Saint Paisios – Signs of the Times

Dear brothers and sisters, Christ is in our midst.

War is raging all over the world and the Fathers are urging us to fall on our knees and pray. Not stop our obediences, but pray!!! I am not ignoring this appalling tragedy unfolding day after day before our own eyes, but in this specific blogpost and in a couple more to follow, I would like to address one rather sensitive matter unfolding in Greece these days, and that is the Holy Synod’s of the Church of Greece decision, on June 12 and 13, 2025, under the presidency of His Beatitude Archbishop Ieronymos of Athens and All Greece, to endorse the new “personal number” system introduced by Presidential Decree 40/2025. This system aims to replace existing identification numbers, such as the ID card number, tax number (AFM), and social security number (AMKA), with a single unified number to streamline public sector registry integration. In its official statement, the Holy Synod clarified that the personal number does not raise theological concerns or infringe on individual freedoms, including personal data rights.  This approval and endorsement is one problem, but the Synod’s insistence “that the personal number does not raise theological concerns” is even more problematic since it seems to contradict most recent Saints’ opinions on this matter.

For this reason, I would like to present to you in a series 3 documents I have from + Gerondas Gregorios, my spiritual father of blessed memory, and St. Paisios, starting with the “Signs of the Times”. The following text of Saint Paisios is written in the Saint’s own hand, in the year 1987, and it was the only time he had given the order for it to be distributed in photocopies (with his handwriting and spelling errors), because as he himself said, he knew that they would try to deny that He had written it and to distort His opinion. What follows is the translation of St. Paisios’ text:

After the demonic storm, the Divine sunshine will come.

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Behind the secular spirit of today’s “freedom” of disrespect for the Church of Christ, for elders, parents and teachers, who fear God, lies spiritual slavery, anxiety, and anarchy, which lead the world to a dead end, to mental and physical destruction.

So, behind the perfect “service card” computer security system, lies the global dictatorship, the slavery of the antichrist. “Rev. John ch. 13’ 16 “to give them a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that they may not buy or sell except one who has the mark, the name of the beast or the number of his name. Here is wisdom; let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast; for it is the number of a man, and his number is sixty-six”. = 666.

Saint Andrew of Caesarea concludes the following: “About the impure name of

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Antichrist. And the accuracy of the vote, as well as the rest of what is written about him, will be revealed by time and experience will bring wisdom;…… but divine grace did not deign to write the name of Lymeon in a divine book; as in a gymnasium, there are many things to be found…. ” Saint Andrew of Caesarea, explanation of the Apocalypse of John, pp. 341-42, ch. 11. –

The strange thing is, many spiritual people, besides giving their own interpretations, are also afraid of the worldly fear of being enveloped, while they should be spiritually concerned, and help Christians with good concern, and stimulate them in faith, to feel divine comfort.

I wonder! Don’t all these events concern them? Why don’t they put at least a question mark on the interpretations of their minds? And if they rely on the antichrist for the sealing, how do they lead other souls to perdition? This means; “…deceive, if possible, even the elect.” Mark. 13’ ”.

Those who interpret them with their minds will be deceived.

And while the signs are clearly visible; “the beast” in Brussels with 666 has almost sucked all the states into the computer. What do the card, the identity card, “the introduction of the sealing” reveal? Unfortunately, we only watch the radio to see what weather we will have.

What will Christ tell us? “Hypocrites, you know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot understand the signs of the times?” Matt. chap. 2, 5!

So after the card, and the identity card, “the envelope” to proceed cunningly with the sealing, they will continue to say on television that someone took his card and withdrew his money from the bank.

On the other hand, they will advertise “the perfect system”; the sealing on the hand or forehead with laser beams, which will not be externally discernible, with 666 the name of the antichrist.

Unfortunately, again “certain gnostics” will swaddle their spiritual children like babies, supposedly so as not to worry; “this does not bother, it is nothing, it is enough that you believe inwardly!”. And while we see the apostate Peter who externally denied Christ, and it was denial, they deny the Holy sealing of Christ that was given to them in Holy Baptism; “Seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit” by accepting the seal of the antichrist, they also say that they have Christ within them!!

Unfortunately, such logic was also held by certain “gnostics” in the years of the Holy Martyrs, who were trying to convert the prospective martyrs, as Basil the Great mentions in his speech to the Martyr Gordius: “… many were foolish in trying to convince the Martyr to deny only with words, and to hold the faith with the soul, the inner disposition, because God does not pay attention to the tongue but to the disposition. However, the Martyr Gordius was inflexible and responded: “He does not tolerate any tongue created apart from Christ to speak against the Creator… do not be deceived. God is not mocked. “From our own mouths he judges us, from our words he justifies us and from our words he condemns us”.

Also, during the reign of Decius, he demanded by decree that the pagans confess their religion, and all those Christians who declared themselves Christians and sacrificed to idols received a certificate and were spared martyrdom. Not only were these deniers of Christ, but also those who gave money to the pagans in the commission and received the certificate without refusing, the so-called “libellophores” and these our Church considered apostates – fallen.

And while we have so many examples, such as the miracle of Saint Theodore, which is celebrated every year on Saturday of the First Week of Lent: “Julian the transgressor, knowing that the Christians They are rather purified by fasting in the first week of Holy Lent, which we also call Clean Week for this reason, and it was then decided to defile them. Therefore, he secretly ordered that during those days, odors contaminated with the blood of idolatrous sacrifices be placed in the market. But the Martyr Theodore, in a dream, divinely revealed to the then Archbishop of Constantinople, Eudooxion

and having made the matter known, he ordered him to summon the faithful immediately on Monday morning and prevent them from using those odors, and to make up for the lack of necessary food from what was at hand with kolibons”…… In this way the purpose of the transgressor was thwarted, and the pious People, preserved undefiled……” – Horologion the Great, p. 446…-

To abstain from idolatrous sacrifices is a rule of the Holy Apostles. Acts. Apos. chap. 6e’…… “And the apostles and the elders were gathered together…… to abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication…”.

Despite all that I have mentioned, one unfortunately hears a mass of nonsense from certain “Gnostics” of today, one saying; “I will accept the identity with 666, I will also put a Cross”, and the other saying; “I will accept the seal on the head with 666 and I will also make a Cross on the head…..” and a mass of similar nonsense, who think that they will be sanctified in this way while these are errors.

Only those that accept sanctification, only those are sanctified. Like; Water,

accept sanctification, and it becomes Sanctification. Urine does not accept sanctification.

Stone, by a miracle, becomes bread. Impurity, does not accept sanctification.

Therefore, the devil, the antichrist, when he is in our identity or on our hand, or on our head, with his symbol, is not sanctified by putting on a Cross.

We have the power of the honorable Cross of the Holy Symbol, the divine grace of Christ, only when we are content with the Holy Seal of Baptism, when we renounce Satan, and we are united to Christ, and we accept the Holy Seal; “Seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit”. –

May Christ give us good enlightenment. Amen. –

Holy Mountain, Koutloumousiou cell “Panagouda”

Saturday of the First Lent 1987.

With much pain and love of Christ,

Monk Paisios”.

Return of the Catacomb Church

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Christian Gatherings in the Early Church

“Doesn’t it impress you that the faithful met in the catacombs and secret places, using secret methods so as not to be detected by their oppressors? Yet they insisted on meeting every night. They endangered their very existence and risked confiscation of their property. Did you ever ask yourself why they did it when any one of them could have asked, ‘Why must I leave my house and expose myself to danger by going out to a secret Church gathering?’ Couldn’t each person have stayed home and worshipped God by himself? In fact, the faithful acted this way because it was in this manner that the presence of the Church was established in history. They gathered because they needed to reinforce the presence of the Church among them, regardless if the pagans or non-believers were persecuting them. Rather, they gathered as the faithful who have the presence of the Church and consequently, the Body of Christ. The Church was and is proof of Pentecost. For us, who are gathered here and for everyone gathered in every Church, we gather, not only for the sermon but also for the worship… Take courage brothers and sisters, Christ is in our midst!”

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matushka constantina's avatarlessons from a monastery

early-chruchBelow is an excerpt from Revelation: The Seven Trumpets & The Antichrist (Vol III), a commentary on the book of the Revelation by Archimandrite Athanasios Mitilinaios of Larisa (pp.79-80). The passage the elder is commenting on is Revelation 10:1-4

I saw still another mighty angel coming down from heaven, clothed with a cloud. And a rainbow was on his head, his face was like the sun, and his feet like pillars of fire. He had a little book open in his hand. And he set his right foot on the sea and his left foot on the land, and cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roars. When he cried out, seven thunders uttered their voices. Now when the seven thunders uttered their voices, I was about to write; but I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, “Seal up the things which the seven thunders uttered, and do…

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Twenty-four hours with St. Amphilochios (II)

1.Cultivate the Jesus Prayer and a time will come when your heart will leap with joy, just as it does when you are about to see a person who you love very much.

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2.Do not neglect evening prayer. Pray with eagerness like those who are going to a feast. They are awake and feel joy alone. Thus, since you are going to speak with your Bridegroom, do not listen when the Tempter tells you various things in order to hinder you, because you know there is someone who cares for you.

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3.-“Elder, how must we picture Christ?”

-“We must always bring to Christ to mind with love. We could be holding the photograph of someone in our hands, but since we do not know them, we do not love him, we are not moved. Whereas, when we pick up a photograph of our mother, our soul immediately leaps and cries out with love.

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4.A person can be raised up above the earth by two wings, one is simplicity and the other is purity of heart. You must be simple in your actions and pure in your thoughts and feelings. With a pure heart you’ll seek God and with simplicity you’ll find Him and be glad. A pure heart passes through Heavens gate with ease.

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5.Self-denial must be cultivated with discernment, otherwise we reach the point of suicide.

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6.We are on the high seas of life, sometimes there are storms and at other times calm. God’s grace does not leave us. Else, we would have sunk, if he had not held us up. 

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7.The saints always look to the other life. It is the grace of the remembrance of death.

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8.God guards us from temptation. He does not allow us to be tempted beyond our strength. He allows everything for our good.

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9.When spirituality increases, even sleep will have been fought off.

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10.Prayer is grace. God gives it when zeal and humility exist.

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11.Fight the Hater of Good, who envies you, bravely suffer whatever befalls you with fortitude, patience and faith.

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12.Do not allow your soul’s enemy to wage war against you. He appears in sheep’s clothing, supposedly wanting your soul’s benefit.

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13.Trust in the Lord always and he will nourish you in time of hunger. … Spiritual bonds become unbreakable when they come across a child-like spirit, innocence and sanctity.

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14.With a good word for your neighbour, supporting him, you buy paradise.

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15.Repentance must occur, not from fear of punishment but because we have sinned before God. Sweeten your thoughts with words of consolation and hope. Warm your words with the warmth of your love towards your Bridegroom and remember His Passion, which he underwent for you, so that you would remain firm, devoted and humble. Give your whole self completely over to the protecting veil of the Panagia.

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16.Love giving hospitality, my child, for it opens the gates of Paradise. In this you also offer hospitality to angels. “Entertain strangers so that you won’t be a stranger to God.”

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17.The saints submitted to whatever God sent them, with childlike simplicity, “That’s the way You want it. Let Your will be done.”

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18.Hospitality… the greatest of virtues. It draws the grace of the Holy Spirit towards us. In every stranger’s face, my child, I see Christ himself.

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Chapel of Unknown martyrs by St. Amphilochios

19.Sorrow is pleasing to God, in as much as it doesn’t take away our courage to fight.

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20.It is necessary and beneficial for a general self-examination to take place from time to time, remembering all former sins. … Our deeds, dear sister, will not save us; God’s infinite mercy will.

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21.Leave all your concerns to the hands of God. Ask for whatever you want, like a child asking from its father. … Prayer is a gift from God. Always ask with hope.

 

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The nunnery of  Evangelismos “The Annunciation to the Mother of the Beloved One” was built in 1613 from a Cretan monk of the Monastery, named Nikiforos. It is southwest of Chora. It consists of the temple of the Evangelistria (Our Lady of the Annunciation) of the side chapel of St. Luke and from a three-floored fortified tower with the side chapel of St. Antonio. The foundation of the monastery is dated from 1936, from the monk Amphilochios Makris, a great spiritual figure. He worked hard for the foundation and the development of the nunnery. The icons in the church date back to the 15th, 16th and 17th century. The sisterhood is home to over 40 nuns who apart from praying, occupy themselves with social welfare, gardening, beekeeping and Byzantine embroidery called the”spitha” (spark). The same stitch was used to make embroidery for aristocratic Byzantine families from the time of Hosios Cristodoulos.

Spiritual Counsels and Sayings Translated by Marina Robb.

All material is copywrited to Evangelismos Monastery, Patmos.

Source: CyberDesert

Remain Open To The Mystery That You Are

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Don’t waste your time and energy hunting for a predetermined idea of who you are; don’t waste your life hunting for an ideal, an image or a name, because it really is irrelevant what you call yourself. You are not the name you call yourself by; you are the content of your being. Before Christ, Who sees the depths of our being, the only thing that matters is your content, not the name we sometimes fight our whole lives for.

Do not hunt for an image, but for a content.

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Do not assume you know who you are; do not assume you know who you are meant to become. Do not pre-determine where you want to get to by the end of your life, because that is a sure recipe for disaster: you will be constantly in doubt, permanently wondering, always questioning, painfully looking back and reimagining other paths you could have taken.

Remain in the here-and-now. Love God and love people. Stay away from evil and do good, and always remain open to the mystery that you are. Accept yourself as an unfinished being, and keep yourself open and ready to receive the revelation of your true name – that name which corresponds to your true content.

The person you were created to become is unknown to you. Your own self is unknown to you. You are a mystery to yourself, and you must remain open to accept your self before anything and anyone else. Do not enslave yourself to a particular image or expectation, because that will only corrupt and deform you. Remain open and tolerant and ready to embrace your own self. Remain open for a Revelation, because that is how your true self will be given to you.

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Nikola Saric’s ‘Windows’

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Holy Martyrs of Libya (21 christians killed by IS terrorists)

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Behold the man! The vision and the glory of God.
(Adam from the cycle “Testimonies”, detail)

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“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”
Revelation 22:13

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Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (Lk 16:19-31), from the cycle “Earthly stories with a heavenly meaning: Parables of Christ”, 2014

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Jonah

“A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Mt 12:39-40)”

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Jn 12:1-11; Lk 7:36-50

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St Demetrios

Akathist to St. Démétrios de Thessalonique, Kontakion10 / Oikos 10

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Akathist to St. Démétrios de Thessalonique– Kontakion 6/ Ikos 6, Nikola Saric, 130×160 cm, acrylic on canvas, 2009

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The Parable of the Great Banquet (Lk 14:15-24), from the cycle “Earthly stories with a heavenly meaning: Parables of Christ”, 2014

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Parable of the Lost Sheep (Lk 15:3-7), from the cycle “Earthly stories with a heavenly meaning: Parables of Christ”, 2014

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Joy and happiness arose in the house of Jacob. Joseph is alive!

[Nikola Saric’s Paintings and own Captions]

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  • Saric’s recent publication “Earthy stories with a heavenly meaning: Parables of Christ”

Windows Into Heaven

Nikola Sarić (born 1985) studied at the TehnoArt School, the Faculty of Applied Arts (art restoration and conservation) and the Academy of Serbian Orthodox Church (fresco painting), all in Belgrade. He focuses on painting, bespoke wall design projects and producing a range of hand-made products under the label Wallsuit.

Saric, a versatile and prolific artist, specialises in sculpting, mosaic, painting, design and calligraphy. Beside working as an independent artist, he holds mosaic courses in Hannover.

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Nurtured in the practice of church art, his artistic expression is deriving from sacred Greco-Roman and oriental art. In his works, through the immediacy and simplicity of visual elements, he is trying to convey the intuition of a “transfigured world” and its everlasting glow, harmony and beauty. His interpretations reflect the personal spiritual experience as well as the tradition that breathes and evolves within the concepts of contemporaries. 

For his decorative arts projects and bespoke wall design projects, go to http://www.wallsuit.de

To watch Saric at work, ‘suiting a wall’, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FvzZBmF5nQ&feature=youtu.be

Photos from a recent church exhibition:

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For more information please visit his website nikolasaric.de