Orthodox evangelism of Hegumen Eumenius. Psychology of contact. Trends in modern psychotherapy

The word "neurosis" is widely used as a collective term to refer to disorders that share three common characteristics. Firstly, they are all functional disorders, i.e. are not accompanied by organic brain diseases. Secondly, they are not psychoses, i.e. the patient, regardless of the severity of the condition, does not lose contact with the outside world, with reality. Third, they - unlike personality disorders - are characterized by a clearly discernible onset rather than by continuous development. early years adult life.

Currently, about 400 million people suffer from some form of mental disorder. Of these, about 80% suffer from borderline (on the verge of health and illness) neuropsychic disorders, among which neuroses occupy the leading place. According to modern definition According to our country, neurosis is a psychogenic (usually conflict-generating) neuropsychic disorder that occurs as a result of a violation of particularly significant life relationships person and manifests itself in specific clinical phenomena in the absence of psychotic phenomena. Simply put, neurosis develops when a person, due to various circumstances, cannot find a suitable way out of a difficult situation, resolve a psychologically significant situation, or endure a tragedy.

The term “neurosis” has become firmly established in our lives and is unknown only to an infant. There are school and retirement neuroses; neuroses of achievement and loneliness; somatogenic and environmental, as well as many other varieties of this unpleasant disease. A special group consists of the so-called noogenic neuroses associated with the loss or lack of meaning in life and value conflicts. There is evidence that approximately every fifth neurotic case has a noogenic basis. In fact, it seems that almost every neurosis has spiritual roots.

The concept of “neurosis” was first proposed in 1776 by Cullen, and since then discussions about the essence of neurosis, the roots of its occurrence and the mechanisms of its formation have not become less pressing. Today it is difficult to find in medicine another concept interpreted by different scientific schools so ambiguous and even contradictory. Neurotic reactions that can occur in a person following severe shocks, conflicts, somatic illnesses or life troubles are very diverse. Their manifestations are refracted by a person’s personality, the characteristics of his character. Hence, views on this problem also differ in polarity.

Moreover, at the forefront of scientific discussions are not only questions of the taxonomy of neuroses, but their very existence as a nosological form. extreme point the view of some psychiatrists looks something like this: “neurosis is normal behavior in an abnormal society.” Other points of view can be presented as follows: cerebral dysfunction; repression into the unconscious; rigidity of attitudes and dogmatic way of thinking; inability to predict conflict and prepare for it; incorrect behavioral stereotypes;
dissatisfaction of the need for self-actualization and many other assumptions.

Some researchers attribute the origins of neuroses to a certain uniqueness of the mind, others to the pathology of emotions, others to the process of self-knowledge, and still others to psychological immaturity and infantilism. There are also authors who tend to think that neurosis is a hereditary disease. There are many opinions, but there is no clarity.

Among clinicians, not only psychoanalysts have noticed a clear connection between neuroses and personality. Some psychiatrists viewed neurosis as a stress response occurring in people with abnormal personality.

It should be said that every psychological direction only then did it become wealthy in the eyes of its colleagues when its representatives were able to argue in a reasoned and new way about their views on neurosis.

IN last decade questions of the origin of neuroses began to be actively revised. Attitude towards neurosis as a mild mental dysfunction in to a large extent changes. The principle of functionality (easy reversibility) is not confirmed by modern clinical practice. According to data published in the press, recovery from neuroses occurs in less than 40-50% of patients. It has been established that in the first three years only 10% of patients recover from neuroses.

Often suffering lasts for years and even decades. Consequently, neurosis more often arises due to some internal personal mechanisms. External provoking factors and circumstances represent only the “last straw”, the trigger for the development of neurotic disorders. A person prone to this illness develops a peculiar “ability” to react to life with nervous weakness, irritability, obsession or hysteria. Some reasons (conflicts, stress) go away over time, become irrelevant, and soon others take their place, and the illness resumes again.

The presence of neurosis or a predisposition to it can be determined by the following signs given by A. Beck:

1. To be happy, it is necessary that I be successful in any business that I undertake.
2. To become happy, it is necessary that I be accepted, loved and admired by all people and at all times.
3. If I'm not on top, then I'm in the hole.
4. It’s great to be popular, famous, it’s terrible to be unpopular.
5. If I made a mistake, then that means I’m worthless.
6. My value as a person depends on what people think of me.
7. I can't live without love. If my loved ones (lover, parents, child) don’t love me, it’s terrible.
8. If he doesn't agree with me, it means he doesn't love me.
9. If I don't take advantage of every opportunity to get ahead, I will regret it.

What causes neuroses? Neurosis depends primarily on the strength of the impulses of sinful desires and the impossibility of their expression either in any decent direct way or in healthy methods of displacement. If a man has been enraged or corrupted from early childhood, he is often unable to deal with the accumulated excitement by the normal methods at his disposal; then this excitement will interfere with his happiness and the productivity of his work, unless he receives help from without.

If a person experiences difficulties trying to cope with his accumulated tensions, then any change in one of the mentioned factors can cause neurosis. Everything can be fine until circumstances lead to an increase in the tension of sinful desires (increased, for example, indignation or sexual arousal), to an increase in the severity of the voice of one’s conscience (feelings of guilt), to a weakening of the ability to store (in case of physical illness) or to deprive a person of ways of healthy expression of tensions (in prison); and then a breakdown occurs.

The role of the voice of conscience is very important, determining how much stress an individual allows himself to relieve and how much he has to store. If the voice of conscience is lenient, it admits free relief, and little storage is required; if he is demanding, allowing only small satisfactions, then many tensions accumulate, overloading the storage capacity. This does not mean that in order to avoid neuroses one must give free expression to one’s impulses. First of all, such behavior can lead to such significant complications with the outside world, that is, with nature and with other people, that further relief becomes impossible, and ultimately more tension accumulates than ever before.

Psychologists say that it is wiser to observe abstinence than to risk offending the voice of conscience: he is a picky master, and his punishment is difficult to avoid. Let's say a woman decides that her conscience will allow her to have an abortion without subsequent punishment from the voice of conscience. If she is not able to correctly judge her true feelings, she may think at this moment that everything will be all right; but if, as often happens, she judges herself incorrectly, then the feeling of guilt can awaken a long time later and, perhaps, under the influence of the incessant reproaches of the voice of conscience, will break through at forty or fifty years.

Sometimes it is impossible to live together with a neurotic person. His demands for love may be excessive. He considers any decrease in its level as its end and, with his nagging, finally destroys it. Healthy man understands that if he does not love someone, then they may not love him either. A neurotic is another matter. He may not love a person, but he is still obliged to love him.

Another important factor in neurosis is the amount of unfinished business left over from childhood. The greater this number, the more likely neurosis is in a given situation and the more severe it may turn out to be. For example, of three patients who shared hardships military service, whose fathers died when they were respectively two, four and eight years old, the first had the most severe breakdown, the second less severe, and the third the mildest. The first had the most unfinished "father's business", the second had less, and the third had the least.

The strength of their neuroses corresponded to their emotional experience - or lack of experience - with older men; this attitude is important in army life, where the officer plays the role of a father figure in many ways. A person with few emotional remnants of early childhood can later endure, without breaking down, more tension than a person with a number of unresolved childhood problems.

Neurotics often say: "My mother and my father were nervous people, so I'm nervous. I inherited this."

This is not true. Neurosis is not inherited; but its foundations can be laid in early childhood due to parental behavior. Neurosis depends on how a person uses his mental strength. Some of its tendencies may depend on the inherited constitution; but his actual development depends more on what he learns from observing his parents. Whatever the baby's parents do seems to him to be the "natural order of things," since he rarely has the opportunity to compare their behavior with the behavior of others.

We have already described how, by imitating them, he becomes pleasant and loving or evil and greedy. If he sees that when faced with difficulties, parents lose their temper, instead of coping with reality according to the reality principle, then he will imitate their behavior. If they use their mental powers in a neurotic way, then he will have a tendency to do the same, because all the behavior of the parents appears to the infant as “necessary”. So, if his parents are neurotic, then he may grow up to be neurotic, but not because he inherited their neurosis, just as his father and mother did not inherit it. They learned neurosis, in turn, from their parents.

It is possible that the strength of sinful desires, the ability to go through the processes necessary to form a strong voice of conscience, and the ability of the psyche to store mental forces and perceptions are hereditary, but the use that a person makes of these innate abilities depends on his early training. Apparently, some children have a harder time developing a normal personality from birth than others, and this places an additional burden on their parents, who must behave especially carefully in such cases. If they did not succeed, then the pastor faces the task of correcting the neurotic behavior traits, no matter how long they have been present; in the process of correction, he must take into account all kinds of qualities and inclinations with which a person was born into the world.

The origins of many neuroses lie in those processes that also determine the development of personality. This line of reasoning has led to the term "neurotic character", denoting a personality whose nature is apparently similar to that assumed in neuroses, even though such a person may currently have no neurotic symptoms.

The symptoms of a neurotic breakdown are well known: decreased mood, irritability, insomnia, a feeling of internal discomfort, lethargy, apathy, loss of appetite. Obsession, outbursts of aggressiveness, anger, etc. may appear. All these symptoms are accompanied by general malaise, unpleasant somatic sensations, and autonomic dysfunction. With neurosis, a person retains clear criticism, is burdened by his condition, but sometimes cannot change anything about himself. In J. Furst’s book “The Neurotic: His Environment and Inner World” we read: “Many neurotics do very well in teaching, research work and other types of intellectual activity, but at the same time they struggle in vain with personal difficulties of a clearly emotional nature." The same author notes that the feelings of a neurotic are stronger than his intellectual convictions, the emotions of a neurotic are the product of his distorted understanding of the objective situation.

Neurotic disorders can occur at three “levels”: as individual symptoms, as minor neurotic disorders and as specific neurotic syndromes. Some symptoms may appear from time to time in some people with normal mental health. In a minor neurotic disorder (otherwise known as a minor emotional disorder), a number of neurotic symptoms occur simultaneously without the predominance of any one; This disorder is often observed in general practice. With specific neurotic syndromes, one type of symptoms predominates; such disorders are more common in psychiatric practice.

The body of a neurotic, in the apt expression of K. Horney, begins to resemble totalitarian state, where rulers live at the expense of their subjects, subtly mocking the latter. Sooner or later a revolution begins and neurosis develops.

The most common complaints among neurotics are anxiety and restlessness, but depression and despondency are almost as common. For the most part these complaints are presented almost simultaneously, and it is impossible to determine which of them should be considered primary.
Almost half of patients have somatic symptoms, and approximately one in four exhibits excessive concern related to the functioning of the body. Some of these somatic symptoms are autonomic manifestations of anxiety; as a rule, the anxiety of patients is so often concentrated on these and other physical sensations when they consult a doctor.

It may be that patients sometimes tend to emphasize somatic complaints, believing that this will be received more sympathetically than emotional complaints. Some apparently also want the assurance that the doctor will carefully examine them for physical illness before classifying their symptoms as psychological.

Patients usually also complain of sleep disturbances, especially difficulty falling asleep and restlessness at night. Complaints about early awakening suggest that this condition may not be a neurosis, but the initial stage of a depressive disorder. Approximately one fifth of patients report having obsessive thoughts and mild compulsive urges. Clear phobic symptoms were less common, although mild phobias are, of course, very common among people with normal mental health. Complaints of fatigue and irritability were also common, and in many cases they were accompanied by difficulty concentrating and a loss of joy. In the past, the grouping of these particular symptoms was considered neurasthenia.

The most typical for patients with minor neurotic disorders are somatic complaints associated with digestive system. In addition, there may be complaints of poor appetite, nausea, weight loss or difficulty swallowing, as well as discomfort in the left iliac region. Cardiovascular complaints include palpitations, precordial discomfort, and concern about possible cardiac disease. Other complaints include pain in the neck, shoulders and back. Headaches are usually described as a feeling of squeezing, squeezing, or a constant dull or throbbing pain.
It is widely believed that childhood experiences play an important role in the development of neurosis in adults. The so-called neurotic traits of childhood are expressed in thumb sucking, nail biting; This also includes childhood fears, food oddities, stuttering and bedwetting.

The etiology of neurosis is believed to include three components. First, it is assumed that the fundamental symptom of all neuroses is anxiety; other symptoms are secondary and arise as a result of the action of defense mechanisms, which are aimed at reducing this anxiety. Secondly, anxiety arises when the conscious “I” is unable to cope, on the one hand, with the pressure of psychic energy emanating from sinful desires, and on the other hand, with the demands of conscience. Thirdly, neuroses begin in childhood, when it is not possible to normally go through any of the three postulated stages of development.

In the etiology of neuroses, the concept of “neurotic behavior” occupies a special place. Based on the theoretical premises of Eric Berne, it can be assumed that tensions of sinful desires unsatisfied over a long period of time can cause mental difficulties in the form of insomnia, absent-mindedness, restlessness, irritability, sullenness, increased sensitivity to noise, nightmares, unsociability, or the feeling that something is wrong with you. everyone is talking.

Along with these symptoms of chronic anxiety, which everyone may experience from time to time, some people experience special symptoms: hysteria, paralysis, blindness, loss of speech, and a variety of other abnormalities that mimic physical illness; Individual people suffer from different forms of obsessive behavior: they complain of constant doubts, inability to make decisions, strange fears that haunt their thoughts and provoke an inability to refrain from repeating the same actions, for example, counting, washing hands frequently, stealing (kleptomania) or walking back and forth around the room. These are all abnormal ways of partially alleviating sinful desires, if they are presented strongly enough, they have some common features.

Let's list them:

1. They are all unsuitable; this means that they all use mental forces in a way that cannot lead to ultimate relief of tension. Mental forces are used to satisfy sinful passions, ultimately causing harm or misfortune to the individual.

2. They all waste mental strength. Instead of being spent under the control of the conscious "I", mental forces are wasted in vain, despite all the efforts of the "I" to change such behavior. The conscious "I" loses control over part of these mental forces.

3. All of them come from the tension of sinful desires that have not found satisfaction for a long time, from the “unfinished business of childhood.”

4. They are all disguised expressions of sinful desires, so well disguised that throughout the history of human thought their true nature was not clearly recognized until the discoveries made eighty years ago.

5. They all use the same useless or harmful methods again and again for disguised expression. This is called "repetition compulsion." It seems as if the individual is forced to experience the same patterns of behavior over and over again when the conscious self loses control.

6. They usually arise from the energy of passions directed inward, which in reality requires an external object for complete satisfaction; in any case, in this case there is always a displacement of the object, and the false object turns out to be either the individual himself, or something merely closely connected with the genuine object.

Any behavior characterized by these characteristics is called neurotic. Neurosis, or psychoneurosis, occurs in cases where this behavior becomes so significant that it interferes with normal life and harms an individual's productivity, well-being, and ability to relate to or love others. So, neurosis is a medical diagnosis of an illness that arises from repeated erroneous attempts to satisfy the tension of sinful desires in unprofitable ways, wasting mental strength, originating from unfinished affairs of childhood, expressing the tension of desires in a disguised, and not in a direct form, using the same ones again and again same templates.

Normal behavior consists of the effective use of mental forces in a way appropriate to a given situation to satisfy certain desires aimed at corresponding objects in the surrounding reality. Examples of this include planning your financial security, raising healthy children or conquering nature.

Neurotic behavior spends mental energy senselessly and wastefully in order to satisfy passionate desires through old patterns of behavior aimed at substitutes, and not at genuine objects or at the individual himself. Examples include gambling, excessive concerns about the intestines, diet and appearance, promiscuity and an obsessive desire to “win” people of the opposite sex, a passion for accumulating property and objects that have no practical and aesthetic value, smoking, drinking.

As can be seen from these examples, neurotic behavior in a mild form turns out to be harmless, socially harmless and normal in some cases; It is only when it becomes harmful to the individual or to others that it is called neurosis or a similar medical term.

For a holistic understanding of the origins of neurotic disorders (as, indeed, other diseases), it is necessary to rise to the highest personal level and consider this pathology from the perspective spiritual origin, from the position of Orthodox dogma and Patristic writings. And then in many cases the root of suffering will be discovered - spiritual blindness, ignorance of spiritual needs, atheism.

Saint Theophan the Recluse points out that “the natural relationship of the constituent parts of a person should be, according to the law of subordination of the lesser to the greater, the weaker to the stronger, such that the body should be subordinate to the soul, the soul to the spirit, and the spirit, by its nature, should be immersed in God. In God it should man remains with his whole being and consciousness. Moreover, the power of the spirit over the soul depends on the Divinity inherent in it, the power of the soul over the body on the spirit that possesses it. After falling away from God, there occurred, and was bound to occur, confusion in the entire composition of man: the spirit, separated from God, lost its strength and submitted to the soul, the soul, not exalted by the spirit, submitted to the body. Man, with his whole being and consciousness, was mired in sensuality." Thus, neurosis is, first of all, spiritual, and only then psychophysiological in nature.

Deep neurosis is an indicator of moral ill health, spiritual and emotional discord. Its forms are different: neurasthenia (despondency, “crying of the soul” or irritability, intolerance); hysteria, which is closely related to the sins of pride and vanity; neurotic obsessions (“mental chewing gum”, tendency to excessive rationalization). Sin, as the root of all evil, is close to neurotic disorders. Taking place in the depths of the human spirit, it arouses passions, disorganizes the will, and takes emotions and imagination out of the control of consciousness (Reverend Theophan the Recluse writes about this in detail in his works).

Sin determines the appropriate spiritual soil for the emergence of neurosis. In the future, the development of neurotic manifestations may depend on character traits, living conditions and upbringing, neurophysiological prerequisites, as well as various stresses and other circumstances, many of which remain unknown. It’s impossible to fit everything into one diagram. Life is much more complicated. In one person a neurosis develops, while in another the reaction is limited to a strong shock, but the disease does not arise. Deep Essence neuroses are a secret known only to God.

Since the time of our forefathers human nature damaged by sin. Therefore, a person suffering from neurosis is no better or worse than others. Neurosis is only a special case of the consequences of sin.

A doctor cannot replace a priest. It only precedes it. The doctor sometimes acts as a “barrier” to prevent the patient from falling into even greater temptations and sins (alcohol, fornication, suicide).

However, today among psychiatrists and psychotherapists believers are a minority. This, in my opinion, is one of the reasons for the low effectiveness of help for neuroses. Psychotherapy today has about 1000 psychocorrective techniques, trying to help the restless soul in an ever-changing way. But quality cannot be replaced by quantity. True healing from spiritual grief can only occur through repentance, which requires spiritual effort and is unusual for a large part of our contemporaries (including doctors). Every disease has spiritual roots, but it is sometimes impossible to recognize them.

Neurosis stands out from other mental and somatic diseases in that it is a kind of sensitive moral barometer. Its connection with the spiritual realm is obvious. And the onset of this illness, due to mental anguish and remorse, can be rapid.

The difficulties associated with finding the causes of neuroses are due to the fact that most scientists and practitioners have tried and are trying to solve this complex problem on their own, without God’s help, without faith. The spirituality of a person (patient) is either replaced by education, erudition, or is not taken into account at all and is denied. The activities of this kind of researchers are comparable to running in circles. Such labors will not bear true fruit. By the way, many of the consequences of spiritual damage in a person suffering from neurosis have been discovered, in my opinion, correctly. I have already mentioned the pathology of the process of self-knowledge, the “neurotic” structure of thinking and the characteristics of the emotional sphere. However, first these same qualities were upset on the spiritual level, and only then were, as it were, reflected in mental life individual. Moreover, everything said above applies not only to neuroses, but also to a wide group of disorders that make up the so-called “minor” psychiatry (character accentuations, acquired psychopathy, etc.).

I would like there to be more Orthodox believers among scientists, including doctors and psychologists.”

The following principles apply to all neurotic disorders. The complex of therapeutic measures consists of three parts: treatment aimed at alleviating symptoms; actions taken to resolve problems; measures aimed at improving the relationship of the flock with God and with neighbors.

For mild symptoms, supportive conversations are effective.

When neurotic anxiety appears, there is no need to achieve complete relief; to a certain extent, it can motivate the flock to make changes in their lives.
However, unfortunately, “a neurotic does not resolve existential problems, but represses them, building a system of neurotic defense: delusional fictions and sick illusions. Many of his creative potentials are not realized and are falsely sublimated, which also distorts a person’s character. The neurotic’s self-conception does not come from personal center, and on a fictitious basis asserts something partial, peripheral: attributing to oneself non-existent qualities, obsession, fears, anxieties about illusory dangers and reluctance to see real dangers. The mentally ill person has distorted relationships with being, the cosmos, things. He takes secondary signs of an object for essential ones , or endows an object with non-existent qualities. in this case, means life in the illusory world. Thus, neurosis is an attempt to avoid the threat of non-existence (contained in every existential problem), which leads to the denial of being itself.

Whenever possible, the flock should solve his problems himself, and not other persons, although relatives should be encouraged to assist him on occasion. However, if problems prove insurmountable or protracted, active pastoral support may be needed.
The flock should be encouraged to participate in identifying problems as they arise, to consider what can be done to solve each problem, and in what order they should be overcome. In this way, he will be better prepared to cope independently with difficulties in the future. If problems cannot be solved, the flock should make peace with them.

As a rule, in flocks with minor neurotic disorders, the problems are only temporary, but for some, social difficulties can be prolonged. They often lack friends whom they could confide in, or some satisfying activity. The pastor can help such people to become involved in active parish or monastic life, associated with responsibility and the ability to make independent decisions.

Some flocks with chronic neuroses lack social contacts is the result of long-standing difficulties in social relations; such people can be helped by using one of the methods existing in modern psychotherapy.

Ecology of life. People: We live in an era of consumption. Most people look at relationships the same way: if there is something to consume, if it is “tasty,” then they are attracted to the source of consumption.

The value of life

Anything can happen in life.

Sometimes you're on top, sometimes you're down.

Sometimes you are a source of energy for others, and sometimes you simply have nothing to give, you feel empty.

It happens that you are impeccable in words and actions, and sometimes you make mistake after mistake.

Sometimes you are extremely selfish, and after a while you are self-sacrificing and unconditional love.

This sinusoid different people- different amplitudes.

We live in an era of consumption. Most people look at relationships the same way: if there is something to consume, if it is “tasty,” then they are attracted to the source of consumption. If the people who surround you have had enough of you, have had enough of you, you become uninteresting. You seem to have demonstrated complete openness and sincerity - but, thus, having revealed yourself completely, you turned out to be “a person without a secret,” and therefore already (as it seems to them) understood, studied, explored.

When we have sacrificially emptied ourselves, “in the name of our neighbor,” alas, our neighbors will go looking for someone else.

When you are empty, “spiritless”, uncreative and joyless, when, as it seems to you, “you have given everything to others” and nothing new is born - who will notice you, who needs you? Will someone be able to come and fill you with their soul, support you, give you something to drink, or just be with you? This is how you think during a downturn.

Those who called themselves friends don’t notice, don’t answer, it’s as if you don’t exist for them at all, binding thread lost... Warmly beloved ones become indifferent, clarity, light, community leave the relationship...

More and more often I hear stories about how famous artists, famous preachers, great writers, who devoted their whole soul to their work, pass away from life with a feeling of being misunderstood, unclaimed and alone.

When you are in a recession, it may seem to you that life has already been lived, everything that you could do has been done, and the most important thing has not happened, has not happened.

You can read in a book or on the Internet that “among the many opinions about me, the most true is the opinion of the person who loves me most,” but at that time it will seem to you that this loving, understanding and accepting person in your life no and never will be... That is, there are no longer those for whom... it makes sense to do something, who will encourage and gather you when life takes you to the sidelines.

All that remains is to build a vertical within yourself again, to find your Center, God inside you, to find your most Permanent Impermanence... After all, you once agreed to follow this path. So so be it. So it is as it is. Just accept that no one can quench this thirst...

Anyone who follows the path of Fire must trust his Deep Self and follow it, no matter how strange it may sometimes look from the outside. You will look detached, unsociable, sad. Don’t be fooled by attempts to “get at” and “stir” you.

Time to collect yourself and return to yourself. Feel your own value for yourself, the value of your life, your inner world. This is the time when you need to return to yourself from relationships with people. Don’t chase what is slipping away, don’t look for what is no longer there. Bring yourself back to yourself, gather yourself, the waves of your Ocean are returning back at this time.

This is a certain stage in the life of your soul. Accept it as a Divine Gift, with gratitude.

“I apparently have such ideas about God that it is impossible to be disappointed in them,” Abbot Evmeniy Peristy said in an interview with KV. His life position surprisingly accurately illustrates the words of the Savior “The Spirit breathes where it will” (Gospel of John).

Hegumen Evmeniy Peristy has been a clergyman of the Russian Orthodox Church since 1989, from 1992 to 2006 he was the rector of the Makariev-Reshem Monastery in the Ivanovo region, and from 2006 to 2008 he was an employee of the Missionary Department of the Moscow Patriarchate. Now he is an employee of the Drug Addiction Rehabilitation Center " Father's house" (village Mukhortovo, Kineshma, Russia), as well as the author of the books “Pastoral assistance to the mentally ill”, “Spirituality as responsibility”, “Hello, baby (a book about healthy pregnancy)", "Anomalies parental love"," "A ray of hope in the drug world", "Father, I am a drug addict", "About victorious Christianity", "Parables of an Orthodox missionary", "The kingdom that is within."

- How best to introduce you?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Employee of the Father's House Recovery Center. Well, you can also say: just a good person (smiles).

- Is your center designed for the rehabilitation of male addicts? Why?

Hegumen Evmeniy: We believe that a person must first resolve the issue of his addiction, and then his relationship with the opposite sex.

- That is, You just don't want "parallel" plots to arise?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Yes, a person recovers, goes home and there let “parallel plots” arise for him ( smiling).

- How long have you been working with this problem?

Hegumen Evmeniy: We started helping addicted people 15 years ago, when I served in the monastery. During that period, he wrote two books - “Father, I am a drug addict” and “A ray of hope in the drug world.” I jotted down in them everything that helped me understand this myself.

- From your works, one gets the impression of a very “higher” education in the field of psychology, psychotherapy and other related disciplines. Where did you study?

Hegumen Evmeniy: In terms of education, I am a virgin (laughs). I have neither special church nor secular education. Initially, I am a traditionally conservative Orthodox person.

However, at some point I realized that not everything related to modern human life, questions can be answered by Orthodox ascetic literature. For example, in Orthodoxy, the issues of group interactions, family, sexuality, issues of our differences - psychotypes, character accentuations - are not considered very deeply and not very well.

And if today we do not have another point of description, besides the religious one, then we form the image of an average, average Orthodox person, instead of revealing in him the fullness of God’s inherent individuality.

- Then where do you get this knowledge?

Hegumen Evmeniy: I explore what interests me personally. I’m not chasing diplomas, courses, or anything else. If I am interested in this or that specialist who has knowledge, I come to him to study.

Teaching for me is not an academic format, not just the transfer of information. You come to a person whom you honor as a teacher - and you get more than he told you formally, at the level of verbal information, he said. This is a different way of learning...

Nowadays, information is publicly available on the Internet, but this fact makes it neither more spiritual nor wiser people they don't. The point is the subtle energy component of what is called knowledge. If I want to learn something about Catholicism, I am not interested in what an Orthodox person will say about it, I will talk with a Catholic, and about Buddhism with a Buddhist.

A religiously limited person is afraid of direct contact with a different point of view; I have no such restrictions.

- Today’s aggressiveness of adherents of the “Benderist theory” or the “Muscovites theory” apparently also comes from this “confessional narrow-mindedness”, when a person tries to “pump” his own picture of the world to himself, first of all?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Maybe. If a person has knowledge, he will not sell anything to anyone. Remember what Lao Tzu said, “he who does not know speaks, but he who knows is silent”?

Cognition is also possible in discussion, a form of interaction that is more like a dance, an understanding of the value of differences and details. Cultural polemics do not become personal. It's more like checking maps, in which we create a more accurate description of the space we're interested in.

Unfortunately, the culture of discussion has almost been lost in our time. Having learned that a person has a point of view that is opposite and not identical to ours, we almost automatically identify him as an “enemy,” withdraw into ourselves, do not hear, and just wait for a pause to begin to prove “our own.”

- It seemed to me that without the academic paradigm of education it is generally impossible to study. But you continue to study? Did you come to Kyiv almost after meeting Stanislav Grof? What did you bring from there?

Hegumen Evmeniy: My ego can boast that now all the transpersonalists who see me know that Stan Grof made me tea in his mansion.

I came to Stan almost by accident, having learned that my acquaintance Vladimir Maikov was in California at that time. Volodya filmed Stan in his mansion, and I sat and listened...

I understood probably 50% of what he said, since my English is not good enough. Stanislav Grof, in my opinion, great person, aware of his monumentality, but there is no “greatness” in his behavior.

Visiting Stanislav Grof

Vladimir asked him about Castaneda, about LSD research, about holotropic breathing, apparently everyone asks him about this, but I got the impression that he seemed to have completed the path of a researcher: there is some kind of completeness in him. And now he shares his discoveries of past years.

- Don’t you get the impression that the struggle somehow broke him? He also had to deal with monstrous pressure from the authorities, colleagues, and the public.

Hegumen Evmeniy: No, because any person who discovers something bright, unconventional on the path of knowledge is faced with resistance, accusations of unscientificness and heresy. This was the case with transpersonal psychology, which was started by Stanislav Grof.

At the end of the meeting, I asked Stan to bless me with some symbolic object. He replied to this that he did not consider himself a guru to bless anyone. I objected that he was a transpersonal guru. But he insisted, “no, I’m just a scientist,” and then I gave up and asked him to just give me something as a souvenir.

Stan went to his room, brought it out and gave me a very interesting image - a painted Orthodox icon, which depicts a young man on a horse, killing another young man lying on the ground with a spear. The symbolism surprised me: what would this be for?

And so, after California, I find myself in Kyiv, where indeed a “man on a horse” kills another lying on the ground, i.e. - war…

- And how do you like it here, in Kyiv?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Fine.

- They say that a priest should engage only in Orthodox spirituality, but you are asking for the blessing of a transpersonal guru. How do you combine everything?

Hegumen Evmeniy: I just look at what interests me and explore it. Without acceptance and trust in everything that exists, interaction with this world is impossible. Acceptance is everywhere.

For example, yesterday I caught a cold, went to the pharmacy - they told me - take this three times a day. And I accept. I take the prescribed medicine, I take food, I take water, I take air, I take the love of the people around me.

- Have you ever been disappointed in God?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Apparently, I have such ideas about God that it is impossible to be disappointed in them. God and His will are expressed to me in what Is.

You can agree, you can resist what is, disagree with it, but resisting is more expensive for yourself. Agreement is like a relieved exhalation, yes, I agree. And then the flow of life carries you along the waves easily and naturally.

- There is such a group of people, they are also called seekers, who are always missing something. Another puzzle, another mentor, another meaning. The mind never stops, the inner itch gives no rest.

Hegumen Evmeniy: When a person searches, he is in dynamics; the path itself, the movement itself, and not the result are interesting.

-Have you already found it?

Hegumen Evmeniy: I have no desire to find anything special there. I'm not looking for a person who will give me the “last puzzle”. There is unconditional agreement with what I know and with what I do not know, whatever it may be.

- Did the picture come together?

Hegumen Evmeniy: The picture develops daily. And it changes every second. Reality is not static, it lives, pulsates, transforms.

If we talk about seekers, these people are not looking for information, but for a state. If it were a matter of information, no one would go anywhere anymore - there is a lot of it. But many people have not found a state where they feel good with themselves. Finding a person in whose presence they can experience this state of clarity and peace is the essence of the search process. Ultimately, this is a search for a father who will give a feeling of stability and security in an unstable world.

When a person has found the Source of Life within himself, inside, it can nourish both you and the people around you.

- Do you need to train for this or is it given freely, by the grace of God?

Hegumen Evmeniy: And so and so! Until a person has discovered the Source within himself, he needs someone who will support and approve of him. If such confirmation comes to the student, exhausted by the search, the teacher whispers in the ear - “you are what you needed, you are what you were looking for” - and relief comes. A real teacher knows how to say these words to the heart, so we cannot believe every teacher.

- That is, we need “executors”? What would he say, command his soul - and she would trust and obey?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Yes. And this can happen if the teacher has enough compassionate love. I am sure that each person is at his own (correct) point of development, in his own truth, and that there is no point in accelerating or interrupting these processes prematurely. And the fact is that everyone is fine.

- I wanted to return to the work of your Center. Are you taking everyone?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Everyone, from any country.

- Are there any plans to invite women for individual or group therapeutic work?

Hegumen Evmeniy: We invite and accept women. They come with different therapeutic issues - for a week, for two. They live near the center, in a neighboring village. And in the evening we have a general meeting, some spiritual work.

- What are your criteria for healing?

Hegumen Evmeniy: No matter what condition a person comes to us in, 3-4 months pass - and he becomes a full-fledged friend, participant, interlocutor. The ability for rich and deep communication is the criterion.

The question is not about “not using” later, but about the fact that the person leaves and maintains the achieved level of awareness.

Recently I had such a case: we met with one person some time after he underwent rehabilitation at our Center. Then, during the rehabilitation period, he and I reached a sufficiently deep level of communication and mutual understanding. And so, having met in a cafe, we just looked into each other’s eyes for about ten minutes. And when we started the conversation, I realized that this world had already “reformatted” him, that he was already a different person. I couldn't continue the conversation, I waited for the waiter, paid and left.

But here is another case, I had one student, still in the monastery. He also underwent rehabilitation there from drug addiction. There I believed in God with all my heart. Having found faith, he spoke (testified) about how God changed his heart in such a way that even experienced preachers and catechists listened and were imbued with it ( laughs).

At some point, the old and new personalities in him collided. He abruptly decided to leave. He left poorly, aggressively, with conflict. Then he had a breakdown...

Before leaving, I told him: “Here, you are leaving, pretending that nothing except a personal conflict is happening, but I still have a “backup copy” of that bright person.”

8 years passed, he appeared in my life again, having by that time gotten married and divorced. When we met, he told me: “everything I was looking for was always here.” These are the kind of intense stories you have to live through.

If you have found and discovered this Source within yourself, it shines and spreads in all directions, it is limitless. It is no coincidence that Christ speaks about this inner light: A candle cannot shine in one direction and not in the other. We already burn out every day, but we can shine, or we can smolder or save ourselves, “so that we have enough for ourselves and those closest to us.”

The area of ​​deep relationships with man and the area of ​​unity with God is one single space. If you are afraid of close relationships with people, you are afraid of God. If you want to find love for God, you seek unity with people. If you cannot confess your deepest feelings to a person, it means that you cannot confess to him about God, who revealed himself and manifested himself in your midst. Everything is one, everything is about one thing.

Sometimes you talk with people, you see - God is on one side (of their consciousness), close relationships with people - on the other, feelings - on the third, reactions to events happening in this world - somewhere else. Splintering, schizis... And if a person is whole, everything is about one thing, in all manifestations and contexts of life he is recognizable.

- The process of contextualization is probably important; it is a stage in the development of human consciousness. As one philosopher said: “In order to unite, we need to completely disengage.” What if you go into spirituality without a soul, without love? Wouldn't this be a substitution, a dissociation of oneself from oneself?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Emotional and sensory perception, manifestations of the soul - that's not all. While the soul is at this level, it seeks its reflection, its completion in another person. At this stage, how much can you open up to a person (and therefore, the universe, life, God), how much can you trust a person (and therefore, the universe, life, God). The soul pulsates, back and forth.

But there is another dimension, beyond duality, where everything is perceived as one, there is no fear, no hope, there is no time, there is only the present moment, and the integrity of the entire universe is experienced not only theoretically, but experientially.

- This fear of perception of entering the space of totality, is it superficial?

Hegumen Evmeniy: In the One (in God) there is no delight, no decline, no charm, no disappointment, but it is possible to go into this, completely, to the depths of going through the space of your soul, for which such a passage is painful and unusual. If you go through it to the bottom, then there is no fear further.

- How to get there?

Hegumen Evmeniy: If a person feels like a seeker, if he has already been launched there, he will reach this space. Have you been to a water park? While you are climbing the stairs, you can go back from any step if this journey seems dangerous to you, but if you have already fallen into the pipe - that’s it, there is no way out. All you have to do is trust the forces that carry you down and not cling to anything.

- Today people are very stressed: Facebook and TV have moved into people’s heads, there is endless internal dialogue. All this can cause, among other things, unhealthy cravings - to take some kind of pill, or alcohol, smoke something, in a word, to somehow take a break from what is happening. Is it worth giving the reader any recommendations now?

And texts from various glamor magazines - how to lose weight, get fat, meditate, how to think about thinking, how to meditate... Remember, in Solaris Snowden says: “A man needs a man”? Each of us needs a person with whom we have a home.

It is very important to find a person with whom you have a home. That is, a person with whom you don’t need to conform to anything, you don’t need to pretend to be anything, to be a “model husband/wife” or “to be spiritual”, you are valuable in all your manifestations, you are welcome precisely because you are you !

Probably, since the days of the hippies, there has been some kind of shift in people's consciousness - the realization that Home is not necessarily those people who are neighbors at the family, everyday, blood level. It can be any person, even if he is geographically far away...

My first confessor was very old, blind, with thin hair, he gathered people at his house and told stories about how John of Kronstadt blessed his mother, something else, he could tell the same thing every evening. People in his presence thawed and experienced grace every time. And I came to him as a young man, about 15-16 years old, and felt this experience of Home. It was there that it first arose for me, and then I generated it and reproduced it in relationships with other people.

Conversation with Pyotr Mamonov

Today, this state of mental orphanhood and homelessness pushes people on a spiritual quest. But in fact, to be honest, we all need a Man... And not finding a man, many think: I’ll go look for God, maybe, even though God won’t kick me out, he’ll accept me as I am.

- Such a familiar feeling - if only they didn’t kick me out. Where does this come from in us? This “imposter syndrome”?

Hegumen Evmeniy: My grandmother told me as a child: “Don’t laugh, so as not to cry later.” Many of us grew up with the firm belief that if it’s good now, then it must definitely get worse later. This is our Russian, Ukrainian, Slavic anhedonism: “Don’t relax!”

“I used to think that a state of this depth, transcendence, a sense of Home can only be achieved with a spiritual mentor. I traveled a lot, looked for something, went to various seminars, and recently in Thailand I met a German bar owner, and we talked all evening in such an easy English language. But there was a feeling of a very deep contact, when you know everything about a person, he knows everything about you, and you are not two, but part of some larger process. Moreover, we are not talking about love relationships. And, yes, he has a very big addiction to alcohol.

Hegumen Evmeniy: The point is not what a person drinks or uses, how many years and with what frequency he does it. The point is where the person is at this time, can we dive into the depths with him or not? Under the influence of alcohol, a person is in an altered state of consciousness, “what’s on a drunk’s mind...” - and unraveling oneself in this state is not an easy task.

What if you seek unity with a person while sober? In a joint movement into depth, you need to consciously overcome barriers, obstacles, fears and complexes. Well, I recently read from one psychologist: “The feeling of spiritual closeness between a man and a woman can be so unbearable that a man and a woman will begin to have sex in order to avoid the experience of intimacy.”

Sometimes you meet religious or “too correct” people. It is even more difficult to go deep with them. They do not have a chemical dependency, but they are dry and emotionally exhausted. Everything is so structured that you don’t know how to talk to such a person...

With a living person, it’s interesting to stumble upon a discrepancy, a difference in worldview! If something falls out of the usual logic of reasoning, this is not a reason for conflict, but a reason for the emergence of a dance of energies and meanings. And with the “right person”, well, you just don’t know how - he has no “sins”, he has no sex, he has no addictions, he belongs exclusively to the right religion, he “has” a confessor (this is especially impressive). The whole question is whether we are able to hold on to the living thread of sincerity, authenticity, realness.

- So not everyone needs to be saved from addiction?

Hegumen Evmeniy: I don’t pose the question like this: is it worth it or not? You need to look at the person, at his request. If a person turns to me and asks for help, I understand that he needs it, I do not impose my result on him. I am interested in a person, with his divine beauty at a deep level. Even if the person himself does not see it, but I see it, then I want to reveal this beauty, first of all, for myself. Yes, yes, for myself. I am interested in this One Light that shines through many beautiful individuals.

- That is, you help a person see this Light?

Hegumen Evmeniy: I can only indicate the direction, but the person will have to go himself.

- What, in your opinion, is the main reason for the emergence of addictions?

Hegumen Evmeniy: Sooner or later, every person has some kind of suspicion that this whole material side of life, with its money, things, the need to get married, get divorced, go to work, prove your competence, take part in some stupid disputes - this is not yet All. There is some kind of pleasure in life, life should be a pleasure, some kind of joy, completeness is missing.

And some personal effort is required so that this search for pleasure grows to the experience of the bliss of life, and does not fall to the level of a banal buzz. The latter is simpler: I inject myself and forget.

You can, of course, talk about the causes of addiction from the point of view of neurophysiology: there are people with reduced synthesis of pleasure hormones: serotonin, dopamine, endorphin. This may be due to heredity, perhaps the person simply does not know creative inspiration, or did not receive additional approval, hugs, or affection in childhood. And the person somehow feels uneasy. I don’t want to go anywhere, I don’t feel drawn to anything, nothing makes me happy. He may begin to search for the joy of life, and, not finding anything, tries a drug.

“I also wanted to ask about the priests, about the church and about the joy of life.” In Nepal, for example, Buddhist clergy are cheerful and smiling. Why are we grieving all the time? I'm not criticizing, but trying to understand.

Hegumen Evmeniy: Because this is our God, this is the God we chose. This, of course, is not about Christ, but rather about how the image of Christ was transformed when it reached our places. First - in the guise of the Byzantine Tsar, then, already in Rus' - Saved by the Ardent Eye, the Judge, from Whose righteous anger only the prayers of His Mother can save.

But, among other things, in churches we are taught to feel guilty that we (each of us personally) are guilty of crucifying Him. Now imagine what a difficult message for the human psyche: we (by our sins, and therefore by the fact that we are alive) killed God, who will subsequently judge us! And it is still unknown until the end, whether by justice (and then - definitely to hell), or by mercy (that is, amnesty).

And to avoid this, you need to ask Him for mercy every day. But these requests do not guarantee any results!

Do you know where this model came from? Of course, from our Russian mentality. These are the “spiritual bonds” of our statehood, about which so much is said today.

- Wait, wait, but African-American churches sing very happy songs.

Hegumen Evmeniy: The interpretation and embodiment of the sacred text largely depends on mentality. Look, the same canonical text of the Gospel, but what different interpretations.

Here, for example, is Mary, Mother of Christ. For us, the Orthodox, She is the Mother of God, for the Catholics she is the Virgin (remember Catholic sculptures), cold and unapproachable. Do you understand? The character is the same, but the mental images, archetypes, are different.

Yeshua - among the Jews, among us - Jesus, in America - Jesus (and “Christ, - Superstar” immediately comes to mind).

Jesus for Catholics to a greater extent the image of a suffering person, crucified on a cross, a martyr, blood flowing. With us He is Basileus, the Tsar, moreover, under the influence of the Mother, because... The Mother of God, as the Orthodox believe, can pray to someone whom He will justly punish.

For that for a long time While I served as a missionary, I became convinced that people would never give up their deepest ideas about God (even if they do not correspond to the Gospel). That is, we need to “love” and “fear” God at the same time. Not an easy task, I tell you, for the psyche.

And in African-American churches there is a natural joy of life, where people just sing and dance before God, there is a constant rejoicing of “Jesus loves you.” And for us, in our mental field, in our religiosity, we get to God only through great sorrow, and even then, without guarantees of getting there.

Maybe just meet once Last Judgment. And then - forever to hell.

- Anhedonia at the state and religious level.

Hegumen Evmeniy: Only sorrows, yes. To suffer both during life and after death.

One Russian philosopher said: “How unfair it is that for some 40, 50, 60 years of my sinful life, God will punish me with eternal torment, commanding me to forgive, punishing us forever.”

And the question of spiritual maturity: having realized such a version of God in oneself, isn’t a person afraid to ask himself and his religion “inconvenient questions”? If a person imagines God as a supervisor who accumulates a file on him all his life in order to get even with him for everything after death - is this God?

- What then is God?

Hegumen Evmeniy: It seems to me that what God is is beyond descriptions and concepts. You can only point to Him. Silence.

Interviewed by N atalyaRevskaya (Khalimovskaya), OM-Agency, especially for KV

), abbot, supernumerary cleric of the Belgorod diocese, employee of the "Father's House" drug rehabilitation center

Then, in February 2008, after the diocesan missionary departments received a theological assessment of “The Parables of the Orthodox Missionary,” authored by Hegumen Evmeniy, the press service of the Synodal Missionary Department issued a statement assessing this work and asking them to refrain from using the text in missionary work. This statement, in particular, indicated that the “Proverbs” of the abbot were published without the blessing of the clergy, and their text contains "dubious examples and comparisons that bring confusion into the minds and hearts of beginners and cannot serve the main purpose of missionary work - the spread of the Orthodox faith."

In December of this year, the Synodal Missionary Department issued an official statement according to which Hegumen Evmeniy, who strives to work with drug addicts and the mentally ill, does not have a blessing for missionary work and is not an employee of the missionary department of the Russian Orthodox Church. The statement says that it appeared as a response to numerous inquiries “concerning the activities of Abbot Evmeniy (Piristy) in the city of Moscow.”

As of April of this year, he was an employee of the “Father’s House” drug rehabilitation center in the village of Mukhortovo, Kineshma district, Ivanovo region.

Essays

• Pastoral care for the mentally ill, 1999
• Spirituality and Responsibility, 2000
• Psychotherapy in Pastoral Counseling, 2000
• Anomalies of parental love. Reshma: Light of Orthodoxy, 2005. 352 p. Ivanovo: Light of Orthodoxy, 2007. 336 p.
• Spirituality as responsibility. Reshma: Light of Orthodoxy, 2005. 326 p. Ivanovo: Light of Orthodoxy, 2007. 302 p.
• Hello, baby!: Pastoral advice to future fathers and mothers. Ivanovo: Light of Orthodoxy, 2007. 256 p.
• A ray of hope in the drug world
• About Overcoming Christianity
• Father, I am a drug addict!
• Parables of an Orthodox missionary
• The kingdom that is within
• Responsibility and power

• Personal site:

Used materials

• Eumenius (Feathery), website "Russian Orthodoxy":
• Hegumen Evmeniy (Feathery), website "Happiness.by":
• _Hegumen Evmeniy. Limitless man (interview for the portal http://kievvlast.com.ua/)_, website "LIFETIME Center":

The independent missionary activity of one of the abbots of Russian monasteries has always aroused, if not envy, then at least surprise on the part of the clergy of the Moscow Patriarchate. The former abbot of the Makariev-Reshem monastery in the village of Reshma, Kineshma district, Evmeniy (Piristy), became a preacher open to everyone. Unlike the Orthodox journalist Deacon Andrei Kuraev, Fr. Evmeniy is less known to the general public, since in his speeches he avoided harsh ideological accents and did not create for himself the image of a strict confessor with numerous faithful children. Independence, the absence of church corporatism and the role of a spiritual psychologist, and not a boss, placed Abbot Eumenius outside the church system.

In the early 90s. O. Evmeniy (Piristy) was one of the first in the Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Kineshma diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church MP to become involved in a youth mission and the publication of educational literature. In the Orthodox community, Fr. Evmeniy was a pioneer in the rehabilitation of drug addicts. The abbot has led the Makariev-Reshem Monastery since 1992 - during this time a lot of projects appeared around the monastery - the publishing house "Light of Orthodoxy", of the same name Orthodox center, seminars, youth ministry and Alpha Course groups in Reshma, called Alpha and Omega. The monastery publishing house published such books that can be called rather general Christian. Among the authors were clergymen, for example, in addition to Evmeniy himself, priest Anatoly Garmaev, priest Artemy Vladimirov, and secular researchers. The topics of the publications were very broad - raising a child, attitude towards the mentally ill, a spiritual outlet for a drug addict, family relationships, spirituality as responsibility. The social work of the “Light of Orthodoxy” center can be called unique in its own way, because the psychological writings of Hegumen Evmeniy and his openness and accessibility in communicating with young people did not fit into the usual idea of ​​what a monastery abbot should be like.

The abbot of the provincial monastery in the village of Reshma also became an active participant in inter-Christian dialogue in the social sphere. Evmeniy led seminars together with pastors of evangelical churches during the all-Russian anti-drug campaign "Train to the Future", held in several cities of Russia. The initiators of the “Train to the Future” project and its organizers were actually Protestants – Pentecostals and Evangelicals. On behalf of the Russian Orthodox Church MP Fr. Evmeniy also performed at the events of the annual Christmas music festival " Star of Bethlehem", also organized by Protestants from the cultural and educational foundation "New Christian Creativity". For many Protestant ministers, Abbot Evmeniy is a representative of open "evangelical" Orthodoxy, who considers other Christians to be their brothers.

Naturally, at the beginning of February 2006, the diocesan council of the Ivanovo diocese actually accused Abbot Evmeniy of improper conduct of monastic life and of Protestantism. As Evmeniy noted in a conversation with the author, a commission was created specifically for his removal from office, which presented the complaints of “patriotically”-minded believers to the diocesan council. During the council meeting itself, the abbot was accused of forcing seminar participants to repeat certain mantras in front of the paintings. The holding of “Alpha courses” in the study of the Bible was considered a heretical distortion of Orthodoxy. At the monastery, the course “Alpha and Omega” became a program “revealing the main topics Christian faith in an interesting, lively and informal atmosphere." "DVRs ("children of believing parents") who left the church at a conscious age, or non-believers who have serious complaints about Orthodoxy and Christianity in general were invited to the discussion." However, the fact is that " Alpha course" arose in the depths of Anglican Church and that he was extremely popular in the Russian evangelical churches, gave rise to accusations that Abbot Eumenius had deviated into Protestant doctrine.

The diocesan decision was carried out almost immediately. The married priest Dimitry Ivanov was appointed acting governor of the monastery. According to Abbot Evmeniy, Father Demetrius handled matters tactfully and politely, and Evmeniy and his like-minded people immediately left the monastery. A youth group (about 10 people) began to meet in a small private apartment, the publishing house ceased its work, and the drug rehabilitation center was dissolved (8 people were sent home). As Father Evmeniy noted, the Church found all his endeavors uninteresting, and everything was liquidated overnight.

Formally, the leadership of the Ivanovo diocese offered a completely reasonable explanation for the removal of Abbot Evmeniy, which had nothing to do with his autonomous educational activities. The secretary of the Ivanovo diocese, Archimandrite Zosima (Shevchuk), in an interview with the author, stated, in particular, that main reason The missionary's removal was due to the fact that he was unable to create a normal, large and rich monastery, while the abbot must have the qualities of a builder. At the same time, according to Father Zosima, Fr. Evmeniy can continue his service in the diocese, for which he will be provided with appropriate opportunities. At the same time, according to Archimandrite Zosima, no one carried out an examination of Evmeniy’s projects, youth seminars and psycho-trainings that were developed at the Light of Orthodoxy center.

The Ivanovo diocese still looked positively at the work of Abbot Evmeniy, representatives of other dioceses also praised him, but, as Father Zosima noted, a significant imbalance arose - in the monastery, in fact, there was no monastic life, people left and came, and the monastery complex itself did not recover. Of course, Abbot Eumenius opposed the Pentecostals, who attract people with games, dances and parties, with his preaching ministry. However, according to Father Zosima, many Orthodox believers long years a critical attitude towards the abbot of the Makariev-Reshem Monastery developed.

The secretary of the diocesan council of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Kineshma diocese, Alexey Fedotov, stated that Fr. Evmeny will be the head of the Center (Ivanovskaya Gazeta, February 15, 2006). The promise to appoint Fr. Evmeniya became the director of the Spiritual and Educational Diocesan Center actually under pressure from the secular authorities. The day before, Abbot Evmeniy met with the newly appointed governor of the region, Mikhail Men. According to Fr. Eumenia, the decision of the diocesan council and the expulsion of the "Light of Orthodoxy" center from the Makariev-Reshem Monastery aroused the anger of the governor. Mikhail Men promised that he would find such a niche for the missionary Evmeniy that he would still remain in the bosom of the Russian Orthodox Church MP, that is, he would oblige the leadership of the diocese to create a rehabilitation spiritual center headed by Abbot Evmeniy.

The peculiarity of the Ivanovo diocese is that the freedom of various kinds of initiatives, which existed under Archbishop Ambrosy (Shchurov), immediately turned into a reason for accusations and a struggle among clergy groups among themselves, as soon as rumors appeared about the imminent retirement of Bishop Ambrosy for health reasons ( especially since Vladyka Ambrose has actually removed himself from the administration of the diocese). The wealth and power of such monasteries as Nikolo-Shartomsky near Shuya, headed by Archimandrite Nikon (Fomin), in recent years increasingly determined intra-diocesan policy and the position of local officials. Parallel to the weakening diocesan power - the monastic power - began to conquer economic territory. This system, according to Hegumen Evmeniy, only works for the exit, and its creators believe that “disobedience to them is disobedience to God.”

Roman Lunkin,
"Portal-Credo.Ru"