Română
In this video recording, His Eminence Serafim (Joanta), Romanian Orthodox Metropolitan of Germany, Central and Northern Europe, recounts the amazing stories of three saintly old women.
Video source: TRINITAS TV and ASCOR Cluj
November 29, 2018, Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Metropolitan Serafim:
A 95-year-old believer I have known for many years… When you see her, you realize that her face is transfigured… Full of light, full of light, of a goodness, of a purity of soul… with sweet and fine words…
She told me:
“Father, the joy of my life has been the Church and the Divine Liturgy… the joy of my life… I have had no greater joy in life than the Liturgy…”
And now, at 95 years old, she came, although she had suffered a small paralysis, they brought her to the church, and she was present at the consecration of that little church.
“The joy of my live is the Divine Liturgy…”
Who can say that? How many of us can say that? It means that she was breathing in the church, she was united with the mystery of the Church, with the Liturgy…
For her there was nothing dearer, better or more beautiful than the Liturgy of the Church…
Another believer, about whom a priest spoke to me, at the same service of consecration of a church last year in August…
“Your Eminence,” the priest said to me, “I recently buried a believer in her 90s… she confessed to me on her deathbed and said to me:
‘Father, I’m not sorry I’m dying, I’m sorry that I can’t go to church anymore…'”
Do you realize what she said?
“I’m sorry that I can’t go to church anymore…”
Dear of her… in her simplicity, in her innocence, in her purity, she did not realize that in the afterlife she will be permanently in the Church… But she was so attached to this Church on earth…
And that’s how we should all be, the Church was her life… The church was her life… She was saying: “I’m not sorry of anything, but I’m sorry that I can’t go to church anymore…” It’s amazing!
Or another woman, she was asked by her grandson (theologian and doctor in theology), a very pious woman, she was praying a lot, she never missed the church, but she was a simple woman…
And her grandson asked her (she lived in a village close to Galati, Romania):
“Grandma, tell me what you feel when you pray, I see that you pray with such enthusiasm…”
And she said:
“Well, my child, what shall I say, it’s as if my heart is growing… and I feel all people as if they are in my soul, in my heart… and they are all dear to me… my heart enlarges…”
In prayer, indeed, our heart enlarges, our heart grows, we embrace all people, we are no longer able to judge, to condemn, to see evil in others, but only in ourselves…
Do you see what God is working? This is the work of God… No one can reach a compassionate, good and loving heart if God did not work in the life of that believer… God transforms us all…
