“True Faith is a life of learning and laboring to trust in God Who is beyond belief.”

We can get a jolt of energy by reading Holy Scripture, the lives of the Saints, and more spiritual reading..but as St. Paisios said, it isn’t enough to get inspired. Taking a “spiritual vitamin” like that might make us feel better and stronger, but it goes to waste unless we do something with it!

…The way that the prisoners, (especially a high-profile Olympian like Louis), were treated wasn’t by typical torturing to try to get information. The Japanese knew that it is possible for a body to withstand torture if the will is strong enough. They instead did everything they could to destroy the dignity and soul of those whom they captured by treating the prisoners like animals and stripping them of their sense of being a human being. This was true slavery, and Louis recalled how it was far worse than anything that they had to endure…even suffering for 47 days in the middle of the sea with no food or water.

Reflections on the statement offered by the Orthodox Church in America’s Synod of Bishops on Marriage, Homosexuality, and Gender.

Completely have trust in God, leave everything in His hands, and believe that His love will act for your own benefit. Then God will take care of everything, because there is nothing He cannot do; everything is easy for Him. The difficult thing is for man to decide to humble himself and leave everything to God’s providence and love.”

-St. Paisios