in any way lessening the responsibility of the parent or other adult for inflicting the trauma... To blame self or other is counter-productive, for it focuses on blame... And the cure of the soul in this condition is the turning to God, and the accepting of self-responsibility, and divine intervention... Worldly interventions are but stop-gaps...

This is what I have found to be true in my own person... Where trauma began very early indeed...
It may not apply to everyone...

The Church seeks to establish this relationship with God, and will perhaps seem insensitive to the neediness of the afflicted... I hope we are not, but are looking to a more substantive emergence that is not born of soulish, but of God&#39;s, interdiction...

And the problem with blaming the adults is blame. It is true that children have this tendency to assume responsibility for the adults, and this is wrong. But the cure is not to blame the adults, but to simply acknowledge the facts as facts, thereby neutralizing them, and then moving into self-responsibility for self, and turning to God...

Lord please let this be read softly...

Arsenios

[Olympiada]

Fr Bless
You actually know me, I just sent you an email. I am well familiar with OCAMPR. I was sent there earlier this year. I will return. I look forward to receiving your article on abuse. I would like to read your other writing as well.

[Owen Jones]

I cannot imagine that no one in the Church ever suffered from abuse, until the advent of modern psychology. The treatment then is the treatment now. The &#34;problem,&#34; such as it is in the Church today, is that the practical dimensions of the tradition tend to be intellectualized, as if knowledge of something is equated with analysing a concept. But the spiritual life is not a concept. It is something that must be lived, and the depth of our spiritual teachings applies to all ills. If they were only put into practice.

Now, everyone suffers. That is the great leveler. That is what makes us all equal. No one has gone through life without suffering. The degrees of suffering, the kinds of suffering are different and, yes indeed, some suffering, especially at a young age, does life long damage. But the principles of Christianity apply in all cases, and in all cases, if put into practice, you will experience spiritual progress from where you were. Even psychotics can benefit from practicing the principles of our tradition, chemical therapies notwithstanding.

In particular, a person abused as a child must not wait for the parent to take responsibility as an excuse not to work at their own spiritual health. One may not be responsible for the abuse, but we are all guilty of mistreating others at some point or other. We must forgive, and we must change our own lives and our own thinking and our own perspective.

A good source on this is the chapter in the second volume of GULAG II that describes Solzhenitsyn&#39;s conversion.

[Olympiada]

Community Members,
I still disagree with you and &#42;strongly&#42;. In order for the adult child to recover they must place responsibility where responsbility lies, with the adults who were responsible for them as a children.

How many of you are in recovery? AA and it&#39;s related affiliates is a path of repenteance, in fact the American contribution to the path of repentance.

I still find the thought of the last two posters to be unhealthy. I am not willing to entertain the thoughts of anyone who has not been through recovery. I have been damaged by too many dry drunks serving in positions of authority in the church to put it simply. It does not matter if the drinking stops. So what. Where is the recovery? Show me somebody with 20 years of sobriety and then I will listen.

I find this thread to be a &#42;most&#42; unproductive discussion.

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear all,

I continue to find this conversation very interesting; many thanks to those who have posted their thoughts. I agree entirely with Owen that one of the problems is faced in the modern day is to assume that only modern categories of psychology, psychiatry and theraputic methods have the potential to deal rightly and effectively with the conditions facing human persons in the world. Not that they should be in any way belittled; but the assumption that &#39;these and no other&#39; are the means to health and recovery, is to deny any sensibility to the fact that the Church and the people of God have been dealing with such problems for two-thousand years and longer. It is also to call into question some of Christianity&#39;s chief confessions of human nature, which must underlie any discussion of the abuses and illnesses of that nature, which have been to some degree discussed above.

As to one of the most recent objects of discussion: blame. I am not a therapist and make no claims in that area; but in various roles I have had the opportunity to work with hundreds of abused and maltreated children and young people, and my experience with these has been universally that &#39;blame&#39; is always a negative -- which is entirely in accord with what the Church teaches. The natural first-reaction of a child, to blame the self, is immensely self-destructive; but there is also the observable truth that merely re-assigning blame to another &#39;cures&#39; that self-destruction with another disfiguration of self -- a kind of deep-rooted torture of relating and knowing others, through &#39;blame&#39;, that has repurcussions throughout life. As Arsenios said above, the matter of acknowledging &#39;the facts as facts&#39;, and dealing with the responsibilities associated with them, is in line with the Church&#39;s tradition of dealing with the passions &#40;in these cases, those inflicted upon us by others&#41; in a manner that does not raise others.

INXC, Matthew

[Joanna Bakas]

Dear All,

As a Psychiatrist but not an expert in theology I have found this discussion very thought provoking. I suppose I have only two points to make. Firstly, I think there is some confusion between illnesses such as schizophrenia which we are finding out more and more are really biological illnesses like diabetes versus personality disorders. Let me add schizophrenia is an illness which is characterised by delusions and hallucinations and usually begins in early adulthood. It is not having a &#34;split personality&#34;. Like all biological illnesses spiritual assistance is vital and miracles can happen. What I worry about is that these people who are amongst the most vulnerable in our society are not further stigmatised by the church. I know locally our priests are very protective and supportive of these people and help educate their families.

My second point was to do with people who have been abused as children. In a way I think everyone is right. Of course the children are not to blame. However, when they become adults , if they then don&#39;t take responsibility for their actions as adults, they will never be well or have a contented worthwhile life. The same I think goes for people abused as adults. Also if people hold onto bitterness they continue to suffer &#40;the abuser often knows nothing about it&#41;.

Joanna

[Olympiada]

Dear Dr. Steenberg,
Now I disagree with you, Oxford professor of theology and all. Oh boy.

I am not talking about blame. I am talking about placing responsibility where responsibility belongs. That is not the same as blame.

I do not see how this discussion is productive. I have found it to be an &#42;immense&#42; source of frustration. It may that I am the only liberal person in this community, I do not know, but I find my self &#42;sorely&#42; disappointed by this thread.

I even called my Bishop and told him about it and he told me not to participate in internet discussions, they were a waste of time. And I said &#34;but this one is moderated by a professor of theology at Oxford and it has Father George Morelli on it&#34;.

Come on guys, you can do better than this.

INXC
Olympiada

[Owen Jones]

Thanks for the very level headed observations from our psychiatrist.

[Olympiada]

Dear Joanna,
Actions take place in a continum. If people do not identify the source of their actions, childhood, they will never recover. There is a form of therapy called object relations that deals with this very thing. In other words, the lack of responsiblity in the adults in a child&#39;s life does affect the child&#39;s future life as an adult.

I will not touch the word abuse.

People do not &#42;hold on&#42; to bitterness. They are &#42;made&#42; bitter by their suffering.

INXC
Olympiada

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear all,


People do not *hold on* to bitterness. They are *made* bitter by their suffering.

This is an incomplete, or somewhat unbalanced, comment. Yes, people can be made bitter by their suffering; but people can also hold on to bitterness, expanding it. This is not an either/or question. Actual human affliction is far more complex. Most persons who experience bitterness caused by suffering deal with an intricate struggle: not only identifying the real source of the original bitterness, but also dealing with the interiorisation of that response and reaction that engenders bitterness elsewhere and in other contexts. It is partially this that makes addressing such issues so complex: it is a matter also of recognising how that source has engendered reactions and actions that go far beyond its original context. This has been a point that others have addressed in various ways in earlier posts. The complexity of human suffering, especially what we would today call 'mental suffering', cannot simply be reduced to a series of causes with patterned events. This is further one of the Church's most basic teachings on the human person: organic creatures of will and experience, react and respond to various events in ways that reach far beyond the immediate circumstances of those events, and do in fact have ramifications for the way one acts, thinks and feels in dramatically other situations. It is not a matter of shifting responsibility, but of understanding the complexity of the human person and of human experience.

Further, the blanket statement that suffering leads to bitterness is also not globally true -- another important part of the Church's vision of human reality. The effects of suffering are bound up in the context in which suffering is experienced and approached. There is suffering that is deadly and destructive, and there is suffering that is transfiguring and transforming. Simply saying 'suffering is bad and has bad effects' is to take observations of a very limited experience of human reality, and globalise it to a universal. This the Church does not allow of us, for human reality is far more complex.

INXC, Matthew

[Trudy]

To a certain extent I agree with you, Olympiada. People should take responsibility for their actions.

If an adult abuses a child, whether it be physically or emotionally, the adult should take responsibility. Sadly, alot of the time they do not. If a child grows up in a chaotic household &#40;as I did&#41; due to whatever reasons &#40;mine were alcoholism, drug abuse, schizophrenia, elder abuse&#41;, the parent&#40;s&#41; should take responsibility.

However, the question is &#34;What does &#39;taking responsibility&#39; look like?&#34; Acknowledging they made a mistake? Acknowledging their alcoholism? Once acknowledged, then what? What will satisfy the abused child who is now an adult? Often it does not.

What about when the child becomes an adult, like me? Olympiada, you&#39;re looking for someone who is suffering severe depression, to the extent of asking God to not let her wake up in the morning? Add panic attacks. You want someone who is on the path to recovery &#40;post 71&#41;? Look no further. I&#39;m your girl.

Do I want my parents to take responsibilty for how they neglected to care for me and to provide a safe and calm home, one that was secure and stable? They think they did! And truthfully, they did the best they could. However, there has been some acknowledgment of the problems with the individual who lived with us who was schizophrenic. Has that made my depression go away? Has that stopped the panic attacks? No.

What has helped is taking responsibilty <u>for myself</u>, for <u>my reactions</u>, for <u>my own illness</u>. How have I done that? Through regular confession, regular communoin, a lot of counseling, a lot of talking, and a whole lot of prayer. By using the medicine the Church has provided for me to heal from my sin, which has been my unhealthy reactions to the abuse.

Their acknowledgment has not given me one bit of satisfaction. Actually I&#39;m glad because I think that would make me feel a prideful, smart-aleck type of self-satisfaction. What has happened as <u>I&#39;ve</u> worked on myself and my reaction, is forgiveness and compassion for them. I&#39;ve come to realize even at a deeper level that they suffered just as much as me.

So responsibility goes both ways Olympiada. Look inward, look to God, and the Church for the healing necessary to move on and pray for those who have hurt you &#40;and me&#41;. It is only then that true Godly healing and forgiveness can happen.

How do I know? Because it&#39;s happened to me.

Love, Athanasia}

[nurse-aid]

hey Anastasia! thanks for the Voice of Orthodoxy in that desert! http://www.monachos.net/mb/clipart/wink.gif

[Joanna Bakas]

Dear Olympiada,

I never meant that the person who committed the abuse was not responsible for their actions. It would be best for them to admit responsibility, for the person they harmed and actually also for themselves. The problem is, often as in Athanasia&#39;s case, the perpetrator will never admit responsibility. If the person who has been abused does not take personal responsibility for their actions as an ADULT it will be difficult for them ever to have peace. They may even end up abusing their own children.

I am not minimising the pain of those who have been the victims of abuse in childhood especially. I work with people who have been abused in therapy. I sometimes feel traumatised by hearing what they have been through, so I can only imagine what it is like to actually have experienced the abuse. What object relations therapy is very focused on is how early relationships affect how we relate to others and feel about ourselves for the rest of our lives. The therapy is focused on helping people who have had problems in early relationships understand what has happened and be able to improve the quality of their lives through their understanding. This is a very simplistic explanation of a complex topic.

Joanna

[Arsenios]

One of the things that I have observed since becoming Orthodox [and not prior to becoming Orthodox] is the large number of people who have had very serious mental health issues and who have been brought through them by God&#39;s grace... And then brought to Orthodoxy... [This was my path]

And they tell me that the real help came from the inside, and that the outer &#39;help&#39; of mental health professionals, while supportive and kind, really did not amount to much in their overcoming the issues that held them. But that divine intervention did... And that upon that intervention, they knew what had occurred, and what was the part of the adults in the genesis of the problem, and what was their response to it... And how it was that their response was what was giving trouble, and the inner demons that implanted themselves by means of that response... And the fleeing of those demons at the approach of divine intervention... And another who, in the face of horrific abuse, was given &#39;forgetfulness&#39; of the event... And now struggles to remember [western psychotherapy]... And may come to not doing so, for the medicine of the Church does not require such remembering...

And Athanasia is right. The medicine of the Church, beginning with the prayers of exorcism at baptism, and the partaking of the holy Mysteries of confession and communion, and the prayers and the repentance of the Church, is a medicine that overcomes these kinds of issues.

I do agree with Olympiada that calling a spade a spade is important, and closing our eyes to adult abuse is sinful and wrong, yet the cure of souls must include both victim and victimizer in its scope, [and not necessarily together!] And that entails forgiveness and repentance and dispassion and love...

I remember asking a mental health worker in our parish about a &#39;situation&#39; of potential abuse in the parish by a severely abused potential abuser, and the response shocked me, because I expected a patristic solution interwoven with western conceptualizing, and what I got was basically a western approach that involved legal [child protective] intervention, drug and psycho-therapy, and had, in a word, nothing to do with the Church... With the somewhat hissed admonition that IF I did not act on the suggestions made, and the child was harmed, it would be my responsibility...

So I just pray for both, and let matters develop - It is not mine to do, and yet I maintain close friendship with the sounded family, and trust in the healing power of confession and repentance, and can report that there is not a phone-call network in place, so that when it gets too tough, one call and relief is at the door in 5 minutes or less...

Granted this is anecdotal, but is a real matter that was dealt with in a real way and is so far working well where the inner pressures are awesome... The abuse story there is utterly knee-buckling...

And there are worse in my community...

And we cannot afford to blink in the face of them...

I really do not know how priests manage to cope...

Arsenios

[Vasilis Kirikos]

&#34;mental suffering cannot simply be reduced to a series of causes with patterned events&#34;
In some, indeed in most cases it can. I got interested in psychology when I discovered that DID patients &#40;Dissociative Identity Disorder; formerly called multiple personality&#41; is caused by child abuse; 97% of these DID patients were sexually abused in early childhood. My graduate studies have been in microbiology. My undergraduate degrees are in biology and psychology. Until I learned about DID and attended several grand round meetings for DID I was convinced that all major psychotic illnesses had a microbial etiology. We are now fairly certain that many of the obsessive compulsive and bipolar disorders have a bacterial etiology; specifically Streptococcus pyogenes. Can you imagine something as mundane as a sore throat can cause such a life long “mental” problem? . And why not? That organism and many others adversely affects other tissues in the body when it causes rheumatic fever; particularly the heart and kidneys. Why not neural tissue? Why not an unfortunate combination of bacteria or bacterium infected with a virus or some combination of viruses causing other major psychosis? But the DID patient is purely a product of abuse &#40;usually sexual&#41; by others during early childhood.
I am bemused when I recall listening to researches asking dental patients who had periodontal disease &#40;of all things&#41; if they had other systemic disorders &#40;usually some gastric ulcer&#41; and referring them to a psychiatrist or psychologist for counseling to teach them how to deal with their “obvious emotional distress” that was causing their teeth to fall out and their ulcers!!! But now we know that a bacteria, Helicobacter pylori is the culprit; and we now treat such patients with antibiotics rather than a strict diet, the anti-acid Tagamet and psychotherapy! Tagamet indeed! What a joke; it once was a strict prescription drug; but when the demand for its use in ulcer treatment went to zero it was suddenly OK to sell it over the counter!! Really makes you wonder; doesn’t it? Yeah really. When attending school I came across a researcher who was dissecting human aortas and found that most of those who had died from cardiac occlusions had bacteria in the sclerotic tissue of the occluded aorta! Yet we insist that obesity is the cause of heart disease; meanwhile very physically fit guys drop dead form heart disease and many who have been morbidly obese all their lives live to their 90es!! I am convinced that some of the Clamydia are to blame for many heart problems; I think passanger air planes are dangerous in that they are a source of Clamydia infections because the air is “reused” by filtering and not freshly pumped from the outside &#40;this is to save on fuel consumption!&#41;. I could go on and on.
I truly believe that psychiatry/psychology has a place in medicine . Psychiatry for treating psychotics and some neurotics with counseling and psychotropic drugs; and psychologists to treat neurotics and the truly emotionally abused that resulted in some psychosis such as DID.
In science everything has a cause and effect. We just have to learn to look in the correct places when searching for the cause.

[Fr Seraphim (Black)]

Dear Byron,
Regarding my discussions with Elder Paisios, Father Sophrony and his words about Saint Silouan, I am more than happy to discuss this with you. I would suggest we do it by email, as it is quite involved, and as I watch this thread unfold, I see sadly, that the very wonderful potential of Monachos, can be easily eroded by quick postings.
Some time ago Dr.Steenberg suggested everyone take a deep breath before posting. I think we all need to pay heed to his advice.
Allow me a few personal reflections regarding this thread, indeed membership in this online community.
Jesus Christ of Nazareth is, as we confess True God and True Man.
The understanding of the Orthodox Church concerning the Petrine Doctrine is correct. It is Peter&#39;s confession that Christ is the Son of the Living God which is the essential, not the person of Peter.
True healing is found only in the Church.
There is only One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church as stated in the Nicene Creed. That Church despite its human fraility is the Orthodox Christian Church.
The great gift of God to humankind is the understanding of Christ found in the Orthodox Church.
If one moves outside being a disciple of Christ and does not see His humility and the consequent necessity that we acquire this grace, then what are we left with?
Though the mystical theology of the main Faiths appears similar in many areas, there is in fact a great difference.
True healing of any ailment is the grace of God.
This healing is given by our Church when we approach Her Priests with Christ-like humility.
We are commanded not to judge.
This is the easiest way to lose grace.
Let us take the example of just one Saint, one amongst a multitude.
I suggest St. Seraphim of Sarov because he is well known and as it has been said by so many so many times,if one person finds this grace, many are saved.
May Christ and His Most Pure Mother comfort and protect us all.

[Owen Jones]

The Biblical and classical Christian diagnosis of sickness, whether it be an obvious physical disease, or some mental disorder, or simple obvious moral disorders, has been attributed to demonic possession. I hesitate to reduce any disease to a purely material cause without the rejection of our own tradition. I think it is a scientific fallacy to attribute any disease or disorder to a purely material cause &#40;i.e. an immanent cause&#41;. Virtually all modern schools of psychiatry and psychology &#40;with notable exceptions among individual practitioners&#41; deal only in immanent causes.


By complex, I do not think Mr. Steenberg is using the term in the conventional sense of, gee, this is very complicated. By complex, he is using the term in its scientific sense, which is to say that there are layers of reality that overlap, and a connectedness between things and processes that otherwise might appear to us to be discreet phenomenon. One cannot simply extract one out of the whole and make it the only thing. Likewise, simplicity in our tradition does not refer to a kind of oversimplification of problems -- a kind of reductio absurdum -- but rather it refers to the experience of harmony, union, and consistent structure to reality that we can examine with clarity. So, as Qohelet said, life is simple. Man&#39;s complex problems are of his own devising.

Most mental disorders have to do with a false desire to control reality, along with a false process of intellectualizing reality. The first treatment is simplicity. To acquire a spirit of simplicity. It is not necessary to analyse the cause of the mental disorder in any definitive or absolute sense. We can become so obsessed wiht causality, assuming that just by knowing the cause of some disturbance somehow the healing will follow. The problem is that there is a virtually unlimited chain of causality and at some point looking for the cause will drive us even more nuts! Particularly if we are deluded into thinking that it is an immanent cause only.

The spiritual principle of simplicity is key, so that the mental disturbance can not be used as an excuse to assume that the person is somehow unique and not connected to reality as a whole.

Now, the Church does not reject material causes. It does not reject the existence of microbes! Lord knows our religion is very physical. Taste and see that the Lord is Good! We even maintain that sanctity can be physically determined through bodily incorruption after death! But in any treatment of a physical ailment, there is always a transcendent cause and effect.

Which means that we might touch on the subject of exhorcism for a minute. Unfortunately, the Church, but especially the Roman Church, has tended to reduce exhorcism to a liturgical ritual. But that is not my understanding of our tradition. It is essentially the fact that the demons cannot reside where the truth is present. Demons exist in the presence of lies. Since all men are liars, we are all, to some extent, infected by and afflicted by some demonic influence. Exhorcism usually involves some other person who has attained a sufficient state of spiritual equanimity so that the demons can be confronted without infecting that other person. We also think of exhorcism has being a dramatic, singlular event in time, when it fact it is the whole process of living a life of spiritual honesty and purity, with guidance from others, and from our Tradition.

Most of us live our lives on a very superficial level. We live our spiritual lives on a very superficial level. If, however, we are confronted through an event, or another&#39;s observation, that we are, say, bitter, for example, or angry , almost congenitally, or obsessed about something, boy look at how the demons react in order to protect themselves! They are parasites that need a host and if we threaten the host with death, i.e. the kind of death that leads to rebirth in Christ, the demons resist, and create a wall, utilizing every conceivable rational argument and &#34;defense mechanism.&#34; This is why submitting to obedience to God, usually through someone who tells us what we are doing wrong, or what is wrong about our thinking, is such an important aspect of our tradition, because we cannot see in us what another might see.

Of course, this tradition of submitting in obedience has often been abused in our tradition. It is the unforgivable sin to be in a position of spiritual authority over another and abuse that authority in such a way that robs another of his freedom and dignity and turns religious doctrine into a burden and a curse, when its purpose is to free us from the demons.

However, God is a consuming fire and according to our inner disposition, He either illuminates or burns.

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear Vasilis and others,

I think Mr Jones has largely addressed the particular points of clarification I would have wanted to raise in response to your &#40;Vasilis&#39;&#41; comments on my earlier message. I still stand by my earlier comment, &#39;mental suffering cannot simply be reduced to a series of causes with patterned events&#39;, when it is taken in the context of the broader remarks I was making in that message &#40;my no. 870, above&#41;. My point there was certainly not that specific causes do not have specific effects, but rather that the complexity of the human creature and human experience is such that the singular effects of singular causes are not the whole story of interior suffering. No one denies that the experiences of one part of life &#40;early childhood in particular&#41; have effects on mental states later in life; this &#39;modern understanding&#39; has been well understood in the Church since the time of the Gospels. But there is not a one-to-one equation of suffering-to-cause that suffices for the healing of the human person. To use Owen&#39;s words, &#39;there are layers of reality that overlap, and a connectedness between things and processes that otherwise might appear to us to be discreet phenomenon. One cannot simply extract one out of the whole and make it the only thing.&#39;

One of the abiding desires of the modern world is to over-simplify &#40;in a way, and here I repeat Owen&#39;s comment, that patently does not equate to the Orthodox concept of &#39;simplicity&#39;&#41;, and in the realm of our present discussion this has clear ramifications in the urge to believe that the agonies of the interior life are like flip-switches of cause and effect -- the belief that if all the &#39;switches&#39; or events that have caused a given &#39;response&#39; can be accurately identified and addressed, that address eliminates its the response; and if we might multiply this to all the causes, all the effects are healed. Human reality is simply more complex. Causes have effects; but effects mingle, and generate others. Associations form between effects and other causes, other effects. Our will and our freedom interact with the causes and their results, we mingle our will from self with those realities thrust upon us; we interiorise and exteriorise; we habituate as well as move on. It is for such reasons that the Orthodox approach to healing of the interior life does involve the deep examination of those &#39;causes&#39; of certain behaviours, mental sufferings, etc.; but does not limit or restrict the approach to healing merely to this discovery and redress. Questions of &#39;what happened then?&#39; are always united to questions of &#39;what am I doing now?&#39;

INXC, Matthew

[Olympiada]

Dear Community Members,
I have listened to many people&#39;s stories. I have found that among the members of the church, many are reluctant to enter therapy. In the arena of marriage, many women are afraid to confront their spouses wrong doing and would rather let them commit adultery, then a bad marriage. Sad but true. This cuts across cultures: American, Romanian, Russian.

What does this have to do with mental health and relationship to God?

Well especially in the arena of marriage and family, women and children are &#42;vulnerable&#42;. There is a double standard. A man can play the whoremonger and get away with it while the woman is expected to put up with it. This obviously causes mental suffering.

Or children, who are at the mercy of their parents are subject to much mental suffering.

Often times the members of the church judge the intervention of the law such as the police or child protective services and say family matters should stay family matters. This is how abuse is perpetuated from generation to generation.

And again, what does this have to do with mental health and relationship to God? Well I would say that human suffering caused by other humans interferes with the human&#39;s relationship to God. And this suffering can be compounded by those who do understand.

My interest now is to how to deal with prejudice in the church towards psychotherapy, child protective services and the police, as well as education such as child development.

INXC
Olympiada

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

I keep looking at the top of my computer screen and seeing the title of this thread; Mental Health & Relationship to God. What volumes could be written about this nowadays! With all of our 'knowledge' we are the most mentally- psychologically, morally, spiritually- devastated generation almost like we have been the victims of another Great War. Meanwhile we are surrounded by social values that drive us to be inordinately content with ourselves to the point of making self-love into what is virtually a new replacement religion.
What to do? First we need to recognise how this same demon roams around in our own hearts & how much damage this demon has done to us as the image & likeness of God- and then to others. And then we need to recognise in what way Christ is calling us as our chief responsibility to co-resurrect man and creation through Him. What we are talking about though is ascetic and self-denying love so that we will be delivered and reborn.

To see this and acknowledge it let alone struggle against it is extremely difficult because this demon of self-worship is so very tasty and addictive. As Owen says we rationalise in any possible way to defend this destructive treasure of ours. So we see the basic problem is really pride- self-protective & blind to its own deeper good- that must be recognised and then struggled with. And the only possible way to counter to this is by seeing our first friend as humility. This is why turning to Christ in confession, through spiritual counsel- and also talking to others with an open spirit- is crucial.

In terms of what Matthew S said above about not over-simplifying matters. If I could just add something. I think it is important to recognise how this arises from passion- specifically from pride. Either our modern tendency to try to 'seize the truth'; or to blame others. The truth of things is to be found in being humble both in mind & heart.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Olympiada]

Dear Community Members,

All right since no one else has dealt with the topic of *sex* and how it contributes to our mental health and our relationship to God, or lack thereof, and since Fr. Raphael alluded to it, I will deal with it.

I posit that our culture's, and when I say our culture, I mean the West, because that is where I grew up, our culture's relationship to sex is the root cause of our mental disease and our estrangement from God. Or one of the root causes. That's right, by the lack of the chastity in the West, starting with saying "auto-eroticism is ok" (meaning making love to ourselves), we get sick and estranged from God.

And if you want a patristic reference I recommend reading this piece of theology:

Fr. Georges Florovsky, "The Darkness of Night: Evil is Among Us": Chapter IV of the Collected Works of Georges Florovsky, Vol. III: Creation and Redemption (Nordland Pub. Co., Belmont, Masachusetts: 1976), pp. 81-91.
http://www.monachos.net/mb/icons/mime_pdf.gif
florovsky_3-4-darkness.pdf (http://www.monachos.net/mb/messages/4225/florovsky_3-4-darkness-27088.pdf) (85.3 k)

Or

Paul Evdokimov, The Struggle with God (Sister Gertrude, OP, translator; Paulist Press, Glen Rock NJ: 1966) (entire book).
http://www.monachos.net/mb/icons/mime_pdf.gif
evdokimov_strugglewGod1966.pdf (http://www.monachos.net/mb/messages/4225/evdokimov_strugglewGod1966-27089.pdf) (564.7 k)

And I am turning over another thought in my head, how the word 'lover' fits into patristic theology, which after some research in my Biblical concordance I may start a thread on.

INXC
Olympiada

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

We better humble ourselves so that we don&#39;t fall into even worse things than that.

[Father David Moser]

I have waited a long time to &#34;weigh in&#34; on this as the whole discussion seems to be an unfocused chaotic mishmash of topics. There are a few bright moments that stand out however they also seem to be quickly smothered in &#34;psychobabble&#34; or &#34;social justice&#34; or &#34;the blame game&#34; or the newest trends in biopsychology or just plain ignorance.

I am a priest of nearly 18 years experience, and I am a psychologist longer than that &#40;most of my practice has been with chronic and severly mentally ill patients&#41; I have had my share of abused children, adults abused as children, abusers &#40;both child and adult&#41; of both children and adults. I am certainly very comfortable working in the unique world of people suffering from schizophrenia and the delusional disorders. I have worked with mentally ill persons of normal intelligence and those who are developmentally delayed &#40;as well as DD people with no mental illness&#41;. I have worked with the very old and the very young, the rich and the poor, and on and on. I say all this meaningless stuff simply to establish the fact that I hope that I have gained enought experience to have some idea of what I&#39;m talking about.

I noted with great interest Dr Bakas&#39; clarification that there are mental illnesses with a biological component &#40;such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, etc&#41; and those that are attributed to environment and learning &#40;particularly personality disorders&#41;. This is an important distinction as it affects prognosis and sometimes even the types of interventions used.

I also took note of Mr Kirikos&#39; assertion that mental illness is caused by &#34;bacteria&#34;. I have read some of the information on this and I think that it is indeed an important avenue of research and something that bears consideration - but it is not the universal cause of all psychosis as he seems to assert for example there are equally compelling studies that demonstrate a genetic disposition to mental illness &#40;a &#34;gene&#34; for bipolar illness has been identified&#41;. Stress also is involved in this equation.

Dr Steenberg and Mr Jones both contributed the idea of &#34;complexity&#34; as in a multi-layered cause and illness and that is quite evident - there is no simple solution - a mental illness can have multiple causes which working together result in the disorder that finally emerges.

If there has been any ongoing theme, it has been that of &#34;blame&#34; or &#34;responsibility&#34; Ms Kane seems to be inexhaustible in voicing her opinion that the &#34;responsible people&#34; should take responsibility. And I have seen that kind of thought in action. It is a good thing to take responsiblility for one&#39;s own actions, but too often the practical result is that rather than take responsibility for one&#39;s own actions, we search for the &#34;responsibile party&#34; for our actions &#40;thus there are adults who put the responsiblity for their adult behavior on their parents who abused them as children or who provided a chaotic home or whatever.&#41; This is not taking responsibility, but abdicating responsibility - it is only continuing the harm long past its original event. By assigning the responsibility for our own behavior to someone else, we then create a legacy of being &#34;blameless&#34; or &#34;not responsible&#34; which we then pass on to the next generation and on and on so that the injury is never healed, the dysfunction is never ended but rather it is perpetuated from father to son to son to son and so on &#40;or we could add mothers and daughters in there makes no difference in this case&#41;. At this point Dr Steenberg&#39;s comment that &#34;there is also the observable truth that merely re-assigning blame to another &#39;cures&#39; that self-destruction with another disfiguration of self -- a kind of deep-rooted torture of relating and knowing others, through &#39;blame&#39;, that has repurcussions throughout life.&#34; becomes very relevant.

It is no accident that one of the consistent tenants of modern psychotherapy is the power of the &#34;here and now&#34; Too often patients will deal in the past or the future and not in the here and now. This is where the illness or dysfunction is most properly addressed, in the here and now &#40;and it is no co-incidence either that God Himself is the eternal &#34;here&#34; and the eternal &#34;now&#34;&#41;. The assigning of responsbility for behavior to someone else takes the task out of the here and now and puts in in the &#34;there and then&#34;. We can&#39;t change the past, we can&#39;t change other people; we can only control our own feelings, our own behavior, our own perceptions, our own lives. This is where we must focus.

Thus I can say that my childhood was bad and so it resulted in certain conditions in my present that I now have to deal with - but it is up to ME to deal with it. If I continue to react to my past as I was programmed by &#34;those responsible&#34;, then I remain enslaved to those &#34;responsible people&#34; and my behavior is determined by them. I am &#34;not responsible&#34; so I can do whatever I want and its &#34;their fault&#34;. This is not functional or healthy behavior, it is certainly not &#42;Orthodox&#42; behavior.

In this the Church and modern psychology are united - it does not matter what &#34;cards&#34; we have been dealt in life, it is our responsibility to &#34;play the hand&#34; &#40;sorry to use a card playing analogy to describe Church practice&#41;. Yes, my childhood and my parents may well have determined certain aspects of my adult emotional makeup. Genetics and microbial conditions also have had a hand in who I am and the inner condition that I face. However it is MY responsibility to react to those conditions, it is MY responsibility to choose my actions, to choose to succumb to them or to overcome them, to choose to deny myself &#40;and all the childhood/biological programming that make up &#34;myself&#34;&#41; and live in obedience to Christ and the Church. It is MY responsibility. But God in His infinite mercy and compassion has not left me alone in my responsibility. He gives me a spiritually healthy pattern of life to which to conform myself - the life of the Church, life in obedience to the Law of God. He gives me spiritually healthy role models - the saints. He gives me medicine and healing power that is stronger than anything I inherit or am given in this world - His grace. All I need to do is to follow the path that He sets out for me, under the care and guidance of my spiritual physician, living the life of the Church.

This is the true psychotherapy - this is true &#34;mental health&#34; to become like Christ and it is the Church the teaches us the way. Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos has written well and patristically on this in his book, &#34;The Illness and Cure of the Soul&#34; when he describes the Church not as a theology or a religion but as a therapeutic course by which the soul is healed.

Modern psychology &#40;and by extension psychiatry&#41; is a good resource for us in that many insights and techniques have been developed for us to more easily see the condition of the soul, but they cannot cure - they can only control the symptoms. The true cure, the only cure, is the revitalization of the soul - rebirth in Christ and the transfiguration of the whole being by the grace of the Holy Spirit. The only place this cure can be found and accessed is in the life of the Church.

Fr David Moser

[Mina Monir]

peace all,

if you permit to me to share you this deep topic

infact, the whole topic -I think- is depending on a fact which is absent to me ... the fact is the Western effect on our pure mind ... and I mean by pure mind the pure values and concepts and view ... we had a pure humanity through baptism ..like a white cloth , but the effect of the world is hurting it. one of these values is the concept of love. today, in the globalization winds all the east and west are under threat of the 'Rock Culture' from a side ... and the 'Jihad terroristic social idea' from the other side. I want to begin from friend Olympiada's previous introduction here :


Dear Community Members,
All right since no one else has dealt with the topic of *sex* and how it contributes to our mental health and our relationship to God, or lack thereof, and since Fr. Raphael alluded to it, I will deal with it.

I believe there are many patristic resources cover this point , because love and sex were not absent from the early church community , and the evidence is that we still exist http://www.monachos.net/mb/clipart/happy.gif
I shall revise some books about it ... but till this moment (as I'm sunk in my study ) I just want to put a single verse :

"And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. rom 12:2"

this prevents us from these winds.

In christ
Mina

note : dear Fr Raphael , I remember that your Rev. asked me from a long time about my name ..I asked a friend about my name in greek , yes, Mina is the coptic name which is equivalent to Menas in greek (but the coptic is the original because st.Mina was coptichttp://www.monachos.net/mb/clipart/happy.gif)

[Antonios]

Thank you Father David Moser for the previous post.

[Vasilis Kirikos]

&#34;Our will and our freedom interact with the causes and their results, we mingle our will from self with those realities thrust upon us; we interiorise and exteriorise; we habituate as well as move on. &#34;
&#34;It is no accident that one of the consistent tenants of modern psychotherapy is the power of the &#34;here and now&#34; Too often patients will deal in the past or the future and not in the here and now. This is where the illness or dysfunction is most properly addressed, in the here and now &#40;and it is no co-incidence either that God Himself is the eternal &#34;here&#34; and the eternal &#34;now&#34;&#41;. The assigning of responsbility for behavior to someone else takes the task out of the here and now and puts in in the &#34;there and then&#34;. We can&#39;t change the past, we can&#39;t change other people; we can only control our own feelings, our own behavior, our own perceptions, our own lives. This is where we must focus. &#34;

I am totally in agreement with our brothers in Christ, brother Steenberg and Father David Moser. I would like to add that am a fan of Steven Covey. In one of his lessons Covey posed this question “who ever said, or where was it ever written that we have to confess the sins of others?” Because to do so accomplishes nothing but more strife. I believe that for our own emotional well being to recognize the wrong someone may have committed against us should only serve the purpose helping us GET OVER IT by understanding why you feel thus or so and “embrace the dragon” so to speak; NOT TO BE AFRAID OF IT; BUT TO RECOGNIZE IT BECAUSE THAT IS THE ONLY WAY WE CAN LEARN TO RATIONALLY DEAL WITH OURSELVES AND CONSEQUENTLY OTHERS. To recognize and be able to say to ourselves “O I know what is going on with me; I feel this way because thus and so. To understand your own emotions, take responsibility and deal with them, your emotions. Not to blame anyone and bathe in self pity. I think that the most common ailment causing mental distress is fear. And fear often brings anger; because ALL anger is nothing more than masked fear.

I have lived the effects of PTSD for many years, actually most of my adult life. And that was sorely exacerbated when my wife , &#43;Betty&#43; became seriously ill due to complications of nephritic Lupus &#40;the complication was a brain abscess due to a yeast infection brought on by the steroid medication used to treat the Lupus……a very complicated case. The medication used to treat the Lupus worsened the brain infection and the medication used to treat the yeast infection was killing her already Lupus ravaged kidneys&#41;. &#43;Betty&#43; spent 63 days in the ICU; and a total of 9 months in the hospital. Finally she came out of the hospital and it was all due to the mercy and love of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. There can be no doubt about that; though she was left with some disability. A side note: my wife and I attended a promotion party for a colleague. At that party my immediate supervisor, who was chief of the department of infectious diseases, came up to &#43;Betty&#43; and asked her if she believed in miracles. &#43;Betty&#43; told him that indeed she did; and his answer came back “So do I . Do you know why?”. &#43;Betty&#43; said “No.” and he replied “Because I am looking at one!”

Soon after I &#40;actually the Lord&#41; got her out of the hospital, though grateful to God, I was still feeling very depressed due to my work and the fact that she was left with some disability along with her having to go to dialysis three times a week. One Sunday in Church during the Liturgy I was feeling my lowest and so I prayed; first confessing my faults and sins and then prayed this prayer &#34;Lord, you said &#39;come unto me all ye that travel and are heavily laden, and I will refresh you&#39;. Well, Lord I am here to collect on that promise&#34; and IMMEDIATELY a force field or power came from the Iconostas Icon of Christ. Somehow I could even sense the power traversing the distance from the Icon of Christ to me. The force hit me it was so wonderful; it was as though I was cleansed of every worry or care. It was the most wonderful feeling I have even had in my entire life! I was floating on air! I was not crying at all but smiling from ear to ear. I don&#39;t know how to describe it; how my mind was cleansed from all that depression. Imagine a very dirty counter top and someone wiping it clean of all debris leaving the counter top glowing. And I was glowing! Our Lord said that such a light cannot be hidden under a bushel basket...it is out there for all to see. O GLORY! It was indeed “The peace that passeth all understanding!”
After the service was over we all went down to the Church hall for coffee and the priest, came up to me and put his hand on my arm, began to rub it up and down and asked &#34;What has happened to you? You&#39;ve changed! You have changed so much! What has happened to you? &#34;
To my deep, deep regret I did not give him a truthful answer but some off the wall remark and just as suddenly the WONDERFUL feeling of peace left me. To this day I weep for that loss. I weep that I did not embrace my wife and try to extend that wonderful feeling to her and perhaps gain her complete healing of her kidneys and the partial paralysis she had on her left side. I am disgusted with myself that I did not immediately confess to my priest what the Lord had given to me My stupidity! My self-centeredness God please forgive me.!!

[Fr. George Morelli]

To the Monachos Community ..Christ is in our Midst .. Earlier in the week on this on the Monachos website was a discussion on “Abuse”. .. It just so happens about the same time earlier this week I also received a request for a detailed well thought out answer to a question on “Abuse” by a mental health licensed Orthodox priest. &#40;Our Holy Fathers teach us all except evil is under God’s Providence & Justice [& even our response to evil can be turned into good by His Grace] , so I choose not to think these simultaneous requests as happenstance or coincidence but a call to respond as part of my ministry blessed by my Bishop, and therefore blessed by God&#41;. I wrote the article referenced at the end of this message. It is my no means the final word. Many complex factors have to be interrelated and integrated: Abuse of any kind is an horrific act and somehow we have to validate the horror of Abuse, we have to as Christians and members of society accept the responsibility of protecting Abuse victims in society, once again as Christians and member of society we have to have Abusers acknowledge “responsibility.” Healing for all &#40;but in very different ways&#41; has to be done using the best of scientific clinical research knowledge and the teachings of our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ on “Love and Forgiveness.” Both victim and abuser have to be respected as children of God. As we say in our funeral service “…there is no man who liveth and sinneth not…” This is not easy and I suggest some general points that may serve as guidelines. If anyone reads a portion of the article and prejudges the rest of what may follow and stops reading or draws conclusions, that would be a rejection of God’s gift of in intelligence to us. We would be pre-judging and not look at the whole picture. Some of what I have written may be hard to understand. All I can ask is pray and follow the example of Our Lord who, said, from the Cross, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do. &#40;Lk. 23:34&#41;. In this preliminary reflection on this issue I have tried to be sensitive to the horror of abuse, the need or societal protection of victims and the absolute need to scourge all traces of anger ….in Christ ..FrGeorge

The article is now posted at http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles5/MorelliAbuse.php

[Olympiada]

Dear Monachos Community,
Sometimes God wounds the soul repeatedly with trauma in order to draw it near to Himself. In this atheist secular world sometimes trauma is the means by which God seeks to draw a soul near to Him. He just requires that one trust in Him, which is not easy for one who has been traumatized. But He chastises those He loves. Trust in God is the medicine to heal from trauma.

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear Fr David and others,

Thank you for the nice summarisation of the rather diverse scope of this discussion; it was helpful to see some of the main threads brought together.

One of the things that has become particularly clear over the course of the discussion is the degree to which the sense of the Church as therapeutic is not nearly-enough understood in broad surroundings. There tends to be a desire to separate &#39;psychology&#39; from &#39;theology&#39;, which would have left the fathers of the Church aghast; and when at times they are brought together, there is a tendency to try to hold the theological views of the person and her healing accountable to modern advances in such fields, rather than holding the two in harmony with, and to some degree, accountable to one another. It&#39;s been encouraging to read remarks by many to the end of overcoming this common attitude.

INXC, Matthew

[Fr Seraphim (Black)]

Dear Community Members,
Not knowing really where to post this, I will place it here in hopes that it finds its proper place.
First, I ask forgiveness in being slow in responding and in some cases seeming to offend Members by my statements. I take great care to not offend, but being human it is a common trait of mine.
Second, I ask your prayers as I am battling a rather severe physical illness which impairs my strength to do practically anything.
The great number of posts on this thread demonstrate our common shared humanity. We are all familiar with illness in all its varied forms.
As I was taught by my Spiritual Father, illness is always a blessing. If it is not taken as a blessing from God for our purification, then it becomes, to echo Dr. Steenberg&#39;s remark, a negative.
We are called to be disciples of Christ. This necessarily means following Christ to the Garden of Gethsemane, to the Crucifixion and then depending on the grace of God entering into the great mystery of the Resurrection.

[Olympiada]

Seraphim,
I am sorry for your troubles. I have been reading a lot lately about God&#39;s purification. It is painful, for me, a sinner.
And in this light mental illness such as depression or post traumatic stress disorder can also be seen as a blessing for purification of the mind, I suppose, so that it may be illuminated and deified, yes?
I often think on Christ&#39;s agony and Crucifixion, but never of His Resurrection. Those thoughts escape me. It is not time for them apparently.

[Tim Grass]

One of the things we should remember... especially talking about mental health and healing... is that the cross and the passion don&#39;t mean anything without the resurrection.

--tim

[Owen Jones]

More on libido dominandi in Augustine:

I could find the exact phrase, &#34;libido dominandi,&#34; in only 2 places in
Augustine&#39;s major works &#40;including City of God, Confessions, On the
Trinity, etc.&#41;, and those 2 are in City of God: I.30, XIV.15.
JvH

[M.C. Steenberg]

For those who do not have the whole of Augustine&#39;s City of God memorised, or don&#39;t know where to find it on-line, here are the portions Owen referenced in his previous post, as containing the phrase libido dominande. The text is taken from the R. Dodds translation (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1201.htm). I do not have the Latin editions of Augustine to hand, so cannot be certain of the location of the phrase libido dominande in each of the passages; but it seems clear in the translation -- I&#39;ve boldfaced and underscored Dodds&#39; translations of that phrase. The first text is City of God book I, chapter 30:
<blockquote>BOOK I, CHAPTER 30 -- THAT THOSE WHO COMPLAIN OF CHRISTIANITY REALLY DESIRE TO LIVE WITHOUT RESTRAINT IN SHAMEFUL LUXURY.

If the famous Scipio Nasica were now alive, who was once your pontiff, and was unanimously chosen by the senate, when, in the panic created by the Punic war, they sought for the best citizen to entertain the Phrygian goddess, he would curb this shamelessness of yours, though you would perhaps scarcely dare to look upon the countenance of such a man. For why in your calamities do you complain of Christianity, unless because you desire to enjoy your luxurious license unrestrained, and to lead an abandoned and profligate life without the interruption of any uneasiness or disaster? For certainly your desire for peace, and prosperity, and plenty is not prompted by any purpose of using these blessings honestly, that is to say, with moderation, sobriety, temperance, and piety; for your purpose rather is to run riot in an endless variety of sottish pleasures, and thus to generate from your prosperity a moral pestilence which will prove a thousandfold more disastrous than the fiercest enemies. It was such a calamity as this that Scipio, your chief pontiff, your best man in the judgment of the whole senate, feared when he refused to agree to the destruction of Carthage, Rome&#39;s rival and opposed Cato, who advised its destruction. He feared security, that enemy of weak minds, and he perceived that a wholesome fear would be a fit guardian for the citizens. And he was not mistaken; the event proved how wisely he had spoken. For when Carthage was destroyed, and the Roman republic delivered from its great cause of anxiety, a crowd of disastrous evils forthwith resulted from the prosperous condition of things. First concord was weakened, and destroyed by fierce and bloody seditions; then followed, by a concatenation of baleful causes, civil wars, which brought in their train such massacres, such bloodshed, such lawless and cruel proscription and plunder, that those Romans who, in the days of their virtue, had expected injury only at the hands of their enemies, now that their virtue was lost, suffered greater cruelties at the hands of their fellow-citizens. <u>The lust of rule</u>, which with other vices existed among the Romans in more unmitigated intensity than among any other people, after it had taken possession of the more powerful few, subdued under its yoke the rest, worn and wearied.</blockquote>
The second passage cited was the second half of book 14, chapter 15:
<blockquote>BOOK XIV, CHAPTER 15 -- OF THE JUSTICE OF THE PUNISHMENT WITH WHICH OUR FIRST PARENTS WERE VISITED FOR THEIR DISOBEDIENCE.

[...]In short, to say all in a word, what but disobedience was the punishment of disobedience in that sin? For what else is man&#39;s misery but his own disobedience to himself, so that in consequence of his not being willing to do what he could do, he now wills to do what he cannot? For though he could not do all things in Paradise before he sinned, yet he wished to do only what he could do, and therefore he could do all things he wished. But now, as we recognize in his offspring, and as divine Scripture testifies, &#34;Man is like to vanity.&#34; For who can count how many things he wishes which be cannot do, so long as he is disobedient to himself, that is, so long as his mind and his flesh do not obey his will? For in spite of himself his mind is both frequently disturbed, and his flesh suffers, and grows old, and dies; and in spite of ourselves we suffer whatever else we suffer, and which we would not suffer if our nature absolutely and in all its parts obeyed our will. But is it not the infirmities of the flesh which hamper it in its service? Yet what does it matter how its service is hampered, so long as the fact remains, that by the just retribution of the sovereign God whom we refused to be subject to and serve, our flesh, which was subjected to us, now torments us by insubordination, although our disobedience brought trouble on ourselves, not upon God? For He is not in need of our service as we of our body&#39;s; and therefore what we did was no punishment to Him, but what we receive is so to us. And the pains which are called bodily are pains of the soul in and from the body. For what pain or desire can the flesh feel by itself and without the soul? But when the flesh is said to desire or to suffer, it is meant, as we have explained, that the man does so, or some part of the soul which is affected by the sensation of the flesh, whether a harsh sensation causing pain, or gentle, causing pleasure. But pain in the flesh is only a discomfort of the soul arising from the flesh, and a kind of shrinking from its suffering, as the pain of the soul which is called sadness is a shrinking from those things which have happened to us in spite of ourselves. But sadness is frequently preceded by fear, which is itself in the soul, not in the flesh; while bodily pain is not preceded by any kind of fear of the flesh, which can be felt in the flesh before the pain. But pleasure is preceded by a certain appetite which is felt in the flesh like a craving, as hunger and thirst and that generative appetite which is most commonly identified with the name&#34; lust,&#34; though this is the generic word for all desires. For anger itself was defined by the ancients as nothing else than the lust of revenge; although sometimes a man is angry even at inanimate objects which cannot feel his vengeance, as when one breaks a pen, or crushes a quill that writes badly. Yet even this, though less reasonable, is in its way a lust of revenge, and is, so to speak, a mysterious kind of shadow of [the great law of] retribution, that they who do evil should suffer evil. There is therefore a lust for revenge, which is called anger; there is a lust of money, which goes by the name of avarice; there is a lust of conquering, no matter by what means, which is called opinionativeness; there is a lust of applause, which is named boasting. There are many and various lusts, of which some have names of their own, while others have not. For who could readily give a name to <u>the lust of ruling</u>, which yet has a powerful influence in the soul of tyrants, as civil wars bear witness?</blockquote>
Interesting to note that in both locations, Augustine is apparently using the phrase to indicate a specific kind of lust for political dominance &#40;taking the participle as object&#41;, rather than what I believe was being discussed earlier in this conversation, namely the dominated lust &#40;which would read the adjective differently&#41;. Though in the second passage at least, it is being inculcated as part of a catalogue of lusts fallen and dominated in precisely the sense that was earlier spoken of -- indeed, that whole chapter is part of Augustine&#39;s exegesis on the &#39;I want to do what I do not do, and do not do what I want to do&#39; reality indicated by St Paul.

INXC, Matthew

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

I found another reference that seems similar. It comes from the Image Book City of God &#39;abridged for modern readers.&#39;
Here is the quote: &#34;And there are still many other kinds of lust, some with names and some without. For example, it would be difficult to find a specific name for that <u>lust for domination</u> which plays such havoc with the souls of ambitious soldiers and comes to light in every civil war.&#34;

It&#39;s difficult for me to follow the numbering system for chapters in this edition but I think it is in the Book xiv, chap 15 referred to by both Matthew S & Owen.
In Christ- Fr Raphael

[M.C. Steenberg]

Thank you for that quotation, Fr Raphel. Yes, it is from the same passage &#40;14.15&#41; as the longer quotation above, though in different translation.

The context of book 14 is wholly focussed on the nature of the sin of Adam and Eve, and the response -- both as issued by God, but also the &#39;inward response&#39; that comes about in their own person&#39;s in reaction to the embrace of sin. This forms part of Augustine&#39;s consideration of &#39;original sin&#39;, for the details of which he has always been criticised by eastern counterparts. Rightly so, in many ways. But it is interesting to read, even in only the small passage from book 14.15 posted earlier, of his conviction that the admission of sin into the person causes a manner of captivity, a domination, that gives rise to the myriad other &#39;lusts&#39; which he is describing here. This is, taken in its own right, entirely Orthodox. Sin is a captivating power; and however its effects enter into the context of a personal life, they have a terrifying ability to take hold and lay root, and in turn give rise to further evils all their own.

This seems to me to be the sense of &#39;dominated lust&#39; that Mr Jones was referring to earlier; and it also has direct bearing on the scope of this thread -- namely, mental health and healing. The &#39;complexity&#39; of the healing process, especially when the illness has something to do with direct motivation in another&#39;s actions, comes at least in large part from the fact that evil has this power. No matter where it comes from &#40;e.g. personal choices or inflicted actions&#41;, it has a power that in time must be dealt with personally, interiorly.

INXC, Matthew

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Thanks for your post Matthew.

This reminds me of something I was thinking about last week while reading your posts. Actually the advice though came from my spiritual father- and that was that confession and revealing of thoughts was like picking up a rock and letting the air into a situation. Conversely, he would explain, under the rock all sorts of things fester in the darkness.
Somehow I am connecting what you Matthew are saying and what my spiritual father told me.

The question of detail often comes up about confession and spiritual counsel- to come to the point: does forgiveness of our sins by God entirely rely on us saying & detailing all of our sins? Forgiveness & healing often presents itself in such a way to our minds. The problem though is who could ever know all of their sins and their significance. And isn't the risk in this approach that one is turning confession into a commodity exchange: I tell God my sins and He forgives me?

The wisdom of recognising the complexity of ourselves is that it opens us up to a putting of ourselves into the hands of God, ie it is a doorway to internal faith rather than an external commodity exchange with God. We absolutely do confess(just so there's no misunderstanding here) what we know of our sin but without remotely claiming that we can fully understand our sins or their significance. In a word our confession is a lifting up of the rock so that Christ's light can shine on our whole inner self far beyond the sin we are confessing.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Olympiada]

Matthew,

You wrote


of his conviction that the admission of sin into the person causes a manner of captivity, a domination, that gives rise to the myriad other 'lusts' which he is describing here. This is, taken in its own right, entirely Orthodox. Sin is a captivating power; and however its effects enter into the context of a personal life, they have a terrifying ability to take hold and lay root, and in turn give rise to further evils all their own.

How does one uproot and throw out this sin that has entered the soul and taken root. I like how you described the ability of sin to take hold and lay root as *terrifying*. I have never heard it described quite like that before. It really hits home.

In Christ
Olympiada

[Olympiada]

Fr Raphael,

You wrote


The wisdom of recognising the complexity of ourselves is that it opens us up to a putting of ourselves into the hands of God, ie it is a doorway to internal faith rather than an external commodity exchange with God.

This is a very interesting take on faith as not being an external commodity exchange with God. Very creative. I have not heard that phrase before. Can you expound on it a little more?

In Christ
Olympiada

[M.C. Steenberg]

How does one uproot and throw out this sin that has entered the soul and taken root.

This is really where the Orthodox approach to healing the person makes its demands. The teaching of the fathers, which the Church embraces as her own today, is that one begins with the self -- for there is nowhere else to begin. And one begins with means that might not, to an 'outside observer', seem like matters of direct correlation. The ability to deal with such afflictions comes through authentic humility, which comes through true obedience, which is enabled by a disassociation from 'worldly cares'. To heal the self, which is really to resurrect the self (and the mystery of Christian theology is that that which is resurrected is beyond that which had died), one must first crucify the self. Ascesis, which is the truest form of Orthodox therapy, begins with the sacrifice of true obedience.

INXC, Matthew

[Olympiada]

Matthew,

The booklet The Life of St. John Climacus and the Ladder of Divine Ascent by Prof. I.M. Kontzevitch has to say about obedience


2. The path of ascetic labor lies through OBEDIENCE. One must renounce one's own will (but not one's freedom). "Obedience is the grave of one's own will and the resurrection of humility."

This is not, however, the extinction of freedom, but rather the transfiguration of the will, the overcoming of passion in one's own will, its purification and refinement, the leading of it into a higher state.

Thank you for inspiring me to continue reading The Ladder. I think I will read the step on Obedience tonight for my spiritual reading. I am looking forward to it.

In Christ
Olympiada

[Owen Jones]

My understanding is that the English word obedience derives from a Greek root which means, &#34;to listen.&#34; So this dovetails with Christ offering the Word to those who have ears to hear. This implies a kind of readiness and openness to receiving a spiritual truth as a benefit and a blessing. One of the problems with receiving a gift is that we often feel that that puts us under obligation. So a gift is kind of a double edged sword. We want it. But we don&#39;t want the responsibility that goes with it. There is also resistance at various other levels. But I think it is important to note that the implications of obedience as we understand it today are not quite in accord with the true meaning of the word. There is a precondition to true obedience for it to be real. And that is being in a state of readiness, of receptiveness, of openness to the Spirit, without prejudging the outcome, or placing terms or conditions on it. The Pharisaic resistance is born of a pre-conceived certitude and conviction, or a kind of existential closure to the Spirit. This certitude of conviction is true in every sense except for that which counts the most.

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

&#34;Extracts from Letters to Young People
Permit me to offer you some advice:
The most radical remedy against pride is to live in obedience- to parents, friends, your spiritual adviser.
Make yourself listen attentively to the advice and the opinion of others. Do not be in a hurry to believe in the truth of the ideas that come to our mind.
Be more simple with people, do not suspect their words and ideas of containing some special, hidden meaning.&#34;

We are called to be obedient as a way of life. To not just &#39;be obedient&#39; sometimes, but to learn how to listen after much prayer and doing. To learn how to listen will take a conversion of heart & mind.
In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

The quote in my last post was from Fr Alexander Elchaninov: The Diary of a Russian Priest.

[Olympiada]

Thank you Fr Raphael
I borrowed this book from church. I will look at this section today. Pray for me a sinner.
Olympiada

[M.C. Steenberg]

Fr Raphael wrote:


We are called to be obedient as a way of life. To not just 'be obedient' sometimes, but to learn how to listen after much prayer and doing. To learn how to listen will take a conversion of heart & mind.

Thank you for this addition to this conversation. There was a good conversation had here some time ago (a few years back now, actually, if memory serves), on the nature of obedience as among the central tenets of Orthodoxy least understood and least applied in the modern context. It is interesting that the theme re-surfaces in this thread on mental health, for certainly they are deeply connected. And yet again, comments that a proper relationship and conception of obedience form one of the crucial steps in addressing mental conditions are often poorly received, even in entirely Orthodox contexts.

INXC, Matthew

[Olympiada]

Yes I was told by a man revered in my parish for his compassion, faith and intelligence there never is much point in arguing. you just have to listen &#40;or not&#41;, and then
make up your mind. Obedience is good, but if you&#39;re always deciding
when to give obedience and when not, then it&#39;s not obedience even when
you&#39;re being &#34;obedient&#34;-- because you&#39;re the one who decides! So if
you&#39;re not going to be perfectly obedient, then you have to be
perfectly responsible. And you have to speak to people and listen to
them, but you do what you think best. so, no point in arguing, but it&#39;s
good to hear.

He&#39;s convinced this is not always the path of the saints, but he is
equally convinced it&#39;s the right path, much of the time.

INXC
Olympiada

[M.C. Steenberg]

There is no room in Orthodoxy for a choice between obedience or responsibility. There is only obedience. The very desire to set up a context in which it is an &#39;option&#39; among many to choose from, is part of the modern problem. There is only obedience. The question is how we are to be obedient, not if or whether.

[Alec Lowly]

The moderator writes:

&#34;There is no room in Orthodoxy for a choice between obedience or responsibility. There is only obedience. The very desire to set up a context in which it is an &#39;option&#39; among many to choose from, is part of the modern problem. There is only obedience. The question is how we are to be obedient, not if or whether.&#34;

I do not challenge the primacy of obedience, yet I am struck once again by the totally negative context in which the word &#34;modern&#34; appears.

Christians are called to live out the Gospel in the times in which they find themselves, not to live out the Gospel in idealized times and places such as Holy Byzantium and Holy Russia, however much we revere their legacy. We are here, now, by God&#39;s grace and will.

Is there nothing good to be said of modern civilisation?

In XC,
Alec, sinner

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear Mr Lowly, you wrote:


I do not challenge the primacy of obedience, yet I am struck once again by the totally negative context in which the word "modern" appears.

Christians are called to live out the Gospel in the times in which they find themselves, not to live out the Gospel in idealized times and places such as Holy Byzantium and Holy Russia, however much we revere their legacy. We are here, now, by God's grace and will.

Is there nothing good to be said of modern civilisation?

I do not believe I said anything against modernity as an era, nor certainly that there is nothing good to be said of modern civilisation, or that it should be treated in an entirely negative context. And I can never be accused of arguing for a return to rosy Byzantium. http://www.monachos.net/mb/clipart/happy.gif This seems to have been a comment reactionary to sentiments more broadly.

Every era has its challenges, as well as its strengths and positive offerings. It is too common, perhaps, for 'modernity' to be criticised in 'comparison' (usually flawed) with some era in the past that is idealised; this is certainly not helpful. But not all criticisms are meant in this manner -- and remember that criticism itself is not of necessity an ascription of over-all negativity. And there are problems with modernity; and in therapeutic circumstances it is important to know what the ailments are, in order to address them.

My original comment, above, was that one of the chief problems in the modern world (no reference to any other era) is that obedience comes to be ranked another selection for the will: I can be obedient, if I wish to be. This is not a context which the Christian ought to accept, in this era or any other.

INXC, Matthew

[Alec Lowly]

Dear Matthew,

You wrote:


"My original comment, above, was that one of the chief problems in the modern world (no reference to any other era) is that obedience comes to be ranked another selection for the will: I can be obedient, if I wish to be. This is not a context which the Christian ought to accept, in this era or any other."

This is certainly true and I do not question it. And thank you for the clarification.

In XC,
Alec, sinner

[Anthony Peggs]

now what about those who struggle with OCD as i do? i really don't know what to do with my struggle with OCD it is horrible! it causes me much pain!

Anthony

[Owen Jones]

Watch the Monk Marathon coming up this Sunday.... (no, this is not a joke or intended as a put-down).

[Dimitri]

Christopherk thank you for the wonderful thread.

I’d like to talk about the “Down Syndrome” children.

In the modern world we live if one wants to see how developed a country is, among other things one checks the infant mortality rate, for example USA’s rate is 6 deaths per 1000 births – Mozambique 129 deaths per 1000 births. The modern pregnant women as we know go through several tests prior to birth, among those tests is the one concerning “Down Syndrome” if the test is positive the doctor normally terminates the pregnancy.

Are we really living in a “developed” and “civilized” world? is this really the answer in order to end up one day with a proud and healthy society by killing those souls before birth? definitely this is not what our Lord Jesus Christ taught us.

I happened to be a father of a Down Syndrome child and I consider my self a lucky person, God almighty gave us this child in order to teach us what life is all about and I thank Him for that. These children might be mentally retarded but we don’t really know their spiritual capabilities, from what I can see they have a lot to teach us.

Thank God for letting us having an angel living with us.

God bless all
Dimitri

[John Charmley]

The modern pregnant women as we know go through several tests prior to birth, among those tests is the one concerning “Down Syndrome” if the test is positive the doctor normally terminates the pregnancy.
Are we really living in a “developed” and “civilized” world? is this really the answer in order to end up one day with a proud and healthy society by killing those souls before birth? definitely this is not what our Lord Jesus Christ taught us.
I happened to be a father of a Down Syndrome child and I consider my self a lucky person, God almighty gave us this child in order to teach us what life is all about and I thank Him for that. These children might be mentally retarded but we don’t really know their spiritual capabilities, from what I can see they have a lot to teach us.
Thank God for letting us having an angel living with us.
God bless all
Dimitri

Dear Dimitri,

Bless you for calling our minds and hearts to this, and for bearing such a witness to the value of human life; you speak from the heart and from experience, and you speak eloquently to us all.

What have we come to as a society when we seek to take the role of God and presume to decide on matters of life and death? How can we presume to put differential values of human lives when He died to save us all.

He did not scorn the halt, the blind and the lame, and nor should we. How fortunate your child is in having such a father and such a mother - and what an example you are to us all.

In Christ,

John

[Paul Cowan]

For those aborted children...I have wondered if they had been allowed to live if the world's problems might not have been solved by one or more of them like cancer, diabetes or aids.

How tragic for us to destroy our hope for the future.

Did you ever see the Twilight Zone episode where the alien came in peace and by of proof brought the cure for all cancers? He was killed out of fear and his "gift" destroyed before he could tell his story.

Paul

[John Charmley]

Dear Paul,

Some good thoughts.

At the moment in the UK we are being bombarded by the media with programmes celebrating the bicentenary of the abolition of slavery by the UK parliament. This is accompanied by the usual (and expected) comments along the lines of 'how could our ancestors have accepted such callousness as a part of life?'

This from a society which allows the clinical killing of millions of unborn children. I wonder if in two centuries' time our descendants will look back and wonder how we could have accepted such a thing; and how we could not have made the connection they will have made between the unhappiness in this society and the way we treat its most vulnerable members.

As people sit in a movie and mentally hiss at the slavers and the slave-traders, they won't think about what our latter-day equivalents are. How could a society which allows such things to happen be mentally healthy?

In Christ,

John

[Paul Cowan]

Dear John:

What makes you think any of us are mentally healthy? How can our descendants in 200 years think bad of us since they will be the left overs of aborted children who are then raised by mentally unhealthy parents?

Their perspectives will be worse than ours currently since they will have the advantage of at least 8 generations of aboritional upbringing.

Man advances in technology. Not in wisdom or knowledge. Had man 2000 years ago developed plastic, he would not be any smarter now just more technologically more advanced.

You can see this by the writings of the scholars of the time compared to writings of scholars of today. Man still thinks and behaves the same if not worse than 2000 years ago. Its just today, I can drive a car rather than a chariot.

Paul

[John Charmley]

Dear Paul,

Good points. In some ways it does seem to be becoming more difficult to preserve whatever one imagines 'mental health' to be.

We are bombarded with images, noise and electronic complications on a daily basis; watching the news on TV with any regularity would seem a very good way to stimulate depression; indeed, scrub that and substitute 'watching TV with any regularity'.

That said, and admitting that what you say about human nature having changed but little, from a Christian standpoint what is surprising in that? It is only secular liberals who imagine that human nature is essentially good and capable of being improved by the action of governments.

We know that although made in the image of God, the inheritance of living in a fallen world is that we veer towards sin and, without His help, will be lost in it; that is what was, what is, and, without Our Lord, what will ever be. So, we are neither better nor worse, but stand, as ever, in need of His redeeming love.

We are equipped with the need to find that love, and, through the Church, we can come to it; but it requires something that is always difficult for humankind - humility and repentance, prior to amendment of life.

How odd we are in the developed world. People spend a fortune on trying to secure, as they see it, physical well-being - and neglect their spiritual health totally; it is not as thought the results of spiritual sloth are any less visible than those of its physical counterpart.

As we enter Holy Week, my prayer is that we may all find in Him the peace that only He can bring.

In Christ,

John

[Kusanagi]

Reading about autism I came across a reference which essentially stated that in "tsarist Russia" it was believed that autists had chosen their condition for religious reasons at an early age. They would go around in rags, disregard social conventions and laws and be called holy fools (I am paraphasing).

I think the article was mixing the concept of a Fool for Christ with that of a "holy innocent" (i.e. somebody who is without sin and therefore holy?). The article with the link is reproduced below - if anybody could correct in German on wikipedia, it would be appreciated.

The article did raised some questions in my mind, which I would like to ask:

What is the attitude of the Orthodox Church towards people who have mental problems/defects from birth or early childhood (as opposed to people whose mental problems are a result of their passions)? For example, what if a child is autistic and cannot interact with the world as we do? What if the child can never develop mentally to be able to speak, communicate, pray, etc. but causes harm to others because it does not understand what it is doing?

Could one say that such children and adults are without sin and in that sense also "holy"? Should one should rejoice having such a child, for the child itself, although it may suffer in this world, can be saved because of its utter faultlessnes; and does this person not also present an avenue towards redemption by being a "burden" to those around?

Are there any particular Orthodox saints who are known to help in case of mental illness? Are there any Orthodox support groups, books, etc. around this subject matter?

Your thoughts would be appreciated.

The original text from http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autismus:



St John Maximovitch of Shanghai healed people with mental problems and so did St basil of Ostrog.

Even if the child has some mental problems it is a life given to you by God so should still be happy. Don't forget what is seen as weakness by man is taken as strength if it is conducted in a religious manner and pleasing to God.
For example if someone has a mental disorder where they are permenantly stuck with a mentality of a child it does help towards the salvation of that particular person. St Arsenios of Cappadocia did so.

As for the child not being able to develope if the person looking after the person is a dedicated Orthodox person through selfless sacrifice I am sure both the mentally handicap person and the carer would be saved, as one is sacrificing a lot to help the other.
Thats my own opinion not the church's

Also i dont think wikipedia is a sensible source as it lacks control and validation of information.

As for Holy Fools thats a particular high calling from God to be able to perform such a highly spritual labour.

[Bill Gall]

When I went to find material to do a thesis online for the Antiochian House of Studies, there was no such thing. With the recommendation of my thesis advisor, an Orthodox Priest (Fr. Ted Pulcini) and with the blessing of His Grace Bishop Thomas I developed the weblog Arms Open Wide: Orthodox Christian Disability Resources. armsopenwide.wordpress.com It does not bring the definitive Orthodox word on the matter, but the matter is addressed somewhat extensively; I've made an effort for the last 2.5 years to scour the Internet for resources around the Orthodox Christian world on disability, including mental illness and developmental disability. And I continue to do so.

[D. Morrell]

Good work, Bill. I see you have Holden's paper there... a great study. I will keep your efforts in my prayers.

In Christ,
Andrew


When I went to find material to do a thesis online for the Antiochian House of Studies, there was no such thing. With the recommendation of my thesis advisor, an Orthodox Priest (Fr. Ted Pulcini) and with the blessing of His Grace Bishop Thomas I developed the weblog Arms Open Wide: Orthodox Christian Disability Resources. armsopenwide.wordpress.com (http://armsopenwide.wordpress.com) It does not bring the definitive Orthodox word on the matter, but the matter is addressed somewhat extensively; I've made an effort for the last 2.5 years to scour the Internet for resources around the Orthodox Christian world on disability, including mental illness and developmental disability. And I continue to do so.

[Christopher Dombrowski]

I mean people who have schizophrenia, have multiple personalities,

Not necessarily, no.