A Visit to the Prodromița Monastery – Father Pimen Vlad

Watch Father Pimen Vlad visit the Prodromiţa Monastery in Romania where he answers various questions from the monastery’s pilgrims.

Enjoy!

– Christ is risen!

– Truly he is risen! How are you?

– Greetings!

– God help us! Greetings!

Thank you Father Abbot for welcoming us here at the Prodromites monastery in the Hârșova area.

– We are very happy to have you in our midst. Look, I got here for the first time.

– With love, whenever you have the opportunity we are waiting for you with love.

– When the Mother of God ordains and when she allows. That, well, we are where we always have the Mother of God with us in her garden. And then, well, when she ordains to get to other parts, having in mind that the monastery has the name of Prodromite here, after the icon from Prodromu, from there, from Athos. I’m happy that here it’s like an oasis that gathers a few “sheep” like this, around. As you can see, we have a few “sheep”.

– “Rams”.

– “Rams”

– The monastery it’s not yet known, even if it’s from 2012, people don’t really know about it.

– Goats, not?

– Now we leave that, part 2. That’s how they were called there. We say sheep, if they’re around the church, you know. Usually, if you went to a beach, somewhere else you had the opportunity to meet everything, but here around the Church, we call them sheep. The Sheep of the Lord.

– The monastery really is not well known, even if it’s since 2012, Not many know of the monastery.

– Okay, but there was old place here, something?

– The old place is just supposed to have been.

– Oh, therefore, as in many places, that is, there was something but it is not known, it is assumed.

– We believe that it was a metropolis and from here a bishop that went to the first Ecumenical Council.

– That’s in ancient history, so as an area, as they say. Well, you know what it’s like, man sanctifies the place. Any place can become holy there if there are also people who live after God and gather people after God there. And then the place is sanctified. So we see that all this Earth was made by God very well. That is, in a perfect order. He just made the man and said, “Take it, master it, enjoy it, work it, and so on.” In our mastery as humans to improve what God has given us. That is, to draw closer to God and then all that is nature, animals all, become closer to us; through us- that is, the connection with God. That he says, the moment man draws nearer to God, he takes from the smell of Adam. As the master, we see, when He put Adam in Heaven God, he said to him, “You are the master of all animals, all beings.” To everything that existed in Heaven. He gave him this dominion, it had a specific Adam smell that they all said “Our God!” and bowed down.

Now, since the fall, that’s been lost. Now that man is trying to draw near to God, to receive again from God’s Grace – we already see so many cases in the saints, the animals obeyed. We see at St. Seraphim of Sarov, even at Fr. Cleopas, that a bear came every day, he had two potatoes a day to eat, One gave him to the bear, one ate him. So a bond is formed with animals, but that’s up to us, how close we get to God.

And in this way we see these oases like this and other places in the country. This has always existed in the old days when it existed in many areas such fortified monasteries. It was the safe place of the people. If a war was coming, they were all going to the woods, to the monasteries, the families. And the men were going to battle. So always the Church, has always been with man, in all moments: both hard and easier and for joy. We see: at birth, he goes to baptism, also to church. At the wedding, also at the church. So there are certain moments in life. After that, at the funeral, also at the church. So even to Joy and sorrow, they all go through the Church. This is how God left it, the Mysteries of the Church, that through them our salvation would also come. That’s why they say, that without the Church, there’s no salvation. Because the Mysteries of the Church are missing.

No one can forgive your sins except as God has ordained: through the Apostles, bishops, priests, through the laying on of hands. You confess and your sins are lifted. A gift that no one else has. Not the angels, no one. So this was given to the priests. Besides the chrism priests in every parish, to exist so many monasteries! Don’t we see that? So the moment you confess, wholeheartedly, without straightening yourself up, do you feel like you’re floating when you get out of there? It is God’s Grace that erases everything. So those sins are blotted out, they don’t stay.

And here, I said this before, let me tell you this: at that time, 5 years ago, better yet, with what happened in the Colectiv club in Bucharest, many were shouting at that time – that it was an arranged interest and then – that in the end it was found out that there was intentional fire, the government of that time must fall. After this madness of the world now. Well, and a lot of people were manipulated into shouting after that “We want hospitals, we don’t want cathedrals!” That is, they turned them from there against the Church. What was the church’s business with that club? It was a club where the young people went to have fun, it had no business. Well, among all these, there was also a young woman. Who also cried out there, “Sir, what so many churches? Tear them down and let’s make hospitals!”

Well, she was a Medicine student, this young woman. After she finished medicine then, shortly after, she went to Germany for a bit of practice, to specialize better. At least a year, to earn a penny there. It was the beginning period. She had a boyfriend in the country, who kind of thought to the same extent, that the churches should be torn down and build hospitals, that this is the basis of society, and so on. As if the hospitals… Hospitals, if God would give there to be no need for Hospitals, as they say. Not that to make hospitals, for what? Are we looking for more sick people?

And she went to Germany. Normally, hard work and learning. She studied for a month, two, three, after about half a year she reached a state of fatigue. She couldn’t take it anymore. And a psychic fall. That she didn’t have something to help her. She tried to talk to certain doctors in hospitals. All there, as they were in Germany, each with his own law. And there was a very good doctor, he was praised from this field of psychiatry – psychiatrist, something. And she went to talk to him, working in the same hospital, she said, to get help a little bit, to recover. That she had fallen a lot, that is, she could not sleep at night, she was tired. That guy said, wait and look at the diary, “I’m sorry, in a month’s time I have room to talk.” So there they don’t discuss otherwise, you were working at the same hospital – appointment! “In a month’s time you come and we’re talking!” She was desperate.

She started calling all the hospitals: 2 months from now. The closest was a month or 2 months, 3 months. All the hospitals in that area where she was there was no psychiatrist to talk to. You realize, it was only then that I realized that in a country that civilized, what does it mean where orthodoxy is absent. They all needed a psychiatrist, months of appointment before, and you didn’t have any seats. So everyone, that was their salvation. And the girl tried.

Despondent she got out of work and that day, she couldn’t find nothing and went for a walk on the streets, like crazy, as they say, trying to recover a cure, to get over it. It was late in the evening, tired, disappointed and at one point she sees in a place, on a fence, aside wrote the Orthodox Church Romanian. She saw “Romanian” and thought she will find a Romanian here, to go in at least to exchange a word, she had no one to talk to. She walks in there, finds the door open, goes inside, the priest is packing some packages there.

– Hello/Good evening, as he said, she went in there.

– God help! Can I sit for a bit?

– Sure, it does not bother me! he was doing his job.

She stayed that way for a bit and felt the need to tell someone what hurt her!

– Can I say something?

– Yes. Of course!

She began the poor woman to open up, slightly slightly, to say all her trouble. The priest listened to her, gave her a piece of advice, while he was doing his work. And while he was talking to her, and he kept advising her, she began to feel like she was relieved. Somehow it was like a confession. What she hadn’t tasted in her life. She had nothing to do with the Church. By the time she arrived in Germany she had seen that a church was being torn down. She said, “Yes, sir! Here are healthy people who know what they are doing! They tear down churches and build hospitals, which is what everyone should do,” she said. Now she realized that no hospital helped her, she came here and the priest, easily, easily, advised her and helped her so that she recovered.

She felt so good, she began to take a cure of courage, of joy, after the advice he gave her and says:

– Father, can I come tomorrow? Or give me a phone number to keep in touch?

– I’m sorry, you can’t do it anymore.

– Why? “You see, I’m packing, I got an order

– I had rented this church from Catholics and tomorrow it’s being demolished. He told us to pack our bags and leave.

When she heard it:

-How to demolish the church???

After all the good it did me! That’s when she woke up when she felt that no one had helped her except that father at church, she got out of there and kept saying, “How can these guys tear down the church, which helps so many people!” She also realized what the Church meant. And of course, in her path, she easily returned to the country and drew near to God. She realized that in fact, here’s the salvation of God through the Church. By Confession. Otherwise, the hospitals get filled with the mentally ill, as she found in Germany. Not to find availability for a check, for a discussion. I mean, everybody needs that. Why? Because they don’t have a church, they don’t have confession. If you reach these things, you don’t need anything else. You confessed, you relieved yourself. It does not mean that you no longer have weights, the cross you carry, but it becomes much easier.

So we see a man, who does a thing out of love. Let’s say hoeing. You go because you love a woman there and you go and you help her hoe and she’s dear to you, you don’t feel it, but you’re already hoeing next to her, right? And another is paid to hoe and the man looks up and the day doesn’t go by. It’s paid by the day. Paid, but he is hoeing, and his hands hurt and everything. So that one is a mess – he’s forced because he has to earn a penny. You see, so both do the same work: one doesn’t feel the burden because he’s doing it out of love.

Well, that’s what we have to do in life. Whatever we do, let’s do it out of love! And that thing becomes easy. In the world, in marriage; no one marries that it will be as the Greeks have “meli gala”, that is, honey with milk, perfect. No! There’s going to be difficulties, things like that, but they’re facing them together. That’s what I’m saying: at marriage the two hands become one. If you put your hand to pick up a table, you cannot, immediately the other hand come and helps! To pick up something, the same. So always, it doesn’t contradict each other. The left does not push over the right: “Why did you do it?” – it jumps to help it. That’s what marriage means. Quickly the hands, side by side, help to move on. That’s what’s going on and that’s what has to be in marriage. And the same in everything.

We must be lenient with each other, help each other and not always feel that we are the good and the wronged and the others are bad. No! Always let’s see, let’s put ourselves in each other’s shoes. Like I was telling someone today. “What you don’t like to be done, don’t do to another!” Put yourself in the place of the other. Would you like them to behave like that? Would you like them to tell you so? You don’t like it! Don’t do it either! It’s not for nothing that the elders said that. That is, always putting yourself in the place of the other: you feel like mocking another, you see him on the street more bitterly. Think about being you in his shoes and mocked. Would you like it? No. Let’s see how you put the zipper on your mouth. And in everything: do you want to steal from the other – what if they stole from you?

So all these things we would should put them through a filter a little bit and we would be much more calculated and behave better with the people around us and we wouldn’t judge them so quickly. I take another sip of coffee.

-Yes.

– I worked, I deserve it!

– You were saying about the wild animals, I remembered that you, too, in Athos, do not feed the foxes?

– Okay, not only me. I mean, they’re all over there. The foxes come. Near the house they live, with the catkins. That we still have cats, they come, they get along. I’m really telling you a thing; I have some more special kittens. A cat made them with a wild cat. And they’re like that, with a lion’s mane, that they all marvel: “What breed is it?” “It’s the original race!” A cat from here that lives just in the forest, comes only a month in the spring, made kittens with a wild cat and came out as if they have a lion’s mane and they are not afraid of either jackals or foxes, they don’t leave: they have their territory! But they live in the forest, descend only to eat.

They know when the chef comes when the cat is in front of the kitchen, it means that the chef came to the kitchen. Then you see them, sometimes they contradict each other, I could see that the big one is absent, the boss, there was another one and they ate a piece of fish and the fox came and said, “Give it to me!” The cat, nothing! The fox stood, it kept spinning, it was patient for a while, and at one point it puffed up like this and pulled a paw at the cat and took its piece. It said, “Hold on…” The cat was that big, the fox was that big, you know! And eventually it said, “Well, do you make fun of me? You ate half, don’t you leave me something?” Something like that.

What to do, animals also live next to humans. We always have leftovers for them as well. Or we have the wild pigs–we take the leftovers to one place, and when the brother took them, he would tell me, while I was leaving them there, I could see through the edge of the forest that they were pulling out their heads and waiting for me to leave, to come and eat, wild boars. They had a herd after them, 6-7, and they went there. Or we have a family of crows. When the car leaves to carry the leftovers they fly up and chase it and if somehow they see that they are not getting any they start screaming that they see that the leftovers are taken somewhere else. They seek to see. Everyone comes to get their portion. The pigs and the eagles, the jackals, the crows also come, they all come to get their rights from there.

– There were two hermits and a family came who knew both of them and went to the first hermit and when he heard that he was coming he took out the best he had. And he puts them at the table and they all eat and he hears, “Look how well these monks live.” And the parent grieved, “I put my best and you criticize me?”. They say, “Father, we want to go to the other parent as well.” “Yes, do you want to go? Tell him not to wet the weeds anymore!”

– “Stop watering them because I have watered them!”

– So he went there, fasting, nothing, put them to prayer, dry bread – that much food. They said, “Boy, let’s get out of here because it’s not for us!” “But not only that,” said the old man to a disciple: let’s pray, that’s how the elders had a habit, they put themselves to prayer and after eating or something else. He said to his disciple, “Stretch out the prayer, then add the psalter.” And instead of an hour of prayer, they had 6 hours of prayer; they were desperate now. After 6 hours of prayer, it was done at night, they took out a bit of a dry bread with water and he says: “You know, we usually do 10 hours of prayer, but for you, we stopped at 6. We eat every 2 days, but because you have come, come on, look, I took out some dry bread with water. ” When they heard that, after eating the dry bread, he asked where the path was to go!

– Because the parent said not to water the weeds anymore.

–Yes, so they had their understanding, he told him “Let’s stop watering the weeds because I’ve watered them.”

– For these guys who say we live like this.

– Well yes, it’s the joy of seeing you again. The Mother of God ordains to offer plenty on the table. So, it doesn’t mean that if they’re on the table you have to eat them all. You’re enjoying them, you know.

At someone in Brasov: and after some discussion, Mother of God here, the Mother of God there and stops at some point and says:

– Father, wait a minute, that I talked to many priests and they all told me of God, of the Savior but I hear you only talking about the Mother of God. What’s the deal, why do you only speak of the Mother of God?

-First of all, I live in the Garden of the Mother of God. She’s my direct chieftess! Who should I talk about? She, she manages to pass on to convey my desires, my joys to God. Well it’s normal, it’s my Direct chieftess! So every day, as they say, I have contact with her: I talk to her, ask her for help, she helps me, she’s the Direct chieftess.

– In general, monks speak more of the Mother of God. They love her very much.

-They accused the monks of hating women, and things like that, but they do not realize that the monks are most in love with a woman: the Mother of God. I mean, I love her above all else.

– I until the Great Lent, I did not pray to the Mother of God, I watched you at the video, I began to cry, (…) she gave me a house that is called Santa Maria. Saint Mary, in Constanta there. That is, the Mother of God did some miracles with me, including here, that I got to the abbot father and we have some projects, maybe the Mother of God can help us solve our problems. And I want to tell you, that thanks to you, I began to pray to the Mother of God.

-Thanks to our Lady. It worked, put it in my mind to say. In fact what was it? All I spoke of the Mother of God was my wish. Let’s take it, sure you’ve all been in love, when you’re in love you always talk about that person you love. It’s how it is, that’s the way it is to me Mother of God. I try to love everyone, but I can’t get in love with everybody. Because I’m once in love. And then I talk all the time about that. I tried my love for the Mother of God to reach others. And we’ve always tried what value to us humans. That is, anything passes. The Mother of God has power to override the will of the Savior, because she is His mother and does not refuse her. And even if He decides something: “That’s it, I’m hitting them!” and the Mother of God intervenes.

Look, I’ll tell you one thing, that we were talking about Father Ephraim in America, in Arizona. At one point, he saw the Savior very angry with Greece, after he had approved these marriages, the civil partnership. And he was upset, “That’s it. Greece burns with fire!” And then the father began to pray to the Mother of God and appeared to the Mother of God and prayed to the Savior not to punish Greece. The Savior says, “No. I’m very upset and I can’t bear them anymore!” And somehow the Savior disappeared. Seeing the Mother of God that she did not listen to her, she took out her vestment and threw it over Greece. Like a cover. That she knew that the Savior will not go over her cover. That is, she somehow took Greece in her arms, under her cover. Because fr. Ephrem was praying for Greece. So the Mother of God has the power to persuade the Savior. So it’s our most powerful weapon that we have in relation to God.

That’s why, what the devils have done to most Christians, not Orthodox, that appeared, thousands of sects: they do not believe in the Mother of God and the Holy Cross, the most powerful weapons of Christians. Why all Christians wear the cross to their neck, have cross in church, when they do something, eat something, make a cross, God help – you make a cross. And what’s scientific, they took water full of bacteria, made a cross on it and saw that they all disappeared from it. So how much power the Cross has! And the Mother of God, her intercessions, so they are weapons wherever we go.

That’s why I say, cross at the neck, an icon of the Mother of God in your pocket, in the car, anywhere, you have the most powerful guard. When I go on the road with the car, this is what I do: (worships) “Mother of God, take control, if you leave me behind the wheel, I enter the first fence.” And I know that the Mother of God drives the car. I once drove from Suceava to Bucharest and I got scared! I had promised someone that I would arrive at an hour and it was impossible, I was dead tired. And I drove very slow, I almost didn’t see; so I just got a hand on the steering wheel and I was just changing gears. We got there in those hours. I said I never do this again, I know that the Mother of God held me in her arms, but I went continuously in overtaking.

From Suceava to Bucharest, I have continuously overtaken. Without anyone stopping me, I was just changing gears and I ended up in that impossible time where I had to meet. I’ve got crazy, if I told him this time, I have to be, it doesn’t matter. And then I arrived, but I said I won’t do this anymore because I realized that the Mother of God held me in her arms.

Sometimes we take advantage of the goodness of the Mother of God. I often ended up asking her for things that seemed impossible, that weren’t in place. And I could see that she was giving them to me like that! Oh, Mother of God you gave me that too? I didn’t say it that seriously. But just to show us her kindness. So we don’t realize who the Mother of God is, how much love she has, so she’s permanent, like that mother, attentive, permanent:

“-Yes. What is it my child, what do you need?”

“Here’s this.”

-Take that too!

– I want a piece…

“Take the whole tray, it’s ok!”

So Mother of God that’s for us. So we have the most beautiful mother, the best, the strongest! And then why should we be afraid? That many say:

-Father, I’m afraid …

-Why?

– Well, if the virus comes and you see them with three rows of masks…

– Folks you have gone crazy. We are all in debt with one death. If we leave ourselves in the care of the Mother of God nothing can affect us. Or if the time comes to die, we die because the time has come. What do you think if you put yourself in, you arm yourself in the glass cube, that’s it, you’re going to live for decades, you’re going to become I don’t know what? No! So our faith is too weak. If we really have faith, it all becomes easy, you know how? We fly!

This is how I look at life as an adventure: and every day I say: “Mother of God today what surprise do you make me? ” When I go on the road, I drive alone and I go, I go everywhere, and I always say, “Mother of God, today let’s see, I never make plans. Yes, I’m going to get there, if the Mother of God ordains on the way to get there or I deviate somewhere else.”

That look, last year, I was coming from Oradea, that’s what I said before. From Oradea to reach Suceava. And I set the GPS. It would usually take me on the big road and you’d put me on the left and take me through the Ukrainian border, through the woods I was the only car, that’s how I went. I say: “The Mother of God knows why!” And I went like this, in one place there was a village of gypsies, I stopped to move the away that they were in the middle of the road, I passed on and took me to Beclea, further from Bistrita, somewhere there, it’s a small town. Well, it was three in the afternoon, I hadn’t eaten anything that day and I see warm pretzels there on the road. Let’s stop. It was a parking space right next to that. I stop there and it was 3 meters up there: I take off my sunglasses, because it was sunny, summer, warm, and I go and get two pretzels. At that time, a woman was looking at a bicycle, paying attention to the bike there. The moment I returned with the pretzels she lifted her head, I was leaving for the car and when she once cried:

– I can’t believe it! Father Pimen! She left the bike, I in the meantime left the pretzels in the car, she came, took me in his arms and was crying in roar. Well, meanwhile, there were about 3 gypsies there, they came quickly, that if we are dressed in black clothes, they have an attraction like magnets – to ask for something. And they got bored, that she kept me in her arms for about 5 minutes and she was crying continuously. And one of the gypsies:

“Oh, father, but what else does this woman love you!”

I’m done with it, I gave him about 5 books – I always have the trunk full of books. I gave her about 5 books written by me, I exchanged 2 words, the woman worked, she had come to the country a bit, she was in Spain.

Well, time passes, this was last year in the summer. I’m coming to Athos, this spring a man came. Say:

– Father, I’m the husband of that lady you met there. We work in Spain. Poor woman, do you know how many years she was praying to God and the Mother of God to meet you? She would watch all the interviews and say, “Mother of God, somehow make me meet him!”

And she was saying to him, “Yes. You’re going to go to Athos, you’re going to meet him, but I’m not going to him. And only come home once in a day and I met him before you! ” After that he had arrived and he told me so. And I said, “Here’s how the Mother of God works!” He took me down a road he never took me to. And it wasn’t the first time that I was doing the road and putting on the GPS. And it took me, it diverted me completely on other roads, because I had to be there at that time for that lady. How much she cried out to the Mother of God. I mean, things that seem to have happened. Never! There’s nothing accidental in our lives. If you meet a man, you meet him for a purpose. God knows. To say, “Oh, I met this one.” No. Maybe you need help or that guy needs that meeting, a word, something, a look, that goes beyond something. That’s why we don’t have to pass by the other indifferent, because nothing is indifferent! They all have an ordinance. Come on, that’s it, we move on! Thank you for all the love and all the patience!

– Bless us, father!

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