THE LENGTH AND HEIGHT OF THE CROSS IS EQUAL TO HEAVEN

“O glorious wonder! The length and height of the cross is equal to heaven!” (3rd stichera for end of matins). In lauding the Life-giving Cross of the Lord with these words from one of its hymns for the feast of the Elevation of the Cross, the Holy Church presents to us one of the aspects of its teaching on the Cross, namely: that the length and the height of the cross are equal to heaven; in other words, that the cross covers the entire universe, all of creation, the entire physical and metaphysical world.

We find a unique exposition of this teaching in a wonderful book by the prominent Russian religious philosopher Prince Yevgeniy Trubetskoy, which deals with the issue that is reflected in its title – “The Meaning of Life.” The book was written in 1918, precisely at a time when the old Christian world was being demolished, and a post-Christian, apostate, apocalyptic era – the so-called New Age – was being established on earth.

In examining the deep and complex issue of the meaning of life, particularly against the background of the surrounding chaos and obvious senselessness of those times, Prince Trubetskoy analyzes in a wonderfully spiritual manner the fundamental structure of life, explaining its horizontal line (length) and vertical line (height), and shows that only in the intersection of these two lines (a cross) is the true meaning of life revealed to us. Here is what this great spiritual writer says (excerpted from the book “The Meaning of Life,” pp.53-65):

“An eternal argument of two opposing concepts of life rages around the question of the purpose and meaning of life – a naturalistic concept, which looks for real life and its meaning in the plane of this world, and a supranatural concept, which asserts that true life and its meaning is concentrated on a different, higher, otherworldly plane of existence. An examination of these two resolutions leads us to conclude that both of them are equally one-sided and thus equally invalid.

For naturalism – both religious and philosophical – real life is precisely this life, which unfolds on this particular plane of existence; the real world is the one which revolves before us here on this plane, periodically dying and being reborn. A vivid example of such a concept of life are the ancient Greeks with their cult of nature and its sunny gods – the Olympians. All these gods of thunder and lightning, sea waves, moonlight, and the blinding light of the noonday sky are human-like personifications of the joy of life on earth. Greek religion also knows the hereafter, but it is not so much the other world as the underworld, where everything is gloomy and barren; Achilles’ shadow speaks of it to Odysseus, saying that it is better to be a slave on earth, than to reign over the dead in the kingdom of shadows.

Speaking of the other world, let us look at those religions which represent a direct antithesis to the buoyant worldview of the ancient Greeks. I am speaking of those religions of India which not only do not believe in the genuineness of this world, but partially even reject its reality. The depth of India’s religious quest is expressed in the fact that it transforms all the judgments of common sense into their opposite. What we call reality is actually a dream, while that which we call a dream is genuine reality and truly valuable – so we are taught by the ascetic wisdom of Brahmanism and Buddhism. The word “Buddha” even literally means “the awakened one.” Thus the entire teaching of both these world religions is nothing more than an attempt to achieve this awakening, to rise above the bustle that is called reality; for Buddhism, as well as for Brahmanism, the true expression of real life is not this reality, but the wings that can lift us and carry us away from it…

The pathos of Brahmanism is also tied in with the practical requirement that a person reject all individuality, all egoistic desires, all striving for a reward either here or in the beyond. This entire world is a lie – therefore, the meaning of life is attained only in a total disassociation from the world. For Brahmanism the ideal of life is a complete dissolution of all that is individual and concrete within the impersonal unity of a universal spirit.

This ascetic disassociation from everything is crystallized in Buddhism, whose ideal consists of rising not only above a finite individual life, but above all life in general, above all striving towards life, above all desire for immortality. Buddhism leaves without reply the very issue of an individual’s eternal life, in order not to awaken in man that vain desire for life which lies at the root of all suffering on earth. A peaceful immersion into the “nirvana” preached by Buddhism is achieved through complete disassociation from life.

In the final analysis, however, the religious quest here also remains unresolved. India’s ascetic self-abnegation turns out to be a half-truth just like the religious worldview of the ancient Greeks. We see here two opposing aspirations to life, two intersecting lines of life. One establishes itself here on earth, has both ends firmly entrenched in this world. The other, on the contrary, yearns away from the earth, aspires upward. But in a fatal manner both these lines lead to one and the same. Both the Olympians’ transient exhilaration with life and the lofty flight of Hindu asceticism end in death. For that which is deemed to be bliss in Brahmanism and Buddhism is, in reality, not the victory of life but just the opposite – victory over life and, consequently, the victory of death.

Hindu religiousness essentially believes not in the meaning but in the meaninglessness of life. The Hindus engage in a spiritual ascent, but it ends in fatal failure, for in their religion the spirit does not animate the world, does not transform it from within, does not vanquish the force of evil in it, but only delivers its own self from this force. The Hindu spirit’s attitude towards earth is exclusively negative: it disassociates itself from earth forever and thus gives up the earth and all the living beings on it into the power of suffering, evil, and futility. The suffering of all living creation is futile and its hopes are in vain, for it has no place in the salvation proclaimed by the ascetics of India: their “salvation” is not the salvation of life, but rather salvation from life; the ascetics’ “salvation” lies precisely in the destruction of all concrete forms, all variety of creation… Thereby the ascent into the beyond, which constitutes the essence of India’s religious aspiration, turns into nothingness, for this ascent does not lead to its goal, and heaven itself remains forever closed to them, forever beyond their reach.

Both the Hindu and the Greek solutions to the question of the meaning of life turn out to be equally invalid. In affirming the world, Greek religiousness finds chaos instead of the cosmos, finds a multitude of forces battling each other, not joined by the unity of a common meaning, while Hindu religiousness completely rejects the world as nonexistent and nonsensical, i.e. finds meaning only in its destruction. Thus, whether man seeks the meaning of life in the horizontal earthly plane or in the vertical ascent onto a different plane of existence, the result of these two movements is the same: suffering over unattained meaning and the return of the circle of life back to earth, to futility.

Both these lines, which express the two basic directions of life’s aspiration – the flat or horizontal line and the ascending or vertical line – cross each other. And in view of the fact that these two lines represent a comprehensive depiction of all possible directions of life, their intersection – the forming of a cross – is the most universal and exact schematic depiction of the path of life. In every form of life there is an inevitable intersection of these two paths and directions – the upward movement and the forward movement.

In this sense the cross lies at the base of all life. The outline of life itself is cruciform in nature, and there is a cosmic cross, which expresses the architectural foundation of the entire universe.

The entire question of the meaning of life boils down to the issue of the cross, since outside of these two intersecting lines of life there can be no other lines or paths. However, for each person the meaning of the cross may be different, depending on whether these paths of life bring one to the requisite goal or not. If one believes that the final result of all life is death, then the crossing of the lines of life represents only an extreme expression of sorrow, suffering, humiliation, – and in such a case the cross is simply a symbol of universal torment: in this manner it was known to pre-Christian mankind. It is a totally different matter if in the intersection of the two lines life achieves its fullness, its eternal, beautiful, and immortal meaning. Then the cross becomes the symbol of this lofty victory, the cross becomes life-giving, which constitutes the only correct formulation of the question concerning the meaning of life…

Neither the self-affirmation of worldliness, personified by the Greek Olympians, nor ancient India’s direct asceticism and flight from the world have led to success. This double failure shows that both paths of life which intersect in the world are invalid by themselves; thus man is led to a new revelation of the mystery of the world. If neither earth, nor heaven, nor high, nor low by themselves comprise the revelation of the meaning of life, this means that the meaning lies somewhere deeper. It is not only larger than earth, but also larger than heaven and, therefore, all attempts to find it only on earth or only in heaven are equally doomed to failure. It cannot be contained within any finite plane of existence, for it encompasses all planes, the entire world in general, while it itself is above the world…

In other words, we must seek the meaning of life not in a horizontal or vertical direction taken separately, but in the unification of these two lines of life, in the place where they intersect. In the true meaning of life all suffering must be vanquished and transformed into joy – both the physical suffering of earthly creation and the spiritual suffering of an unsuccessful ascent into heaven. The meaning of life is tested by the cross, because, in the final analysis, the question of life’s meaning is the question of whether the cross – a symbol of death – can become the source and symbol of life?

Of all religions only Christianity provides and affirms a positive resolution of this issue, for it preaches the abolition of death, preaches the transformation of the cross itself from a path leading to death into a path leading to life. Moreover, this is the only possible positive resolution, for in Christianity the world has been shown total victory on the cross, and in the belief in Christ as perfect God and at the same time perfect man the world has been shown the indivisible and unmerged unity of the divine and the human… The voluntary passion of the Son of God and the resurrection as its consequence – such is the only revelation of meaning in the world by which this meaning may be realized and confirmed.”

 

 Prince Yevgeniy Trubetskoy

 

 

 

HOMILY FOR THE NATIVITY OF THE HOLY THEOTOKOS

 

When a king plans to live in a certain city or settlement, an appropriate dwelling is prepared for him there in advance; in like manner the Heavenly King, before coming down to earth, prepared for Himself a wondrous palace, not made by hands, in the person of the Most-immaculate Virgin Mary. And if we, when looking at notable sights, focus our attention on the beautiful architecture of palaces and various monuments, then with how great a piety and awe should we not bow down before the living House of God?

Today the Church prayerfully commemorates the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, the most blessed among women, Who has so wondrously served the mystery of the incarnation of God the Word. Her parents, the righteous Joachim and Anna, came from families of kings and high priests, but lived in obscurity. Being distinguished by high morality, they were at the same deeply unhappy, since they had lived until a very old age without having children, which at that time was regarded as severe punishment from God. This was because every Jew of those times ardently wished for the awaited Christ to come from his family or at least from his descendants. This meant that whoever had no children was deprived of such a hope. Joachim and Anna often earnestly prayed to God to remove from them such a disgrace in the eyes of the Jews, but the Lord tarried in fulfilling their request because the time was not yet ripe. It seemed to them that all hope was already lost, but what is impossible for man is possible for God. God’s Providence once again raised their hopes especially strongly. During the feast of the renewal of the temple, St. Joachim came to Jerusalem with his servants and wished to offer a rich sacrifice, but the priest did not accept it, indicating that Joachim was unworthy because of his childlessness, while another Jew expressed his contempt for Joachim in front of everyone. The childless father’s cup of sorrow overflowed. He let his servants go back home, while he himself went off into the desert and spent 40 days there in fasting and prayer. “Lord, – he cried out, shedding copious and bitter tears, – deliver me from the disgrace of childlessness, and if by Thy blessing my wife should give birth to a child, I will dedicate it to Thy service.” At the same time St. Anna, having learned from the servants of what had happened to her husband in Jerusalem, refused to be comforted and tearfully increased her prayers, acknowledging herself to be a sinner and unworthy of God’s mercy. Being unable to find peace anywhere, she went out into her garden and in one of the trees saw a nest with fledglings. “My God, my God! – she said tearfully and sorrowfully, – even the birds of heaven are more fortunate than I, for they have offspring, while I am lower than dumb creatures…” At this her trial ended. An angel suddenly appeared to her and said: “Anna, fear not, thy supplication has been heard, thou shalt conceive and give birth to a Daughter Who shall be the most blessed of all.” Who can describe the joy of the previously unfortunate woman? She immediately hurried off to Jerusalem, in order to give praise and thanks to God in the temple. The same angel also appeared to righteous Joachim and announced to him that a Daughter, Whom he should call Mary, would be born to him, and in confirmation of the truth of his words the angel said: “Hurry to Jerusalem and there thou wilt meet thy wife Anna at the city gates.” In truth everything came to pass as was foretold. The overjoyed couple offered a sacrifice to God, which the priest accepted very readily this time, and afterwards returned home, where a Daughter was born to them and was called Mary.

So you see, dear brethren, that even people who are righteous from childhood do not always get what they ask for right away. Sometimes many years pass before the Lord responds to the supplication of His servants. One thing remains without doubt – that never does our sincere supplication slip by the All-seeing God. For this reason Christ teaches us: ask and ye shall receive. He did not mean “ask once,” but rather “keep on asking,” perhaps for a long time, persistently, earnestly, and above all – with faith in God’s mercy. However, it is not forbidden to ask for an acceleration of celestial help, but we should always remember that the Lord governs His own paths and, if necessary, fulfills our entreaties in their own good time, as occurred with the nativity of the Most-immaculate Virgin Mary. Amen.

 

 Protopriest Leonid Koltsov

 

 

 

 

CHRISTIAN TEACHING

 

On venerating the saints

 

No one who has ever been to an Orthodox church could mistake the greatness of our respect and veneration for the saints. Their icons look upon us from every corner and from every wall, their faces dispassionate and yet filled with glory. Some say that we pay too much attention to saints and not enough attention to Christ. Some say that we take away from what rightly belongs only to the Lord.

From earliest times the followers of Jesus Christ have venerated saints. They understood quite well what St. Paul meant in writing to the Thessalonians that when the Lord Jesus Christ comes at the end of the world, He will be accompanied not only by hosts of angels, but also the saints – those who have won the unending reward of Heaven; and furthermore, at the end of the world, Christ “will be glorified in His saints” (2 Thess. 1:10). In other words, an army of saints will accompany Christ at the judgment of the world, and Christ will be glorified, or praised, in these saints. Therefore, it is pleasing to God that we, here below, awaiting patiently the consummation of the ages, give glory and praise to Him in and through His saints. But the question naturally arises, especially among Protestants: why would Christ wish to be magnified in the saints?

This is a question the Holy Fathers of the Church themselves often addressed, and did so at length, for it involved a subject dear to them – the mystery of salvation.

Commenting on the Lord’s Prayer, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, that great teacher of converts, had this to say about the phrase “Our Father, Who art in heaven”: “They also are a heaven,” he wrote, “who bear the image of the heavenly, in whom is God, dwelling and walking in them.” This was in reference to St. Paul’s words: “And as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly” (1 Cor. 15:49), and: “Ye are the temples of the living God; as God has said, ‘I will dwell in them, and I walk in them’” (2 Cor. 6:16).

Developing the same thought, St. Macarius the Great wrote that he who keeps the word of God in his heart actually has paradise in his heart! “For this reason the whole company of holy prophets, apostles, martyrs (that is, all the saints), kept the Word in their hearts, caring for nothing else, but despising earthly things, and abiding in the commandment of the Holy Spirit, and preferring before all things the Spirit’s love of God and the Spirit’s good…”

Because paradise dwells in a saint, his instructions to others are truly inspired and act, as St. Symeon the New Theologian says, “like a two-edged sword in the heart of a carnal man: it causes him (the carnal man) pain…”

The word saint comes from the Latin sanctus, meaning holy, consecrated, set apart from others. The Greek also means “holy,” or “sanctified.” A saint, therefore, is utterly different from the rest of us. In common with us, he holds the Orthodox Faith (St. Symeon says that Orthodoxy is part of the “blessedness” of a saint); but unlike us, he has led a praiseworthy life as “a friend of God,” a life that has clearly demonstrated the presence of God in him. Thus St. Symeon also writes: “He who has not part in God, or, rather, who does not possess Him wholly in himself, how can I consider him to be blessed? It is impossible! Were the sun without light, how could it be called the sun? If a man does not partake of the all-Holy Spirit, how can he be called holy? For the Lord has said: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’ (1 Peter 1:16).” And so, in order to encourage us to imitate Him by our deeds, the Compassionate One (Christ) says: “Leave off from evil deeds and practice all good deeds; pursue every virtue and become holy as far as it is attainable, if you really want to have fellowship with Me. For I am holy…”

From all this we can see that the first Christians glorified Christ in the saints and struggled to imitate them in their separation from sin and the world. The Holy Fathers of the early Church provided us with the theological explanation of how and why this is proper. Themselves being saints, the Church Fathers never tired of urging the rest of us to follow after them. Thus, St. Clement of Rome, the “co-struggler” of St. Paul, encouraged Christians to become saints with these words: “Brethren, let us contend, knowing that the contest is nigh at hand, and that, while many resort to corruptible (worldly) contests, yet not all are crowned, but only they that have toiled hard and contended bravely. Let us then contend that we may be crowned. Therefore, let us run in the straight course, the incorruptible contest… that we may also be crowned. And if we cannot all be crowned, let us at least come near the crown…”

 

 Father Aleksey Young

 

 

 

 

A WORLD LYING IN INIQUITY

Looking around us at the surrounding environment, it is not difficult for an Orthodox Christian to see that the modern world is literally lying in iniquity, and that in its sinfulness mankind has not only caught up with and surpassed Sodom and Gomorrah, but also the antediluvian mankind that was destroyed by the Lord by means of the Flood. And if current mankind has not yet been destroyed by fire, as had been foretold, it is only because it still contains the requisite number of righteous ones for which the patriarch Abraham tried to bargain with God in order to save Sodom and Gomorrah (and could not), and because the Lord continues to show everlasting mercy to mankind and is granting a chance for salvation to all who can still be saved.

It is extremely difficult for an Orthodox Christian to live in a world where the sins of sodomy exceed the original ones a hundredfold. Not only the souls of righteous ones, but also the souls of all the faithful languish and suffocate in these hellish fumes… However, by his very nature an Orthodox Christian should not despair, but should rely on God’s Providence in all things, should continue to live and work on the salvation of his soul. At the same time it may be worthwhile to attain a deeper understanding of the situation in which we find ourselves. With this in mind we offer you the following article, which deals with this issue.

Discourse on the meaning of evil

The thought of universal evil lies like a heavy burden of doubt in the hearts of many of the faithful. It seems incomprehensible to them that God allows the existence of evil, since in His omnipotence He could easily eliminate this evil… How can the infinitely merciful God tolerate a situation wherein the evil actions of a single scoundrel can doom thousands, and sometimes millions, and even up to half of mankind to misery, woe, misfortune?

Wherein lies the meaning of evil? In God’s world there is nothing meaningless.

In order to reply to these questions, we must understand the precise nature of evil. Evil does not mean suffering, misery, or poverty, but sins and moral guilt. God does not want evil. The Omnipotent God cannot approve of evil. Moreover, God forbids evil. God punishes evil. Evil or sin are a contradiction or opposition to the will of God.

The foundation of evil, as we know, was laid by the supreme angel created by God, who came out from under obedience to God’s benevolent will and became the devil. The devil is the cause of evil, and he either inspires or influences the engendering of sin in man.

It is not man’s body, as many people think, that is the source of evil. No, the body becomes the instrument of either sin or virtue not of its own accord, but by man’s will.

The true faith of Christ indicates the following two reasons for the existence of evil in the world:

(1) The first and primary reason lies in the freedom of man’s will.

(2) The second reason for the existence of evil is that bearing in mind its inevitability in order to accommodate free will, God directs even this evil towards man’s good.

Our free will is the reflection of our likeness to God. This gift from God raises man above all the other creatures in the world…

In freely choosing good and rejecting evil man magnifies God and perfects himself.

In the book of Ecclesiastes there are the following words: “He (God) created man in the beginning and left him in the hands of his own will,” i.e. God originally created man and left him with free choice.

In this manner God gives people with good will the opportunity to earn heaven for themselves, and those with evil will – to merit hell. However, both one and the other are arrived at only by means of man’s free will.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem says: “If you were to do good by nature and not by choice, why would God then prepare incomparable crowns? The sheep are meek, but they will never be crowned for their meekness, because their meekness comes not from choice, but from nature.”

St. Basil the Great says: “Why have we not been fashioned sinless, so that we would not be able to sin even if we so desired? For the same reason that you yourself would not consider your servants to be efficient if you kept them constrained, but only if you saw them fulfilling their duties before you voluntarily. Thus God, too, is pleased not by what is forced, but by what is done voluntarily; virtue comes from will and not from necessity, while our will depends on what is within us, and what is within us is free. Therefore, whoever criticizes the Creator for not having fashioned us sinless shows that he prefers a nature that is unfeeling, immovable and without any aspirations to a nature that is gifted with free will and independence.” In other words, such a person prefers a machine (robot) to a sentient being.

Under no circumstance does God wish for evil. However, since evil of necessity penetrated into the world through the fault of creation, God makes even this evil serve to the good in His universal plan.

For example: the sons of Jacob sold their brother Joseph into bondage. They did an evil deed. But God turned evil into good: Joseph achieved high standing in Egypt and thus had the opportunity to save his family, from which was due to come the Messiah, from famine. When several years later Joseph saw his brothers, he said to them: “You planned evil against me, but God turned it into good!”

In the apostles’ times the Jews persecuted the Christians in Palestine. And so the Christians were forced to flee from Judea, which was sanctified by the life and blood of the Saviour. However, wherever they went, they propagated the word of the Gospel. The sins of the persecutors were directed by the Divine hand towards the spread of Christianity.

The pagan Roman emperors persecuted the young Christian Church. Tens of thousands of martyrs shed their blood for Christ in those times. And this blood of martyrs became the seed for millions of new Christians. Thus here, too, the persecutors’ fury and the sins of hate and murder were channeled by God into building up the Church. The persecutors planned and committed evil, while God turned all their deeds into good.

The entire history of mankind, up to our own times, confirms the truth of these words. The greatest catastrophes for people were at the same time the greatest triumphs for religion and served to turn people to God.

We only need to have patience and to wait, for with God one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years are as one day. Moreover, this intertwining of evil into God’s plan for administering the world was not some belated adjustment or a correction of creation, but a conscious act of God’s pre-eternal will.

 

Protopriest Seraphim Slobodskoy

 

 

LIVES OF THE SAINTS

 

On September 25^th (the 12^th according to the old calendar) the Church commemorates the righteous Saint Simeon of Verkhotursk.

St. Simeon came from a noble family, but in order to escape worldly vanity he left his native parts in the beginning of the 17th century and went off beyond the Ural Mountains to far-away Siberia, to a region newly-converted to Christianity, in which only in 1620 was the Tobolsk diocese established. Humbly concealing his noble parentage, he led the life of a pauper who did not have a permanent shelter. He was a good tailor and so, going from village to village, he sewed clothes. He ate at the homes of his customers, being content with very little. Having finished a job, Simeon would leave his hosts while they slept, in order to avoid payment and worldly praise.

His favorite place for prayer was the village of Merkushino in the environs of the city of Verkhoturye in the Perm province, but above all he loved to spend time in solitude among centuries-old cedars and leafy trees. He also engaged in another innocent pastime – he fished in the turbulent waters of the Tura River, following the example of the fishermen of Galilee.

Simeon conscientiously attended church services in Merkushino, showing extraordinary obedience, love, and generosity to his neighbors. He always tried to feed other paupers from the fruits of his labors and spoke with many people about divine truths, guiding the various local peoples onto the path of Christian righteousness.

St. Simeon reposed in the Lord peacefully and in anonymity in 1642. He was buried near the church of St. Archangel Michael in which he used to pray. St. Simeon’s brief but pure life served as a model in the wild region that had just been enlightened by Christianity.

The righteous Simeon was one of those saints of God whose posthumous actions were better known than the events of their temporal life, which were known only to God. The saint’s relics were found incorruptible and produced a multitude of miracles. St. Simeon not only healed diverse illnesses, but appeared in dreams with stern injunctions to drunkards on sobriety, powerful denunciations to users of offensive language, promised God’s wrath in the form of plague and famine to those who lived uncleanly, and also expelled schismatics.

In 1704 the saint’s relics were transferred from the village of Merkushino to the Verkhotursk monastery of St. Nicholas, while in Merkushino a stone chapel was erected in 1808 on the site where the honorable relics of the saint had been discovered. At the site of the righteous saint’s former grave there is now a spring which the faithful come to visit. Pious pilgrims take water from this spring for the blessing of their homes.

 

 

SIGNS FROM HEAVEN

 

An Orthodox Christian understanding of unidentified flying objects (UFOs)

 

(Continued)

 

The Six Kinds of UFO Encounters

 

“Close Encounters of the Second Kind” (CE-II) are essentially similar to CE-1 experiences, with the one difference that they leave some striking physical and/or psychological effects of their presence. These effects include marks on the ground, the scorching or blighting of plants and trees, interference with electrical circuits causing radio static and the stoppage of automobile engines, discomfort to animals as evidenced by strange behavior, and effects on humans which include temporary paralysis or numbness, a feeling of heat, nausea, or other discomfort, temporary weightlessness (sometimes causing levitation), sudden healings of sores and pains, and various psychological and physical after-effects, including strange marks on the body. This kind of UFO encounter gives the greatest possibility for scientific investigation, since in addition to human testimony there is physical evidence that can be examined; but little investigation has actually been undertaken, both because most scientists are afraid to get involved in the whole question of UFOs, and because the evidence itself is usually inconclusive or partially subjective. One catalog has been compiled of over 800 cases of this type in 24 countries. No actual “piece” of a UFO has ever been authenticated, however, and the markings left on the ground are often as baffling as the sightings themselves. The most frequent marking left on the ground after a sighting (the UFO itself having been seen either on the ground or just above it) is a burned, dehydrated, or depressed area in the shape of a ring, usually 20 to 30 feet in diameter and 1 to 3 feet thick; these “rings” persist for weeks or months and the interior of the ring (and sometimes the whole circle) is reported to be barren for a season or two after the sighting. A few chemical analyses of the soil in such rings have produced no definite conclusions as to the possible origin of this condition.

“Close Encounters of the Second Kind” often happen to persons during the night in isolated sections of road. In many similar cases a glowing object lands in a field nearby or on the road in front of an automobile or truck, the engine and headlights on the automobile fail, and the occupants become terrified until the UFO leaves, often shooting suddenly straight up without a sound; the engine of the vehicle then can operate again, and often comes on by itself.

The strangest of all UFO reports are those that deal with “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” (CE-III) – that is, UFO experiences involving “animated beings” (“occupants” or “humanoids”). The first thought of many people when hearing of such reports is to picture “little green men” and dismiss the whole phenomenon as unbelievable – a hoax or hallucination. However, the success of the recent American science-fiction film, named precisely for this category of UFO phenomena Close Encounters of the Third Kind (for which Dr. Hynek served as technical consultant), together with evidence of the Gallop Poll in 1974 that 54% of those who are aware of UFOs believe that they are real, and 46% of all those interviewed believe in intelligent life on other planets (the percentage today would certainly be greater) – point to the rapidly increasing acceptance by contemporary men of the possibility of actual encounters with “non-human” intelligences. Science fiction has given the images, evolution has produced the philosophy, and the technology of the space age has supplied the plausibility for such encounters.

Astonishingly, these encounters seem actually to be occurring today, as attested to by the evidence of many believable witnesses. Of crucial importance, therefore, is the interpretation that must be made of these occurrences; is the reality behind them an actual contact with “visitors from outer space,” or is this only an explanation provided by the spirit of the times for a contact of a different kind altogether? As we shall see below, today’s scientific investigators of UFOs have already asked these questions.

Dr. Hynek admits his own repugnance to face the possibility of CE-III experiences: “To be frank, I would gladly omit this part if I could without offense to scientific integrity.” However, since his aim is scientific objectivity, he finds it impossible to ignore the well-documented cases, from believable witnesses, of this strange phenomenon. Of nearly 1250 “Close Encounters” reported in a catalog by Dr. Jacques Vallee, 750 report the landing of a craft, and more than 300 of these report “humanoids” in or about the craft; one-third of all these are multiple-witness cases.

In one “humanoid” case, which occurred in November 1961, in one of the northern plains’ states in the USA, four men were returning from a hunting trip late at night, when one of the men noticed a flaming object coming down, as if it were an airplane crashing about a half mile up the road from them. When they reached the site of the “crash,” all four men saw a silo-shaped craft in a field, sticking in the ground at an angle, with four seemingly human figures standing around it (this was at a distance of about 150 yards). They flashed a light on one of the figures, who was about four-and-a-half feet high and wearing what looked like white coveralls; he made a gesture to the men to stay back. After some hesitation (still thinking it was a plane crash), they went to a nearby town for a police officer, and when they returned they saw only some small red lights, something like automobile lights. They drove into the field with the officer and followed the lights, only to discover that they suddenly disappeared, leaving no tracks whatsoever, despite the muddiness of the field. After the puzzled police officer left, the men again saw the “silo” coming down out of the sky with a reddish glow. Instantly after the object landed, two figures were visible next to it; a shot was fired (although none of the men admitted to firing it) and one of the figures was “hit” in the shoulder with a thud, and spun around and down to his knees; in panic the men ran to their car and raced off, agreeing among themselves not to mention the incident to anyone. They returned home with a strange feeling that there was some period of time lost during the night. The next day one of the men was visited at his work by several well-groomed official-looking men, who asked him questions about the incident (but without mentioning the shooting) and then took him in their car to his home, where they questioned him about his clothes and boots and then left, telling him not to say anything about the incident to anyone. The hunter assumed these men were United States Air Force investigators trying to conceal some new secret device, but the men never identified themselves and never contacted him again. All four men were extremely shaken up by the incident, and after six years one of them felt compelled to tell the whole story to a U.S. Treasury agent.

The main incidents in this story are typical of many “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” A little different case of this sort is the famous UFO “landing” at Kelly, a small town near Hopkinsville, Kentucky, which was investigated extensively by the police, Air Force, and independent researchers. In the evening and night of August 21, 1955, seven adults and four children in one farm household had a prolonged encounter with “humanoids.” The incident began at 7:00, when the teen-aged son of the family saw a flying object land behind the farmhouse. No one believed him, but an hour later a “little man” emitting a strange glow came walking toward the house with his hands raised. Two of the men in the house, out of fear, shot at the creature when it was 20 feet away; it somersaulted and disappeared in the dark. Soon another similar creature appeared at a window; they again fired at it, and again it disappeared. Going outside, the men shot at another creature with a claw-like hand which they saw on the roof; still another on a tree nearby floated to the ground when it was hit. Other creatures also were seen and hit (or perhaps the same creatures reappearing), but the men saw the bullets seem to ricochet off from them and have no real effect; the sound was like shooting into a bucket. After firing four boxes of shells with no effect, all eleven people, thoroughly terrified, drove to the Hopkinsville police station. The police arrived at the farmhouse after midnight and made a thorough search of the premises, finding a few unusual markings and seeing several strange meteors that came in the direction of the farmhouse, but discovering no creatures. After the police left, the creatures reappeared, causing more consternation in the household.

The “humanoids” in this case were described as being about 3-and-a-half to 4 feet tall, with huge hands and eyes (without pupils or eyelids), large pointed ears, and arms that hung to the ground. They seemed to have no clothing but to be nickel-plated. They approached the house always from the darkest side and did not approach when the outside lights were turned on.

Dr. Hynek sharply distinguishes between “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and “contactee” cases. “Contactees” have repeated encounters with UFO beings, often bringing pseudo-religious messages from them about highly-evolved beings on other planets who are often connected with UFO religious cults. Ordinary CE-III experiences, on the other hand, are in general very similar to other “Close Encounters”; they occur to people of similar occupation and reliability, are just as unexpected, and produce the same kind of shock at the sight of something so unbelievable. The “occupants” who are seen (usually from a little distance) are often reported as picking up samples of earth and rocks, showing a seeming interest in human installations and vehicles, or “repairing” their own craft. The “humanoids” are described as having large heads with largely non-human features (no eyes or large eyes widely spaced, small or no nose, a bare slit for a mouth), spindly legs, no neck; some are reported to be of human size, other about 3-and-a-half feet high, as in the Kelly-Hopkinsville incident. Recently a new catalog of over 1000 CE-III cases has been compiled.

There have been a number of cases, seriously reported by seemingly reliable people, of “abductions” by UFO occupants, usually for purposes of “testing.” Almost all evidence of these cases (if we exclude “contactees”) has been obtained by regressive hypnosis; the experience is so traumatic to the witnesses that the conscious mind does not remember it, and it is only some time later that such people agree to be hypnotized in order to explain some mysterious time loss in connection with their “Close Encounter” experience – the first part of which they do remember.

One of the best-known “abduction” cases occurred at about midnight on September 19, 1961 near Whitfield, New Hampshire. It was made the subject of a book by John Fuller (The Interrupted Journey). On this night Barney and Betty Hill were returning from a vacation trip when they saw a descending UFO which landed right in front of their car on a side road. Some “humanoids” approached them, and the next thing they remembered, it was two hours later and they were 35 miles farther down the road. This amnesia bothered them, leading to physical and mental disorders, and they finally went to a psychiatrist. Under hypnosis they both independently related what had happened during the missing time. Both stated that they had been taken aboard the craft by the “humanoids” and given physical examinations, with samples taken of fingernails and skin. They were released after being given the hypnotic suggestion that they would remember nothing of the experience. Under hypnosis they related the experience with great emotional disturbance.

In a similar case, at 2:30 A.M. on December 3, 1967, a policeman in Ashland, Nebraska saw an object with a row of flickering lights in the road, which took off into the air when he approached it. He reported a “flying saucer” to his superiors and went home with a strong headache, a buzzing noise in his ears, and a red welt below the left ear. Later, it was discovered that there had been a period of twenty minutes that night of which he remembered nothing; under hypnosis he revealed that he had followed the UFO, which again landed. The occupants flashed a bright light at him, and then took him aboard their craft, where he saw control panels and computer-like machines. (An engineer in France had seen something similar when he was “abducted” for 18 days.) The “humanoids,” wearing coveralls with a winged-serpent emblem, told the policeman that they came from a nearby galaxy, had bases in the United States, and operated their craft by “reverse electromagnetism”; they contact people by chance and “want to puzzle people.” They released the man, telling him “wisely not to speak about this night.”

At first sight such incidents seem simply unbelievable, like some strange cases of hallucination or disordered imagination. But there have been too many of them now to dismiss them quite so easily. As reports of encounters with actual physical aircraft, to be sure, they are not convincing. Further, psychiatrists themselves caution that the results of regressive hypnosis are very uncertain: the person being hypnotized is often not capable of distinguishing between actual experiences and suggestions planted in his mind, whether by the hypnotist or by someone else at the time of the supposed “Close Encounter.” But even if these experiences are not fully real (as objective phenomena in space and time), the very fact that so many of them have been implanted in human minds in recent years is already significant enough. Without doubt there is something behind the “abduction” experiences also, and recently UFO investigators have begun to look in a different direction for an explanation of them.

Such experiences, and especially the “Close Encounters” of the 1970s, are noticeably bound up with paranormal or occult phenomena. People sometimes have strange dreams just before seeing UFOs, or hear knocks on the door when no one is there, or have strange visitors afterwards; some witnesses receive telepathic messages from UFO occupants; UFOs now sometimes simply materialize and dematerialize instead of coming and going at great speeds; sometimes “miraculous healings” occur in their presence or when one is exposed to their light. But “Close Encounters” with UFOs have also resulted in leukemia and radiation sickness; often there are tragic psychological effects: personality deterioration, insanity, suicide.

The increase of the psychic component in UFO sightings has led researchers to seek similarities between UFO experiences and occult phenomena, and to seek the key to understanding the UFOs in the psychic effects they produce. Many researchers note the similarity between UFO phenomena and 19th century spiritism, which also combined psychic phenomena with strange physical effects, but with a more primitive “technology.” In general the 1970s have seen a narrowing of the gap between the normal UFO phenomena of the past and the UFO cults, in accordance with the increased receptivity of mankind in this decade to occult practices.

 

(To be continued)

 

Father Seraphim (Rose)

 

(From the book Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future)

 

 

 

SPIRITUAL POETRY

 

PRAYER

 

O King of Heaven, Father of orphans, Protector of the weak and poor, Have mercy on us – and in days of trouble Do not deprive us of Thy boons! So hard to live! So many sorrows Surround us... The frail spirit is tired – Tired to suffer in the sea of life, Where Satan himself now runs the show... Thou camest into the world, gavest it Thy Word – The holy word of Thine own Gospel; But still the world sought another king And did not deign to follow Thee. Thou didst not choose a kingly throne here, Nor splendor, glory, nor the purple... Thou art not needed by the world, Thou art too meek and humble of heart... Another will come – with pride and malice, With cunning, lies, and rampant evil, With spiteful mockery of religion, Of Divine Truth and Divine Goodness. Thy hateful enemy will be accepted, The sinful world will follow his lead, It will wholeheartedly reject Thee And make an idol for itself. That day is nearing.... and anxiety Encompasses our hearts... Cold and darkness Surround us, God is now forgotten, And the fierce, audacious enemy is near. Forgive us all! From our rancor, Malice, and deceit deliver us, So that henceforth, till our grave, The light of faith shine in our hearts!   — Metropolitan Philaret (Voznesensky)