Letters of the Valaam Elder Schema-hegumen John (Alexeev).
01.07.1954
It is very sad to hear that the priests
teach their spiritual children to imagine the Saviour, or the Mother of
God, or some Saint in the mind while praying.
This method of prayer is wrong, even
harmful. I know that the ones who prayed so, became of unsound mind and
went to the doctors to be treated.
I'll tell you briefly how to pray
according to divinely wise Holy Fathers. The mind must be enclosed in
the words of the prayer and attention should be kept in the top of the
chest, for attention is a soul of the prayer. You should not push the
heart with attention, since if there is attention in the chest, the
heart will sympathize. When tenderness and warmth of heart appear, do
not think that you have received something great. It happens naturally
because of concentration, but it is not delusion. Yet God gives some
consolation to the praying person by the grace.
By all means try not to judge anyone for
anything. What you do not want for yourself, do not do to others, and
nor bear hatred, or the prayer will not become establish in the heart.
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