Friday. [II Cor. 4:13-18; Matt. 24:27-33, 42-51]

   Watch; for ye know not, what hour your Lord doth come. If only this were remembered, there would be no sinners. But it is not remembered, although everyone knows that it is unquestionably true. Even the strictest ascetics were not strong enough to easily keep this in mind, and made efforts to fix it in their consciousness so that it would not leave—one kept a coffin in his cell, another begged his co-ascetics to ask about his coffin and grave, another kept pictures of death and judgment, another in other ways. If death does not touch a soul, the soul does not remember it. But in no way can what immediately follows death not touch a soul; a soul cannot but be concerned about this, since it is the judgment of its fate for eternal ages. Why does a soul not remember this? It deceives itself that death will come not soon, and that perhaps somehow things won’t go badly for us. How bitter! It goes without saying that a soul which abides in such thoughts is careless and self-indulgent. So, how can it think that judgment will go favorably for it? No, one must behave like a student who is facing an exam: no matter what he does, the exam does not leave his head; such remembrance does not allow him to waste even a minute in vain, and he uses all his time to prepare for the exam. When will we acquire a mindset like this!

Saturday. [I Cor. 1:3-9; Matt. 19:3-12]

   The Lord says that originally God Himself blessed the marriage union, and put this law into our nature. About those who do not want to get married He said: He that is able to receive it, let him receive it. It is clear that although He admitted that marriage is a natural law, it is not so indispensable and inescapable that there is no room for celibacy. He allows celibacy, but guards it with a condition which brings it nearer to the law of nature. A eunuch from birth is celibate according to a natural law; but he who by his own will puts himself in the same state as that of the natural eunuch’s by birth without the participation of will, moves onto one level with him in relation to natural needs. Consequently, in this sense, both the former and the latter are natural celibates. Why is the state of a spiritual eunuch—self-imposed celibacy—considered unnatural? Because people do not understand nature. For them “natural” means what is natural for the body, but what is natural for the spirit, and what becomes natural [for the body] as a consequence of the spirit’s influence, people do not want to consider natural. It would be a different matter if these were all materialists, but this is not so. Discuss some other subject with them and they will speak reasonably.