Faith, Hope, and Love – Fr. Pimen Vlad, Pro Vita

Watch the first part of the conference delivered by Father Pimen Vlad in Iași, at the invitation of the “Pro Vita” Iași organization, which is under the Metropolis of Moldavia and Bukovina.

At the conference, Father Pimen offered an edifying word about the three greatest virtues—faith, hope, and love—virtues which encompass all others.

Enjoy!

…Treasury of Blessings, and Giver of Life, come and abide in us, and cleanse us from every impurity, and save our souls, O Good One. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and forever and unto the ages of ages. Amen. Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy. Most Reverend Father Counselor, bless!

Fr. Nicodim: Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers and of St. Paraskeva the Venerable of Iași, Lord Jesus Christ, our God, have mercy on us and save us! Amen.

Lucian Apopei: Welcome, good people – of course, my instinct is to say – “to a new edition of your beloved show,” which I believe you are also familiar with. Usually, for a show, I look in front of a camera and hope that behind it, or I sense that behind it, you’re there too. Now I’m happy to be able to see you especially since I’m as nervous as you are, having Fr. Pimen Vlad here with us.

I hope you all fit in; if not, you know how we have that Romanian saying, “Let’s find a little corner at least.” I believe each of us found a little corner, and I assure you that each of you fits in the heart of Fr. Pimen, who, I assure you, is overwhelmed by the love you have shown by coming here in such large numbers. I want to say that this special meeting, this wonderful gathering, takes place with the blessing of our good Metropolitan Father, whose word of blessing will be addressed very briefly here by Father Abbot Nicodim Petre from Bucium Monastery, to whom I will give the microphone for a minute. Dear father…

Fr. Abbot Nicodim Petre: Fr. Pimen, welcome to Iași, welcome to each of you, welcome to the people of Iași. I have seen many beautiful, familiar faces, and I realized that we, the people of Iași, are a big and beautiful family, sharing the same Christian values. We meet at church, we meet on the feast day of St. Parascheva the Venerable, and at events like this, occasioned now and then by guests with kind souls.

This evening, one of them will remind us that this life has a purpose and that from time to time we need to take breaks, to remember God and our soul. We also welcome those who come from other places; I have heard that there are some who have come from across the mountains, from Transylvania; faithful who wished to see Father Pimen Vlad, and everyone, including those from abroad, all are welcome in Iași, the capital of Moldavia, to spend a few moments, a few hours together in a thought of meditation. We also thank Pro Vita Iași for the initiative. Pro Vita occasioned this moment. Thank you very much!

Lucian Apopei: Thank you, Fr. Nicodim! Yes, I also feel indebted to thank those at Pro Vita, a warm-hearted team with many, many beautiful activities. Surely you have all heard of the “Family Festival,” of “Gift for Children,” the project through which houses are built for families with many children, and the scholarships for students and pupils. And I look in the room and know that many of you have contributed to this project. And I hope you won’t be upset, Fr. Pimen, for me to reveal that both you and the monks of the cell of the Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple have contributed with advice, but also materially, to this project.

We are also talking, of course, about the Saint Emilia Maternal Center. This is actually the latest project or the most recent project of Pro Vita. It is an extraordinary thought to host several mothers with children in a center, mothers who, due to the hardships of life, do not have the possibility to raise their child as every child deserves and neither the peace that every mother and every family deserves. Pro Vita came up with this idea of building this maternal center, where these mothers can be hosted and encouraged to manage their households as every family should. This center is under construction.

I myself have arrived at the Holy Mount Athos for the first time and for the second time also with the support of the Pro Vita department, and I am looking here at the warm-hearted Fr. Radu Brânză. I know that he is not the kind of person who necessarily wants to speak, to stand out; he is the type who stays in the background and thinks, designs things. But I will dare to give the floor for a minute to Father Radu.

Fr. Radu Brânză: Thank you! Why would the Pro Vita department, which is dedicated to mothers, families, and children, invite a monk from the Holy Mountain? What connection could there be between our department and the Holy Mountain? Two reasons have led us to attempt this evening for the soul – as this is what we wish it to be – an evening of peace, for the soul, in which everyone can rejoice and calm their soul. The first reason is the beautiful friendship that has been built by the will of the Good Lord and that of the Mother of God, between our department and Lacu Skete – the community of the Cell of the Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple.

This happened a few years ago when my dear colleagues told me – we were then starting the project with vocational scholarships for the warm-hearted and studious children from large families – they told me that they had received some money from some fathers in the Holy Mountain. And my eyes widened with joy, but also with surprise. Several stages followed, which Mr. Lucian also mentioned. From this point of view, the community at the cell of Fr. Pimen represents for us some soulful and reliable people when we want to build something.

The second reason why we desired this evening is because when a person’s soul is in joy and finds peace, sin flees. Because many things we encounter in the Pro Vita activity happen because we sometimes slip, we lose our direction, because we don’t know how to stay on course (or perhaps we are not helped or taught), such moments are times when we can recover if we have slipped, or we can watch out not to slip. Therefore, I believe that a spiritual evening with a beloved father of ours from the Holy Mountain is and can be, and I believe it will be, an exceptional work of Pro Vita. Thank you, father, for coming!

Lucian Apopei: Thank you, father Radu! So, we all gathered here to see him, to listen to Fr. Pimen. It is indeed a rare moment… when we retired a few minutes ago, father, being surrounded by all of you and overwhelmed, I can say, by your love, he, like me, also felt the need to retire a bit, and I found out what I had intuitively sensed, that this is the first such moment that Fr. Pimen Vlad is participating in. Father, I will dare to say something, based on what I have seen during the two journeys – pilgrimages – I made to Mount Athos, the way I see you.

You have listened to him here, on the screens, and in the shows we have produced, you will listen to him again tonight, but you should know that Fr. Pimen Vlad is a quiet man, Fr. Pimen Vlad is not talkative. I have gotten to know him as a reserved person, and it is very good that he is, which I wish for you as well. And I tend to believe that this is due to the fact that Fr. Pimen Vlad lets his soul speak more. We live in a world where indeed everyone talks; I was just looking at the images before the conference and I had a shock. I was looking at footage of myself. So, we live in a century where we look at screens, at footage of ourselves. I don’t encourage looking at screens at all, but in this way, we somehow manage to discover such people, and glory be to God that, even if for the first time – so we are privileged – we have the opportunity to have Fr. Pimen Vlad among us.

Fr. Pimen Vlad: May the Lord help us! It’s good to see you… again, as it should be said, or, as I have gotten you used to in certain recordings, I mean, most of those from recent times: “My dear ones, here we are again!” As the colleague next to me said, this is the first time I participate in something like this. I have always avoided it; I have been invited everywhere, even now, don’t think that he asked and I accepted. For about three months, [he said] “Come, father!”

“I’m not coming!”

“Come on, say yes! We’re organizing it next year or whenever you want, just say yes, so I can get the blessing from the Metropolitan!”

“Alright, if it’s in a year or two, I’ll say yes…”

And after that, since I said “Yes,” that was it, it was too late to [back out]. But maybe, as we have always known, actually not “maybe,” rather, surely the Mother of God arranges everything as she knows is beneficial. We, as people, always hesitate, but God is working. Because I’ve been in [Romania] for a while, I traveled a bit around, and that’s how everything was arranged. I realized, then, because I wanted to go back to Athos and then come back now, but having some health issues, I got stuck somewhere, as I have problems with my spine. I stayed for about three days, I couldn’t get up from the chair, and then I asked myself why the Mother of God had blocked me, that is, why she allowed this to happen. And I found reasons, because I was somewhere in Timișoara, there was OYM (ITO) there, as you know, the Orthodox Youth Meeting, and other quite beautiful things there, we can say, with the youth and not only. And then I realized that it wasn’t for nothing that the Mother of God kept me there. And so that is how she willed it, that the time was coming for me to be here.

As you have seen in the title that was given by the father, “A Spiritual Evening” – because the father asked me, “Father let’s give it a title, what we were going to talk about?” I replied that I’m not the kind of person you can be put into a strict framework about what we’re going to discuss because I cannot do something like that. I told him, “To be able to discuss freely, we should choose the title: On faith, hope and love.” And we all know that these three virtues encompass the entire Gospel and this means that we can talk about anything, because they fall under the three virtues. Now, since we’re on this [subject] and I have the New Testament here – but the writing is small and I have aged, so I took a photograph of the New Testament with my phone to make it easier for me to read – I want us to read the chapter that talks about this. 1 Corinthians 13, from the Holy Apostle Paul, says the following:

“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.

And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

I wanted to read from the Holy Scripture, since we are talking about these, as a testimony of the Holy Scripture. You see, “And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” That is why it is said that love never fails. We see faith: many people say they are atheists, that they do not believe, but there is no person who does not believe. Because if they find themselves in a hopeless situation – let’s say during an earthquake they end up underground, ten meters down and they are aware that there is no escape. No matter how much of an atheist they may be, the moment they see that their final moment is approaching and they have no human chance of being saved, that person will start to think, “Can no one really save me? Someone greater than men?” and then they begin to wonder, “Does someone like that exist?” And – just as we have different situations and miracles – they would start, “Lord, if You exist, think of me too because I am here! Help me, get me out of here because I have no chance!”

So, the one who was the greatest atheist begins to have his conscience stirred and starts to think that there is someone! Even if at first with doubt, they realize that they cannot live without [faith]. So, without faith, we cannot live. We need faith! And we see it even with the Savior, He says, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?”

“I believe, Lord!“

“According to your faith, let it be done to you!”

So we need faith in our lives. After that, hope, without hope… it’s the same. Cancer comes, or some illness, you go to the doctor and they say, “We’re sorry, there’s nothing more we can do,” but then hope in God intervenes, the doctors can no longer help, but God can, and one always goes with hope. The person goes, confesses, receives Communion, goes to Holy Unction, prays, runs to all the saints, and hopes that God can make them well, even though officially, everything from the doctors says it’s over, yet they still hope. So hope does not let a person die, regardless of the situation; it does not let a person get lost in any hardship of life. Thus, it constantly gives him that hope that something good will intervene in his life, that the problems he has will be resolved.

And love – why is it said that it never fails? It says that it’s the only virtue that goes with us into eternity, because it comes from God. For God is love and love never fails. But we often confuse love with selfishness. We ask of the other, “I love you, and because I love you, you must do this or that for me!” In fact, we set conditions. We have selfishness, but we call it love and impose conditions on the other. “Well, if I love you, why don’t you do this or that for me?” But love, as we have heard, besides not failing ever, does not seek its own. So, love doesn’t ask for anything for itself. The person who says they love does not ask for anything for themselves; they are not interested in their own person, they are interested in the person next to them, to offer them everything possible so that person can be well. This is what love means, that’s why Christ is called Love! He sacrificed Himself on the cross for us.

Therefore, never confuse selfishness with love. Love is above all! So, whenever you say that you love, do not demand, just offer. If not, don’t say that you love, because it’s false! “Oh, how I love you!” and immediately after two minutes he said something to you and you hit with whatever comes to hand. And where is that love we talked about earlier?

We constantly stumble, first of all, over selfishness. It says that our greatest enemy is selfishness. We say, “That one is my enemy, because he did that to me, the neighbor did that to me, the other…” No! The greatest enemy is the selfishness that fights us our whole lives and not only does it fight us, but it torments us and doesn’t let us enjoy what is beautiful around us, what is good, our loved ones. It doesn’t let us, because that selfishness is always in our way. And besides not letting us rejoice in our loved ones, it doesn’t let us get closer to God, as it says that, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” And what does this mean?

The moment our selfishness intervenes, which is a branch of pride, it comes between us and God. And then our prayer, as it is said, no longer reaches God, it is no longer heard by God because it is selfish. But when it says that He gives grace to the humble, when we humble ourselves, we set aside selfishness, in our prayer to God and in relation to other people, God gives us grace.

And again, the Holy Scripture tells us somewhere, “The fruit of the Spirit” – for we seek the fruit, as they say, in a man as in a tree; it may grow, it may be full of leaves, but if it has no fruit for one year, two, ten, you cut it down – that’s why it says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness…” and all the rest. So, the fruit of the Spirit, the purpose of our life is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, who enlightens us and guides us on what to do in life. And the fruits of the spirit are those that I mentioned. If we see that through the life we lead we have none of these fruits, it means that we are making a mistake somewhere.

Many say, “Father, but I confess, I go to church, I pray, I do everything I can, and look, I have no joy at all, I have dryness, sadness, despair.” It means that you are not doing these things properly, because all these come back with a reward, with an inner joy. When you do good, if you do it with all your heart, out of love, you can’t help but feel joy in return. Go to a poor, sick person and give him something with all your heart, and see how much joy you receive in return. But if you do not receive joy, it means that either you did not give with all your heart, or you see that person as miserable, perhaps a bit unkempt, and you throw it to them from a distance. No, it must be done out of love.

Anything done out of love has value. It may be the smallest thing, but it has value if it is given with all your heart. And I will return to a story that I have told before in recordings. There was once a hermit who lived in seclusion and he was weaving some things, baskets or something else he had. Once every few months he would go down to the town to sell them and buy himself rusk and whatever else he needed. One day he saw a man without legs at the edge of the road at the entrance to the market. Everyone threw something at him from a distance, the man being legless, of course, could not wash himself and because of that, he smelled, and everyone threw him something [without getting close]. The old man looked and felt very sorry for him and said, “What should I give him? This man without legs doesn’t need baskets.” He looked a little to the right, to the left, and after the people had left, he went and hugged him, but with all his heart. And he said, “Forgive me, brother, for I have nothing else to give you!” The legless man began to cry and said, “No one has ever given me anything like this before!” So that love, that hug filled with love, meant more than everything the others had given him.

Well, most of the time, that’s what those around us need. When they are suffering, they do not need words, but a warm embrace from the bottom of the heart. Because there is a saying, “What comes from the heart goes to the heart.” If you gave the other person a warm hug, know that it reaches exactly where it needs to and perhaps, at least for the moment, it calms the other person, it heals them from their suffering. That’s why everything you do, do it out of love, because otherwise, we live in vain on this earth. And you should know that life is short.

It may seem to us that we have years to live, but we see every day around us that people leave, they leave and leave… And we care too much about the things around us and forget the essential, that one day we will be called too. Tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, we don’t know! And then we will say, “Lord, you know, I didn’t have time.” And God will say, “But I gave you 20, 30, 50 years, 70, 80… how did you not have time, what did you wait for?” Because none of us knows when we leave. And then it’s good to think that it’s the last day, but not with despair.

Let’s think that in the coming night we must meet God. What answer do we give to God? Are we somewhat prepared? Alright, maybe not with everything, but at least in the family where you are, try before you go to bed to hug everyone, to tell them that you love them, to ask for forgiveness for what you upset them about, and go to sleep peacefully. See how peacefully you will sleep. And if God allows any of you to leave, your conscience is clear that you embraced them before that, that you have not been in an argument or anything. Because many times, over trivial matters, one sleeps on one side, and one on the other, without speaking to each other.

It makes no sense to lose everything for a few moments of selfishness, for a bit of foolish pride, which has no place in our lives. That’s why, let’s try to be kinder and have more love, and let us not end up hating each other for any trivial matter, not being able to rejoice. If God wouldn’t have wanted us to rejoice in everything He created around us (…)

We see so many flowers, so many trees, so many birds, so many beautiful things; in every country, you find something new. He made all this for man. If God had known that man should not rejoice, that he should just stand there with his head bowed, crying all day, then He would not have made all these things. When God created the world, He would have separated the land from the water, He would have placed man on that unformed and empty land as it was and would have said, “Man, here you shall stay and cry all day until I call you beyond!” But no, God made all these beautiful things and gave them to us to rejoice in them. But let us not forget that God made them and gave them to us so that through them we may see God and glorify Him, and thank God for all that He has given us. Because God, being God, He can one day take them away from us, allow something, I don’t know, a solar explosion or something, to burn all this greenery in the world… Let’s see then… And allow us to live in all that dryness, without water, without all these things that God has given us as a gift.

Many complain, “But what has God given me?” What has God given you? First of all, He allowed you to be here, because you could have not been. Or you could have even been killed by your mother in the womb, or something else. After that, everything around us, this air that we have for free from God, the oxygen that we breathe, abundantly, and we do not appreciate. We cut down the trees, the forests, our source of oxygen. I think that nobody, among all these, not even animals destroy their source of survival, as they say, and we do this instead of enjoying it more, protecting them, thanking God every day, and afterwards, for all the other beautiful things. Look at the sky how beautiful it is at night when it is full of stars.

Someone told me that a Romanian woman married a Chinese man and the Chinese man came to Romania and he would disappear from bed at midnight. After a few hours, she would go to look for him and would find him in the garden, in the grass, looking at the sky, lying on his back.

“What are you doing here?”

“What do you mean what am I doing? Can you sleep when there is so much beauty? Consider that in China I have never seen either the moon or the stars, from so much pollution. And now that I see so much beauty, I can’t sleep the night!”

He would spend 3 to 4 hours outside at night admiring the sky. We have all this beauty and we don’t know how to appreciate it and enjoy it. Sometimes months go by and you don’t even look up once to see the stars, to see the moon, to rejoice in them. I mean, these worldly cares overwhelm you so much that you no longer manage to lift your head and enjoy all the beautiful things that God has given us for free and everything else around us. We have come to be in such a rush that we no longer slow down a bit to rejoice in each other. With all this technology now, people meet and everyone is on their phones, they no longer rejoice. Put them aside!

When you meet each other, look into each other’s eyes, talk to one another, help each other, hug each other, rejoice, listen to each other’s burdens! You don’t realize how much it matters. But try a bit to set all that aside. And even at home, try to make it a habit to get together in the evening and talk, but turn off everything related to technology, otherwise it won’t allow you to do that. At least an hour every evening, put everything aside, and in a room where there are none of these things, sit in a living room and talk to each other, play something together!

It’s very advisable for children to learn how to play chess, to be able to play with one another, as it greatly helps with brain development and concentration; otherwise, if you let them get caught up in this technology, they lose interest in everything, all the time, neither in learning nor in rejoicing, in playing, because they become addicted, and then it’s very difficult. So, try to do this every day, to have at least a little time when you put everything aside and are together, to talk, to rejoice.

If you have children, take them outside, play with them, run, play different games, even football, if there are more of them, anything, just to get them out of this framework. Additionally, if possible, in the evening, let one of them read a prayer aloud while the others listen. We also had this habit when we were children at home, one would read aloud and the others would make prostrations. It was also a sport; they didn’t need to go to the gym. You do 50 prostrations, and you’ll see how your body shapes up beautifully, and everything you want, your belly reduces, everything gets in shape. One reads aloud the Paraklesis to the Theotokos or an evening prayer, and the others make prostrations, and it’s two in one; you’ve prayed and worked out too.

So, beautiful things can be done if you want, without spending a lot of money at the gym, going there to pull some cables in order to shape your figure. Even doctors say the great prostration is the best sport. Make a hundred great prostrations one after another, and you’ll see how good it is. You sweat and eliminate toxins too! Everything there is.

So, there are a lot of beautiful methods, which seem hard for us. And you know what happens? If you tell someone [to do that, they say], “Oh, but I can’t, it hurts,” and whatever else… and the next day you see them at the gym lifting all the weights, nothing hurts anymore. Or there’s the other side of things. If you tell them, “Hey, fast a little bit!” they say, “But I can’t, father, my stomach hurts!” But if the next day you tell them, “I see you’ve gained weight!” they say, “Oh my, can you tell?” “Yes!” and you’ll see how they go home and not eat until sunset, not for fasting, but because they feel like they’ve gained weight.

So, we can do a lot of things, that’s why there was a saying: “May God not give you according to what you can bear.” We think we can’t do anymore: “Oh, but I can’t!” We can do a lot with God’s help, if only we are willing. Because if we do not want to, then we can do nothing. But when we make the sign of the cross and say “Lord, help me! Mother of God, help me!”, you will see how many beautiful things we can do in our lives! That’s why, always with hope in God, in the Mother of God, and with the help of the Saints, we can do anything that is good and useful in this life!

To be continued

Online commemoration lists and donations

May the Lord help us!

Online Commemoration Lists and Donations

May the Lord help us!

If you have a bank card and wish to send commemoration lists and donations online using your card, and/or to support our philanthropic activity, including this site, please fill out the form below to make a small donation. The form is secure – we use Stripe for payment processing – a world leader in this field. We do not collect your personal data.

If you do not have a card, or do not wish to use it, visit the webpage for Online Donations and Commemoration Lists.

We will pray for your loved ones! (Please do not include inessential details like wishes, degree of kinship, introductions etc. JUST the name!)

Especially for recurring commemoration lists, we ask that you please keep them to under 20 names long. If you include a member of the family, we add “and for their families.”