7/11/2022
Bishop Joseph (Korolev)
Our elders could combine unceasing prayer and work. True, it’s not total stillness—we won’t see it at the Optina Monastery. But there was the path of cenobitic monasticism, there was monastic life in the skete and there was eremitic life.
The elders of Optina were skilled spiritual physicians who penetrated into the very depths of the human soul.
This is spiritual and not fleshly joy —that we live with God and every day thank God for our health and our lives. We pray and thank God for everything that happens to us.
Bishop Joseph (Korolev) of Tarusa
My spiritual father, Batiushka Vlasy, repeatedly called me “Vladyka” half-jokingly, and I didn’t take it seriously.
