Brotherly relations in the Orthodox family. Family, Christianity, society: an Orthodox view. Preparing for the sacrament of the wedding

Orthodoxy discusses everything in terms of salvation. What does not lead to salvation leads from God. The Church assumes that there should be one husband and one wife in life. The church is very sensitive to the relationship between a man and a woman. It is believed that here bodily and spiritually there is a mutual penetration. Communication not for marriage or outside of marriage is destructive for a person. The connection that comes from selfishness, for pleasure, is not useful for a person, it is destructive.

The ideal marriage is when two people are united into a small Church in Christ. In ancient times there was no sacrament of marriage, the sacrament was marriage itself, when two members of the church freely decided on the union of a small church, this was announced by them at the Eucharist and celebrated there.

The family is created not only for the glory of God, but also to facilitate each other's path to salvation. This is what the church calls a sacrament. There was no special rank until the tenth century. Emperor Leo VI demanded that all marriages be legalized and churched. Legal functions were assigned to the church. The Church was forced to withdraw the rite of wedding from the Eucharist.

The Church considers only the first marriage a sacrament. If two are united in Christ, then nothing can destroy this unity. With God, everyone is alive. Marriage in Christ is the union of people with one another and with Christ. People help a life partner to climb to Christ. One can only be a Christian by loving another.

For a Christian, there is no such thing as a disagreement in character, etc., since this implies a legal relationship, and people must sacrifice themselves for each other.

Marriages do not exist for procreation, but because most people can only be saved in this way, helping each other.

Orthodoxy forbids a Christian to abhor marriage. Christ, by His first miracle, was at the marriage and sanctified it with His presence.
In marriage, if we believe in God, we remain faithful to our spouse even after his death. Christianity does not insist that there should be love between the young; the Holy Fathers write little about this. It is difficult to find a person who would be in love only once in a lifetime. We were brought up on classical literature, and it is all non-church. Love at 18 and 40 is different. We have an extremely high attitude towards love, and this gives us a reason to leave our wife or husband. There is a lot of self-gratification in love, and this is often not useful for us. The Church Fathers say nothing about the first feeling, good or bad. An experienced confessor will certainly warn the young that their first feeling may pass, that they need to be able to get used to each other, and this is very difficult.

The Church blesses the 2nd wedding, but this is a repentant rite, because “it is better for them to marry than to be kindled” (Ap. Paul).

The Church cannot debunk, it does not have the tools for this. The only thing she can do is testify that this marriage no longer exists.

In the Russian Empire, the Church had legal functions, since there was no civil marriage. A marriage could only be destroyed by adultery on one side. Now there are other reasons why you can dissolve a marriage (a person who has been missing for many years, a drug addict, an alcoholic, a venereal disease or AIDS, a person who cannot perform marital functions, but did not report it before marriage), but this is non-economic, such divorces are permissible, but not welcomed by the Church.

childbearing

The position of the Church is to make as many children as possible, regardless of the economic situation in the family and health.
The church categorically forbids abortions, equating them with murder.

On the 8th day, the child is given a name in the Church, and on the 40th day they are baptized. A woman in labor or a woman after a miscarriage cannot attend the Church for 40 days and receive communion. Experience shows that unaborted children are the most desirable.

Aborted contraceptives are not possible. Only means that do not allow conception are allowed.

The church does not bless "IVF" - the birth of children from a test tube, as many embryos are fertilized, and the doctor leaves only the strongest. The church is against male donation, bearing someone else's child and cloning, all of which are usually destructive. But children conceived in this way are baptized by the Church.

The apostle Paul says that marriage should be avoided only during fasting. But if one spouse is non-church, then the church one must yield in this matter.

If the conversion of one of the spouses occurred after marriage, then it is his duty to convert the other by fasting, prayer, and his own example. It is not a reason, a reason for divorce, if the appeal occurred after marriage.
Marriages between believers and non-believers are usually not blessed, because the fullness of the marriage is not obtained, there are a lot of sorrows. Especially if they are of different faiths.

Relationship between parents and children

The 5th commandment is the purest. Because elderly parents are the most useless thing we have. But they must be respected. The demands of children on their parents are absolutely unfounded.

ill. Suren Khondkaryan

According to the materials of the Forerunner Catechism Courses

Report of the Archbishop of Tobolsk and Tyumen Dimitri at the section of the same name of the XIV International Christmas Educational Readings

Dear Fathers, Brothers and Sisters!

Orthodoxy is not just a duty that we perform on Sunday morning and forget about when we leave the church; Orthodoxy is a way of life. And the way of life includes the totality of habits and views, thoughts and actions: lifestyle and way of life. For us Orthodox, Christianity is "our daily bread." A Christian strives for Christ and His Church, and not for the ideals of the modern world, which in many ways do not correspond to the Christian way of life or distort it. This is especially noticeable in relation to the family. First of all, she was subjected to the corrupting influence of secular society, which distorted love and marriage.

Now love is often mistaken for love, and this spiritual (not spiritual) feeling is by no means enough for a true family life. Falling in love can accompany love (however, not necessarily) - but it passes too easily; and then what? “At every step, we have cases when people get married because they “fell in love” with one another, but how often such marriages are fragile! Often such love is called “physiological”. When the “physiological love” subsides, people who in marriage, either violate fidelity, maintaining external marital relations, or get divorced" (1).

How does the Church view marriage?

The Church sees in marriage the secret of love - love not only human, but also divine.

“Marriage is a sacrament of love,” says St. John Chrysostom, and explains that marriage is a sacrament because it exceeds the boundaries of our mind, for in it two become one. Blessed Augustine also calls marriage love a sacrament (sacramentum). The grace-filled character of marital love is inextricably linked with this, for the Lord is present where people are united by mutual love (Matt. 18:20).

The liturgical books of the Orthodox Church also speak of marriage as a union of love. “Oh hedgehog send them love more perfect, more peaceful,” we read in the aftermath of the betrothal. In the course of the wedding, the Church prays for the gift of “love for each other” to the newlyweds.

In itself, marital love in relation to spouses to each other is mysterious and has a shade of adoration. “Marital love is the strongest type of love. Other impulses are also strong, but this impulse has such a strength that it never weakens. And in the next century, faithful spouses will fearlessly meet and will abide forever with Christ and with each other in great joy,” writes Chrysostom. In addition to this side of marital love, there is another equally important one in it.

“Christian marital love is not only joy, but also a feat, and has nothing in common with that “free love”, which, according to the widespread frivolous view, should replace the supposedly outdated institution of marriage. In love, we not only receive another, but also give ourselves entirely, and without the complete death of personal egoism, there can be no resurrection for a new exalted life ... Christianity recognizes only love that is ready for unlimited sacrifices, only love that is ready to lay down its soul for a brother for a friend (John 15:13; 1 John 3:16, etc.), for only through such love does an individual rise to the mystical life of the Holy Trinity and the Church. This is how marital love should be. Christianity knows no other marital love than love like the love of Christ for His Church, Who gave Himself for her (Eph. 5:25)” (2).

St. John Chrysostom in his inspired sermons teaches that a husband should not stop at any torment and even death, if this is necessary for the good of his wife. “I consider you more precious than my soul,” the husband says to his wife at Chrysostom.

“Perfect” marital love, requested in the rite of betrothal, is love ready for self-sacrifice, and the deep meaning lies in the fact that in Orthodox churches the church hymn “Holy Martyr” enters the wedding rite.

What is marriage for?

Marriage is not just a "way of arranging" earthly existence, it is not a "utilitarian" means for procreation - although it includes these aspects as well. First of all, marriage is the mystery of the appearance of the Kingdom of God in this world. “When the holy Apostle Paul calls marriage a “mystery” (or “sacrament”, which sounds the same in Greek), he means that in marriage a person not only satisfies the needs of his earthly, worldly existence, but also takes a step towards to the purpose for which he was created, that is, he enters into the kingdom of eternal life. Calling marriage a "sacrament," the Apostle asserts that marriage is preserved in the kingdom of eternity. The husband becomes one being, one "flesh" with his wife, just as the Son of God ceased to be only God, became also a man so that His people could become His Body. This is why the gospel narrative so often compares the Kingdom of God to a wedding feast. (3)

Marriage is established already in paradise, established directly by God Himself. The main source of church teaching on marriage - the Bible - does not say that the institution of marriage arose sometime later as a state or church institution. Neither the Church nor the state is the source of marriage. On the contrary, marriage is the source of both Church and State. Marriage precedes all social and religious organizations. (4)

The first marriage was concluded by "God's grace." In the first marriage, the husband and wife are the bearers of the highest earthly power, they are sovereigns to whom the rest of the world is subject (Gen. 1, 28). The family is the first form of the Church, it is the "small church", as Chrysostom calls it, and at the same time the source of the state as an organization of power, since, according to the Bible, the basis of any power of a person over a person is in the words of God about the power of a husband over wife: he will rule over you (Genesis 3:16). Thus, the family is not only a small church, but also a small state. Therefore, the attitude of the Church towards marriage had the character of recognition. This idea is well expressed in the gospel narrative of marriage in Cana of Galilee (John 2:1-11). She saw the sacrament of marriage not in the wedding ceremony, but in the very union of husband and wife into one single being through consent and love. Therefore, the holy fathers often call the mutual love of spouses a sacrament (for example, Chrysostom), the indestructibility of marriage (for example, Ambrose of Milan, Blessed Augustine), but they never call the wedding itself a sacrament. Attaching the main importance to the subjective factor of marriage - consent, they make another, objective factor - the form of marriage - dependent on the first, on the will of the parties and give the parties themselves freedom in choosing the form of marriage, advising the church form, if there are no obstacles for it. In other words, during the first nine centuries of its history, the Church recognized the optionality of the marriage form (5).

How does the Church view marriage? Man is not a purely spiritual being, man is not an angel. We consist not only of the soul, but also of the body, matter; and this material element of our being is not something accidental that can be discarded. God created man with soul and body, that is, both spiritual and material, it is this combination of spirit, soul and body that is called man in the Bible and in the Gospel. "The intimacy of husband and wife is part of the human nature created by God, God's plan for human life.

That is why such communication cannot be carried out by chance, with anyone, for the sake of one's own pleasure or passion, but must always be associated with complete surrender of oneself and complete fidelity to another, only then does it become a source of spiritual satisfaction and joy for those who love "(6)" Neither a man or a woman cannot be used simply as partners for pleasure, even if they themselves agree to it ... When Jesus Christ says: "everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matt. 5:28), He forbids us even in our thoughts to perceive another person as an object of pleasure. Nothing is unclean in itself, but everything, without exception, can become so through misuse. The same thing can happen and, alas, very often happens with the highest Divine gift to man - with love. And in place of holy conjugal love, which naturally includes carnal relationships, a dirty passion, a thirst for possession, can stand. But in no case should you put an equal sign between them ”(7).

It is very important to remember that marriage is a long and complex spiritual path, in which there is a place for one's chastity, one's abstinence. Where intimate life occupies too much space, the family is in danger of falling into passion, and the task of the family, as an integral life, remains unresolved ... As soon as spiritual ties are empty in the family, it inevitably becomes a simple sexual cohabitation, sometimes descending to real fornication. which has taken a legal form.

It was said above that procreation is not the sole purpose of Marriage. But Marriage certainly includes (at least potentially) this side as well. And how it flourishes, how it is transformed in the light of the truly Christian teaching on matrimony! The birth of children and caring for them in the family are the natural fruit of the love of a husband and wife, the greatest guarantee of their union. Husband and wife should think of their intimate relationship not only as their own satisfaction or the fulfillment of the fullness of the life of the individual, but also as participation in the bringing into being of a new being, a new personality, destined to live forever.

Intimate relationships are not limited to the birth of children, they exist no less for unity in love, for mutual enrichment and joy of spouses. But with all the lofty significance that Christianity recognizes as carnal union, the Church has always unconditionally rejected all attempts to "deify" it. Our time is characterized by attempts to free carnal extramarital union from associations with sin, guilt and shame. All the champions of this "emancipation" do not understand, do not see that moment, which, perhaps, is central in the Christian vision of the world. "According to the Christian worldview, human nature, despite the fact that it is ontologically good, is a fallen nature, and not partially fallen, not in such a way that some of the properties of a person remained untouched and pure, but in its entirety ... Love and lust - hopelessly mixed up, and it is impossible to separate and isolate one from the other ... It is for this reason that the Church condemns as truly demonic those ideas and trends that - in various combinations with each other - call for sexual liberation" (8).

But is man, in his present, fallen state, capable of true, perfect love?

Christianity is not only a commandment, but a revelation and a gift of love.

In order for the love of a man and a woman to be as perfect as God created it, it must be unique, indissoluble, endless and divine. The Lord not only gave this institution, but also gives the power to carry it out in the Sacrament of Christian marriage in the Church. In it, man and woman are given the opportunity to become one spirit and one flesh.

High is the teaching of Christ about true Marriage! Involuntarily you ask: is it possible in real life? "His disciples say to him: if such is the duty of a man to his wife (i.e., if the ideal of marriage is so high), then it is better not to marry. He said to them: not everyone can accommodate this word, but to whom it is given"

(Matthew 19:10-11). Christ, as it were, says: “Yes, the ideal of marriage is high, the duties of a husband to his wife are difficult; not everyone can do this ideal, not everyone can accommodate My word (teaching) about marriage, but to whom it is given, with the help of God, this ideal is nevertheless achieved” . "Better not get married!" This is, as it were, an involuntary exclamation of the disciples, before whom the duties of a husband to his wife were inscribed. Before the greatness of the task - to transform the sinful nature - a weak person trembles equally, whether he enters into marriage, whether he takes the veil as a monk. Unity in Divine love, which constitutes the Kingdom of God, is given rudimentarily on earth and must be nurtured by achievement. For love is both joy, and tenderness, and rejoicing over one another, but love is also a feat: "Bear each other's burdens, and thus fulfill the law of Christ" (Gal. 6:2).

1. Prot. V. Zenkovsky. On the threshold of maturity M., 1991. pp. 31-32.

2. S.V. Troitsky. Christian philosophy of marriage. Paris, 1932. P.98.

3. Prot. John Meyendorff. Marriage and the Eucharist. Klin: Christian Life Foundation. 2000. P.8.

4. Prof. S.V. Troitsky. Christian philosophy of marriage. Paris, 1932. P.106.

5. Ibid., p. 138-139.

6. Prot. Thomas Hopko. Fundamentals of Orthodoxy. New York, 1987. p.318.

7. Ibid., p. 320.

8. Prot. Alexander Shmeman. Water and Spirit. M., 1993.S.176.

Marriage is a social and, in particular, a legal institution, consisting in a long-term union of male and female persons, which forms the basis of the family.
Orthodox Encyclopedia, vol. VI, p. 146

The history of mankind knows different forms of marriage: monogamous (marriage of one husband and one wife), polygamous (polygamy) and polyandrous (marriage of one wife with several husbands, cases of such a marriage are rare). Christian tradition recognizes marriage only as a monogamous union.

"And they shall be one flesh..."

The Digests of Emperor Justinian, a Byzantine collection of laws, contains a definition of marriage given by the Roman jurist Modestinus (3rd century): "Marriage is the union of a man and a woman, the communion of life, participation in divine and human law." The Christian Church, taking it from Roman law, gave it a Christian interpretation based on the testimony of Holy Scripture. Included in the canonical collections of the Orthodox Church and thus adapted and sanctioned by it, it acquired ecclesiastical authority. This definition refers to the main properties of marriage: physical (monogamous union of persons of different sexes), ethical ("communion of life" - communication in all life relations) and religious-legal ("complicity in divine and human law").

In accordance with Christian doctrine, the marriage union is an institution of God. As a law, it is laid down in the very constitution of man: "And God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them" (Genesis 1:27).

Marriage was established in Paradise, before the fall of man: “And the Lord God said: It is not good for the man to be alone; let us make him a helper corresponding to him… And the Lord God created a wife from a rib taken from a man, and brought her to the man. And said the man, "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, for she was taken out of man. Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother, and cleave to his wife; and they shall be one flesh" (Gen. 2, 18:22-24).

The Lord Jesus Christ, referring to this blessing, teaches: “Therefore they are no longer two, but one flesh. "Not two, but one flesh" indicates the constant metaphysical unity of the spouses. "That's why God calls her (wife) helper, to show that they are one," says St. John Chrysostom. Such a unity of a man and a woman is a mystery, it exceeds human understanding, therefore it can be understood only in comparison with the mystery of the Holy Trinity and the dogma of the Church. In marriage, a person becomes an image of the supra-individual, one in essence, but trinity in the persons of God.

God is always present here, the Holy Scripture testifies to this: God brings the wife to Adam (Gen. 2, 22); God's wife is "predestined for you from the beginning" (Tov. 6:18); "The Lord was a witness between you and the wife of your youth" (Mal. 2:14); marriage is a "covenant of God" (Prov. 2:17); God combined husband and wife (Matthew 19:6); marriage, according to the apostle Paul, should be "only in the Lord" (1 Cor. 7:39; 11:11).

The Fathers and Doctors of the Church emphasized the idea of ​​the presence of God Himself in marriage. Tertullian taught: "The Lord ... abides with them (Christian husband and wife) together." And St. Gregory the Theologian in his writings pointed out that God is "the Creator of marriage". The thirteenth canon of the Council of Trullo says: marriage is "established by God and blessed by Him at his coming."

The image of the union of Christ and the Church

Marriage relationships are built on a feeling of satisfied love, and therefore on a feeling of fullness and bliss. The union of the primordial couple, by the will of God, was monogamous "there will be [two] one flesh", for only in it is the full manifestation of the mutual closeness of the spouses possible. Marriage is the mystery of the Kingdom of God, leading a person into eternal joy and eternal love. Freely accepting what God gives him, a person through this Sacrament, which opens the way to salvation, to true life, participates in the high reality of the Holy Spirit. Marriage is holy, "for the will of God is your sanctification" - teaches the Apostle Paul (1 Thess. 4, 3.) and is indissoluble, since its destruction leads to the destruction of the fullness of human nature.

The Apostle Paul's teaching on marriage is closely related to his teaching on the Church. The apostle calls Christian families "house churches" (Rom. 16:4; 1 Cor. 16:19; Col. 4:15; Philm. 2). In accordance with this, Christian marriage is a sacrament that unites husband and wife in the image of the mysterious union of Christ with His Church for the full indivisible communion of life and brings down upon them the gifts of God's grace. In Ephesians, the apostle Paul wrote: “Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife, just as Christ is the head of the Church, and He is the Savior of the body. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the Church and gave himself up for her... Therefore a man will leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. to the Church. Thus, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife fear (her) husband" (Eph. 5:22-25, 31-33). “It is good for a wife to honor Christ in the person of her husband, and it is good for a husband not to dishonor the Church in the person of his wife,” says St. Gregory the Theologian. Marriage, according to St. John Chrysostom, is "a mysterious image of the Church and Christ." This image plays a key role in Holy Scripture. The relationship between God and the Old Testament Church is usually depicted in the images of marriage, the Bridegroom and the Bride, the Husband and the Wife (Is. 49:18; 54:1-6; 61:10; 62:5; Ezek. 16:8; Hos. 2:19 ; 3, 1, etc.). In the New Testament, Christ speaks of Himself as the Bridegroom - (Matt. 9:15; 22:2-14; 25:1-13; Luke 12:35-36; Rev. 19:7-9; 21:2) . John the Baptist calls Him the Bridegroom (John 3:29), the Church appears to Him in the form of His Bride, Wife (2 Cor. 11:2; Eph. 5:25-32; Rev. 18:23; 19:7 -8; 21, 2, 9; 22, 16-17); in the parable of the Lord Jesus Christ, the kingdom of heaven is presented as a wedding feast (Matthew 22:2-14).

The crown is a sign of the feat of patience

According to Holy Tradition, marriages have been performed in the Church since its very origin (Eph. 5:22-24; 1 Cor. 7:39). Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom, Hieromartyr Methodius of Patara, and other Fathers of the Church bear witness to the priestly blessing of marriage in the Ancient Church. The performers of the rites of the Sacrament of Marriage are the bishop or presbyter. The bride and groom before the priest, and in his person before the Church, make a free promise in mutual marital fidelity. The priest asks them from God for grace-filled help in everything and blessing for the birth and Christian upbringing of children.

When the ceremony is performed, crowns are laid on the spouses (therefore, the Sacrament of Marriage is also called the Wedding), which has several meanings. On the one hand, this is the reward of the Holy Church for the preservation of chastity before marriage and a sign that the bride and groom are worthy of the purity of soul and body to receive the grace of the sacrament. On the other hand, the crowns are also a sign of achievement, the achievement of patience and condescension to each other's infirmities. Finally, they are also laid as a symbol of the fullness of the fulfillment in marriage of Christ's commandments about mutual love, mutual service and the fullness of self-sacrifice.

Highly appreciating the feat of voluntary chaste celibacy, accepted for the sake of Christ and the Gospel, and recognizing the special role of monasticism in her life, the Church has never treated marriage with disdain and condemned those who, out of a falsely understood desire for purity, despised marital relations. The 51st Canon of the Apostles says: "Whoever, a bishop, or a presbyter, or a deacon, or in general from the holy office, retires from marriage... , creating a man, a man and a wife, he created them, and thus, blaspheming, slanders the creation: either let it be corrected, or let it be expelled from the sacred rank, and rejected from the Church.

Hieromartyr Ignatius the God-bearer says that Christian marriage is performed "for the glory of God." “Marriage is sacred,” writes Clement of Alexandria, “and, according to the commandments of the Divine Word, it is perfect if the marriage couple is obedient to the will of God.” "... I consider virginity much more venerable than marriage; and yet, because of this, I do not put marriage among the bad deeds, but I even praise it very much," remarks St. John Chrysostom.

The religious and moral principle is the basis of Christian marriage; its other elements are subordinate to it: natural, social, legal. The moral content of marriage lies, according to the teachings of the Apostle Peter, in self-sacrifice: “Likewise, you wives, obey your husbands, so that those of them who do not obey the word, by the life of their wives without a word, will be acquired when they see your pure, God-fearing life. May your adornment be not external weaving of hair, not golden headdresses or finery in clothes, but the innermost man of the heart in the imperishable beauty of a meek and silent spirit, which is precious before God ... Likewise, you husbands, treat your wives wisely, as with the weakest vessel, honoring them as joint heirs of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered" (1 Pet. 3:1-4,7).

God's love that unites hearts

The main goal of marriage cannot be outside of itself, since the highest goal of human existence is to achieve unity with God, god-likeness. In marriage, spouses are elevated by God to the level of an outlier, supra-individual being. “In marriage, souls are united with God by some kind of inexpressible union,” says St. John Chrysostom.

Union is created by love: the love of God unites the parties in marriage, those who are married are united by love in God and through God. "Love, wholly directed towards God," according to Abba Thalassia, "unites those who love with God and with each other." “Marriage love is the strongest type of love,” St. John Chrysostom believes, “other attractions are also strong, but this attraction has such strength that it never weakens. And in the next century, faithful spouses will fearlessly meet and will abide forever with Christ and with each other in great joy." The Word of God requires of spouses that their love should be like the love of Christ for His Church, Who "gave Himself for her to sanctify her" (Eph. 5:25).

From this it follows that moral dignity can be recognized for a single, lifelong marriage. The second and third marriages, allowed by the Church for the laity, are considered as some kind of imperfection in the life of a Christian and are blessed by her in condescension to human weakness and for protection from fornication. The Apostle Paul, believing in the power of Christian love, allowed divorce in a mixed marriage for the non-Christian side and forbade it for the Christian side, whose love should sanctify the non-Christian side as well (1 Cor. 7:12-14).

Mutual completion in the marriage union also serves to help in the salvation of the husband and wife. The personality and properties of one spouse are replenished by the personality and properties of the other, and thereby determine the harmonious disclosure of their spiritual strengths and abilities.

"In marriage, complete knowledge of a person is possible - a miracle of feeling, seeing someone else's personality. That is why before marriage a person glides over life, observes it from the outside, and only in marriage plunges into life, entering it through another person. This is the enjoyment of real knowledge and real life gives that feeling of completed fullness and satisfaction that makes us richer and wiser... Marriage is a dedication, a mystery. It contains a complete change in a person, an expansion of his personality, new eyes, a new sense of life, a birth through him into the world in a new fullness, "wrote the archpriest Alexander Elchaninov.

The rest of heaven on earth

The next purpose of marriage, which is indicated by Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition, is the birth and upbringing of children. "When marriage is actually marriage and marital union, and the desire to leave behind children, then, - according to St. Gregory the Theologian, - marriage is good, for it multiplies the number of those who please God." According to St. John Chrysostom, marriage was established by God in order to make up for the loss of people caused by sin and death. From now on, spouses need to constantly remember that they no longer have personal freedom, they no longer have their own life, their own interests, their sadness or joy. Everything must be shared, everything must be given to another. When the family increases, children appear, then the fullness of selflessness increases even more. For the wife and mother, as well as for the husband and father, there is no longer their own life - but there is only the life of a spouse and children.

What does it cost parents, and especially mothers, to raise and educate children! And if they fulfill this duty according to the commandments of Christ, then by doing so they fulfill the greatest destiny of man and ensure a bright lot for themselves in the Kingdom of Heaven - they provide those crowns that, as a preliminary gift, the Church gives them as a reward at marriage.

Here it seems appropriate to recall one poem, naive in form, but profound in content:

When you come to heaven's door
And the bright angel will ask
How was your whole earthly life,
You will answer him: I am a mother.
And quickly he will retreat from the threshold,
To bring you into a bright paradise,
Only they know in heaven with God,
What can a mother bear.

But even a marriage left without offspring is recognized by the Orthodox Church as legal.
Another purpose of marriage, which the Holy Scriptures and the holy fathers speak of, is protection from debauchery and the preservation of chastity. “Marriage is given for childbearing,” writes the Chrysostom teacher, “and even more so for extinguishing the natural flame. The Apostle Paul is a witness to this: “But, in order to avoid fornication, each one should have his own wife, and each one should have her own husband” (1 Cor. 7, 2 ).

These are the establishment and goals of marriage as the beginning of a family - a small church. According to the biblical view, shared mainly by all mankind, marriage and the family are the remnants of paradise on earth, this is the oasis that was not destroyed by the great world catastrophes, was not defiled by the sin of the first people, was not flooded by the waves of the global flood. This is a shrine that we ourselves must not only keep clean, but also teach our children to do so.

Priest
Alexander MATRUK

Orthodox Christian moral theology

Professor I. M. Andreevsky

APPLICATION

Prof. AND.

M. Andreev. Marriage and family (In the Orthodox-Russian sense)

The problem of marriage is as old as the world.

The biblical story of the creation of the world is full of superhuman wisdom. It alone can withstand the strictest, most captious criticism. That is why most of the greatest scientists believe in God and in the revealed books, i.e. to the Bible.

Biblical images, in addition to their depth and complexity, are also artistic images, which is why they have attracted and will continue to attract the attention of the greatest representatives of all arts: poetry, music, painting and sculpture.

In order to understand the full depth of the problem of marriage, we must begin to consider this problem from a religious point of view.

The first marriage was the marriage of Adam and Eve in Paradise. They were created by God and their marriage was blessed, as the whole earth was blessed and everything that was done on it at that time.

According to the biblical story, Adam was created first, i.e. a man, then Eve was created from his rib, for God said: “It is not good for the man to be alone; Let us make him a helper fit for him.”

And the man said, “This is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she will be called wife, for she was taken from her husband.

The Apostle Paul added to these words: “This mystery is great!”

Truly, marriage is a great mystery!

Christianity not only confirmed the Old Testament truth about marriage as a sacrament of dual unity (the two will be one flesh), but also gave a new deep prototype of marriage: the unity of Christ and the Church.

Regarding the relationship between husband and wife, the apostle Paul says: “Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord. Because the husband is the head of the wife, just as Christ is the head of the Church. But just as the Church obeys Christ, so do wives obey their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for. So also husbands should love their wives as their bodies: he who loves his wife loves himself. For no one has ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and warms it, just as the Lord does the Church. So let each of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife fear her husband” (Eph. 5). Of course, “afraid” should be understood not in the philistine worldly sense of slavish fear, but in a religious one: “afraid” of offending, “afraid” of offending, “afraid” of doing something unpleasant to a loved one, “afraid” of losing his love and disposition, and, finally, “ afraid to receive a just and deserved punishment.

This is how a Christian marriage should be.

In a Christian marriage, the man should be the head, and the woman should be his corresponding (completing) helper. A man - a husband, must love his wife, like Christ the Church, i.e. must, love more than himself, must be ready to lay down his life for his wife.

A wife, in response to such selfless love, must submit to her beloved.

Philistine thought does not agree with this. Modern women usually say: “Well, no! To let my husband push me around! Never! Vice versa! I always want and will command my husband!”

There is a deep misunderstanding, thoughtlessness, slander on Christian marriage in these words. Why push around? Indeed, in a true Christian marriage, a loving husband is worthy of trust and selflessness!

If the modern “ideal” of marriage is that in no case should the husband be the head, then they are looking for a husband who cannot be the head.

Instead of marriage - dual unity, in which the masculine principle of love is paramount, a different marriage is obtained, in which both parties are equally non-selfless, love only themselves, their self (hence the words: "male" and "female").

The Christian Church, among its seven sacraments, also has the sacrament of marriage. The Church blesses those who are married, reminding them of the ideal of marriage.

The Sacrament of Marriage is a bodily-spiritual unity, a dual unity of a man and a woman.

Crowns over the heads of those who are getting married are symbols, primarily symbols of martyrdom, for a blessed marriage will certainly bring with it a lot of suffering. First of all, suffering begins in fulfillment of the covenant: “bear one another’s burdens!”

How far mankind has gone from the basic religious paradisiacal principles of life, built on universal mutual love, is evident from the enormous labor that is required to realize this love only among two beings: and a wife.

In addition to the hardships that husband and wife bring to each other in marriage, they receive other hardships when children appear.

Sorrows in marriage are inevitable, and marriage is always a special kind of martyrdom!

Do those who are getting married think about it? Is this sacrament always taken seriously? - Almost never!

But the crowns over the heads of the couple are not only a symbol of martyrdom. They are at the same time a symbol of help from above, a symbol of victory, reward, triumph and glory!

In the sacrament of marriage, the Church not only crowns martyrdom, but also crowns with the promise of help from above and the promise of the triumph of goodness. Per aspera ad astra!

It is a wonderful time when loving each other - a man and a woman - the bride and groom. But how much more beautiful, in a Christian marriage, is the time when they become husband and wife!

In love between the bride and groom there is not yet the fullness of love.

Nadson has a poem: “Only the morning of love is good!”

With deep subtle sadness, this poem notes that this often happens in real life. Not many can stand this temptation.

For whom "only the morning of love is good", he does not know true love. For this, of course, the bride is always better than the wife and the groom is better than the husband.

One of the modern songs sings: “We love the Motherland like a bride!” By this they want to express the greatest, best love. This song is not random. Modernity knows almost no love for a wife, which is better than love for a bride!

How much deeper is Blok's cry of painful love for Russia: “Oh, my Rus'! My wife. »

Here "wife" - symbolizes the greatest, deepest love that is possible in life.

In a true Christian marriage, love never wanes. On the contrary, over the years it grows, expands, deepens, spiritualizes. Such love, “wide as the sea, the life of the shore cannot contain,” and here, on temporary earth, it begins to turn into eternal love and becomes truly “stronger than death!”

It should be! This is how a Christian marriage should be.

But what happens in real life?

Leo Tolstoy said that the deepest tragedies of life are the tragedy of the bedroom. Indeed, the tragedy of marriage is very often played out in the bedroom.

The lack of harmony in bodily relations, in the presence of spiritual unity, is sometimes deeply tragic.

The mismatch of sexual temperaments often leads to suicide (see Durkheim - "Suicide"). Tyutchev considered suicide and love to be twins.

The intimate moments of marriage are very rarely depicted in highly artistic poetry (another thing is in tabloid novels). This requires an in-depth aesthetic overcoming of natural ethical obstacles.

Such overcoming is Pushkin's famous poem - "No, I do not value rebellious pleasure", in which Pushkin depicted the harmony of bodily marital relations, in the presence of different sexual temperaments.

About this poem, such a chaste person as S. T. Aksakov exclaimed, “turning pale with delight”: “How he told about it!”

The unusually masculine temperament of Pushkin and the equally unusually feminine temperament of his wife N. N. Goncharova gave harmony to bodily relations. Physically, Pushkin was happy in marriage. But there is absolutely no spiritual unity. And the marriage ended tragically: a duel and the death of Pushkin.

In Yuri Verkhovsky's poem "Is that all?" - the state of disharmony of bodily and spiritual relationships is wonderfully subtly and artistically depicted. But then a subtle hint is given about the possibility of future harmonization of relations on the basis of mutual sensitivity:

"And it's all? you said

Bowing faded features,

In response to the whirlwind of happiness

It seemed in a storm of voluptuousness!

And it's all? Fog covered

Radiance of joyful wings.

I hesitated, bowed before you -

Extinguished suddenly and singed.

Disharmonies can be much deeper and more tragic (See "Life" by Maupassant, "Eugen the Unfortunate" by Ernst Toller, "The Idiot" by Dostoevsky and others.).

In Russian philosophical literature, there is a great work on the topic of these disharmony by V. V. Rozanov - “People of the Moonlight”.

When a child or children appears in a marriage, then the marriage turns into a family, in which no longer dual unity, trinity and polyunity of people begin to be realized.

Marriage is the reunion of two sexes, i.e. halves to a single whole. But the floor is not a simple homogeneous half. A man and a woman are different elements, and marriage is not just a dual unity, but something new (similarly, hydrogen and oxygen are water). In marriage, the spouses get something completely new, which they can never get while being apart. The symbol of this new is the child, which is the real realization of both dual unity (for in him alone are both father and mother) and novelty (his own new personality).

In every child - moreover, there is a breath of holiness - ("theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven"). The child, as it were, revives the former and lost holiness of the parents.

The ideal human body is beautiful.

The body of a woman is mostly beautiful (“beautiful sex”), but the most perfect, most beautiful beauty is the beauty of an infant, which Raphael portrayed with an ideal and deep understanding.

One of the remarkable artists of the word - I. A. Goncharov - wrote about the babies of Raphael: His babies always seem to be drenched in the rays of the sun - so soft, tender, childishly puffy and warm in their forms under his brush that they seem to have no contours. The beauty of his babies is universal, universal beauty without nationality. She is in a look of purity and ignorance, alien to any damage and shadow, she is in a smile, she is in tears - she is, finally, in this infantile grace of movements, which a child cannot break, no matter how he grimace. And all babies of tender age are more or less Raphael babies.”

I. A. Goncharov sees Raphael’s special merit in the perfect transfer in painting - “the grace and purity of eternal childish beauty!”

The most beautiful phenomenon in life is the image of a mother with a baby in her arms.

A childless marriage is always flawed.

A woman (made from a “rib”) is also always a kind of child. Ap. Paul calls women “weak vessels.” This should never be forgotten by a man - a husband!

Modern philistine psychology does not understand this at all, and modern “emancipated” women consider such a view for women even “offensive”.

“What God has joined together, let no man separate,” teaches the Church.

Divorce, as a principle, is religiously forbidden. The Orthodox Church allows divorce very rarely and only with the blessing of the bishop.

From a biological point of view, divorce is also a tragedy, a biological tragedy. The biological fact is extremely interesting, when a black child was born to a woman from a white husband, because before this woman had another, black husband! What great significance, therefore, even biologically, is the first husband!

When children appear in a marriage, the husband and wife change (and very deeply) - turning into a father and mother. This is the touchstone of true marriage.

The love of the bride and groom deepens and spiritualizes in the love of husband and wife and reaches its peak in the love of father and mother. In a Christian marriage, children bind their parents very tightly with spiritual bonds. Christian marriage becomes a Christian family. A courageous man - a father, becomes even more "masculine" and is not afraid to do a "women's" business - babysitting children, if necessary. Feminine woman - mother becomes even more feminine. A woman-mother - in a Christian marriage becomes the best wife (and the father - the best husband).

After all, a husband is not only a husband, but also a father, i.e. the one without which there is and could not be motherhood. Children need not only a mother, but also a father, whom a mother can never replace. And a real mother feels this, knows, understands and becomes a better wife, the more she is a mother, i.e. the more she loves children.

But not only because of the love of children, a mother becomes a better wife. There is one more condition. The fact is that in motherhood a woman can lose herself, dissolve in children to the ground, lose the sense of her "I". But communication with her husband saves her from this. In the most selfless love for her husband, a woman will never completely dissolve if there are children. On the contrary, she will feel her feminine individuality more deeply.

From a religious point of view, contraceptives and abortion are completely unacceptable. Abortion is infanticide, and contraception is fornication.

People come to church with their sorrows, with grief, with joy. And as a priest, I must say that the vast majority of all problems are connected precisely with a person’s life in the family, with relations between husband and wife, between parents and children, mothers-in-law, mothers-in-law, etc. This sphere of relations occupies a huge part in a person’s life. And if something is not in order in the family, then the whole life, perhaps, is not in order. Therefore, the theme of the family is legitimately considered one of the most important.

Now work has become a very important place in people's lives. And very often we are faced with situations where parents do not see their children for days, because they earn money, and as a result, they meet with their children once a week. There are doubts about the correctness of this way of life. Parishioners often ask the question, should there be anything more important for a person than a family?

I think it would be wrong to say that either the family or social activities should be put in the first place. In my opinion, another statement of the problem would be correct. A person really has the most serious obligations to society, to the service to which he is called. But I would not oppose family and public service, because one includes the other. Let's try to change the angle of view.

To do this, I will give an example. Before becoming a priest, I worked as a teacher and literature at school, I also had a chance to deal with family issues. In my last year of teaching, the director suggested that I take an elective course in the psychology of family life in my senior year. I took it up with great interest and, I must say, with great arrogance. There was such an abundance of material, first of all, fiction, some kind of life experience, a lot of publications, good articles on this topic. That is, I thought that the psychology of family life can be turned into one of the most important and interesting subjects. But I failed completely.

Our school was strong, and at the end of the school year, we had conversations with the children about what subject they like, what they don’t like, what is interesting and what is not, what is the job of a teacher. I got a D in this subject. I realized - do not take on your own business. Then I was very sad, but now I know what the problem was - the approach itself was wrong. The family was seen as something separate: each person has a job, friends, some kind of hobby, and there is a family. We tried to talk about problems in the family and how to solve them correctly, but we didn’t think at all about the essence of a person, oh.

Now, as a priest, I understand that talking about the family is possible only in the context of talking about the meaning of human life in general.

Yes, and any moral issues, and not just the issue of the family, can only be truly resolved when we consider them in the context of a broader, more important - what is a person, what is his vocation, what is his true dignity, what elevates a person and which, on the contrary, humiliates, etc. From the height of such a formulation of the problem, the role of the family in a person's life becomes clear. After all, if it is something valuable in itself - this is one thing. But if the family is part of a person's wider ministry in this life, then everything is seen quite differently.

Family in the context of the meaning of life

Since we started with the meaning of human life, we will speak in the language of the Gospels, in the language of theology. said: Seek first the Kingdom of God and its righteousness, and all this will be added to you (Matthew 6:33).

Expresses the same idea in a slightly different way. He says that the purpose of human life is the acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit. In fact, the Kingdom of God is the Kingdom of the grace of the Holy Spirit, being in the grace of the Holy Spirit. The Kingdom of God is within you (Luke 17:21), says the Lord. When the grace of God abides in us, we are still in this earthly life in contact with the Kingdom of God. The Holy Fathers have the word “deification”, that is, union with God, when man is in God and God is in man, when man and God become one. This is the highest goal to which a person should strive.

The term "deification" is used here as ecclesiastical and theological, however, sometimes it can be said in a simpler, worldly way, perhaps not quite accurately, but more understandably. To save your soul means to learn to love. Everything that I said above - the Kingdom of God and the acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit - is the same. After all, what is union with God, deification? You and I know the words: God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God (1 John 4:7). That is, deification is a state when love becomes dominant in a person.

To the extent that a person learns to love, to the extent that he is fit for eternity. If love has not become the main content of the human heart, the main content of his soul, then there is nothing to do in eternity. Not because they won't let him in there, but because he himself will have nothing to do there. For example, if a person with impaired vision has to wear black glasses because he cannot look at the sunlight, how will he feel in bright light? Likewise, probably, for a person who is not able to love truly, it will be completely impossible and painful to be in the area of ​​that light, which is God, which is Love.

And since the main task of a person in this earthly life is to learn to love, it means that everything that is capable of teaching this love acquires value in this life. Indeed, every episode of human life, every situation, every event, every meeting is, on the one hand, a lesson for a person, and, on the other hand, at the same time, an exam. Because we are testing how truly we are. I think that for a person who understands this, there is a certain danger. He may begin to think that he has already learned to love, but in fact he has not.

So the best examiner of our success in this area is family life. Because the farther a person is from us, the easier it is to show love to him. It is not difficult to make some effort and do deeds of love, to speak kind words, to be kind to that person with whom we meet from time to time. The closer one gets, the harder it gets. All the shortcomings of people especially close to us are highlighted before us. And it is much more difficult for us to endure and forgive them.

But even if we see great shortcomings in a person who is at a distance from us, we still love him. After all, it is known that it is easier to love the distant than. Therefore, it is in the family that a person and love are subjected to the greatest trials. Sometimes in no one hatred is expressed so strongly as in people connected by marital ties. You can just wonder how you can say offensive words to each other, so hate each other.

In Herzen's novel "Who is to blame?" one of the heroes says that the most ferocious animal in its hole, in its lair, in relation to its cubs, is meek. Very often, the most seemingly normal, respectable and good person in his family turns into a beast, becomes worse than any animal.

The ancient Greek poet Hesiod has these lines: “There is nothing better in the world than a good wife. And nothing is worse than a bad wife. But I want to make a reservation right away, to tell all the women that Hesiod said so because he was a poet. A poetess would write that nothing is better than a good husband, and nothing is worse than a bad husband.

What I have been talking about so far is probably applicable to any family, both Orthodox and non-Orthodox. How does the Orthodox approach to the problems of family life differ from the non-Orthodox? Imagine that you had to live with such a wife or with such a husband, more terrible than which there is nothing in the world. What to do? ? Most of the time, people do this. This is very easy to do these days. If earlier this was associated with very great difficulties, even purely technical ones, now these problems have been reduced to a minimum and therefore it is enough for people to simply run away and forget that they were together, although, of course, it will not be possible to forget, but, nevertheless they no longer have any obligations towards each other.

But in the Orthodox Church it is quite different. So you got married? Married. What is your wife? I quoted Herzen and Hesiod, and now I will quote the words from the Book of Wisdom of Jesus, the son of Sirach: “I will agree better to live with a lion and a dragon than live with an evil wife” (Sir. 25, 18). If this is what happened, then what? The Lord Jesus Christ categorically forbade divorce, leaving the possibility of divorce only if adultery occurred on the part of one of the spouses. And not because this is a valid reason for a divorce, but because this divorce has actually already taken place. actually destroys the marriage. And it is quite difficult to demand from people that they preserve what is no longer there.

If a wife is grumpy or a husband, or a terrible despot, but does not change, then we must endure.

One of the big problems is that when people get married, in most cases it seems to them that they have loved each other forever, and they do not at all assume that after a while they may find something unpleasant in their “half”. And therefore, very often the bride, who seemed to her husband the most beautiful wife in the future, becomes that very bad wife, more terrible than which there is nothing in the world. How then to be?

The attitude to in Christianity is completely different than in secular society. Everyone agrees that there must be love, but not everyone understands that we ourselves do not have a source of love. It sometimes seems naively to a person that it depends on him - to love or not to love. But after all, we know that love is a certain force that acts in a person regardless of his will and desire.

An example is the case when the whole world is ready to shout to a person: whom do you love?! Some kind of nonentity, generally unworthy of the name of a person. And the mind and reason tell the lover that this is the way it is, but he cannot do anything with himself. I'm not talking about the opposite case, when there is no love in the heart, it's cold where, it would seem, everything speaks in favor of a person in all respects. Sometimes you need to talk about, that is, about some kind of attraction that should not be confused with love. But now I want to talk about love.

God is love. And if I don’t love someone, but at the same time I am connected with him by a sense of duty, and I don’t feel love, then this does not mean at all that it will not happen. The question is whether I want love to appear or not. This is the fundamental difference between the secular, worldly approach to marriage from the Orthodox. For a non-believer - if there is no love, then you need to run away, but for a believer - if not, then you need to ask.

You can give a historical example. The wives of the Decembrists went into exile with their husbands. Among them were women who passionately loved their husbands and simply saw no other way out for themselves. This is Trubetskaya, Muravyova ... But Volkonskaya found herself in a different situation. She was given in marriage as a young girl to a man who, by age, was suitable for her father. And she, as can be seen from her notes, in general, did not love him, did not love him with real love, which everyone assumes is necessary for marriage. But, nevertheless, when the question arose for her: to go or not to go, she went, as she herself writes, because there was a sense of duty, because she is his wife, they got married in the church.

She tried to love and hoped that the appearance of this love would bring. Moreover, she simply did not have time to create love. They were together for a very short time, and she could not get to know her husband properly. There was an uprising ... We all watched on the screen and read in books how she arrived, fell to her knees, kissed his shackles. His suffering brought them closer.

The example is very clear and eloquent. Of course, he probably has some kind of exclusivity, because not everyone is exiled. Perhaps, indeed, in exceptional circumstances, such a sense of duty awakens in people, which turns out to be stronger than anything, and it, as it were, entails the birth of love or the multiplication of love.

And in those cases when nothing extraordinary happens, when people just live and work, and at the same time a mutually unpleasant situation arises, what to do then? The Orthodox Church says that, after all, relations must be built.

You must immediately decide for yourself: no matter what happens, there are no other options and there won’t be any more, it’s already forbidden to dream, since the Lord brought you together with this person. Remember that what God has united, let no man separate. So God, of course, can separate Himself if He sees that it is necessary. He will find a way somehow something. But a person's own efforts should be aimed at learning to love another with a new love. Not the one that was for an illusory person. After all, very often a person before marriage loves not the one who is in front of him, but the one whom he created for himself in his imagination, and the one who tried to appear that other, spouse or wife.

And this other person needs to be loved, but this love does not exist and you need to ask the Lord for it. I remember one of my friends. He got married a few years ago. He is a believer, Orthodox. The wife is also a believer. Everything was as it should be. And there was love, and before signing and getting married, they even went to take a blessing from. And so the marriage took place.

And then the nightmare began. It was just a tragic situation in the family. It was very hard. A year after the wedding, I asked him about life. He replied, “You better not ask. We don't get everything right. If I were an unbeliever, if I were non-Orthodox, then there would not even be any questions, they would disperse (he even laughed). With such ease they would have dispersed, but I understand that it is impossible.

Here is a true believer: "You can't." And what do you think? Now in the last few years they have a very good family. Everything was overcome, they managed to adapt to each other, new sources of love were opened. And now there can be no question of any divorce. Have children.

And problems, of course, arise, like everyone else from time to time again and again. But, in general, they understand that they can no longer be without each other.

Look here. After all, in fact, they were restrained only by the consciousness of Christian duty: if the Lord connected you with this person, then you are now responsible and you will not run away from him anywhere.

If only all people would have such an attitude towards marriage! If everyone treated marriage not as an experiment: if it works out - good, if it doesn't work out - let's run away! And so that when entering into marriage, remember the saying: "measure seven times, cut one." But if you cut off, that's it. And you know that no matter what happens, you will always live with this person. And the only thing you can do is get love back in you. This is, it seems to me, the only correct way in the family.

It may be objected to me that the people I cited as an example were true believers. God sends trials. And if they were weaker in faith, then, perhaps, they would not have survived ...

Here again we need to remember that we are talking about the family in the context of the meaning of life. So the most important requirement of a person to himself should be the striving for perfection: Be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect (Matt. 5:48). I think that each of us should strive for this.

You have to talk to many young people and ask them the question: “Is there a desire to achieve perfection?” In response, the young man or girl shrug their shoulders, they did not even think about it. In general, this is a flaw in our upbringing. In noble families, in those cultural families that were before, the striving for excellence and indifference, the fear of living life and not achieving something big, not being able to develop a truly beautiful, beautiful personality was considered the norm. Nothing, probably, scared the young man, who was brought up in the spirit of the nobility, like the threat that you can live this life in gray and there will not be something bright, genuine in it. There was a fear of living like everyone else.

There are both positive and negative points in this approach. Of course, there is a danger of pride and vanity here. On the other hand, understanding your calling is to make your life really beautiful. From a Christian standpoint, this means to glorify God with our lives... When we repeat “glory to God”, we praise God everywhere, then this is verbal praise to the Lord. And when in our life all the gifts that God has given us develop to the full extent, then this is the glory of God. It is the pursuit of perfection. But for self-improvement.

Psychologists write that a person almost never, with extremely rare exceptions, is not what he really is. A person plays some role all the time: one with friends, another at work, etc. I would not even say that this is hypocrisy, because a person also plays a role in front of himself. And what a person really is often not known not only by those around him, but the person himself is not fully aware of himself. Only God knows this. And I would add here that the wife and children. Because the family includes such a complex of circumstances under which it is impossible to play for a long time, the personality shows, in the end, a true face.

If you really want to know what you are really worth, then carefully, without being irritated, listen to the words or children. They give you a true assessment, they really know what you are worth. Of course, it is very embarrassing. They say that there is no prophet in his own country and in his family. It's all like that. But only a proud person is offended by critical remarks: for everyone he is like a prophet, but not in the family. But if a person really strives for perfection, he just understands that the family will tell him what to work on, even if the family is unfair, because, of course, those who look at us are also not all right with their eyesight, seeing our shortcomings, they will not see our virtues.

And I want to see the advantages, not only the disadvantages. I think that for a person who sincerely strives for excellence, the experience that he gets in the family is simply priceless.

In order to fully reveal the theme of the meaning of human life, one must remember that humanity in the form in which it exists is fallen, and our way of life is imperfect. Fall and damage are expressed in our disunity, to which our forefathers led. Because, ideally, a person should be in unity with all people and with the whole world, and not perceive himself as something self-sufficient.

Humanity should be like, moreover, including not only people, but all nature with the plant, animal world, and even the inanimate. It turns out a wonderful antinomy: on the one hand, a person retains his unique personality, and on the other hand, he feels unity with everything that exists. And, perhaps, the tragedy of the world lies in the fact that people have ceased to perceive themselves as a single whole with each other, with all creation and with God.

There are words in the Gospel that the Son of Man came to gather the disparate children of God together. And again, in His prayer the Lord speaks to the Father about His disciples and repeats these words: May they all be one, as You are the Father in Me and I in You (John 17:21). This is exactly where salvation lies - in unity, not in external, but really in such, when someone else's joy becomes your joy, someone else's pain becomes your pain. When you do not think of yourself as separate not only from your contemporaries, but also from the past and the future. When we are all from, then in this sacrament we unite with God and with each other in God.

Sometimes they forget about this unity, that it is a calling of a person. And the family is just the first step to such unity. Where the husband and wife are truly one flesh. After all, the ideal of love is when two people already become one. And just this family is that organism in which two personalities, who were originally strangers to each other, must become one with a single heart, common thoughts, in the image of the Holy Trinity, while not losing their personal uniqueness, but enriching and complementing each other.

This harmonious whole is the most beautiful thing in the world. And when children are still included in the family, the flower blooms with new and new petals, and each of them makes the whole flower even more beautiful. And this makes all of humanity more beautiful when everything consists of such bouquets of flowers.

intimate relationship

Marriage has a lot of aspects, and one of them is this. There is an opinion that priests or any Christian do not have sex at all, there are marital duties only for, and sex is an accessory of our sinful essence. And therefore it is necessary, if not to fight this matter, then, in any case, to treat it very evenly and not attach great importance.

In general, there is no single opinion on this matter, in Orthodox church books one can read various judgments on this issue. I will express my opinion, which I verified by reading patristic literature and contemporary theologians.

Nowhere in Holy Scripture can we read any judgments from which it would follow that the Church sees something dirty, bad, unclean in intimate relationships. This, perhaps, was already brought later, separately. And the whole tragedy lies in the fact that any side of a person's life can be built by him according to the saying: clean - everything is clean, dirty - everything is dirty.

Therefore, we need to think about how we look at all this. I would say that it is in the physical relationship between a man and a woman that a person can manifest both the dirtiest and most disgusting, and the most beautiful and sublime.

I am convinced that it is in this that sometimes a person can prove himself especially beautiful if love is at the core. Because in intimate relationships there can be satisfactions of lust and there can be manifestations of love.

In the first case, it is disgusting, low, sinful. A person has to fight this, because in nothing depravity manifests itself so strongly as in the lust that lives in everyone. The fight for is the hardest fight.

And in the second case, when people are attracted to each other by love, when each sees in the other not a means of satisfying his physiological needs, but just wants complete unity and the joy of communication, then there is nothing sinful in this.

And even more than that. If these relationships existed only for procreation, then people would be like animals. Because this is the case with animals, but only people have love. And, I think, it is very wrong to see in intimate marital relations only a means of procreation. People are attracted to each other, first of all, probably not by the desire that children appear as a result of this attraction, but precisely by love and the desire to be completely united with each other. But at the same time, of course, the joy of childbearing also becomes the highest gift of love. That is, love sanctifies intimate relationships. If there is love, they become beautiful.

Not only does the Church not condemn these relationships if they are based on love, the Church, through the mouths of the Holy Fathers and even through the mouths of Holy Scripture, uses these relationships as in some way to depict a more sublime love, love between man and God.

One of the most beautiful and amazing books of the Bible is the Song of Songs, in which many things can confuse people who are prone to excessive severity. It may even be completely incomprehensible how such a book got into the Holy Scriptures. And on the one hand, it really depicts the love between a young man and a girl, and with such frankness that can confuse sanctimonious people.

On the other hand, since ancient times there has been a tradition to understand this book allegorically, even the Old Testament interpreters understood it this way, and our holy fathers. Much is written about this, that in the Song of Songs, the love of a man and a woman is an image of the love of the human soul and God.

Therefore, any earthly love is a reflection of Divine love. And unity and every manifestation of earthly love is, perhaps, a step towards perfect love, when a person becomes one with God. I think that it is in this vein that one should consider the relationship between a man and a woman, including intimate relationships, in which there is nothing shameful or shameful in any way.

Parenting

In my opinion, he brought out the ideal formula for raising children in the novel The Brothers Karamazov. He writes that the best upbringing is a good memory that a person made from childhood. The more good and kind memories a person accumulates during childhood, the stronger will be the moral basis of life in the future.

Indeed, a person is arranged in such a way that he does not forget anything from what happened in his life. It’s just that something is clearly remembered and stored in the mind, but something seems to fall out of memory and it seems that it has completely disappeared. But psychological research shows that this is not the case.

There is a case with one illiterate simple woman. She had a stroke at a very advanced age. Lying in the hospital in an unconscious state, she began to pronounce some words in an unknown language. The doctors who were next to her understood from the rhythm of her speech that she was reading poetry. This was of great interest to doctors. They began to invite philologists, but none of them could determine what language she spoke. In the end, they found out that it was Hebrew and Sanskrit. The woman was illiterate and did not study any languages ​​at all, especially ancient ones, but read huge passages. They began to research her biography. It turned out that in her youth she worked as a maid for a professor of theology, a specialist in Sanskrit and Hebrew. And while she cleaned his room, he walked and recited poetry. She, of course, was not going to memorize them and, probably, thought her own thoughts. And now, many decades later, in old age, something happened to her brain, perhaps as a result of a stroke, but all this began to spill out.

What does it say? The fact that everything that a person has ever heard, did not even listen to, but simply heard, everything remains in him. It’s like we have a tape recorder in us that is constantly turned on and absolutely everything is recorded there, our every thought, our every feeling, our every desire.

If it's already registered! What to talk about everyday things ... Here, in my opinion, a little secret is revealed when all these "tape recorders" are turned on and see what was recorded there.

In some Orthodox church hymns there are words: the books of conscience will unfold at the Last Judgment. And naturally an archaic image arises: some books where everything is written down, so they unfold and will be read. I have to see some skeptical grin when it comes to conscientious books. It is clear that this is a poetic image. But let's look at the essence: don't like "books", call it, for example, a tape recorder, or something else. After all, everything does not just settle in memory. Each sinful desire, each unworthy thought about some person, each of our suspicions not only remains, but on a subconscious level affects our behavior in the future.

Therefore, returning to the upbringing of children, I think that Dostoevsky's words in this context are very well understood. My task is to do everything in my power so that in the memory of my children, in their consciousness and, to a much greater extent, in the subconscious, there remains as much as possible imbued with kindness, love, truth. What I talk about in the kitchen with my wife, when the child in the next room is reading a book or playing, will remain in his memory. And, perhaps, from this then his thoughts, feelings, his attitude to everything that happens will be built. the child himself will not understand why he has such an attitude, such behavior. Although, such a view has nothing to do with official pedagogy.

In the beautiful work "The Summer of the Lord" he recalls his father, the life of their home. His entire adult life was based on these memories.

So, one person will have, like Shmelev: holidays, weekdays, sorrows - everything. And the other such positive memories, unfortunately, may be very small. After all, the main role in education is assigned to the power of example. And we parents ourselves do not need to do anything bad, so that later our children do not do it. It will be useless to instruct your children with correct verbal formulations. Because really in their memory there will be an example - what we did ourselves.

I would also like to say something that has completely disappeared from the life of a modern family - about reading together. What has become a unifying principle in the family is, it seems to me, a great tragedy, because it unites only externally, but internally, on the contrary, separates.

I remember that one father was very worried that his son did not join the Church in any way, and his son was just a boy, twelve years old: “I am his. Come on, stay with me."

And then I suggested that he not so much, maybe, try to drag him to church. After all, in Christianity the most important thing is not what happens in the church, and this is not an indicator of spiritual life. Everything matters though.

But still, the most important thing in Christianity is the person of Jesus Christ and fellowship with Jesus Christ. And what happens in the church is already the form in which this communication takes place. And it often happens that when a person comes to a church, he perceives the service as a kind of magical and aesthetic act, and by no means as a means of real communication with Jesus Christ, because he knows little about Christ.

So I advised that dad: “You don’t worry more about him falling in love with the temple, but about him. To do this, he must know as much as possible about Christ. Because Jesus Christ is such a beautiful person that a person who really looks into Him can hardly resist not loving Him. And when there is love for Jesus Christ and a desire to be like Him and communicate with Him, then the necessity and participation in worship will become clear.”

For any boy, as far as I know, communication with his father is very important. Such conversations will be of incomparable value. They will get closer. After all, people want to communicate. But in reality, only communion in Christ and with Christ, where two or three are gathered in My name, there I am among them (Matt. 18:20), when Christ is among us, then only communion is reduced to a real goal and is not illusory, but truly connects us to each other.

Now I would like to touch upon the topic of intimate relationships again, but in relation to the upbringing of children. When this question concerns the relationship between husband and wife, this is one thing. But when it comes to children who grow up and then it also begins to excite and disturb them, this is different.

We now live in a time when the information received by children is incommensurably more abundant than that which we received in our time. It is enough that the child walks down the street past the stalls with newspapers and magazines, where everything is open, everything “shines” there.

I'm not talking about what he can see on TV, about video production. I want to tell parents that this is a very serious problem and should not be brushed aside. Because there is an erroneous opinion: if a person is good, then it will not hurt him that he sees all this. They say that these magazines are for him, that these films are for him, if he is a normal child. And this is not so in reality. Because lust lives in every person. And it may not be so obvious, because everyone is hiding it. Because in society it is perceived as something shameful. And that's why people usually don't talk openly about it. It is not customary to discover.

People sometimes in the depths of their souls, in the recesses of their hearts, have such desires, such thoughts arise that they will be horrified if someone else finds out about this. The Holy Fathers write a lot about the fact that, perhaps, it is so difficult for a person to fight with anything as with this particular sphere. Therefore, as the child grows up, this begins to come to life in him. What form will it take?

We talked about the fact that intimate relationships between a man and a woman can be beautiful and pure, elevate and ennoble, and can humiliate a person worse than to the bestial image. Because an animal is not capable of such filth that a person is capable of when he gives free rein to his base passions.

Now the flow of external information is aimed at developing everything vile and vile in a person. It may be very embarrassing to talk about intimate life with children, but it is necessary. Because now the moral problem is being solved outside the church walls and the topic of chastity is not raised at all.

Sometimes they say that the Christian approach to, in principle, is no different from the universal one. That is, it is not even necessary to be a believer, you can be a highly moral person even without faith. Good and evil do not depend on whether a person believes or not.

Partially, of course, we can agree with this. Because there are many values ​​that are such both in the eyes of a believer and in the eyes of a non-believer, in particular: honesty, courage, conscientiousness, diligence - all this is almost neutral in relation to religion.

But as soon as it comes to chastity, here I would say that the unbelieving public consciousness almost does not know this value now. And the person is inspired with the idea that there are no restrictions here. If they do arise, they are connected not with a passionate sphere, but purely with a physiological one: so that there is no unwanted pregnancy, venereal diseases. There is such an expression - "". But it is not only the physical body that is at risk. You can make sure that a person does not get AIDS, there will be no unwanted pregnancies, but, nevertheless, the soul, the spirit will be destroyed. Only believers really talk about this in our time.

I would call the current situation catastrophic. Every young person, with rare exceptions, has these base desires, and it is very difficult to resist the external influences of the media. We practically become helpless.

How to be? I am consoled by Dostoevsky's thought put into the mouth of Dmitri Karamazov. He speaks vivid words about the fact that a person is wide, completely opposite desires coexist in one and the same person, for example, the desire for and worship before the Madonna. He is amazed: "Moreover, both are sincere." One part draws a person into the very abyss of sin, and he still has a desire for a pure life. This is what comforts.

We, Christians, can only oppose the corrupting external influence - to go towards the striving for purity. Not even the most important thing is to convince, as Lot convinced Sodom, that it is a sin to follow vicious inclinations.

Most people know this themselves, but they cannot help themselves, because it is a powerful force. a lot of people are reading now. He writes that the whole world history, the whole human life is determined by these instincts. Of course, we cannot agree with such a total influence of the sexual instinct. But we cannot but agree that sexual attraction really dictates and determines human behavior in this world in many ways. However, Christians add that the desire for purity is in man.

We say in the evening prayers: "The seed of aphids is in me." Yes, a certain infection lives in me and poisons me, and if I do not fight vice, it will develop in me. At the same time, we remember that the image of God lives in each of us. We know the words of Tertullian that every soul is by nature a Christian, that a person suffers and languishes in the depths of his soul when he follows his vicious passions, and that his soul strives for the light.

I think that when raising children, parents and teachers should try to feed this desire for purity, for light. This is where the emphasis should be. It is necessary to curse the darkness, but darkness can only be displaced by light. The more light we kindle in the soul of a child, the less darkness there will be.

Fasting in the family

Previously, when almost everyone fasted in Rus', not only the menu changed, but people were very careful with entertainment. Theaters were closed, there were no fair entertainments and so on. Those who were fasting tried to read spiritual literature. And not only in the evening they could read the Scriptures with the whole family, but they achieved that the whole life changed at this time, even in everyday life. In Shmelev we read that even the front furniture in the houses was hung up, that women did not wear jewelry, dressed more strictly than usual.

Now this is not so. What is described by Shmelev is an ideal. But it must be borne in mind that now there are very few families in which Orthodox traditions have already taken root. We live in an era when the vast majority of Orthodox are not those who absorbed the faith with their mother's milk, but those who discovered the faith for themselves as adults. Let the ideal that Shmelev describes remain. But at the same time, the measure of avoidance from joys, entertainment, etc., it seems to me, should be purely individual.

As for the observance of fasting by adults, there are general rules for fasting, and the Church invites each person to observe them to the extent that he is able. The question is not posed point-blank: strictly execute everything to the end, although, of course, it is better to do everything as it should be. But if it is not possible and impossible to comply with all this due to work or some kind of illness, simply due to weakness of the soul, do what you can, it is better than nothing.

The issue is more complex and serious. I am always saddened by the approach of some Orthodox parents who believe that children do not need to fast at all. Once during the time there was such an episode. We were sitting with one person drinking tea with lenten cookies, his schoolboy son ran in, took a sandwich with sausage and went. His father apparently caught my eye, although I did not intend to interfere and teach, but it became clear that this surprised me a little. And he says: "I believe that children do not need this, not the age, the growing body."

This situation is very typical, and such an opinion is often encountered. I strongly disagree with this. In my opinion, fasting is important and necessary for children more than adults.

After all, what is asceticism in general, in the Orthodox sense? This is a system of exercises aimed at ensuring that a person learns to subordinate the flesh to the spirit. The ability to manage one's desires is the dignity and beauty of a person. And it is not by chance that in the Holy Scriptures it is said about one man that he was a man of desires. And in our church hymns, troparia in honor of various saints, this expression is used.

What does "man of desires" mean? This is a man who knows how to control his desires. The tragedy of many people is that desires control them, and they do not control desires. And if we are raising children, then, naturally, the greatest thing we can give them in our upbringing is to teach them to control their desires. And one of the most important goals of fasting is the development of such a skill.

I know of such a case. A little girl was treated to a chocolate candy by a familiar aunt, the girl runs to her father and says: “Dad, they gave me a chocolate candy, you take it away, now it’s fasting, you can’t eat it, but on Easter you will give it to me.” And it is impossible not to be touched and not to admire! She could eat this candy and no one would see. And the child has already developed the ability to refrain.

By the way, once in a translation from Russian into English, I came across the word “abstinence”. It was translated into English as "self-control", that is, "self-control".

This is how sometimes reading in a foreign language helps to better understand the meaning of the words of your native speech. I immediately looked at the subject from the other side. That is, the emphasis is not on giving up something, but on the fact that a person controls himself, that a person controls himself.

This is the meaning of Orthodox abstinence. Not a chocolate candy is bad and not a piece of meat - there is nothing bad in them as such. All this is for the glory of God, but the bad thing is that a person cannot resist, that the desire to eat candy turns out to be stronger than the desire for inner strength and the ability to control oneself.

For children, as well as for adults, there cannot be a single recipe, uniform norms on how to fast.

Firstly, it is very important that the fast be voluntary, so that the child really understands that it is necessary, that his refusal is conscious, that this is a manifestation of his freedom. Some say: “I have such a weak-willed child, he believes in God, but fasting is very difficult for him. He wants to believe in God and go to church, but he doesn’t want to refuse.” What to do here? Force, demand?

I usually suggest trying to have a conversation with the child. Maybe nothing will work out, because there really are weak-willed and spoiled children. However, some steps need to be taken. For example, you can say to him: “Well, okay. Come on, you decide what you can refuse. And if you chose, then let's decide that it won't happen before that."

Let your child refuse not the entire list of food and entertainment, but choose one, two, three items, as long as it is what he loves. It will be the smallest refusal, but the experience of abstinence will begin. It is necessary that a person has some experience of overcoming himself, and, in the end, he will be able to get joy from this, because nothing pleases a person so much as victory over himself. And the experience of this victory, this joy should induce him another time to take up something more serious.

To love and not seek love

(Conclusion)

In our world there are various laws. I don’t mean legal laws, but the patterns by which all life is built. There are others. Every science is engaged in discovering these laws. Because such knowledge helps people to behave correctly and not to violate these laws. If I know that the earth attracts all objects from the fifth floor to itself and I want to go for a walk from the balcony, then it is clear that I will not do this, because I have a good idea of ​​the consequences of such an act. Only a completely insane person would think that this time the law will not work. It will always work, there will be no exceptions. All these natural laws are known.

But there is another kind of laws - spiritual ones. The Church knows them, and humanity did not discover them on its own, they were given to us by Divine Revelation. The one who created the earth, the material world, the spiritual, He also revealed these laws to us. and Sacred Tradition, among other things, is the knowledge of these laws. And our preaching is an attempt, an effort to bring the spiritual laws to the people.

The trouble is that the patterns of spiritual life are not as obvious as chemical, physical, mathematical laws. But they work exactly the same way.

The spiritual world is generally a mysterious world, and therefore, firstly, this word is not obvious, and secondly, not immediately. If I take a walk from the balcony from the fifth floor, then the law will work immediately. If I violate some spiritual law, it will not work immediately, and that is why a person may have the illusion that there is no such law.

In such a situation, a person can rely on only two things: on faith, on trust in God, Who says that it will be so, and on experience, probably. Indeed, with a careful look at the experience of mankind, at the experience of our loved ones, our acquaintances, at the experience of historical figures about whom it is written in books, one can see that spiritual laws always work.

For example, the Holy Fathers said about one of these laws that it is more blessed to give than to take. Here are the blessed, that is, speaking Russian, happy, although the words "happiness" and "bliss" are not entirely synonymous, but "" is more understandable to modern man. The one who gives is happier than the one who takes.

In a broader sense, giving means serving. After all, the Lord Himself said that the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve Himself (Matthew 20:28). He Himself washes the feet of the disciples, giving them an example of how to build their relationships with other people.

We say all the time that human nature is fallen. One of the manifestations of this fall is that a person is often selfish. And he is more inclined to be served, and not to be served.

The family is precisely the organism in which all its members serve each other. If I look at my family as something that gives me certain conveniences, advantages, comfort, then the harmony of human relations and unity will be violated. It is necessary to understand that in order to maintain unity in the family, I must give, not take.

I remember a case, partly even funny. When I was ordained a deacon, I had a wedding ring on my hand. Already at the altar, congratulating me on my ordination, he pointed to the ring and said that there is a tradition in the Russian Orthodox Church that clergy do not wear rings. I took it, of course. But for some reason I didn't think to take it off right away. I think after the service I'll take it off and put it away. And I forgot to do it.

The service is over, I go out in a cassock, happy - I have just been ordained. And as always happens in such cases, the Lord recalls what was said. The consecration took place in the Novodevichy Convent, which, after the service, becomes open to tourists as a museum. A foreign group is stopping not far from me. Suddenly the guide comes up to me and says: “Excuse me, please, foreign tourists saw a ring on your right hand, and they ask if you are a Catholic. Why do the Orthodox wear the ring on the right hand, while they, the Catholics, are supposed to wear the ring on the left?” Of course, I internally complained to myself that I didn’t think of removing the ring in time, but I already had to somehow get out, think of something.

And I got out, maybe not in the smartest way, but my answer satisfied them. “You know,” I say, “the right hand is the hand with which we give, and in marriage a person must give. The ring on the right hand reminds me of this.” Naturally, I invented it all right there and I thought that it was not a lie, because to some extent it is true. Though that doesn't seem to be the case. They were very pleased, admired: “What is the right answer!”

And maybe the answer was not very smart, because we also take it with our right hand. But at that moment it seemed to me that this was still not the worst idea, since it was essentially true. Of course, I immediately took off the ring, until someone else asked me some questions. And this slightly funny case reminds us of the most important thing, that in the family we must learn to give.

One person wrote a pitiful letter to a wonderful ascetic saying that they do not love him, and he answered him: “Do we really have such a commandment that we should be loved? We have a commandment that we love." I think that each of us should see our task in life this way: of course, I really want to be loved, but this is how it will turn out, I won’t be asked much for it at the judgment of God; but how I loved, this will be the true criterion of the value of my life. Our trouble is that we complain about the misunderstanding on the part of others, we seek consolation and we want love. But the Church, Christ tell us that everything should be the other way around. In one ancient prayer there are such wonderful words: “Lord, make me worthy to understand and not seek understanding, console and not seek consolation, love and not seek love.”

Published according to the publication: Priest Igor Gagarin. To love, not to seek love. Reflections on family and marriage. Klin, Christian Life, 2005.