My dear brothers and sisters, it is good to be with you again. I feel a little anxious seeing so many of you, but I know your love surrounds us all. When you know there are people who love you, that anxiety begins to fade. I am deeply grateful to your Metropolitan, Chrysostom, for his blessing and permission to give this talk. I thank the fathers of the Christian Union and its president. I think it was his persistence that brought me here. When someone invites me to speak, I usually decline at first. I wait until they have called two or three times, so I can tell they truly mean it. Inviting a familiar speaker has become a bit of a fashion.

But when you see that the person inviting you, and those behind the invitation, truly thirst for God and seek Him, you go gladly. You go to offer the little you have, and also to receive something yourself.

I receive something from being with you: from your struggles, your prayers, even your anxiety. As a priest, I must turn that anxiety into divine peace within myself and give it back to you. Yet I too am often anxious. Once I asked the children at school whether anxiety can be overcome. One child told me, “Anxiety does not go away. All we can do is manage it a little, fit it into our lives, and keep it somewhat under control. But getting rid of it is hard.” I do not know whether anyone here today, or anyone you know, has no anxiety at all. Such a person is hard to find. The Lord found no one in His own time who was free of anxiety. That is why He never said, “Be like this person or that one.” He said, “Look at the birds of the air. Look at the flowers.” And Saint Chrysostom says, “Think of it: He could not find a single person so calm, so free from anxiety, worry, and turmoil. He could point only to the birds of the air.” They were His example of what it means to live without anxiety. We live in a very difficult time. This crisis is breaking upon us, and they say its

tragic effects have not yet fully appeared. It fills us all with anxiety. People have begun to take their own lives, overwhelmed by fear about what will happen to them, their children, their money, their loans and expenses, the jobs they are losing, and their failing health. Psychological problems are appearing.

In confession, I ask many people, “Are you sleeping well?” “No, I cannot sleep.” Yesterday a woman told me, “I did not sleep all night.” I noticed dark circles under her eyes and asked her about it. She was not sleeping. “I think,” she said. “I think and think.” What is anxiety? It is worry and fear about something that is not yet a problem before us, but that we feel is coming.

It is fear and worry even when nothing is happening. Anxiety brings the feared thing before you and makes you feel as though it were already here. Say I am sitting peacefully in my living room, reading a book. The heat is on. I have eaten, so I am not hungry. I have a bed to sleep in. I am fine; nothing is troubling me. Then a thought comes into my mind: “Father, what will you do in a few years if your parents grow very old and you do not know how to care for them?” There I am, sitting quietly with my book,

with no lion bursting into my room to tear me apart and no danger before me. Yet as soon as I begin thinking about what the future may bring for my family, my stomach tightens, my chest tightens, and I cannot breathe properly. Anxiety.

My heart races. Right now my parents are doing very well. With God’s help, they are healthy and not yet very old. But that is precisely what anxiety does: you imagine problems and make them larger before they even arrive. Before the trouble happens to you, you suffer it in your soul. You fear the hardship before it comes. That is anxiety: fear of something that has no reality yet. That is why many Saints call it a deception. Anxiety has a great deal to do with logismoi, intrusive thoughts. Suppose I go to the dentist. Once I am in the chair, I can hardly bear the sound of the drills and equipment; it sends me into a panic. But that lasts half an hour.

Anxiety about the dentist can last for days beforehand. You keep thinking: What will it be like? How will I get there? What if the first anesthetic does not work, or the second? What if I need a root canal and feel it? You think, imagine, and frighten yourself. That is anxiety. If we recognize its deception, its lie, our souls can become much calmer. It matters greatly that we do not go through life alone. When you are alone, you are anxious. When loving people are beside you, your anxiety eases a little. If I thought I were about to speak to people who did not value, respect, or love me, I would be terribly anxious. But I know you love me, and you know I love you. That is why my anxiety

subsides. Someone once asked me, “Pantelis, do you not feel embarrassed speaking to so many people? Does it not get to you?” “Of course it does,” I said. There are relatives of mine I can hardly speak to, even if only two of them are there, because I know they may come down on me for something I say. But when I am speaking to people who love me, the anxiety goes away. A child raised with love at home has a better chance of happy adult years with as little anxiety as possible, because that child has known warmth and love. Love. Do you know when we carry a great deal of anxiety? When our childhood was not very happy, when we did not receive enough love from our parents. Perhaps we were given food and money. Perhaps

we were given houses and land, but not warmth. Perhaps we were never told, “Well done, my child. You matter. I love you. You are a precious soul. You are a person of worth, and God loves you.” Instead, there were only corrections, threats, and fear. When all that sinks into you, you go out into life anxious about everything. You go to work and feel anxious. You board a plane and feel anxious again. You want to marry and worry that you never will. You marry and worry that you will not have a child. You have a child and worry about how to raise it. Anxiety never stops; it finds many ways to show itself. We become anxious over the smallest things. Each of us has our own fears. Some people fear heights and cannot go up

into tall buildings. Others cannot bear enclosed spaces. I know people in Athens who cannot get on a bus. They say, “As soon as I step inside, anxiety takes hold of me. Something comes over me in an enclosed space, and I cannot feel at ease.” Others are anxious about their work or about speaking before a crowd. Anything can bring out that insecurity within us, that fear ruling our souls. But when you understand that you have strength within you, that you have worth, and that God and other people love you, you can handle your anxiety much better. You can say, “All right, it is not the end of the world.” The people who see me

and the people I approach about a job are human beings too. Then you see life differently. Your logismoi, those intrusive thoughts, become brighter, more hopeful and more optimistic. That matters greatly. Faith in God’s love and protection helps us enormously to ease and manage our anxiety. Do we truly believe in that? In recent years I have noticed that many of us in the Church do not feel a living trust in God deep in our souls. We say we believe in God. Yesterday, several people came to confession. I asked most of them the same question: “How is your life going? How do you feel?” About eighty percent answered:

“Father, it is awful.” Why, my child, does life feel so awful? Why does everything seem to tell you that your life is no good? Why does everything look bleak? This has taken hold even among us in the Church. God calls us to metanoia, repentance, and to some concern about our sins while we work to overcome our faults. Then we should make room for joy, hope, happiness, and our relationship with Him. Yet some people spend their whole lives in the Church, right into old age and even to their last breath, weighed down by anxiety, guilt, insecurity, and fear. They say they believe in God, yet the slightest thing makes them tremble.

You ask, “Do you not believe in God?” They answer, “Yes, I believe in God, but I cannot bear what is happening to my child. I believe in God, but I do not know what the future will bring.” Then what have you learned through all those years in the Church? A woman told me that her daughter had asked her, “Mum, after all these years of going to Church, what has changed? You were nervous before, and you are still nervous. You used to panic, and you still do. What are you doing in the Church?” Where is the sense that God does more than simply exist: that He loves and protects me, takes up my troubles, and resolves them in the way He knows best? Do we believe that here, in our hearts, and not merely here, in our heads? Has our soul been renewed? Going to a public gathering

to declare our faith is one step. But saying “I believe in God” does not mean we truly believe in Him. That faith must enter your heart. It must show in how you treat your children and your family. Others should see you face difficulties calmly, with composure and a clear head. That is what it means to be free of anxiety because you believe in God. And what does believing in God mean? It means trusting Him. God knows what will happen in my life, and He will bring about what is best. Of course, “best” does not mean that I will never feel pain, be hurt, or go through trials. I will go through trials. What is good is not always pleasant. I will suffer. We sometimes make the mistake of entering the Church thinking that all our problems will be solved.

Sometimes we hear, “Come to the Church and your life will change.” People think, “I will go to the Church and everything will be fine. Once I become a Christian, everything will go smoothly, and my anxiety will disappear.” But when you enter the Church, your struggles can increase. You see your true self and begin to wrestle with life. You are no longer living in the clouds; you see what is happening within you and around you. That is part of entering the Church. Because we expect everything to go well and are unprepared for trials, we are startled when they come. We ask, “Why does God let all this happen to me? Why does life make me so anxious?” God treats you as His child. That is why He allows you to pass through trials, hardships, and sorrows, as all the Saints of the Church did. You will pass through them too. Someone once spoke to me about his spiritual father: “I am so grateful to him.”

“He taught me something important: not to be surprised or anxious when problems come. Whenever I went to him worried about some difficulty, he brought me back down to earth. He would say, ‘Why are you surprised? What did you expect? This is life, my child. Life includes pain; accept that. Did you expect to come to confession and have all your pain disappear? Life is like this, full of ups and downs.’” Once you understand that and learn to enjoy life through both its good times and its difficulties, you become a grounded, happy human being. Then God builds His blessing and holiness within your soul. That is what it means to be a Christian, rather than living in the clouds. So when you are prepared by this kind of faith in God,

why be overcome by the problems you meet? We should be ready for anything life may bring. “I am close to God,” you might say. Good, but what does that mean? “My child went to look for a job and was turned away. Yet just the other day I made prosphora, the offering bread, went to the Church, went to confession, and attended our study groups.” What did you expect those things to mean? Do you attend the groups so that your problems will disappear? What about the millions of people in the world who suffer? You and I face trials just as they do. If we understand that, much of the anxiety behind the question “Why is God treating me this way?” will fall away. Because you are a human being, that is why. You too are His child. You will be tested by hardships. And they will surely work for your good. One day you will see that even what makes you anxious can work for your good. An elderly woman once told me:

“When I look back on my youth, the moments that did most to bring me closer to God were the hard ones. Now I give thanks to God. At the time, of course, I was in pain. I cried out, wept, and protested. But when I ask myself when I grew stronger, I remember the times when things were hard and I placed myself in God’s hands. Something was happening within me then. God was at work, shaping my character, though I could not see it at the time.” Some people understand this only in old age. They say, “So this is what life is about.” By the time you have learned your lesson, the hour gradually comes to leave this world. Then you understand why you lived. It is the same for all of us. Everything can work for our good: sorrow, poverty, illness, loneliness, having many children, and having none.

Holy Matrimony and the single life: all of these can turn out for our good. There is no reason to panic. It also matters greatly that we feel united with one another. When you feel that unity, you are less anxious. I see you prospering, and I know that your progress is a blessing to me too. Your happiness is my happiness, and I know you feel the same about me.

My progress brings you joy, so we need not be anxious about one another. Suppose an acquaintance’s child gets married. If you share in their joy, you will not be so anxious about your own children who have yet to marry. But if you think of them as strangers and ask, ‘Why them and not us?’ you set yourself apart, and anxiety takes hold. That is why Christ stressed this unity so strongly,

this love. Feel united with one another, so that each person supports the next through life’s troubles. Another person’s joy becomes your joy, and their pain becomes your pain. This takes panic and anguish out of our souls. Some people are terribly anxious about death.

‘Death makes me anxious.’ And how could it not? As the hymn says, ‘The mystery of death is most fearful.’ It truly is a fearful thing. A few days ago, on my birthday, someone asked me, ‘Were you born on this day?’ ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘How old are you now?’ When I stopped to think about it, someone else looked at me and said, ‘Your hair has gone a little gray since I last saw you.’

I said, ‘All right, everyone, did you arrange this together? “You’ve gone gray, you’ve grown older, you’ve...”’ When I was little, I kept wondering when I would grow up; I was anxious to grow up. Now I’m anxious because I am growing older. I think, ‘My God, soon I’ll be saying, “The years keep passing, the years keep passing.”’ And when you grow very old and know you do not have many decades ahead of you, you feel anxious. Once, when I went to the Holy Mountain, I asked an elder, ‘Father, what about death?’ ‘Look,’ he told me, ‘it’s simply...’

He told me, ‘I accept that I belong to the human family. Everyone dies, and I too will take my place in that line calmly, without struggling against this mystery I cannot solve. My child, only faith can help us face it. We will die. My grandmother died; my grandfather died. They too passed through this difficult

moment of our lives and went on to the next life. So we too will entrust ourselves to God and say, “Lord, like everyone else, I too will go when my time comes.”’ We can meet that hour with trust in God, provided we are ready as God wants us to be. There is no need to panic. Live your life rightly, and you will leave it rightly. Whoever lives today as God wants will also leave this life as God wants.

The anarchists once put the question well in graffiti on a wall. We sometimes ask, ‘Is there life after death?’ Their question helps us answer it: ‘Is there life before death?’ We are alive, all of us here right now. But are we really living? Can we call the way we sometimes live a life? Do not spend your days worrying about what comes after. Live today as God wants.

‘Give us this day our daily bread’—bread for today, here and now. We will see about tomorrow when it comes. If each day you live your life happily and with God’s blessing, as He wants you to live it, then the hour of death will come peacefully too. So, little by little, we face this anxiety as calmly as we can. As calmly as we can, because it is not easy. Thank you. It is also very important to understand that our logismoi, our troubling thoughts, need correcting if we are to be free of the deep insecurity they bring. Our thoughts can make us ill. Thoughts, worries, fears: if someone asks, ‘What are you afraid of? Show me,’ they are all in here. Thoughts, logismoi. Change them into what Saint Nicodemus calls thoughts filled with light.

That is also one way to understand the candle we light. As we light it, we can say within ourselves, ‘My Christ, as this candle gives light, fill my mind with thoughts filled with light. Help me to see what lies ahead in the light, not in darkness.’ Let us change our thoughts. Let us ask Christ to change our logismoi, our troubling thoughts. We so easily imagine the worst and become anxious.

A young person emailed me a chart, a colored circle showing what mothers think when their child does not answer the phone. By far the largest section was, ‘Something has happened to my child.’ Only a tiny sliver said, ‘The child did not hear the phone.’ Perhaps they simply did not hear it. Or perhaps they were busy.

Thank you. The chart showed how quickly we think, ‘Something has happened to my child.’ The child is late, so something must have happened. The hour has passed—call the police at once! And then the child comes home perfectly calm. Our minds turn so easily to danger, threats, disaster, and fear. And if both husband and wife think that way, heaven help them: each feeds the other’s worries. It is a difficult situation. Someone in the home needs to shake off those logismoi, those troubling thoughts, and bring hope, optimism, and a living faith, which we so often lack. We all imagine that Greece is heading for disaster.

But we can also imagine Greece held in God’s care and grace. Once I went to a home to celebrate Holy Unction. I rarely do that, partly because I have little time, and for other reasons as well. When you invite a priest, you need faith. Sometimes your anxiety about an illness is greater than your hope in God. What do you expect then? A man said to me, ‘Father, please celebrate Holy Unction. Perhaps something might happen.’ I said, ‘Nothing will happen.’ ‘How do you know? You haven’t even done it yet.’ ‘I haven’t,’ I told him, ‘but in your mind you have already decided it will fail. What did you just say? “Perhaps something might happen.” Do you believe a miracle can happen? Can you imagine, deep in your soul, that the person you love could get better?’

A young woman was about to sit her English proficiency exam for the third time. ‘Father, pray for me,’ she said. ‘I just can’t see myself passing. I can’t see it.’ ‘All right, then,’ I said, ‘I’ll pray that you don’t pass.’ ‘But Father, I want to pass! I just can’t see it happening.’ I told her, ‘Listen to the words you used: “I can’t see it.” That is the key. Learn to see what you hope for as something that can happen. See it already taking shape; otherwise, it will not happen.’ If you put more faith in the failure you fear, Christ’s words may confront you: ‘Let it be done according to your faith.’ Since you believe you will fail, then let yourself fail. We need to believe in the Lord’s power. Without that faith in our lives, anxiety overwhelms us.

I especially love the account of the lepers.

You remember how the Lord sent them to the priests to show themselves, though they were still covered with leprosy. He had not yet healed them. He told them, ‘Go and show yourselves to the priests.’ They carried the fear of illness and of being cast out. They lived outside the town because people would not accept them into the community. If I had been one of them, I would have said, ‘Lord, heal me first, and then I’ll show the priests that I am well. What can I show them while I still have leprosy?’ But He said, ‘Go.’ And what does the Gospel say next? ‘As they went...’ Come on, you good people of the Church, finish the verse! I used to love doing that too when I listened to a speaker. ‘They were cleansed.’ As they went on their way in faith, imagine what was happening

in their minds and souls. Could they not already sense the possibility of healing? They said, ‘We still have leprosy, but the Lord told us we would get well.’ Instead of looking only at their leprosy, they looked toward healing: ‘I do not see the leprosy; I see health, I see health.’ And as they trusted the Lord’s words, His grace worked together with their faith: ‘As they went, they were cleansed.’ That is what it means to believe and to let your logismoi, your troubling thoughts, become filled with light. It makes such a difference. This is how anxiety begins to leave you. See your life in the light of Christ. Do not wake up and answer every ‘How are you?’ with ‘Terrible. Another day like all the others. Let’s see how we get through it.’ You begin your day already in depression, first thing in the morning.

You drink your coffee with despair. How can the day go well? Here is the difference. A young woman in Cyprus had been married for years and had no child. I told her, ‘You will have a child. I believe God will give you one.’ She and her husband were dear people, very loving. One day she wrote to me: ‘Father, I believe I will have a child. I am anxious that I may not, but I have come to believe it. Sometimes I even feel as though I am already pregnant, as though my child is on the way.’ I thought, ‘My God, may it be so. Her faith is so strong. I believed a little, but she is living that hope.’ One year passed, then two.

She kept writing, and I grew embarrassed to answer because I had run out of words of comfort. At first I said, ‘Have patient endurance; God may be testing you.’ But after one year, then two, I no longer knew what to say, and I changed the subject. Then, a few months ago, she wrote: ‘Father, I can hardly believe it. I’m beside myself. I’m pregnant! I’m going to have another test at the doctor’s to be sure, but I’m pregnant.’ I was overjoyed.

The hope she lived with touched her whole soul, her body, and her state of mind. God saw that a miracle could happen in this person, in her body and soul. A miracle needs ground ready to receive it, and panic and anxiety do not prepare that ground. This is what it means to believe in God.

How could that young woman be anxious now, when she feels that God is real, that He enters her life, changes things, and makes everything new? That is the difference. Another young woman told me, “Father, I believe, and I’ve started knitting baby clothes. I’m not pregnant, but I’m making them anyway. And I’m making them blue. It will be a boy!” Wonderful! I don’t know what will happen, but hearing how she believed, I told her, “That is what it means to have faith.” Don’t be divided within yourself, wavering and unsettled, saying one thing and then taking it back. God knows we cannot fool Him. Do you believe it? If you do, with God’s help it will happen. Most of the time, we believe it won’t happen, and that is why it doesn’t. And let me tell you something else that may comfort you: of all the things I worried would happen to me in life

all the troubles I feared were coming, I would say 95 percent never came. They existed only in my thoughts. I feared one thing; it didn’t happen. I feared another; everything went well. They were only thoughts. When I was preparing for university, I worried all year. It was a madhouse of studying, anxiety, and pressure. I got into university, and my spiritual father said, “Now, my child, learn to trust God. He has shown you that He loves you. Remember this when you take the next step.” “Yes, Father, of course. Now I’ll always have faith.” Time passed. I started university, and then I worried about graduating. After that, I worried about finding a job, and then about what would come next. One fear after another, and none of them came true. Think about what frightens you right now.

We’ll go hungry. We’ll fall ill. We’ll be thrown out onto the streets. These things will not happen in the terrible way we imagine them. Our imaginations take them to extremes. People who really are hungry can be more hopeful than we are. They find the strength to struggle on. We often have everything we need, yet our thoughts drive us out of our minds. That is why I said we need Christ to enter our minds and change our thoughts. In 2000, a young woman was anxious that she would never marry, and she passed that anxiety on to me. Some people who come to their spiritual father have a gift for this: they cannot settle down unless they see him panic too. It isn’t enough to say, “My child, be calm.” “But Father, how can you tell me to be calm?” It’s as though you haven’t understood that they have a problem. Eventually they make you feel that what they are going through is truly dreadful. She became ill from the worry, and I nearly did too. By 2010

“I won’t get married; I won’t have…” In 2004, her life settled down. “See how worried you were?” I told her. “In the end, things worked out.” “Yes, Father, but now I don’t know whether I’ll have a child.” “Please, leave me alone. Do whatever you want. You’ve learned your lesson. The Lord has shown you that He exists and intervenes in your life. But you,” I told her, “seem to have made this into something within yourself… You cannot live without it.” You know, there is a little demon in us that makes it feel strange when we have been anxious and then are no longer anxious. We cannot live without a problem; we want something to worry about. It is like having neighbors we always quarrel with. They suddenly move away, and we look across the street for someone else to quarrel with. What, are we to have no trouble at all in life? Sometimes we have this urge to wrestle with something, to worry about something. That is torment.

What a shame. For some people, this tendency is inherited. It has to do with their parents or grandparents. Some people become anxious over the smallest thing. They might panic just because you are coming over for a simple cup of coffee. Others stay calm even if the world is burning around them. That is their temperament. Still, we can do something to get a little hold on our own condition. Let us not be frightened before anything bad has happened. It may never happen. And if it does, God will surely help us face it. You do have strength. Here is another problem: many Christians, because they are so kind, sensitive, and gentle, constantly feel incapable. They have confused humility

with helplessness. They say, “I am unworthy. I am incapable. I can’t do anything with my life.” That is a mistake. The Apostle Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” I can do all things. Is that an arrogant thing to say? No. It is true. I can do all things, though on my own I can do nothing. On my own, I am incapable and unworthy, a small and poor creature, mere dust. But with God’s help I can do many things. Many souls have grown up constantly believing, “I can’t manage in life. I can’t bear it. I can’t stand strong.” Why can’t you?

You think you can’t? We can. We have God’s grace. We have Holy Baptism. God has given us gifts and talents that will come to life when the hard hour comes. We need to tell ourselves that.

We forget it. Notice how, whenever the Lord spoke of His Passion, He spoke of something that truly brought anguish: the prospect of death. As a man, even the Lord felt troubled before death. Death did not belong to Him. He said, “My soul is deeply sorrowful.” He suffered; death was frightening. Yet He never spoke only of the anguish of death. He always spoke of the Resurrection that was to come. We should think that way too. God will bring some answer after my suffering. My life will hold more than problems. I will also have gifts, strength, and the ability to get through them. Hold these two truths together: I am weak and afraid

and with God’s help I can overcome. When we become anxious, we may feel unwell. Our breathing grows quick, we tremble, and our stomach turns. Think of young children going to school in the morning when they have not studied a lesson. They do not even want breakfast. Some feel so sick that they want nothing at all; they shake and can hardly catch their breath. The Philokalia says something beautiful about this. When fear and anxiety make your breathing uneven, take the opposite course: learn to pray with the name of Christ, and let your breathing grow calmer. When you are calm, you breathe calmly. When you are distressed

you breathe in gasps, pant, and tremble. So when you feel yourself becoming upset over a problem, sit down and take deep breaths while calling on the name of Christ. Breathe in and breathe out. Let the name of Christ become the very air your soul breathes. Try it, and see how it calms you. When you hear bad news, pray, and calm your breathing at the same time. As you breathe in, say the Jesus Prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.” Draw your attention away from the problem. The temptation will still say, “You owe money tomorrow. They’ll come after you and seize your home. Your rent is due.” No, no. Breathe slowly and deeply, and say the name of Christ. Do this at home.

You can also do it while driving, or when you lie down to sleep. Breathe deeply in and out with the name of Christ as you fall asleep. It does a great deal to ease anxiety. Try this peaceful breathing and see how much it helps. You may find it much easier to sleep with the name of Christ. Now, what have you understood? Did you expect this talk to take all our anxiety away today? No. After all, I’ll be giving it elsewhere too! These talks serve to remind us of something we need to remember deep within. The Philokalia says that ever since the human soul lost God in Paradise, one of its great problems has been forgetfulness. There is a Greek word for it: lethe.

Exactly. Forgetfulness. We forget. We have known and discussed all these things since childhood. We hear them again and again in our catechism classes, our groups, and our parishes. But what happens when temptation and trial come? We forget everything. I am saying these things to you now, but on my way back to Athens, if something happens on the road and frightens me, I may forget them all and panic. Why? Because I forget. So let us ask God to help us remember these truths. What truths? That Christ loves us very, very much. If we truly felt that we stand at the center of God’s love, it would change us. When we finish shortly, I would like to greet every one of you, though I may not be able to. It will not matter if each person understands that

whether the speaker greets me or not, the God of the universe loves me personally. That knowledge will bring great strength, joy, and peace to the soul. God loves me. Say it within yourself. When you wake in the morning, feel God’s love surrounding your soul. I am a beloved creature of God. Perhaps you quarreled with your husband the night before and are still not speaking to each other. God loves you all the same. God does not quarrel with you or take offense. He loves you every moment. Say within yourself, “God loves me. My Christ, thank You for loving me. I have worth. I am a person for whom You were crucified.” Strengthen your souls. Every one of us needs that strength.

We need a little lift, so that the wilted flower inside us can come alive again. Problems have worn us all down, and we all long for someone to say a kind word and ease our anxiety. Which spiritual fathers do we usually love most? The ones who can ease that anxiety. All spiritual fathers help us with our sins, but we say, “When I speak with that dear father, my soul grows peaceful. When I speak with him, I feel comforted.” We all want that. Let us seek it first from God, and also from the people of God. When a problem makes us anxious, let us look a little further ahead and say, “Be calm. Things are hard today, but this too will pass.” It will pass. Five years from now, what worries us today may be a funny memory.

Or perhaps it will be a bad dream that is over. Yes, you have no job today. But if I see you in five years, will you still have no job? You may well have one. Right now, though, the problem has grown so large in your mind and worn you down so badly that you say, “My whole life has fallen apart.” It has not. You will live. Look ahead for the help God will bring. God’s help is coming. Remember Christ’s promises: that He will be with us through all our troubles, that no trouble will be greater than we can bear, that He will fill our lives with wonders and give us strength to do the works He did, and even greater ones. And as far as we can, let us live in the present, in this day we have been given.

We need to set a limit on how far ahead our minds run, so that worry does not make us ill. How does the saying go? “Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” Today has enough worries. What will I do the day after tomorrow? What if they cut my pension again next month? All right, I can weep about it next month. Why weep now as well? Why add thirty days of tears? If you can solve the problem, solve it. But if you cannot, leave it until it comes. At least you will suffer once, instead of suffering continually. Live now, like little children, who live in the present whatever happens. They do not think far ahead, and so they are not filled with anxiety. If a father comes home and tells his children, “I’ve lost my job,” they do not grasp all it may mean. They think, “We’ve eaten, we’ve had a drink, we’re fine. Come and play!”

A child does not brood anxiously over the distant future. We are all right today. We will take care of tomorrow too, but without letting worry overwhelm us. Why let it go so far that we end up needing medicine from the doctor? Why do we keep giving psychiatrists so much work? They do valuable work, of course. But if we are in the Church, why do we not have the peace Christ brings? That is the question. Thank you.

We should not be anxious about the mistakes we might make in life, either. Some people are so afraid of making a mistake or failing that they do nothing at all. Fear stops them in their tracks: “What if I make a mistake? What if I go there and fail? What if I take that job and cannot do it well?” It is better to try something and struggle through than to do nothing. What does the Ladder say? Some who struggle fall in the midst of their struggle, yet their fall can be worth more than the victory of others who are proud and self-satisfied and simply sit there doing nothing. You are human. You will make your effort, and you will make some mistakes too. Do not be anxious; there is healing. I am not saying we should be

Careless in life and unconcerned about sin. Of course we must be careful, but without all this panic. “I did something wrong. I’m not the person I should be. I’m not a model Christian.” That is all right. You are trying. Be a little humbler; you do not have to be the perfect example. Some people strained so hard to become the perfect example that they achieved the opposite. Others were simpler and more aware of their limits. They said, “This is what I can do,” and they did it. They were of more help to their children and families. So the anxiety of perfectionism does us no good. I mean perfectionism, not perfection. We should strive for perfection, but perfectionism makes us ill. You are human; you will make mistakes. You cannot go through life without a crease. Someone once told me he had done the very thing he had condemned all his life.

I said, “Don’t you see why you did it? God allowed you to see that you, too, are human.” “I never imagined I would do such a thing.” “That is exactly why it happened,” I told him. We also need to get past our anxiety about what other people think. Do not worry so much about what they say about you. That, too, can be torment. What will they say? Especially in summer, when we are out among people more often, we pass a restaurant or café and see a crowd gathered. Then we think, “What will the younger people say about me? How do they see me? What impression have I made? Do they recognize me? Do they respect me? What will this family say, or that one?” Let it go. Worrying about other people’s opinions can make you ill. What does the Apostle Paul say about this?

If I were always trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ. I do not live for the approval of others. Why should I worry about what they say? They do not truly know me. They see only the outside; they cannot see what is within. So do not be anxious about what people will say about you. If they say something bad, make allowances for them. They spoke according to what they knew and understood. And if they say something good, that is not the whole truth either, because they do not know exactly who you are. Let us move beyond other people’s opinions and live for God. I hope you can see where all this leads: we need to be renewed within and become spiritual people. Anxiety does not disappear in a single moment if we have not changed inside. It fades as we take up the whole struggle of the spiritual life. Do a little of everything; it all helps.

Prayer helps you. Fasting helps you. Love, humility, and giving to those in need all help your soul grow calm, draw near to God, and find peace. Can we be close to God and still be anxious? Every moment we spend in anxiety shows that, at that moment, we are not resting in Him. You cannot feel Christ beside you and remain anxious. Here is some practical advice: read the Psalter. The Prophet David often felt insecure and afraid. He turned his anxiety into prayer and kept telling God about his pain: ‘Please, Lord, troubles surround me. I face temptations and dangers.’

‘Where are You? My enemies have set traps all around me. Do not forget me. Are You asleep? I cannot bear it. I cannot sleep. My bones are as dry as kindling; I am wasting away inside. Please help me.’ This is deeply comforting, because the Prophet David does not try to make himself look good. He shows what he truly feels, and we could say much the same in today’s words. Young people might say, ‘I am losing my mind. I cannot take any more. Everything ahead looks dark.’ That is how David speaks. So let us recognize how anxiety deceives us. In time, many of the things worrying us will no longer be there. One day we ourselves will no longer live on this earth. We are anxious about things that pass away.

If we draw near to our God, who dwells in peace and undisturbed stillness, then we too can be freed from anxiety. In its place we can receive the peace, trust, and calm that Christ brings. I hope you remember what we have said when the time comes. You may forget it now, but when you go home and something happens, ask your guardian angel to remind you. It does not work by saying, ‘Now, what was it we talked about?’ It has to rise from within you. May the Holy Spirit, who has dwelt in us since Baptism, bring these things to mind. When something happens to your child at school, when your child fails a class, when your daughter is still unmarried, or when a neighbor tries to provoke you just to see whether you will lose your temper, then say, ‘My God, give me light now. How should I respond? What should I say?’

‘Keep my heart from pounding out of control.’ That is what I mean. I pray that the Lord takes away your anxiety and mine, and helps us bear this life. Life is hard, but it is also blessed, because through it all He leads us closer to the Lord. Thank you so much for your love. I want to mention just one thing. I have the blessing of the fathers and the chairman to tell you about it. On the way from Patras to Athens, if you look across toward Galaxidi, you can see a little white spot at the top of a peninsula. I saw it on my way here. It is the second time I have seen it, and it still catches my eye. It is a church we are building, with rooms around it, dedicated to the Most Holy Theotokos (All-Holy), Our Lady of Galaxidi, Mistress of the Sea. There is also a chapel below dedicated to Saint Luke the Evangelist. To help build this church, we have published...

...seven broadcasts from Divine Passages in a book, with a CD included. The broadcasts are all written out, because some people asked to have them to read. We brought the book solely to help finish this church. I hear about the money, but I do not see any of it myself: the money is not mine. It is only for the church, for a marble fitting, a window, and so on. If anyone would like a copy, please take one. If you cannot, that is all right; please pray for us. The financial crisis has held back many things we hoped to do, as it has for everyone. But we are not anxious. God will provide. May we all be well. I wish you a blessed beginning to Great Lent, which is coming soon. May you have the joy of Christ in your soul, and may the prayers of the fathers and all the saints shelter you. It has been a joy to be with you.