THE PRAYERS OF A PRIEST

 

THE PRAYERS OF A PRIEST

 

Olga Rozhneva

 

All morning, Archpriest Boris, the rector of the Church of All Saints, was flooded with memories. The past was seen as bright and clear as though it were yesterday. But then, already fifteen years had passed. Perhaps a bit less…

 

Fr. Boris just served Liturgy. Tall, broad-shouldered, stout, with a black beard beginning to turn gray, Batiushka blessed the people. People were coming up to the cross. There were a lot of them—there was a whole line. Joyful eyes. They awaited his look, his smile, his attention, his pastoral care. And he looked at his parishioners with paternal love.

 

There was an elderly couple. He recently prayed for them—they were both sick at the same time. He sent young sisters to them from the parish. And Michael just returned from a trip. Already a month has passed since a moleben was served for this traveler. There’s Tatiana with her husband Alexei and their son. Fr. Boris recalled how he baptized the father and son at the same time. At first, Alexei didn’t want to let Tanya go to church. Then he went with her once, and he stayed. Now he’s one of the most active parishioners, helping with repairs and other tasks. And there’s old Claudia—she’s at church day and night.

 

Accompanying the old woman with a look, Fr. Boris suddenly recalled how fifteen years ago it was only Claudia and the watchman Feodor coming to the cross. There were no other parishioners in the old church. He would walk past the half-empty candle stand towards the exit, and the old icons looked so sad in the semi-darkness.

 

Batiushka closed the gates, but the parishioners were in no rush to disperse. Only those who were especially in a hurry left, while the rest gradually gathered in the trapeza for the Sunday meal as usual. The trapeza was large and the parish friendly. At that time, at the very beginning of his ministry in this church, he could barely feed not just Claudia and Feodor—it was difficult enough to feed himself. Yes... But why are these memories coming to mind today?

 

The high, narrow windows of the altar with their delicate latticework were being battered either with snow or rain, or perhaps it was snow with rain. The light from the multi-colored lampadas and the yellow flames of the candles in the altar seemed so warm and familiar compared to the gloomy, barely glimmering twilight of the just-beginning November day. And the memories came back so vividly that Batiushka even had to sit down on a chair. It was the same wet and cold November morning. Fr. Boris remembered it his entire life. Perhaps it was one of the turning points in his life.

 

You know how it is: Someone is going along his path in life and comes to a fork in the road, with several roads branching out. Yes, those same roads that we choose. And with them we choose our fate. It’s a shame that we often don’t notice this fork, hurrying and rushing at full speed. And only years later, recalling the past, do we clearly see ourselves at a crossroads, at this intersection of roads and destinies.

 

It was Saturday then too, and he had also just served Liturgy, except the church was cold and empty. Old Claudia was huddled by the stove, and the forever-frowning Feodor went out right after the service to get an armful of wood. Two old women from the choir wrapped in tattered shawls were wandering towards the exit. Before they could open the door, it swung open itself and a woman in her mid-forties ran in with a gust of wind. She wasn’t exactly dressed like a church-going woman: in pants, a sheepskin coat, and a fur hat instead of a headscarf. But her hat was slightly askew, her coat open, and tears running down her cheeks. She clumsily ran towards Fr. Boris and fell at his feet weeping. Fr. Boris barely managed to calm her down; he sat her on the bench and asked about her misfortune.

 

It turns out the woman’s name was Elizabeth. Her daughter, Tanya, and her newborn grandson Egor were in the ICU. The whole family had been waiting for this child! They had thought of names long ago. If a girl, then Elena, and if a boy, then Egor.

 

“Our Egorka was born! Our baby, our darling sunshine! Tanechka, my poor daughter! My own flesh and blood!”

 

The woman started sobbing again, and Fr. Boris could barely get it out of her that the birth was difficult: Her daughter lost a lot of blood and fell into a coma, and the child was born in a state of asphyxiation and with some kind of pathology. Both were on artificial respiration. The grim ICU doctor said the diagnosis didn’t look good. An experienced nurse we knew overheard a meeting of the concilium gathered in the ICU and whispered to Elizabeth that her daughter and grandson were dying—it was just a matter of when to disconnect the apparatus.

 

“Our old babushka told me to run to you, at the church. She said to ask for help from God and for your prayers, Batiushka! Help, please, help, Batiushka! Please! You can! Can’t you? You’re a priest! God will listen to you! Who does He listen to if not you?! My Tanyushka! Little Egorushka!”

 

And the woman started sobbing again. Fr. Boris felt his heart squeeze. He felt very sorry for this young mother, who never saw her long-awaited son. He pitied the child who was dying, never having been held to his mother’s breast, having never been met by the love his entire family. His crib and toys (presumably they’d bought them) would not get to meet their little owner. And somewhere there is the young husband, the father, who would lose both his wife and his long-awaited son at the same time. Instead of joy, everyone will be standing in the cold November wind at two snow-covered mounds. This image immediately flashed through Batiushka’s mind, and he shook his head, driving away the evil vision.

 

“Calm down, Elizabeth! Everything will be fine! Everything—will—be—fine, do you understand?! The Lord is merciful! He will save both mother and child! Let’s pray and entreat His mercy! He will certainly help!”

 

Elizabeth gradually stopped sobbing, and looked up hopefully:

 

“Yes, mama always said that God exists! And if He exists, He will certainly hear you! That means everything will be okay! Isn’t that right? They’ll recover?”

 

Fr. Boris led the woman to the door. With a weary sigh, he started to get ready to go home. He wasn’t in a hurry to get there lately. Matushka Alexandra had gone to see her parents, taking their son Kuzenka with her. Batiushka had been serving in this small Ural town for three years already. And that whole time, services were held in an empty church.

 

The people in the town worked a lot and lived poorly, and in the summer they preferred to work on the land at their dachas, growing some simple crops for the winter. In the winter, the women spend the weekends doing laundry and cleaning, baking pies, and watching TV. The men gather in their garages where they drink white wine under the pretext of doing repairs. Many of them wound up in church not by their own will, but feet first: It was common to die from carbon monoxide poisoning in the town, as when after drinking his share of white wine, some man would decide to warm up, turn on the engine, fall asleep, and never wake up again. The rest were also in some kind of terrible dream, as if they’d buried a friend and were now going to drink to his soul in the same garage.

 

Matushka Alexandra, thin and frail, shivering in her shawl, said:

 

“I’m afraid for these people. They live day to day, never thinking about God, about their souls, about the meaning of life, about what will happen there, beyond life’s threshold… Father, let’s leave here! For some other, bigger city. We won’t live to see more parishioners. And there won’t be any help for the church, nor for you and I, Father. We’ll be in poverty our entire lives. We don’t even have enough money to get fruit for Kuzenka.

 

Fr. Boris was wearily silent. In the first year of his appointment, he really hoped that a flock would soon appear, that parishioners would come to the church, whom he, as the pastor, would lead on the path of salvation. But the church was full only on Theophany, Nativity, and Pascha. People came for holy water on Theophany, at Nativity they were merry, silly, often drunk; and on Pascha they came with the obligatory eggs and Pascha breads. The rest of the year, the church was empty.