May: Day 25: Teaching 3: On the Birthday of Her Imperial Majesty, the Most Pious Sovereign Empress Alexandra Feodorovna

May: Day 25: Teaching 3:
On the Birthday of Her Imperial Majesty, the Most Pious Sovereign Empress Alexandra Feodorovna
 
(How Should the Gift of Life Be Used?)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. Today our national Church gratefully commemorates and celebrates the birth of our Most Pious Sovereign Empress Alexandra Feodorovna and prays to the Lord that He may grant her many years in health and unchanging prosperity. The gift of life, beloved brethren, is immeasurably great for every individual person, as the gift of rational and free life, to which immortality has been promised, as a gift accompanied throughout a man’s life by countless sweet blessings from the Creator, especially in the life of a Christian. But the gift of the life of the Empress, the Mother of the Russian people, who lightens the heavy burden of rule borne by her sovereign husband the Emperor — the gift, I say, of life, precious for her, is also precious for the whole people, because her life has brought and continues to bring many blessings to the entire nation. Therefore it would be great ingratitude on our part before God and before the sacred person of the Empress not to celebrate this day with hymns of thanksgiving and praises to the Lord flowing from the grateful hearts of the great Russian people.

Homily Two on Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker (St. John of Kronstadt)

Homily Two on Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker
and the Name Day of the Right-Believing Tsarevich and Grand Prince Nicholas Alexandrovich

By St. John of Kronstadt

"The righteous will be remembered forever" (Psalm 111:6)

Today's feast day and all saints' days serve as proof that the righteous man lives in the eternal memory of posterity. Saint Nicholas lived fourteen hundred years ago, yet we remember him as if he lived and died only yesterday. His holy, God-pleasing life, his benefaction to humanity, are so vividly presented to us. Why, then, does he live in the eternal memory of humanity? Because virtue is immortal, because even after death he lives, and dwelling in heaven, he looks down from there upon us who dwell on earth and acts beneficially upon those who call upon him for help with faith and love. Thus, it is not for nothing that the righteous man is eternally glorified by the Church: his glory is, so to speak, an echo of his immortal, great deeds, his constant response from heaven to our calls in times of spiritual and physical need. People generally don't like to remember anyone in vain, and they quickly forget someone who lived a useless life. If they do remember someone, it means they're worth remembering, it means they live in their hearts through their deeds. I'd like to use this feast as an opportunity to discuss the immortality of the human soul.

October: Day 21: Teaching 2: The Day of the Accession to the Throne of His Majesty Emperor Nicholas Alexandrovich

October: Day 21: Teaching 2:
The Day of the Accession to the Throne of His Majesty Emperor Nicholas Alexandrovich
 
(The Sorrowful Fruits of Intellectual Education Without Religious and Moral Upbringing)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

“I do not cease giving thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened” (Eph. 1:16-18).

I. On this solemn day, let us turn our attention to these words of the Holy Apostle Paul, written in his epistle to the Christians of Ephesus. The good will expressed by the Holy Apostle to the Ephesians is important for Christians of all times and peoples, as it indicates the spiritual powers Christians must cultivate in striving for ever greater perfection. For our time, this apostolic good will is especially significant, as the direction of our lives and our education has deviated from the path indicated by the Holy Apostle.

October: Day 21: Teaching 1: The Day of the Accession to the Throne of His Majesty Emperor Nicholas Alexandrovich

October: Day 21: Teaching 1:
The Day of the Accession to the Throne of His Majesty Emperor Nicholas Alexandrovich
 
(God is with us!)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. "God is with us, understand, O nations, and submit" (Isaiah 8:9)! Blessed is God, who has justified the Most Pious, Most Autocratic, Great Sovereign Emperor Nicholas Alexandrovich to reign over us. Faithful to God and His Anointed, Tsar-loving Russia, if ever, then especially now, on this bright day of our national triumph, having formed from thousands and thousands of hearts into one loyal heart, will offer up a fervent prayerful song of praise and thanksgiving to the Most High King of kings, who has granted her a king after His own heart.

II. There is one, brethren, the supreme source of this and all other blessings, under the shadow of which our Orthodox fatherland stands unshakable; one source of our prosperity, power and glory - God is with us!

Let us pay reverent attention, for our edification and consolation, to this bright and desired truth for us.

Homily Before the Memorial Service for the Tsar-Martyr (St. John Maximovitch)

Homily Before the Memorial Service for the Tsar-Martyr

By St. John Maximovitch

Forty Years Ago, a single day saw the collapse of the greatness and glory of the Russian State, a bulwark of peace throughout the whole world. The signature of the Sovereign, the Emperor Nicholas II-do, on the act of abdication from the Throne, is a historical boundary separating Russia's great and glorious past from her present dark and cruel circumstances.

The entire weight of the present regime's evil and its reordering of life is aimed at honest, well-intentioned and devout people, and the whole nation lies in oppression and constant fear. People are afraid of their own thoughts, thoughts they have not expressed aloud; they are afraid that what they are thinking might be reflected in their facial expressions.

What happened that day, forty years ago?

Homily on the Anniversary of the Accession to the Throne of Tsar Nicholas II (St. John of Kronstadt)

A Homily on the Beneficence of the Tsarist Autocracy, Delivered on the Anniversary of the Accession to the Throne of the Most Pious Sovereign Emperor NICHOLAS ALEXANDROVICH, October 21, 1896, in Saint Andrew’s Cathedral, in Kronstadt

By St. John of Kronstadt

“For the kingdom is the Lord's; and He shall have dominion over the nations” (Ps. 21:29).

In the entire universe - in all worlds, visible and invisible to us, no matter how great and countless they are - in all this wondrous, wise, beautiful, living world mechanism, one wise, omnipotent, personal, beginningless, all-good, and all-unifying Power is clearly noticeable, which gave to all this infinite and varied mechanism unity, order, wonderful harmony and beauty, generally the same everywhere, constant and unchanging. On the earth we inhabit, in all animate and inanimate creations, the diversity and unity of genera and species in animals and plants, the unity and harmony of actions, customs, morals, instincts and general manifestations of life are also noticeable. For example, with the onset of autumn, migratory birds in long lines, under the control of their foremost leader, like a column leader, stretch into the air heights to warm countries. With the onset of spring, they again fly in the same lines, also under the control of the advanced ones, to us for their livelihood and their trade and for the breeding of others like themselves. Bees and ants work together, under the control and guidance of the queen or king, preparing food and shelter for the winter; annual plants wither and disappear, but their species in the seed and embryonic state remain unchanged and, at a favorable, warm temperature, send out their shoots again and develop into the same beautiful and living forms as last year. In everything - small and great - in the flow of the stars and the actions of the elements, in all plants and animals, one all-creating, all-life-giving, all-decorating, all-ruling Hand of the Invisible Creator and Provider is noticeable. This same all-ruling Hand rules over all nations, the entire human race; appointing kings and deposing, and in the place of some raises others. This also elevated the New Tsar to the throne of the Russian Kingdom, the branch of the recently deceased Tsar-Parent. “By me," says God, "kings reign and rulers decree justice” (Prov. 8:15). The king is the image of God on earth, the Ruler of the universe. “Listen, kings, and understand; learn, judges of the ends of the earth; take heed, you who have multitudes and are proud before the nations: Dominion has been given to you from the Lord, and strength from the Most High, who will examine your deeds and test your intentions” (Prov. 7:1–3), cries the wise one, a king to those like him.