“Through the narrow gates”: about the cooling towards faith and church lifetranslated

Every believer experiences ups and downs in his life. Very often, a period of ardent inspiration from the acquisition of faith is replaced by a cooling of the heart, when everything connected with God and the Church is fulfilled “according to duty,” but without joy. These periods can be very long, difficult and dangerous, because it is then that someone leaves church life. There was even such a concept as “de-churching.”

Where does a modern Christian most often “stumble”? For what reasons does his Christian church life freeze or be interrupted? We are talking about this with Metropolitan Longin of Simbirsk and Novospassky.

— Vladyka, starting a conversation about the reasons why a person’s church life “breaks,” it’s probably worth saying what it should be like, what it consists of.

— The church life of a believer should be based on faith in God. Everything he does, everything he encounters in his life, he must evaluate based on the word of God.

I am convinced that everyone who came to the Church remembers that feeling of special joy, I would even say happiness, that he experienced upon believing in God and discovering church life with its Sacraments. A person feels that a completely different world has opened up before him...