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His Grace Nichifor of Botoșani speaks to us
For Saint Parascheva, monastic life meant precisely being alone with God. And it teaches us to look at ourselves with God, alone, to judge ourselves each time in relation to God, not to others. To judge yourself by how much you have fulfilled your purpose, not by how much others have fulfilled theirs, more or less than yours. Doing this means growing in understanding and power, because what we receive by venerating Saint Parascheva, her relics, is this spiritual power. Her relics preserve the sign of a life lived in divine power. And today, beloved faithful, those who step out of their worries, out of customary patterns and out of man's clever way of solving all sorts of shortcomings and weaknesses, those who step out today are called to sanctify their lives.
Saint Paisie of Sihăstria, himself a monk, closer to us, almost contemporary with our days − many of us even knew him, we listened to his words −, a man raised in the countryside, but endowed with wisdom, with a deep heart and strong faith, even for him it was not easy to leave his parents' household, to leave the prevailing norms of his community. But man does not enter monastic life with sadness, turmoil and fear, but with joy and fervor and courage! He himself entered monastic life with joy, and the Lord increased his joy, even passing through tribulations, through sorrows. For neither life in Sihăstria Monastery nor in any other monastery is a saccharine life, a life in which man spends his time relaxing, in amusement. It is a life spent with self-awareness and with the joy of understanding God's plan, and of understanding that, in this life, every encounter and every opportunity that God places before us has a purpose for our growth. Understanding this, man no longer wishes to be distracted from this struggle, and no longer seeks the amusements of this world, but is drawn by God and towards the good struggle.
Such was Saint Paisie as well. And he himself, even during his long life, was a comforter and guide to people, often knowing their thoughts before they spoke them, knowing their needs before they confessed them. Neither popularity, nor glory, nor the things of abundance remained for himself, and God endowed him with deep peace and grace. Both of them have stepped out of life's turmoil and come to comfort our turmoil. Today you too have stepped out for a time, for a day, for a few hours, those of you who have chosen to spend time venerating their relics, you have stepped out of your worries to strengthen yourselves, to comfort yourselves. And we make of this an act of faith.
Our pilgrimage is an act of faith, beloved faithful. It is a step towards the Lord. May the Good God reward you for this step! May the Lord reward your effort and act of faith and this stepping out of the pattern of your worries, and may He grant to each of you, but also to all of us, to this country, may the Lord grant us the good stewardship of life! May He grant us victory over the seen and unseen powers of evil! May He grant us the assurance that, when we unite in prayer, God works in a way other than humanly, stewarding the life and work of our souls!
May the Lord help us so that this path we take to venerate Saint Parascheva, pilgrims from all over the country, every step may be for our growth, for the assurance that God has a purpose for us, but also for the good resolution to become ourselves comforters of others, with a word, with a good deed, with patience, with the wisdom not to despair and to call upon God in our lives and in the history of our country, to the end, that He may sanctify us, that He may conquer all evil and cleanse us of all that may have been wrong in our lives.
Speech delivered on the morning of October 8, 2026, at the bringing forth of the relics of Saint Parascheva and Saint Paisie from Sihăstria in the courtyard of the Metropolitan Cathedral in Iași
Photos from doxologia.ro