The biography of the priest me

Such opinions are expressed by church and non -church people not only abroad, but also in our country. They have solid arguments, and objective facts confirming such views are widely known. But these disasters collapse, like a house of cards, if we recall many figures of the Russian Orthodox Church, clergy and laity who created its genuine history.

Throughout the seventy -year oppression of the Church, they, contrary to everything, retained and increased the fullness of the spiritual wealth of the teachings of Christ. It is not only about the new martyrs, but also about those who, in the tough framework of the totalitarian system, worked in the church field. One of these people was the late Archpriest Father Alexander Men. Recently, a lot has been written about him and talk more than in his lifetime.

He now has many admirers, spiritual children and students, but many enemies. Around his name and his books, disputes arise and sometimes incredible, absurd rumors spread. Who was Father Alexander actually? What are its role and significance in the life of the modern Russian Orthodox Church? On the eve of the tragedy, which in the twenties suffered a church, a local cathedral - years came to the conclusion that it was necessary to reform church life in all its areas.

Many decisions were adopted about the external and internal life of the church. The revival of the parish as a church family was planned so that the relations of the pastor and parishioners were personal in accordance with the practice of the ancient Church. The wishes of the establishment of fraternal relations with Catholics and Protestants were expressed. It was supposed to conduct such theological dialogues with them that would contribute to the strengthening of peace and love between Christians.

After the cathedral, the church immediately fell into the vice of atheistic power, and persecution began, but before the most severe terror unleashed in the year, it had three or four years left, when she managed to partially realize many decisions of the cathedral. Under the leadership and with the blessing of famous hierarchs, including St. Tikhon, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus', for the first time dialogues were carried out with representatives of other Christian faiths.

They did not pursue polemic goals, their task was to recognize each other in the brothers and sisters in Christ. Soon, all this was reduced to naught, and a long, seemingly hopeless night came for the church. It was necessary to have great personal courage in order to implement what was scheduled for the cathedral in these conditions. All his activities became the embodiment of the ideas of the cathedral.

In the difficult conditions of the totalitarian atheistic regime, he worked for the future church. With his sermons and books, his whole life, to the end of the service to God, he discovered believers the path to true life in Christ in modern conditions. He did this in contrast to those who carefully hid the truth from people and wanted to turn the Church into a certain museum of rituals.

His sermons penetrated the soul to everyone, starting with ordinary village old women and ending with an intellectual elite. He possessed the gift of intelligibly state the highest truths of Christianity and deeply touch the hearts. His word changed the direction of thoughts and the whole life of thousands of people and turned them towards Christ. Father Alexander was an outstanding theologian of our time, a deep religious thinker.

He did not receive official recognition, he was almost not printed in our church press. But he was used and used in seminaries and spiritual academies. Something in his views does not coincide with school theology, but there is nothing wrong with this. We were simply weaving from the pluralism of opinions that existed from the apostolic times and constituting wealth and the depth of the patristic heritage.

This pluralism is the necessary diversity, which, according to the Apostle Paul, should find the most skillful I Kor. In his condolences to the family, spiritual children and parishioners of Father Alexander on the occasion of his death, Holy Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus', Alexy II, emphasized "The talent of Father Alexander as a preacher of the word of God and the recreate of a truly communal parish life." This book, written by a personal friend and spiritual daughter of the late Archpriest, recreates the image of the great shepherd, theologian, ascetic and faithful son of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Hegumen Martiria Bagin [on page by Alexander me in the religious awakening of the Russian intelligentsia after seventy -year fainting unconsciousness. His ascetic work of the sower of the word of God on the burnt by atheism, the barren, seemed to the earth, his tragic lonely figure and martyrdom on the way to the temple from the murderer’s ax will undoubtedly attract the attention of more than one generation of thinking readers.

The author fell happiness to communicate with Fr. Alexander for nearly twenty -three years. In - gg. Alexander Malaya told me about his past. Little by little it turned out how he developed as a thinker, a priest, character.He told in fidels: in the trains, on the way from his Novodervensky temple to the station, in the wagon of the soon Feodosia -Moscow train ... It was clear that he first and consistently speak of his childhood, youth, the first years of serving in the church and these memories give him pleasure.

When the idea arose from the records of these stories to make a book, he immediately agreed. For the chapters of childhood, he gave the manuscript memories of his mother “My Way” and aunt - “Catacombs of the XX century”. That is why their evidence by the will of Fr. Alexandra is abundantly quoted in the first chapter. Sometimes different documents are wedged into the text or my own certificates of events, the eyewitness of which I happened to be.

In addition, I was friends with my mother Fr. Alexandra heard a lot from her. It happened, to the question that touched the topic of a particularly important topic for him, about. Alexander replied: "I will write it to you myself." And indeed, he wrote. Texts written about. Alexander we print them with italics. He generally seriously treated this work, gave various archival documents: his children's notebooks, drawings, a handwritten album of V.

Vasilevskaya with poems dedicated to him, photographs and much more. The narrative of his life about. Alexander brought to about a year. This year we met, and then his life flowed before my eyes. Therefore, the first, biographical part of the book ends only with a brief mention of the main events of the last Novodervensky period of service Fr. It began and proceeded under his powerful influence, and, of course, in the diaries there are many records about my wonderful confessor and our not always simple relationships.

At the direction of the priest, based on these vast diaries, a book was compiled about my spiritual path “The Spirit breathes, where it wants”, for which about. Alexander wrote a preface. This book will be published as the third book of the series "Fate of Crushing." On the same basis, the second part of this book is also written. But this is not always a literal diary text: sometimes it is reduced or for brevity is simply retold, sometimes the necessary clarifications or explanations are introduced into it.

And in general, during the life of the author, it seems to me to publish a diary without exemptions. But the meaning and content of the records remained unchanged. Occasionally, the text seems to hang in the air, when the original concerns the life of my jokes, who did not authorize me, of course, talk about them in the press. But let white spots remain in this book. The inner life of every person is a secret.

Some events for various reasons, including according to the then requirements for conspiracy, were not written in the diary, but were preserved in memory.

These late inserts are printed in smaller font. I have preserved about one hundred and sixty letters about. Alexandra, and some of them are included in this book. The author apologizes to the reader that in a book built on documentary evidence of different people, he sometimes failed to avoid repetitions, and also in the fact that, talking about the great shepherd, he had to talk about his own insignificant person, otherwise it would be difficult to talk about the mentoring work of his confessor.

In the end, this is not the case: it is important to save for contemporaries and offspring any large and small events of the life of this religious genius and the holy ascetic, including those that fell into the author’s field for more than two decades.