Feast Day: February 9th
The Life of Saint Peter: He is concerned throughout his writings with the personal Ascesis and Prayer of the Hesychast. His writings are not only for Monks, since he insists that Spiritual knowledge is within everyone’s reach. He advocates continual Prayer and believes that it is possible in all situations…
+
Prayers
Saint Peter Pray to God for us.


+
“The merciful person is he, who gives to others what he, himself, received from God, whether it be money, or food, or strength, a helpful word, a Prayer or anything else that he has through which he can express his compassion for those in need.”
“Patient endurance kills the despair that kills the Soul; it teaches the Soul to take comfort and not to grow listless in the face of its many battles and afflictions”
“Such are the Souls of the Saints: they love their enemies more than themselves, and in this age and in the age to come they put their neighbour first in all things, even though because of his ill-will he may be their enemy. They do not seek recompense from those whom they love, but because they have themselves received they rejoice in giving to others all that they have, so that they may conform to their Benefactor and imitate His compassion to the best of their ability; ‘for He is bountiful to the thankless and to sinners’ (cf. Luke 6:35).”
“He who has not tasted something, says Basil the Great, does not know what he is missing; but once he has tasted it, he is filled with longing. Thus he who has tasted the sweetness of the Commandments, and realizes that they lead him gradually towards the imitation of Christ, longs to acquire them all, with the result that he often disdains even death for their sake. Glimpsing the Mysteries of God hidden in the Holy Scriptures, he thirsts to grasp them fully; and the more knowledge he gains, the more he thirsts, burning as though drinking flames. And because the Divine cannot be grasped fully by anyone, he continues to thirst for ever.”
“…we have never achieved anything good on our own, but all good things are ours from God by Grace, and come as it were from nothingness into being. For ‘what do you have which you did not receive?’ asks Saint Paul – receive, that is, freely from God; ‘and if you received it, why do you boast as if you had not received it’ (I Cor. 4:7), but had achieved it by yourself? Yet by yourself you cannot achieve anything, for the Lord has said: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing’ (John 15:5).”
“Stillness, which is the basis of the Soul’s purification, makes the observance of the Commandments relatively painless. ‘Flee,’ it has been said, ‘keep silence, be still, for herein lie the roots of sinlessness.’ Again it has been said: ‘Flee men and you will be saved.’ For human society does not permit the intellect to perceive either its own faults or the wiles of the demons, so as to guard itself against them. Nor, on the other hand, does it allow the intellect to perceive God’s providence and bounty, so as to acquire in this way knowledge of God and humility.”
“We should give thanks to Him, as it is said: ‘In everything give thanks’ (I Thess. 5:18). Closely linked to this phrase is another of Saint Paul’s injunctions: ‘Pray without ceasing’ (I Thess. 5:17), that is, be mindful of God at all times, in all places, and in every circumstance. For no matter what you do, you should keep in mind the Creator of all things. When you see the light, do not forget Him who gave it to you; when you see the sky, the Earth, the sea and all that is in them, marvel at these things and Glorify their Creator; when you put on clothing, acknowledge Whose gift it is and praise Him Who in His Providence has given you life. In short, if everything you do becomes for you an occasion for Glorifying God, you will be Praying unceasingly. And in this way your Soul will always rejoice, as Saint Paul commends (cf. I Thess. 5:16).”
“In the words of the Psalmist, ‘As you lie in bed, repent of what you say in your heart’ (Ps. 4:4 LXX), that is, repent in the stillness of the night, remembering the lapses that occurred in the confusion of the day and disciplining yourself in Hymns and Spiritual songs (cf. Col. 3:16) – in other words, teaching yourself to persist in Prayer and Psalmody through attentive meditation on what you read. For the practice of the moral Virtues is effectuated by meditating on what has happened during the day, so that during the stillness of the night we can become aware of the sins we have committed and can grieve over them.”
“Every trial and temptation is permitted by God as a cure for some sick person’s Soul. Indeed, such trials not only confer on us forgiveness of our past and present sins, but also act as a check on sins not yet committed.”
“For to sin, even in the case of those who are most righteous, is easy, while repentance is not easy for everyone because death is near; and even before death comes there is despair. It is good, then, not to fall; or, if we fall, to rise again. And should we fall, we should not despair and so estrange ourselves from the Lord’s love. For if He so chooses, He can deal Mercifully with our weakness. Only we should not cut ourselves off from Him or feel oppressed when constrained by His Commandments, nor should we lose heart when we fall short of our goal. Rather, let us learn that a thousand years in the sight of the Lord are but a single day, and a single day is as a thousand years (cf. Ps. 90:4). Let us be neither hasty nor tardy, and let us be always ready to make a new start. If you fall, rise up. If you fall again, rise up again. Only do not abandon your Physician, lest you be condemned as worse than a suicide because of your despair. Wait on Him, and He will be Merciful, either reforming you, or sending you trials, or through some other provision of which you are ignorant.”
“Only, as has been said, in all things we ought to renounce our own will so as to attain the goal God has set for us and to pursue whatever He wishes. Unless we do this we can never be saved. For since Adam’s transgression we are all subject to the passions because of our constant association with them. We do not gladly pursue goodness, nor do we long for the knowledge of God, nor do we do good out of love, as the dispassionate do; instead we cling to our passions and our vices and do not aspire at all to do what is good unless constrained by the fear of punishment.”
“Then, coming to itself, the intellect recognizes its proper dignity – to be master of itself – and is able to see things as they truly are; for its eye, made blind by the devil through the tyranny of the passions, is opened. Then man is granted the Grace to be buried Spiritually with Christ, so that he is set free from the things of this world and no longer captivated by external beauty. He looks upon gold and silver and precious stones, and he knows that like other inanimate things such as wood and rock they are of the Earth, and that man, too, is after death a bit of dust and mould in the tomb. Regarding all the delectations of this life as nothing, he looks upon their continual alteration with the judgment that comes from Spiritual knowledge. Gladly he dies to the world, and the world becomes dead to him: he no longer has any violent feeling within him, but only calmness and detachment.”
“The greater one’s purity, the more clearly one sees how much one sins; and the more one sins, the more benighted one is, even though one may appear to be pure. Again, the more knowledge one has, the more one thinks oneself ignorant; and the more one is ignorant of one’s ignorance and of the shortcomings in one’s Spiritual knowledge, the more one thinks one knows. The more the Spiritual contestant endures afflictions, the more he will defeat the enemy; and, lastly, the more one tries for one day to do something good, the more one is a debtor all the days of one’s life, as Saint Mark has said; for even if the ability and desire to do good are one’s own the Grace to do it comes from God. It is only because of this Grace that we are able to do anything good; when we do it, then, what have we to boast about?”
“Just as sick people need surgery and cautery to recover the health they have lost, so we need trials, and toils of repentance, and fear of death and punishment, so that we may regain our former health of Soul and shake off the sickness which our folly has induced. The more the Physician of our Souls bestows upon us voluntary and involuntary suffering, the more we should thank Him for His compassion and accept the suffering joyfully: For it is to help us that He increases our tribulation, both through the sufferings we willingly embrace in our repentance and through the trials and punishments not subject to our will. In this way, if we voluntarily accept affliction, we will be freed from our sickness and from the punishments to come, and perhaps even from present punishments as well.”
“God says, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your Soul, and with all your might’ (Deut. 6:5); yet how much have the Fathers said and written – and still say and write – without equaling what is contained in that single phrase? For, as Saint Basil the Great has said, to love God with all your Soul means to love nothing together with God; for if someone loves his own Soul, he loves God, not with all his Soul, but only partially; and if we love ourselves and innumerable other things as well, how can we love God or dare to claim that we love Him? It is the same with love of one’s neighbour. If we are not willing to sacrifice this temporal life, or perhaps even the life to come, for the sake of our neighbour, as were Moses and Saint Paul, how can we say that we love him? For Moses said to God concerning his people, ‘If Thou wilt forgive their sins, forgive; but if not, blot me as well out of the book of life which Thou hast written’ (Ex. 32:32 LXX); while Saint Paul said, ‘For I could wish that I myself were severed from Christ for the sake of my brethren’ (Rom. 9:3). He Prayed, that is to say, that he should perish in order that others might be saved — and these others were the Israelites who were seeking to kill him.”
“Every tribulation that we accept patiently is good and profitable; but if we do not accept it patiently, it drives us away from God and serves no useful purpose. When this happens, there is only one cure – humility. The humble man censures and blames himself and no one else when he suffers affliction. Consequently, he patiently awaits for God to release him, and when this happens he rejoices and gratefully endures whatever comes; and through his experience of these things he gains Spiritual knowledge. Recognizing his own ignorance and weakness, he seeks diligently for the Physician and, seeking, he finds Him, as Christ himself has said (cf. Matt. 7:8). Having found God, he longs for Him; and the more he longs, the more God longs for him. Then, purifying himself as much as he can, he struggles to make room in himself for the Beloved for Whom he longs. And the Beloved for Whom he longs, finding room for Himself in this man, takes up His abode there, as the Gerontikon says. Dwelling there He protects His home, and fills it with light. And the person thus filled with light knows and, knowing, he is known, as Saint John of Damaskos says.”
Even if you are not what you should be, you should not despair. It is bad enough that you have sinned; why in addition do you wrong God by regarding Him in your ignorance as powerless? Is He, who for your sake created the great universe that you behold, incapable of saving your Soul? And if you say that this fact, as well as His Incarnation, only makes your condemnation worse, then repent; and He will receive your repentance, as He accepted that of the prodigal son (cf. Luke 15:20) and the prostitute (cf. Luke 7:37-50). But if repentance is too much for you, and you sin out of habit even when you do not want to, show humility like the publican (cf. Luke 18:13): this is enough to ensure your Salvation. For he who sins without repenting, yet does not despair, must of necessity regard himself as the lowest of creatures, and will not dare to judge or censure anyone. Rather, he will marvel at God’s compassion, and will be full of gratitude towards his Benefactor, and so receive many other blessings as well. Even if he is subject to the devil in that he sins, yet from fear of God he disobeys the enemy when the latter tries to make him despair. Because of this he has his portion with God; for he is grateful, gives thanks, is patient, fears God, does not judge so that he may not be judged. All these are crucial qualities. It is as Saint John Chrysostom says about Gehenna: it is almost of greater benefit to us than the Kingdom of Heaven, since because of it many enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, while few enter for the sake of the Kingdom itself; and if they do enter it, it is by virtue of God’s compassion. Gehenna pursues us with fear, the Kingdom embraces us with love, and through them both we are saved by God’s Grace (Homily On 1 Timothy 15:3).
A weak person especially ought to pay attention to the promptings of his conscience, so that he may free his Soul from all condemnation. Otherwise at the end of his life he may repent in vain and mourn eternally. The person who cannot endure for Christ’s sake a physical death as Christ did, should at least be willing to endure death Spiritually. Then he will be a Martyr with respect to his conscience, in that he does not submit to the demons that assail him, or to their purposes, but conquers them, as did the Holy Martyrs and the Holy Fathers. The first were bodily Martyrs, the latter Spiritual Martyrs. By forcing oneself slightly, one defeats the enemy; through slight negligence one is filled with darkness and destroyed.
+