Video-message of His Beatitude Sviatoslav. June 14. 111 th day of the war

Today is Tuesday 14 June 2022 and the Ukrainian people have been resisting the full-scale Russian aggression for 111 days, the 111th day of the great war started by the Russian invader against peaceful Ukraine.
Again, we thank the Lord God and the Armed Forces for surviving this morning and being able to see the light of day. Heavy fighting is going on along the entire front line. But since the President of Ukraine assured us last night, the Ukrainian army has a strategic initiative along the entire front line. And although the enemy outnumbers us, he has more firepower, but tactically, Ukrainians heroically defend their land and resist this invasion.

The enemy mercilessly shells the Sumy region, Chernihiv region, shelling reappeared in the city of Kharkiv. This morning a missile strike was launched on the Odessa region.

But Ukraine is standing it! Ukraine is fighting! Today, Ukraine is more united than ever. United in a common desire, the desire to win, and this victory will be the achievement of a just peace for our country.
We were touched by the story that became known to Ukrainian society yesterday about 33 volunteers from Mariupol. They are drivers who took people out of this martyr city by various means of transport and saved lives. Under bombs, under shelling, risking their own lives. And today they have been captured by the Russians, subjected to ruthless torture, and most likely face a long term of imprisonment. The Russian occupier does not know how to distinguish a volunteer from a terrorist. Today we want to say loudly to the whole world: No to violence against civilians! We want to say that a volunteer is not a terrorist, but a saviour of human life.

Yesterday we celebrated the Monday of the Holy Spirit, the Feast of the Holy Trinity. That is why I want to begin with you today our daily reflections on the gifts that the Holy Spirit has brought to man. We know that according to our traditional Catechism there are seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit. That is, the signs by which we can say that the Holy Spirit rests on a person. It is about these gifts of the Holy Spirit that we first read from the prophet Isaiah: "For it is by these signs," said the prophet, "that the Messiah, anointed with the Holy Spirit of Christ, can be recognized." He says: "The Spirit of the Lord will rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom, the Spirit of reason, the Spirit of counsel and strength, the Spirit of knowledge and fear of God." Thus, the Gifts of the Holy Spirit are a special sensitivity that the Holy Spirit gives to man in the presence of God. The Holy Fathers and teachers of the Eastern Church spoke of the so-called "spiritual sense organs" that the Holy Spirit reveals in man. Just as in order to know the visible, created world we have sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch. In the same way, the Lord God gave man a number of spiritual sense organs, through which we can contemplate God's presence among us.

Today I would like to reflect with you on the first Gift of the Holy Spirit, which is wisdom. In fact, wisdom is a certain ability of a person to contemplate the truth, to know the truth. But to see this truth, which man is able to discover in the light of God's Wisdom. This wisdom, as a gift of the Holy Spirit, is not the fruit of any training of man's intellectual ability.

Our people say: "There are many learned people, but few are wise." Only wisdom, as the Gift of the Holy Spirit, allows a person to see everything he knows, knows all the events of his life in a certain perspective. But the most important thing in the perspective of God's plan is about man and the universe.

May the Lord God grant us all His Heavenly Wisdom, that Wisdom of God, to which Prince Yaroslav the Wise dedicated our main sobor, or church, the Cathedral of Saint Sophia in Kyiv. That Wisdom of God, which for millennia has been a measure of the righteousness of our princes and warriors who build national, social life, church leaders, all those engaged in the struggle of monastic life.

O God, give us Your Wisdom! Give wisdom to the leaders of our state. Give wisdom to the modern leaders of the nations, so that they may live in Your Wisdom and reflect it in their lives, and then there will be no wars on earth. May the Gift of God's Wisdom bring peace to Ukraine and the world!

May the blessing of the Lord be upon you through His grace and love of humankind, always, now and ever, and for ages of ages. Amen. 

Glory to Jesus Christ!