Orthodox Monastic Life

Orthodox monasticism is the boast and glory of the Church. The nuns of the Orthodox Church, living an angelic life, transcend time and death, and thus through their prayer they carry out a timeless mission within society. Beyond their significant contribution to the Church as an institution, which they benefit in many ways, they pray at the same time for the departed, for the living, known and unknown, and for those who will be born in the future. Today the world is in great need of monastic life, and that is why people flock to monasteries to encounter the authenticity of Christian life and to find true love, freedom and fruitful stillness. Monasticism, when lived in its true dimensions, offers what people are seeking. True monastics are the true Christians; they live the future already now and sanctify the present, and for this reason they were and are for us light and life. Saint Gregory of Nyssa, who came from the married clergy, said that in the Body of Christ, the Church, the monastics are the hair of the head: just as the hair is dead matter yet adorns the head, so the monastics are dead to the world, yet at the same time they are the glory of the Church. Saint John of Sinai, in his book known as "The Ladder", makes the characteristic remark: "Angels are a light for monks, and the monastic life is a light for all people." Monastics are illumined by the angels, since they live a life equal to that of the angels. If, then, we look at the Church apart from the monastic life, we are looking at a secularised Church.