How does the church treat psychics and healers? About the attitude of the church towards psychics and the nature of “paranormal phenomena”. Extrasensory perception is a reality...

12.06.2022

About healers, fortune tellers, astrologers, psychics and grandmothers” - the road to HELL, why it is a sin to contact them.

In order to better understand why it is impossible to be treated by “miracle workers”, healers and similar “healers”, we will try to penetrate into the very essence of this problem. “Diseases all and always come from sins and because of sins,” says St. Theophan the Recluse, and only very rarely, in some cases - as a test. And here it is appropriate to remember who and under what conditions the Lord Jesus Christ healed. He healed everyone who came to Him with faith in His Divine dignity, and this faith was always combined with deep, sincere repentance of a person. Let us remember, for example, how the blind people of the Gospel turned to the Savior. They cried after Him: “Have mercy on us, O Lord, Son of David” (Matthew 20; 30). These words convey deep faith in Christ as the Redeemer of mankind and, of course, a sense of repentance. The Lord forgave their sins to everyone who came with a sinful burden, and then healed them. “Your sins are forgiven you” (Matthew (9:2); “...behold, you are healed; sin no more, lest anything worse happen to you” (John 5:14) - such words sounded from the lips of the Savior when He healed the sick. But what about the grandmother, how can she forgive sins? Or just add something even worse and more unthinkable, inflicting a severe wound on the soul and handing it over to Satan for reproach.
And as can be seen from the Gospel, all healings primarily had moral significance for those who sought help for their ailments. Those who came to Christ had full consciousness of their sinfulness, their unworthiness. The very appeal to the Savior marked the beginning of deep repentance and correction of life. In this way, the soul was cleansed and healed from sin - the source of various illnesses and sorrows. And the Lord always, following the recovery of the soul, granted healing to the body.

After Christ's ascension into heaven, miraculous healings did not stop

Like Christ, the apostles, martyrs, hermits and all the righteous who pleased God performed healings and miracles. What force did they act with? St. John Cassian the Roman says that “the cause of healings is... grace, which produces miracles and is given to chosen and righteous men for their holiness, as is known about the apostles and many others.”
And in our time, miraculous healings can also occur. And the source of these healings was, is and will be until the end of the world Divine grace abiding in the holy Church of Christ, which is given through its holy sacraments: Baptism, Repentance, Communion of the Most Pure Body and Blood of the Savior, Blessing of Anointing (Unction). However, everyone who begins the Sacraments must remember that, as in the time of Christ, grace-filled help acts only in accordance with the warm faith and repentance of the one approaching. That is why, before the greatest church sacrament of the Eucharist, the Sacrament of Confession was established, in which penitents receive remission of their sins.
Also, since apostolic times, a special sacrament of Blessing of Anointing or Unction has been established. According to ancient custom, not only the seriously ill and suffering, but also relatively healthy people can begin this sacrament. This happens during holy fasts, especially during Lent, when we require special grace-filled help for the cleansing of our souls and physical health.

When discussing church means of healing the soul and body, we must not forget that grace acts mysteriously and unnoticed, avoiding curious and inquisitive gazes.
There is no doubt that we have all approached the church sacraments and can testify to their grace-filled power. However, we must not forget that this benefit, so obvious to us, is only a small part of what we actually receive in the holy sacraments. Only God knows what diseases we were healed from and what troubles we were able to get rid of thanks to the grace of God. “Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). And just as during His earthly life He avoided fame, so now He heals and heals those who come to Him with faith, without causing worldly rumors and noisy sensations. After all, the main thing in the work of Christ is not only physical health, but the moral rebirth of man, turning from sin to God, from serving the forces of evil to good, from death to eternal life.

The Church also does NOT reject the help of doctors.

And this is what the Bible says: “My son! In your illness, do not be careless, but pray to the Lord and He will heal you. Leave your sinful life and straighten your hands, and cleanse your heart from all sin. And give a place to the doctor, for the Lord created him too, and let him not depart from you, for he is needed” (Sir. 38: 9-10, 12).

But let's return to the problem of the newly-minted “healers” and “miracle workers”. As you know, these are people who are not distinguished by holiness and height of spiritual life, they are very far from the Church. But what force do they have on people? We again find the answer to this question from St. John Cassian the Roman, who says: “...healings” ...of this kind occur through the seduction and trickery of demons. A person given over to obvious vices can sometimes perform amazing actions and therefore can be revered as a saint and a servant of God. Through this, many are carried away to imitate his vices and a vast path is opened to the reproach and destruction of the holiness of religion; and even the one who is confident in himself that he has the gift of healing, arrogant with the pride of his heart, experiences a grave fall. The Gospel says about such people: “false Christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect” (Matthew 24:24).
It is important to note here that these “miracle workers” cannot actually heal anyone. By using magical actions they create only a feeling of weakening of the disease, after which a sharp deterioration in health often occurs, as the press has repeatedly testified. Thus, one newspaper reports that “every day, alarmed doctors call the editorial office. They say that ambulances deliver patients with advanced stomach ulcers and other serious complications to hospitals. The fact is that they completely trusted the passes from the television screen and completely stopped taking the medicine. Some letters from delighted patients have been published. And this is not surprising, because demons do not wish us healing, they do not wish us good even in earthly life, let alone eternal life. And they learned to deceive us. They can create the appearance of a weakening of the disease to certify the person that he really got to a real doctor. But then it happens to him that “the last is worse than the first.”

An interesting statement about the psychics of St. John Chrysostom:

“The demon, even if he heals, will do more harm than good. It will benefit the body, which after a little while will certainly die and rot, and harm the immortal soul. If sometimes, by God’s permission, demons heal (through healers), then such healing happens to test the faithful, not because God did not know them, but so that they learn NOT to accept even healing from demons.”

And such phenomena as hypnosis and various kinds of suggestions have been known in magic and witchcraft since ancient times. And the Church answered unequivocally on this matter back in the middle of the first millennium at the VI Ecumenical Council, where it was said about the prohibition of various types of witchcraft, used both to help with illnesses and to harm people. The Nomocanon also says that if anyone engages in witchcraft, whispering water (exactly what they do on TV), as well as scattering beans, pouring eggs, wax, he falls under church prohibition (anathema) And at the same time he is excommunicated from Communion for 6 years - both those who treat with these means and those who turn to them. And those who try to use these means for the death of a person are excommunicated for 15 years, on a par with murderers, even if they repent and never do this again.

And the worst thing is that sometimes such healers present an alleged church blessing.

No sorcerers, psychics, “traditional healers,” or grandmothers can have a legitimate church blessing. The documents presented are false. In any case, if you want to make sure of this, you can request copies of the documents and take them to the diocesan administration at your place of residence.
In almost any newspaper, sorcerers and healers offer their services, and all of them are hereditary. But remember that fundamentally and initially there are NO:

kind,
white,
Orthodox,
good sorcerers
psychics,
rakeists,
Vedic doctors,
money,
Vaishnava doctors,
shamans,
witches,
traditional healers,
voodooists,
energy therapists,
whisperers,
palmists,
transcendental psychologists,
astrologers,
soothsayers
fortune tellers
magicians

Any magic, white, black, even pink with yellow stripes, is still from Satan and is still contrary to the nature of Christ

Let's first define what prayer is and what a conspiracy is.

Prayer is an appeal to God or to saints. John Chrysostom says that prayer is our reverent conversation with God. Prayer in itself is not at all a guarantee that what is asked in it will definitely come true. The Lord, as a wise Father, gives a person what is beneficial for his life exactly when it is necessary, and not at the whim of a person.

Conspiracy, unlike prayer, is its complete opposite. The person who reads it is given almost a 100% guarantee that the request will be fulfilled. Quite often, Orthodox terminology is used liberally as a cover in conspiracies. Therefore, many people cannot always distinguish Orthodox prayer from a conspiracy.

First of all, you need to pay attention to the acquired literature. All Orthodox literature is published with the blessing of His Holiness the Patriarch or the diocesan bishop. And of course, if there is such a blessing on the first page, then the appearance of conspiracies on the pages of such a publication is almost impossible, since this literature undergoes strict church testing. No church literature can be printed with the blessing of an ordinary priest. You also need to be careful about literature printed with the blessing of elders or famous confessors. As a rule, these people are zealots of church deanery, and will never give such blessings bypassing the ruling bishop of their diocese. Of course, it is better to purchase Orthodox literature in churches or specialized church shops.

I will give just a few examples from prayer books printed without blessing.

One of them contains a “prayer for the blessing of water.” Moreover, there is a reservation that “you need to slander the water three times, it really helps the “damaged” patients.” The very name itself arouses suspicion, since only a priest has the right to bless water, and certainly none of them “slanders” water, and a water-blessing prayer service is a whole prayer sequence with the reading of the Gospel and immersing the cross in water three times. All these rites are completely absent from the proposed prayer. And, probably, every person knows what miraculous power real, and not “spoken” holy water has.

There is a huge difference between prayer and conspiracy

The same as between a humble request and persistent extortion. Prayer is a humble request for God's help in the work that we are about to begin. This is the first and most important difference. Secondly, a praying person does not strive to achieve what he wants at any cost. He believes that it is not for him, a sinner, to judge what is good for his soul and what is not; but this is known only to a good and loving God. Therefore, a praying person always readily accepts everything that follows his prayer. Thirdly, real prayer is always associated with a deep feeling of repentance. A believer knows that difficulties and sorrows are sent from God for his sins and untruths for his edification and correction. Here, for example, is how a rural priest at the end of the 19th century describes the penitential atmosphere in which nationwide prayer services were held on the occasion of a long lack of rain: “... the priest with a cross in his hand came out of the altar to the pulpit and stopped in front of the procession, face to face with the people.
“What are you going to do, Christians? “He said impressively to the people, “go to your fields and ask for mercy from God?” But are you worth this favor? Weren't you the one who recently went on a rampage and drank for weeks without waking up? I asked you, you laughed, I begged you, you behaved outrageously, I pointed you to God, and you turned away from His face. Now God has turned away from your criminal faces and will punish you with dignity and righteousness. I dare not pray with you before the angry Heaven!
Touched at such a decisive moment, the people, like one sheaf, fell to the ground and knelt before the images raised on the campaign...”
And let’s also see with what humble feeling the people accept the wondrous mercy of God - the rain that began shortly after the prayer service:
“...Suddenly a cloud rose and rain began to fall. The people cry with joy, place handfuls under the icons from which streams of rain are pouring, wash themselves with this water and repeat: “Glory to Thee, the Creator, who heard our sinful prayer!”
As we see, result of prayer depends, first of all, on the faith of the person asking, on his lifestyle and on whether the fulfillment of his request is useful or not useful for the person asking. These are the three most important factors. If a person lives without remembering God and does everything in defiance, it is unlikely that his request will be fulfilled.

So even the “doctor’s” use of prayers, the Cross and the presence of icons in his house cannot serve as a guarantee that this is not a charlatan.
Remember the words of the Savior: Many will say to Me on that day: “Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name? And didn’t they do many miracles in Your name?” And then I will declare to them: I never knew you; Depart from me, you workers of iniquity." (Matthew 7:22-23)
Yes, as a result of the “healer’s” manipulations with dark forces, a person can receive significant relief from his suffering. But what is the cost of this? The disease is driven inside a person and after a certain period of time it will definitely come out in the form of even more severe symptoms. By subjecting himself to such “treatment,” a person pays with his soul. Relief and recovery are often imaginary. A person who turns to a “healer” puts his family at risk - demons begin to act through the “healed” person, destroying the souls and bodies of his loved ones.
As for damage or the evil eye, a person who regularly resorts to the Church Sacraments - confession and communion - is not afraid of them, even if they shovel this “damage” to him.

Let's take a look at what magicians and psychics offer on the service market.

They can heal, bewitch, charm, predict, etc. It doesn't seem to be a big deal.
We need to be more careful about the words we use to describe the world and ourselves. The world is known through the word. If we plunge into the world of paganism, then the world in our eyes becomes colored in shamanistic jargon. The world of a Christian is the world of prayer, the world of a pagan (occultist and shaman) is the world of conspiracy, spells and mantras.
As a rule, people far from God proceed from the fact that man is a material and temporary being in this world. His main task is to live as long as possible without any problems. The second point of view comes from the fact that in addition to the body, a person also has an immortal soul. In this case, it is important to understand that the “success” of such a person’s life in the perspective of eternity depends not only on physical health. When we devote all our strength to maintaining physical health, we need to remember that the body, one way or another, is a temporary phenomenon.

What cannot be said about the soul - it is eternal. And then, if we make enormous efforts to heal the body, and at the same time cause irreparable harm to the soul, are we acting wisely? There are known cases when grandmothers helped... But they helped only in the visible. Only in healing the body... Why is Christianity against such healing? Yes, because this inflicts a mortal wound on the human soul. The child was cured, everything is fine, we are happy... If we do not see with our eyes the soul of the child and the wound that was inflicted on him, this does not mean that this wound does not exist...

“Praying and believing is good, but only if faith is strong, and what if not?...”

It’s not clear, to be honest, this is what... Why do we admit the powerlessness of our own faith in God, and at the same time shout about limitless faith in everything else? Where does the strength for such faith come from? Or is it that faith comes more easily to grandma, without any effort...? But even so, everyone knows where there is free cheese.
According to the Bible, man was created “in the image and likeness” (Gen. 1:26) of his Creator. Reason, freedom, the gift of creativity, the uniqueness of the human personality are the highest values acquired by people. These are gifts of a supramundane order.
“What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? or what ransom will a man give for his soul?” (Matt. 16:26). The Christian knows the answer to this question: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son” John 3:16. There is nothing more precious to God than the world of people. And the shaman-magician considers it permissible to bewitch, regardless of the wishes of the other party. Did he give a choice to the other side, who doesn’t even know about it, or just doesn’t even know that person? Fans bewitch their idols... well, it’s nonsense, you have to admit, an idol who doesn’t even know him, among the raging crowd. Is this moral? What culture can generate such an attitude towards a person, turning him into an object of his whim? The culture of slave trading and exploitation of their own kind. Who thinks about this nowadays? And old man Kant once said: “Man can never be a means, but always only an end.” This is the anthropological maxim.
And the most amazing thing is that people are ready to give up their freedom. It is so burdensome that many regularly consult with horoscope forecasts or diagnose karma. After all, if something happens, you can blame all responsibility for your actions on the “will of the stars”: they say, what am I? I drank too much - the stars say, I was rude to my wife - that's karma. But if karma is the totality of previous deeds, and you believe in total dependence on it, know “The Lord is Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor. 2:17). So is it the Spirit of the Lord or the spirit of slavery in your life? Christ breaks all connections with cause and effect relationships in “In Him we have redemption through His blood and the forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:14).
Christian repentance and the proclamation of God's forgiveness are an affirmation of freedom and moral responsibility.

The alternative is deadly. How ugly the picture is revealed before the eyes of the occultist can be understood if one realizes what place a person is given in this value system. Other people are an object of manipulation, a means for realizing my desires. The “grandmother” and the one who addresses her look at people with such an unkind, unloving gaze. Exploitation of the human body is prostitution, exploitation of the human soul is undiluted Satanism. Even in human terms it can be called an abomination. What can we say about God...

What's wrong with harmless astrology and horoscopes?

The fascination with horoscopes was natural for the pagan world, in which the law of fate (fate, fate, karma) rose above all beings, subjugating even the gods. But Christianity brought to the world the news of human freedom in Heaven - not the blind laws of karma or astrology, but the Loving Father, in Whose will is the WHOLE UNIVERSE and human hair. The repentance of the thief on the cross did not depend on the stars, but on the feat of his faith. It was not the horoscope that led Mary Magdalene or Peter to repentance, but their love for Christ. Belief in horoscopes paralyzes a person’s will, fetters freedom and dulls the sense of personal responsibility. Astrology carries heresy about a person, because it thinks too lowly about him... Two people meet. Getting acquainted. First question: who are you? I'm a Taurus. And you? I am a Scorpio. As a result, who is the person? animal, reptile, insect? It’s amazing how deaf people can be. They don’t ask for God’s blessing, but compare themselves to horoscopes; if they don’t fit, they run away..
And people now believe in anything and anyone... And by and large, there are not even atheists. Because now even an atheist, and other annual “deities,” believe in a yellow pig, a red cow or a fiery bull.
A person trusts some signs of heaven, thinking that through the study of planetary paths it is easier to understand God than through the voice of conscience and soul... Isn’t it fitting for God to manifest Himself not in man, but in the starry sky? Well, the star will lead you to God, who became a man (a man, not a star)

Let us remember the wise men (astrologers, magicians, sorcerers) who came to worship Christ

What advice did the Lord give to the wise men: “And having received a revelation in a dream NOT to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by a different route” (Matthew 2:12). A different path was opened to them after meeting the Savior. Different, different from the previous one: showing the wise men a different path to return home, God thereby commanded them to leave their bad craft (see Tertullian. On Idolatry, 9)

(Andrey Kuraev “When Heaven gets closer, about miracles and superstitions, about sins and holidays”
Priest Dionysius Svechnikov “the difference between conspiracy and prayer,
superstition - no)

About psychics, astrologers and other evil spirits

When demons are powerless...

Text version of the TV program

Ved.: Today on the Internet, on television, in many print media you can find a huge number of advertisements offering the services of psychics, bioenergetics, magicians, and clairvoyants. Moreover, the range of problems that they propose to solve is quite wide: from healing various ailments to organizing your personal life and even spelling money and good luck. Why are there so many of them, and how are they dangerous? - today we are talking with the rector of the temple in honor of the icon of the Mother of God “Quench My Sorrows,” Abbot Nektariy (Morozov). Hello, Father Nektary.

This “epidemic” has been around for several years now and, as we see, it does not subside and only seems to be gaining momentum. Why is this happening?

Hegumen Nektariy: There are probably several main reasons here. One of them is that it is common for a person not to be satisfied only with what the material world can offer him. Man instinctively seeks solutions to his problems beyond the boundaries of this visible world. Let's just say that for a person in the full sense of the word, a believer, a church member, it is completely natural to turn to God in prayer and ask not only for eternal salvation, but also for some of his temporary needs, because our life cannot do without this. For a person who has not truly come to God, has not turned, faith is still a kind of abstraction, something that has not entered into his life. And at the same time, his soul persistently reminds him: “you are weak, you are limited, you need the help that people cannot give you.” And here, on the path that logically should have led a person to the temple, numerous traps and snares are placed, into which a religiously illiterate person naturally falls. And these snares and traps are the very specialists of a very wide market of occult services. These are magicians, and psychics, and astrologers, and the so-called “grandmothers” and others, others, others, all this kind of public.

Why does such a stir persist in this area today? The fact is that almost all researchers of this problem - and this problem is not a year old, not ten years old, it periodically arises throughout, probably, the entire history of mankind - agree that all the unfavorable periods in the history of various states, the world as a whole, are sure to be marked by a surge of interest in this side - precisely for the reason we are talking about.

Judging from a religious, spiritual point of view, why does this or that crisis arise in the country, in the world? Yes, because people forget about God, they move away from Him as the Source of their being, and this leads to failure in everything - in the economy, in politics, in the personal lives of specific people, and the life of that society is formed from the personal lives of specific people which they make up. And this gives rise to a feeling of uncertainty, panic: “Where to go?” And all this mass of people who are actually far from God rushes to where we are talking. And in our country we can observe, unfortunately, for many, many years, extreme instability in both the political and economic spheres, and hence people’s uncertainty not only about the future, but also about today. Since, unfortunately, no one really deals with people’s problems, this pushes them into the arms of potential deceivers and murderers.

Ved.: But we constantly hear that people who call themselves clairvoyants, psychics, true healers, very often deceive their “clients” and turn out to be swindlers. Isn’t a person, turning to such a “specialist,” afraid that he will be deceived? Why is this fear missing, why is common sense missing?

Hegumen Nektariy: Again, there are several reasons. Firstly, in fact, a person is a creature who, with enviable persistence, is inclined to repeat his mistakes. I once, quite by accident, saw an instructor teaching German Shepherd puppies to be distrustful on a site specially designed for this purpose. There is a necessary skill that a service dog must have, and this is done very simply: the instructor calls the puppy who came with the owner to him and, when he runs up cheerfully, he nibbles him. It hurts him, he gets offended and runs away. And it’s very interesting that there were puppies that didn’t come up the first time, there were those that came up once, and after experiencing the unpleasant sensation from the pinch, they didn’t come up again, and there were those that came up twice, and three, and four, and Five times. And it turned out that no matter what you do with them, they will still come up. Most people, unfortunately, are like this because they are careless, they live without using the experience that the reality around them offers them. Well, and on the plus side, there is probably some element of conscious “delegation of responsibility” in this. When a person is inclined to refuse responsibility for something, it is very difficult to expect reasonable actions from him. Psychologists say that there are many different fears and phobias in modern people. But these phobias are really very different, and they can be combined into one - this is the fear of living, in principle. What's the worst thing in life? Not fear of hunger, not fear of death, not fear of some kind of disease, no. This is the fear of being responsible for the gift of existence that God gave you. Of course, not every person understands it this way, but, nevertheless, it is so. There is a huge temptation to “entrust this responsibility” to someone else.

When a person comes to the temple, they begin to explain to him: “This action is performed for such and such a purpose, this is for such and such a purpose...”, and the person can understand what he is doing. If a person comes to some sorcerer, magician, healer, he does not understand anything. He says: “I have such and such a problem, solve it for me.” This very appeal suggests that a person will not be interested in what is being done to him (and indeed not a single person knows what is being done to him there). This means that this is a person of a certain type: he will still come and not even think about the fact that he can be deceived, and trust, and endure harm, damage, and then he will go again. And, perhaps, not to this, but to the second, to the third, to the fourth. Because I had to see a lot of people who were passed on like a baton: first they came to their grandmother, then to an astrologer, then to some psychic from some distant country who doesn’t even remember what it’s called, and so on and so forth , other. In these wanderings, a moment may come that will be critical, when both the human psyche and his physical composition will reach such a state that he will naturally approach death. You also have to see such people.

Ved.: But it turns out that there are also people who, under no circumstances, will go to magicians and healers?

Hegumen Nektariy: Yes. There are people who simply by their nature will not go, and will not go precisely for the reason that they think this way: “If I don’t understand what they will do to me, then I will not let anyone do anything to me.” You know, our norm in Soviet medicine was: “What will they do to me now?..” - “Patient, it’s none of your business how you will be treated.” This is not a normal approach to the healing process. It's the same here. A person must understand. If he doesn’t understand, he doesn’t go - if the person has developed critical thinking. In essence, those people who end up in totalitarian sects, those who go to psychics, magicians and occultists for treatment - these are people of approximately the same type. These are people who are not inclined to think critically, analyze and want to delegate their responsibility for themselves and their destiny to someone. Moreover, it’s an amazing thing - people are sometimes ready to do any damage to themselves, even damage to their health and life, as long as they don’t have to answer for anything.

Ved.: Father, but there are situations when a person actually cannot adequately assess them. I speak now, remembering the example of the mothers of Beslan, to whom Grigory Grabovoi promised to resurrect their children. In such cases, it is probably difficult to demand any kind of critical approach from the mother. The man is driven to despair. Maybe you can somehow prepare yourself in advance?

Hegumen Nektariy: No matter what state a person is in, he will still do what is natural for him. Of course, in that tragic situation, Grabovoi played in the most terrible, most vile way on human grief, on the state in which these people were. But, on the other hand, if before this terrible episode, before this terrible tragedy, they had not had the potential readiness to turn to this kind of charlatan, then this would not have happened when the tragedy actually happened. Therefore, the only way to avoid making such a mistake is to have a completely clear attitude towards this type of market, and this is precisely the market.

This is commerce, this is a market, and really nothing more. Although these are not always swindlers, not always charlatans, often these are people who really have some capabilities. But the nature of these opportunities is another matter. I would even say this: getting to a charlatan is not so dangerous, because a charlatan can extract money, deceive, force you to make some decisions that will not have the best effect on your life, but he cannot cause irreparable spiritual harm to a person. And if this is not a charlatan, if this is a real psychic, that is, a person who, voluntarily or unwittingly, has given himself up to serving the dark forces, then everything will be much worse.

Ved.: Yes, the Orthodox Church says that the worst thing, probably, is to harm your soul through communication with the world of spirits, or at least through an attempt to communicate with this world. How real is this danger, and what does it consist of?

Hegumen Nektariy: She is completely real. It’s just that most people who seek this kind of help don’t think at all about any kind of spirit world. They hear something about cosmic energies, about the hidden reserves of man himself, but do not ask questions - neither what this energy is, nor what these hidden possibilities are, but allow themselves to tell themselves any more or less suitable story for this case. In fact, we are in some kind of constant space, a field of struggle. This is approximately the struggle that Dostoevsky spoke about when he said that the human heart is a field on which God and the devil fight for a person’s soul. But all this is not so simple, not so clear. It’s not that God and the devil fight for a person’s soul, no. God gives a person everything he needs for salvation, but the enemy wants to destroy him - that would probably be more correct to say. And when a person does not even have the moral question: “Where will help come from?”, then by the mere fact that he does not make such a distinction, he puts himself in a certain risk zone. And then, when it turns out that he is looking for help from those people who draw their strength from this opposite to God, evil, terrible, destructive force, he gives this force the right to enter his life.

Why are we convinced that this kind of “miracle workers” draw their power from such an unclean source? For a very simple reason: if we talk about whether there were true miracle workers in the history of the Orthodox Church - yes, indeed, there were, and there were many of them, but none of them were engaged in the “practice of healing.” These were simply people who lived in God, and the Lord was more likely to hear and fulfill their prayers because of the purity of their hearts, because of their closeness to Him. The Lord hears every person, and is ready to fulfill every person’s prayers, but the problem is that sometimes fulfilling a person’s prayer can be dangerous for him. And there are a lot of people whose prayers cannot be fulfilled, not only because they ask for something that is not beneficial, but simply because they will become proud, die from vanity, and even simply go crazy. There are many such cases in the history of the Church, when people died only because it began to seem to them that they were miracle workers, that the Lord was fulfilling all their requests. Therefore, the Lord can fulfill the request of either a person who is close to Him and pure in heart, or of a person whose fulfillment of the request will not harm him. It is like a child who can be given a medicine, and it will cure the disease for which the child wants to be treated, but he himself may take too much or take it incorrectly, and die from some other disease or the consequences of taking this medicine.

The same people who practice healing today, if you look at their lives, are not righteous, not saints, not hermits, not silent people, not stylites. These are people who commit many sins and misdeeds in their daily lives. It's not that I blame them for something and say that they are worse than everyone else. No, they may not be worse, but they are not better either. And then the question arises: where did they get this amazing gift? If we take the consequences of this kind of treatment, we see that they turn out to be very destructive. Sometimes a person comes to a psychic with an ulcer, a certain number of years pass after receiving “help” - and he dies of stomach cancer. It happens that the life of a family, which was formed thanks to some kind of love spells and lapels, is completely destroyed. It happens that in such families terrible events occur, the cause of which is completely incomprehensible - for example, the husband suddenly jumped out of the window, and the wife turned on the gas... And no one can understand what was the starting point of that process, which then completely destroyed both family and personality.

But it also happens that nothing so terrible visibly happens, but even more terrible things happen: a person passes by God in his life. Because why does the Lord send us illnesses, sorrows, and some difficult circumstances? - Because this is a reason for us, unreasonable ones, to turn to Him. And so, as I already said, a man moved along a certain path, and suddenly someone appeared on his way and said: “You don’t need to go there, I’ll decide everything for you now.” And the problem is “solved” without repentance and without changing the person’s heart, and the person never comes to the Source of being, happiness and salvation. This is even more terrible than any visible consequences of such treatment.

Ved.: Moreover, often, when a person comes to some psychic or clairvoyant, he sees Christian paraphernalia around him - icons, candles, the Crucifix. It is difficult for him to recognize in this healer to whom he came a charlatan or a magician who could harm his soul. In such cases, what should he pay attention to, what should he think about?

Hegumen Nektariy: Well, first of all, as far as paraphernalia is concerned, this is a completely natural thing, because we live in a country with very deep and ancient Orthodox roots, and therefore for people who are engaged in providing this kind of service, in general, it is clear that this can be done great to play. Although there is another, let’s say, “layer” of specialists of this kind who understand that there is a huge craving, relatively speaking, for a certain East, and without knowing anything about this East, they surround themselves with some attributes of Eastern religious mysticism. This could be smoking sticks, certain sounds, certain poses, clothes, etc. What should you look at in order not to be deceived? Again, to what we are talking about: what does a person seek first of all? The healing of your soul, the source of the disasters of your life? If a person begins to persistently seek it, he understands that this source is his retreat from God, and even his lack of thought about Him. By and large, we must not forget that the need to analyze and think critically is something that should be inherent in absolutely every reasonable person responsible for his life. And these small precautions, critical thinking, analysis - they will already allow you to avoid such a disaster.

Ved.: Father, what should I do if, for example, I find out that some close person of mine is going to turn to such a healer, for example, and I’m trying to explain that “you can harm your soul,” I’m trying to find him some words. and he says: “No, it doesn’t matter, the most important thing is that they help me now, the most important thing is that I stop hurting.” What to do, what “last word” to find for him?

Hegumen Nektariy: The apostle says that those who are intelligent must be saved by reasonable arguments, but those who are obviously foolish must be saved by fear. That is, if a person is not afraid of spiritual consequences, we can explain the possibility of purely physical consequences, which we talked about earlier. If this person lives in the modern world, he imagines what it is like to conclude a deal or some kind of agreement. For example, people have to sell and buy an apartment, there are a lot of legal issues. And if a person has not read the agreement on the provision of certain services, he, as a rule, does not sign it. And here a person goes and signs an agreement, the subject of which is himself, but what is in this agreement, what the consequences are, he has no idea. Before using the medicine, you should read the paper accompanying it, the annotation, which states what the side effects of taking this drug may be. And I need to inform the person, if he has read it to me anywhere, what the consequences may be. And then all that remains is to pray for him and hope that he will make the right choice. Although ultimately it will depend on the person himself. And God will definitely give each person according to his heart. If a person seeks to be tempted, he will be tempted and fall in that temptation. And it’s only up to us to do the little that we can.

Ved.: It happens that a person feels some kind of unusual gift in himself: he either foresees some events, or feels that he can heal or somehow influence other people. What should he do in this case, how should he react to this, and how can we help him figure out who this gift is from - from God or from the opposite side? There is an opinion that the devil cannot bestow any gifts.

Hegumen Nektariy: It is probably necessary, without having the experience of independently distinguishing such gifts, to turn to the experience that already exists. For us, believers, such experience, or rather, a treasury of experience, is the huge library of patristic works. And with all the differences, with all the differences in those situations that are described in the lives of the saints, in various Fatherland books and Patericons, one can see something in common. When the saints were given the wondrous gift of working miracles, healing the sick, driving out unclean spirits, most of these saints, with rare exceptions, fled this gift, asking the Lord to take the gift away from them. And moreover, there were saints from whom, through their prayer, the Lord took away this gift. Why? Because they knew how easy it is even to be deceived by God’s gift, how easy it is to fall.

Why does the Apostle Peter first walk on water and then begin to sink? They say simply because he doubted. If you dig deeper, what do you doubt? He did not hesitate to step onto the raging water and walked along it. So he had enough faith to do it. But, as some interpreters explain, at some point he forgot that he was walking on water only by the power of God, he thought that he was walking on his own. And as soon as he thought that he was walking on his own, at that moment he already doubted and began to drown.

The same thing happens, and can very easily happen, to any person who has received some kind of gift from God, so the saints were afraid of these gifts. But what is a holy man? This is a person who acquired this holiness, this purity through a long-term feat, long-term attention to himself, cutting off all proud, vain, impure thoughts and movements of the heart. Do we have such experience? Do we have experience of this kind of struggle, similar heart purity? No, we don't. And therefore, if this gift (we won’t even figure out where it comes from) appears to us, of course, it can very soon destroy us.

As for the gift, I don’t think that it will be given to a person who is not ready for it by the Lord, because He cares about the person and does not want death or any temptation for him. Then this is really some kind of temptation from the enemy, and the enemy cannot perform real miracles. But, nevertheless, it has that power with a negative sign that can create the illusion of miracles. He can't really create anything, he can't create anything. But to put a patch on something, so figuratively, primitively speaking, yes, of course, it can.

But these can also be natural human abilities. Which? Not some mysterious “reserves” that psychics talk about, but rather, it is a kind of shadow of what was lost, because the primordial man was beautiful, he was perfect. And he had many possibilities that are no longer inherent to us now. Probably the most important change that has occurred is the loss of abilities in the human soul. We read in Scripture that after the fall of our forefathers, the Lord made leather vestments for them, and they became theirs and ours for the rest of their lives. Of course, these are not the skin, which, apparently, were originally present in humans. These are not the skins of wild animals with which a person covered himself so as not to be afraid of the cold. These leather vestments, according to the interpretation of many holy fathers, are a kind of “fencing off” from the spiritual world. Why? Because in his fallen state, a person would much sooner enter into a relationship with the world of fallen spirits than with the world of light spirits. And yet the increased sensitivity of the soul remains in some people. It’s like some kind of very thin membrane that catches the vibrations of what is happening, but these vibrations can be very unclear, indistinct. And again, having experienced how what you foresaw or saw in a dream comes true once, twice, three times, it is very easy to be seduced by this, very easy to be damaged. But the enemy is somewhere nearby, and he is ready to take a person who has trusted him and lead him somewhere by the hand. Not even one who believed him, but simply one who believed himself. Because it is the same - that to believe in yourself, that to believe the enemy - for him it is the same thing.

It happens that we feel that something is happening to a person close to us. Do we feel why? Our soul feels this. But it’s always better not to trust this feeling, but to at least call and ask. And even if this is confirmed, do not assume the next time we feel something again that it is so. Again, there were ascetics in the history of the Church who began to see dreams, hear some voices, and this came true, was realized. And then, at some point, they suddenly threw themselves into the abyss, committed suicide, or in some other way ended their lives in a very disastrous way.

Ved.: If a person is still tormented by the fact that, having given up his gift, he will not help someone else, how can he be consoled or his consciousness slightly changed?

Hegumen Nektariy: Again, such fear, such unbelief is a lack of hope in God, because God has many ways to help a person. And to believe that it is through our certain abilities that we do not understand that He is ready to provide this help - in fact, this is great pride and great foolishness. We have hands, we have legs, we have strength - and this is what we can really put into serving our neighbor, and we can be more or less confident in the consequences of such service. And if these are some forces unknown to us, how can we know whether these forces create or destroy? Or do they first create and then destroy? We don't know. Therefore, you should not, without knowing it yourself, destroy another person with your ignorance. Because if we talk about medicine, one of its fundamental principles is “Do no harm.” How can you be sure that you will not do harm when you operate on something that is beyond your control?

Not long ago I had to communicate with a former psychic. This sounds wonderful: “former psychic,” which in itself suggests that this is some kind of “profession” that a person acquires and then can leave it. And he was a fairly sincere, frank person who was talking about what he understood very well: what he was doing was simply making money, exploiting what he did not fully understand about himself. And this thought depressed him more and more and, in the end, tormented his conscience so much that he abandoned what he was doing. Unfortunately, such honesty, sincerity and willingness to follow the dictates of conscience are very rare. But there is another point: he felt the danger of what he was doing, because he really did not know the source of this power, these nascent abilities. But it must be said that what comes from God is always peaceful and calm, and a person has no fear, no trembling, no trembling. On the contrary, a feeling of peace. And the “power” that comes from the enemy, and the “help” that comes from him, is always associated with a feeling of anxiety, restlessness, excitement, exaltation. But again, people with the skill to distinguish between good and evil, to discern spirits, as one of the apostles says, can truly distinguish this. For us, ordinary weak people, it is better to simply remember that everything that is from God will definitely be given to us by the Lord Himself, and unexplored human abilities or “cosmic energies” are what the enemy dresses up in order to deceive us.

Interviewed by Inna Stromilova

Nika Kravchuk

How does the Church treat psychics?

Various shows with psychics are actively broadcast on television, gathering mass audiences. Turning to “clairvoyants” is a trend that has never lost its popularity. But how does the Church treat psychics? What is he criticizing for?

The Church has always spoken negatively about magicians, sorcerers, psychics, various grandmothers, hereditary witches and their activities. Why? Because they are not acting according to the will of God. They serve the devil.

And you can expect help only from two sides: either from the Lord or from the evil one. The Almighty does not act with “cheap” methods and is waiting for everyone’s personal appeal. For God, everything is possible, but he wants a person to come to everything consciously.

If a person asks for something and it will benefit him, then God sends it. After all, what is a miracle? This is a manifestation of God's mercy in response to our prayers and labors. In addition, God will find for a person only what is useful for him.

How do psychics work? They “fulfill wishes” with the help of the evil one - if a person turns to magicians and sorcerers, he begins to communicate with the devil.

This definitely harms a person’s soul.

Beware: magicians disguise themselves as Orthodox Christians

Recently, priests have been conducting active missionary work, so many people are trying to stay away from television screens with harmful programs and advertisements in the style of “A hereditary witch... will remove damage, get rid of the evil eye, return her husband, cure alcoholism.”

But the evil one is truly cunning when it comes to inventions.

Father Arkady, rector of the Church of St. Basil the Great, clearly answers the question negatively: “How does the Church relate to psychics.” He points out another problem - magicians and seers are trying to “mask” as Christians:

“If a psychic tries to disguise his activities with the Church (this is often observed when they hang icons in offices, burn some censers, candles), then this does not say anything [good]. There is a phrase in the Gospel: even demons believe and tremble. Therefore, while the psychic is not yet camouflaging his activities under [Orthodox] surroundings, he still evokes some kind of “respect.” And when it is hung with icons, crosses, candles, it’s a complete disgrace.”

In order not to fall into a trap, you need to bypass the tenth road of these people. Everything we really need we get from God. You just need to pray and give thanks.

And those who nevertheless fell into the hands of demons, because there is no other way to call it to grandmothers, face a difficult path of correction.

Yes, we do not presume to deny that psychics can “help.” A person can supposedly recover. But very often it has a certain “expiration date”.

For example, like a jar of mayonnaise: consume before such and such a date. After this it will deteriorate.

It’s just somehow insulting to compare a person to a jar of salad dressing.

In addition, regardless of the validity period of the result, the person will have to pay. This time - at the cost of the health of not only the body, but also the spirit.

Only God can heal this through the action of grace - through the church and the priest. But this process can last a very long time, often even until the end of earthly life. Too much damage has been done.

And after all this, is at least some positive answer to the question possible: “How does the Church relate to psychics?”

Take it for yourself and tell your friends!

Christian view of psychics

Seers, healers and all their other varieties claim that they either have superpowers and the ability to awaken “dormant possibilities of consciousness”, or draw strength from some “higher sources” or “accumulate the energy of the Universe ».

In any case, the attitude of the Church towards psychics is the same: if they are not scammers, then all their supernatural abilities are the actions of evil spirits.

What does Orthodoxy say about psychics?

The fact is that the spiritual world can be either heavenly or hellish. In order to work miracles by the power of God, you must be a saint. Through the prayer of, say, St. Seraphim or St. Nicholas, God actually healed the sick, ended the drought, and even resurrected the dead.

Read about Orthodox miracle workers:

Important! The gift of grace-filled miracles is given only to people with impeccable righteousness of life.

And it’s hardly possible to say this about psychics, so their “highest sources of power” are not “higher” at all and are by no means good. And even if sorcerers claim that there is no mysticism, that only the hidden capabilities of their mental energy operate, in fact, it is all the same thing.

Does the use of Orthodox shrines and prayers by sorcerers change matters?

The most modern type of sorcerers are psychics who preach occult ideas formulated in pseudoscientific terms. For example, they claim that they have the technique of condensing cosmic energy in their body in order to then use it to change the world around them, for example, to treat the sick.

But among them there are also traditionalists who prefer folk pagan beliefs mixed with Christian rituals.

People with little knowledge are often confused by the presence of Orthodox attributes in a healer’s office: candles, icons, Bibles. Such sorcerers can send a person to a temple for holy water or advise him to read prayers, but all this is just a form. The essence remains occult, non-Christian.

What is real prayer? This is a person’s appeal to God, which requires both faith and humility. The one who prays, asking God for help, submits his life to His will and places his hope in His mercy. It’s not a matter of words, but of a person’s inner mood.

Sorcerers simply offer a magical conspiracy. Even if this is the text of the Lord’s Prayer, we are not talking about God’s mercy, but about some kind of mechanical action. Allegedly, the words of this prayer themselves have power. And if you say them 3 times at sunset, on the 15th day of the month, etc., then your wish will come true - the stomach ulcer will go away, your competitor will be kicked out of work, your daughter will get married, etc.

Should you trust psychics?

The same applies to shrines. It is one thing to worship an image, mentally resorting to God, another thing is to perform, at the behest of a clairvoyant, a certain witchcraft ritual - applying to 9 icons.
It happened that healers even tried to mix their magic with the Holy Church Sacraments.

For example, they sent the client to confess and take communion in order to cleanse themselves for further rituals. Or they sent a person to be baptized a second time, with the goal of “receiving another inner essence,” because the first one was “severely damaged by corruption.”

Anyone who follows such advice will commit a grave sin. Not only is the meaning of the Holy Great Mysteries completely ignored here, but they also become part of witchcraft. It's hard to imagine a greater blasphemy!

Confession is needed to repent before the Lord, change, and receive grace to help in the fight against sins. By partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ, a person becomes one with Him in nature and unites with God Himself. This Sacrament is the basis and meaning of our religion, the main goal in the life of a Christian.

It cannot be a stage of preparation for some higher rituals. There is nothing greater than the Eucharist. But baptism happens only once, and this is not a pagan “acquisition of essence,” but a dedication of oneself to Christ. The grace of baptism remains with a person for life.

Attention! By mixing the occult with the attributes of Orthodoxy, sorcerers are trying to show that they are supposedly not at all hostile to the Church. They need this to deceive people, and maybe themselves. But there is nothing here except substitution of meaning and blasphemy.

What awaits a person who turns to sorcerers?

The priest knows many similar stories. They develop approximately according to this scenario: a person comes to a fortune teller and complains, say, about poor health. She assigns him to read “Our Father” 3 times a day for a week, supplementing it with some “especially strong prayer.”

The person does everything, but healing has not occurred. Comes for the second time. The healer says: I feel that someone from your environment has cast a strong spell on you. This is some woman with dark hair whom you have known since childhood, let's think about who it could be. They think. They find out that this is a former classmate of the client who lives in the next building.

The healer advises sprinkling her door with sacred Jerusalem soil, reading the akathist to the Mother of God “The Unbreakable Wall” 30 times and, for a month, at exactly noon, repeating a prayer to strengthen the aura.

The attitude of the church towards psychics

In this case, these are very effective protective measures. But it’s strange, a person follows the clairvoyant’s advice word for word, and the further time goes by, the worse he becomes. My health has completely deteriorated, my life is a continuous streak of failures, my soul is somehow empty and cloudy. At times he experiences bouts of despair. “This is a very angry and strong woman, she dries you out. She wants to distort your aura and shorten your life!” - the fortune teller explains to him and strengthens his protective measures more and more. “Filled with flattery and destruction, may your malice be your destruction! Just as Yegoriy fought and won, so I will crush the enemy and destroy his cause. Kissel, jelly, cook all day…” the client repeats, feeling a well-deserved fierce hatred for his former classmate.

Prayers from evil forces:

If the client finally decides to turn to the priest, he will open his eyes to the real state of affairs. When a man came to a fortune teller and began to read conspiracies, he called upon evil spirits and gave them the opportunity to influence his life. The closeness of the soul to the invisible evil world always causes melancholy, emptiness and despair.

Deterioration in health and failure after meeting a fortune teller are also caused by their influence. But their main goal, of course, is the moral degradation of a person, it is especially good if they manage to cultivate hatred in his soul. This is the most anti-Christian “measure of education.”

And it happens that the client’s wish actually comes true. The occult action gives the expected effect and the person receives the external well-being he was looking for. But this will come at a cost. Not to mention how a visit to a sorcerer will affect the state of a person’s soul, his life will soon also be crippled.

Priests know many such stories: I came to a psychic to be treated for eczema, and it helped. A few years later he fell ill with skin cancer. She asked the witch to bewitch the man, it really seemed to work, and they got married. He turned out to be a sadist and stabbed his wife to death in a fit of inexplicable anger .

Those forces that act through sorcerers only want to destroy people, “for the devil is a murderer from the beginning” (John 8-44).

Advice! The best thing that someone who has visited a healer can do is to quickly run to church and repent of everything to the priest in confession, so that the Lord will have mercy and protect the person from evil forces.

Is it a sin to watch the program “Battle of Psychics”

This will definitely not benefit the soul. A Christian should not look at occult practices, because, as has already been said, they are associated with evil forces. Why be interested in all this? In addition, at the “Battle of Psychics” a lot of lies and blasphemy are uttered. For example, that the Monk Seraphim was a great magician and modern psychics are no different from him.

Christians who know their faith are offended by such statements, and those who do not know can be misled.

Video about the church's attitude towards psychics. Archpriest Andrey Tkachev answers

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