It was said of Abba John the Dwarf, that one day he said to his elder brother, 'I should like to be free of all care, like the angels, who do not work, but ceaselessly offer worship to God.' So he took off his cloak and went away into the desert. After a week he came back to his brother. When he...

The first, the basic definition of man is that he is the priest. He stands in the center of the world and unifies it in his act of blessing God, of both receiving the world from God and offering it to God--and by filling the world with this eucharist, he tranforms his life, the one that he receives...

A brother at Scetis commited a fault. A council was called which Abba Moses was invited, but he refused to go to it. Then the priest sent someone to say to him, 'Come, for everyone is waiting for you.' So he got up and went. He took a leaking jug, filled it with water and carried it with him. The...

If our life is poured out in useless words, we will never hear anything, will never become anything, and, in the end, because we have said everything before we had anything to say, we shall be left speechless.

A mother came here with her little child, posessed with a devil, who said to his mother, 'Get up woman, let us go away from here.' She replied, 'I cannot walk any futher,' and the little child said to her, 'I will carry you myself.' I wondered at the devil's tricks and how eager he was to make them...