ORTHODOX PSYCHOTHERAPY   o  ·   1     2     3  ·   4  ·   5  ·   6   © Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos CHAPTER II The orthodox therapist Prerequisites for the role of priest-therapist The value of the priesthood The calling and ordaining of the Apostles Basic prerequisites for ordination The three degrees of priesthood Rekindling the Spiritual Gift Basic qualities of priest therapists Spiritual Priesthood The Search for Therapists   [ BACK ]

So far I hope we have established the truth that Christianity is mainly a therapeutic science. It is seeking the spiritual healing of man. Yet the right practice of medicine requires a good physician, a professional physician, and this applies to spiritual healing as well. There has to be a good doctor. He is the bishop and the priest.

As we have noted before, people today feel that the priest's function is to enable them to take part in the holy sacraments. They feel that he has been commanded by God, as His servant and deacon, so that they may confess their sins and have spiritual relief. They feel him to be the deacon of God, called to pray to Him that their labours may be blessed, and so forth. Certainly no one can deny that the priest will do such work as well. But usually people seem to regard the priest rather as a magician (if I may be forgiven this expression). For when we look at the life of worship apart from curing, then rather it is magic!

We repeat however, in order to make it clear, that the priest is properly a spiritual physician who cures people's sicknesses. Worship and sacraments must be placed within the therapeutic method and treatment.

Even as a confessor, the priest is mainly a therapist. The sacrament of confession is not simply a formal absolution, especially of the Western type, as if God were angry and demanded expiation. It is something more. It is a part of the therapeutic treatment. There are numerous Christians who make confession over a period of many years but are not healed of their spiritual ills. Ignorance on the part of both the people and the pastors contributes to this.

The task of the bishop, priest or confessor is to lead the people out of Egypt into the promised land, like another Moses. This guidance requires toil and labour, privation and anguish. It is mainly therapeutic supervision. The Fathers are very insistent upon this truth. Let us take St. John of the Ladder as an example. He advises that "those of us who wish to get away from Egypt and the Pharaoh need an intermediary with God, to stand between praxis and theoria and stretch out his arms to God, that those led by him may cross the sea of sin and put to flight the Amelek of the passions". The saint goes on to say that those who rely on their own powers and claim to have no need of a guide are deceiving themselves (1). From the Old Testament story we know what Moses endured and how he guided that stiff-necked people.

This spiritual Moses is a physician. Furthermore, all of us are sick and have need of therapy and the physician.

St. Symeon the New Theologian, speaking to monks, makes this truth clear. As we know from the Orthodox Tradition, the monasteries are properly hospitals. It would be better to claim that they are medical schools. As sick people we are cured and after that we learn how to cure. That is why the early Church took priests from the monasteries, which are medical schools, to place them at the observation post of bishop.

So in speaking to monks, St Symeon does not hesitate to say that we are all poor and needy. He then tells how all of us who are in the cells are injured and affected by different illnesses; therefore we can do nothing but cry out day and night for the doctor of souls and bodies to heal our wounded hearts and give us spiritual health. The saint writes: "And that is not all: (apart from being poor and naked) we lie pitifully wounded, affected with various illnesses, or move with difficulty in our cells or monasteries as if in so many hospitals and homes for the aged. We cry out and groan and weep and call upon Him who is the physician of souls and bodies - at least in so far as we are aware of the pain of our wounds and ailments, for there are those who do not even know that they have a disease or an ailment -that He should come and cure our wounded hearts and give health to our souls that lie in the bed of sin and death. For all of us have sinned, as the holy Apostle said, and we have need of His mercy and grace" (2).

We have quoted this whole text because the mission of monasticism and the Church, as well as the work of the pastors, is shown clearly. It is chiefly a therapeutic task. We are sick in the bed of sin and death. Any who do not sense this truth are `mad'. So the Christians who do not remain in the Church in order to be healed or who feel that they are well, are mad.

According to St. Symeon the New Theologian, the priest is a physician: a person comes to the "spiritual doctor ravaged with passion, his mind all distraught..." (3). The "expert doctor", "who is human and compassionate, understands his brother's weakness, the inflammation caused by the ailment, the tumour; he sees the sick person wholly in the power of death". Then the saint describes the way in which the spiritual and expert physician approaches the sickness, and how it is to be cured (4).

We have previously mentioned two basic images which characterise the pastor's work: that he is a Moses who leads his spiritual children, and he is at the same time both a scientist and a sympathetic physician. Both these qualities are contained in one of St. Symeon's poems describing his own healing by his spiritual father, his "personal" Moses. He applies to his life the journey of the Israelite people and the guidance by Moses. He writes:

He asked his Moses for "assurances" that he could do such a thing.

And after a long journey in which, through the interventions of his spiritual father, he has succeeded in confronting the passions and being freed from slavery to them, St. Symeon begs his spiritual father:

However, in order for a person to be an Orthodox therapist and cure the spiritual ills of his spiritual children, he himself must previously have been healed as far as possible, he must stand "in the middle between praxis and theoria". How can one heal without having previously been healed or without having tasted the beginning of healing? Therefore St. Symeon accuses those who regard themselves as spiritual directors before being imbued with the Holy Spirit, rashly receiving others' confessions and daring to rule monasteries or occupy other positions of authority, "pushing themselves forward shamelessly by a thousand intrigues to be made metropolitans or bishops to guide the Lord's people..." before they have seen the bridegroom "in the bridal chamber" and become "sons of light and sons of the day" (6).

All this has been put matchlessly by St. Gregory the Theologian who writes: "It is necessary first to be purified, then to purify; to be made wise, then to make wise; to become light, then to enlighten; to approach God, then to bring others to him; to be sanctified, then to sanctify..." (7).

St. John Chrysostom, who has been hailed as an expert on the priesthood, writes in a famous passage in which he seeks to justify his refusal to be made a bishop, that he is aware of the weakness and smallness of his soul as well as the importance and difficulty of guiding the people: "I know how weak and puny my own soul is. I know the importance of that ministry and the great difficulty of it" (8).

In his discussion with St. Basil he asks him to have no doubt about what he has said, that while he loves Christ, he is afraid of provoking scandal by taking up the spiritual ministry "since the infirmity of my spirit makes me unfit for this ministry" (9). The great purity of his thoughts and feelings caused him to feel that the weakness of his soul made him unfit for this great ministry. For indeed, as will be observed later, unhealed passions prevent a priest from helping to heal his spiritual children.

If the therapist has not previously been cured, he is "commonplace". "They simply take commonplace men and put them in charge of those things..." (10).

All these things to which we have already referred point to the great truth that the priests who wish to cure the illnesses of the people must themselves have previously been cured of these illnesses, or at least have begun to be cured, and must feel the value and possibility of healing.

What is to follow will also be placed in this context. We should make it quite clear that we are not planning to look at the whole spectrum of the priesthood or the role of priests. It is not our purpose to explain the value and importance of the priesthood, but to look at this great and responsible office from the point of view that it is a therapeutic science whose main work is to cure men. If at some points we seem to be trying to underline the value of the priesthood, we do it solely in order to look at this side which we wish to emphasise here.

It is the Holy Spirit and, in more general terms, the grace of the Holy Trinity which accomplishes the cure of sick Christians. The priest is a servant of this cure. The whole organisation of the Church is divine-human. Moreover the grace of God works secretly in the priest and he knows from experience this hidden action of the grace of God.

The value of the priesthood is great. St. John Chrysostom writes: "The work of the priesthood is done on earth, but it is ranked among heavenly ordinances" since it was not ordained by man, angel, archangel or other created power, but by "the Paraclete himself" (11).

"As the sun excels the stars" so does the celebration by the priest "excel all psalmody and prayer" and differ from all the other services. This is because through the sacrament of the Eucharist we sacrifice the Only-begotten Himself who was slain for our sins (12). If one celebrates properly "the divine, revered and awesome mysteries, the benefit derived from this will be greater than that which one derives from any work or from theoria" (13).

The value of the priesthood, which can sacrifice the fatted calf, is due to the fact that it helps man to go from the image of God to the likeness of God. It can guide him towards deification, which is in fact the healing of man, or rather manifests this healing.

The Fathers, comparing the priesthood with many other kinds of work, consider it greater, because other offices help man to solve worldly problems, while the priesthood leads him to deification. Therefore "the priesthood is higher even than a kingdom", since the one "governs divine things and the other governs earthly things" (14).

Indeed, as we have emphasised, in pastoral work the priesthood is the priesthood of Christ himself. The priests minister this grace upon the people and therefore are able to forgive and heal the sins of men.

We have said only these few things about the value of the priesthood, for it was not our purpose in this chapter to emphasise the great value of that work.

The Lord calls those suitable for this work and grants them His priesthood. Thus the first bishops were the Apostles. The Lord called them to the apostolic rank, had them with Him for three whole years, then gave them the Holy Spirit to forgive sins, and sent them to preach to "all nations" and to guide people. He made them fishers of men and preachers of the Gospel. This choosing and sending them out is what made them Apostles. We have no evidence in Holy Scripture that the Lord used a special ceremony to confer the priestly service on the Apostles. We can say, however, that "the Lord, being Himself the one who instituted the sacraments, was not bound by them, but was able to make them effective through a simple expression of his will" (15). At all events, the fact is that the calling of the twelve Apostles by Christ, his appearing to them after the Resurrection, the gift of grace to forgive sins and the coming of the Paraclete on the day of Pentecost established them as shepherds for the people of God.

We also have the case of the Apostle Paul, who was not a disciple of Christ in Christ's life-time, but he too was called to the apostolic rank. He himself considered himself to be Jesus Christ's apostle: "Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the commandment of God our Saviour and the Lord Jesus Christ..." (1Tim.1,1). Indeed he writes elsewhere: "For I claim to have done no less than the very greatest of the apostles" (2Cor.11,5). In another place the same apostle writes: "I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength. By calling me into his service he has judged me trustworthy" (1Tim.1,12). He has the certainty that he was a genuine witness of the Resurrection, because while on the road to Damascus he saw the risen Christ. Therefore in recording the appearances of the risen Christ, he makes bold to claim: "Last of all, I too saw him, like the last child that comes to birth unexpectedly" (1Cor.15,8). He counts himself among the witnesses of the Resurrection.

The appearance of Christ to Paul not only conferred on him the rank of apostle but represented his ordination into the priesthood of Christ.

Prof. Romanides writes: "According to the Apostle Paul, the prophets in a parish (1Cor.14,29) are those who, like the apostles (1Cor.15,5-8), have attained deification, the vision of Christ in the glory of the Holy Trinity. Paul clearly emphasises this when he writes about the mystery of Christ `which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets...' Eph.3,5). It is within this context that the saying introductory to the listing of the members of the body of Christ is to be understood: `If one member is honoured, all the members rejoice with him' (1Cor.12,26). That is to say, the honoured member is deified and made a prophet by God. This is why the Apostle, in enumerating the various members of Christ's body, begins with the apostles and prophets and ends with those speaking in tongues and interpreting them (1Cor.12,28), which are the forms of noetic worship (Eph,5,19f). One who prophesies in Paul's terms is one who interprets the Old Testament - the New Testament did not yet exist - on the basis of the experience of the noetic prayer which is called `different kinds of tongues'. By contrast, the Prophet is one who has attained deification. This is precisely the later patristic distinction between theologising and theology. All those from the Apostle down to the person prophesying and interpreting had `varieties of tongues', that is to say, different kinds of worship of the Holy Spirit within their heart. They were therefore called by God to be members of the body of Christ and temples of the Holy Spirit. In being called by God they differed from the `uninformed' (1Cor.14,16) who had not yet received the anointing of the visitation of the Holy Spirit praying unceasingly in their hearts, and so had not yet become temples of the Holy Spirit. They had apparently been baptised with water for the remission of sins but not baptised by the Spirit, that is, chrismated. Probably the sacrament of anointing with chrism was done to confirm that the Holy Spirit had come to pray within them and therefore it came to be called `confirmatio' in Latin.

"The deified apostles and prophets and illuminated teachers, together with those possessing gifts of miracles, healing, helps, administration, or varieties of tongues (1Cor.12,28) apparently all constituted the anointed clergy and the royal priesthood, as the service of Holy Chrism indicates. The rest, as the Fathers testify, were the lay people. `Those whom God has appointed in the Church' (1Cor.12,28) clearly refers to those who have received the visitation of the Holy Spirit, with deification of the apostles and prophets and illumination of the rest, and not only through a liturgical act" (16).

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