CHURCH OF CHRIST IS PLACE OF SALVATION

BELGRADE, MAY 17 /SRNA/ - The Church of Christ is where the faithful people should be; it is the place of salvation, said Metropolitan Siluan of the Australian-New Zealand Metropolitanate of the Serbian Orthodox Church /SOC/ today after the liturgy at the Church of Saint Sava in Belgrade.

Metropolitan Siluan called on the faithful to return to the Lord again and again through repentance, according to the website of the Serbian Orthodox Church. “We cannot even imagine the struggle for a human heart, how subtly unclean forces act and how much they try to confuse humanity, and above all, Christians, Orthodox Christians, to separate them from the Holy Church,” the bishop said. He pointed out that Saint Sava calls the Serbian people to unity, to the path of the God-man Christ, to the path of the Orthodox faith, unity, truth, and love. “For there is no true love if truth is absent. And truth is not genuine if it is separated from Him who is love, from God, our Lord, from the Holy Divine Trinity,” the bishop said. He emphasized that a man without Christ is blind and a slave to demons, sin, and death, and that with the coming of the Son of God, the man becomes a place of joy, comfort, hope, faith, love, and forgiveness. His Holiness, Serbian Patriarch Porfirije, prayed that God grant the faithful spiritual sight, often obscured by sins, passions, and alienation from God, so that, through divine grace, they may attain clear and healthy spiritual vision. Then they would be healed, and that means saved, the Serbian Patriarch said. The working part of the Holy Assembly of Bishops, the highest hierarchical, legislative, and judicial body of the Serbian Orthodox Church, began in Belgrade on May 14.