Mother Siluana Vlad: How can I be patient with my neighbour?

"I saw God’s image in that woman. It was a staggering beauty!

Excerpt from a conference titled “Patience, a persecuted virtue in our times” held in Suceava, Romania, on Nov. 21, 2018

Translated by Grig Gheorghiu

Question:

How is monastic life? How can I be patient with my neighbor?

Mother Siluana:

Come to the monastery! The neighbor that you try to be patient with in the world is not as close to you as you think. If you work at the same company, you go back home, if you are married, she goes to work or to visit her parents, he goes to watch a game and you have some respite, you can have a coffee by yourself…Not at the monastery! Your neighbor is right at your door, right next to you! And it almost seems like the most unpleasant people were picked to be next to you! You say to yourself: maybe if I lived next to the other person it would be better, because my neighbor is impossible to deal with…

Well…this is the meeting place where we live with God’s power, and not with our power. As Elder (Saint) Sophrony of Essex said: “If you learn to love a person, then you are already prepared to love ten million people like that person”. And so, when your neighbor is unbearable, it is the moment to say: “I have work to do: I need to learn to love this person!”

And I really did this! I said: “Lord, if You give me the strength to love this woman…a caricature of a woman, an awful woman…then I will listen to you unconditionally for the rest of my life!” And of course, the solution was to love my enemies. I said: “I can’t do this, but You can, because You are God - You can give me to love this woman!” - hoping that He will change her so I can love her. 

And I heard that it’s good to say the prayer for your enemies. I picked up a prayer book, I found the prayer for enemies, I wrote it down on a piece of paper, and I would take it out of my pocket and read it. And I would say: “Lord, excuse me, but I don’t believe a word of what it says here! Because it is not me who behaves badly - she behaves badly! It is not me who is a sinner - she is a sinner!” And at least in that situation, that was actually the objective truth. I would say: “I don’t believe I have to pray for her salvation. Don’t You see what awful state she is in? Don’t You see what she is doing, and that she doesn’t want salvation? But I will read the prayer because it is written by the Holy Spirit, because You gave it to us…I will read it but I can’t believe it. All I can do is say it with my lips and give You what I have - the widow’s mite.”

After a few days, something happened - I am not going to tell you what exactly because I have said it in many other conferences and books - something happened and I saw God’s image in that woman. It was a staggering beauty! I was stunned of course and ever since (actually at that time I said “what if this is just an impression” and I asked God for two more proofs, and He gave me two more proofs, from a gypsy man and from a beggar…) - ever since I walk on eggshells you might say…You can do whatever you want; I know that beyond that there is a wonderful image. And I am not worthy anymore to see it fully, but I am not even asking to see it fully anymore, because I can’t bear the burden…because this way I can still get mad at my neighbor from time to time, whereas if I saw God’s image in my neighbor I would just fall on my knees…This way I can get things off my chest from time to time! 

So we need to believe that the deep part of our neighbor is where God is, where Christ is - and we need to behave accordingly. We need to do what we can, to give what we can: the widow’s mite. The rest belongs to “the old man” in us; all our desires, all our habits belong to “the old man” who causes us to function on auto-pilot. And so my freedom consists in saying “I will do what God is telling me I should do” - and then He will come and work within me.