Question from the audience:

How much can we stand praying and attend the church services?

Answer by Fr. Savvas:

Frankly, if we start praying, it means we start breathing!

Hence, when we ask about how long we can stand praying, it is like asking how long we can stand breathing. So, can we stand breathing? And if yes, for how long? Can you stand breathing only for 5 min. a day? Obviously not, because within less than 2 minutes since we stopped breathing, we will have to take a new breath again!

Do you realize what most of us do? It’s totally crazy, but this is exactly what we do: our soul breaths 5 min. in the morning and 5 min. in the evening. What about the rest of the 23 hours and 50 min.? We actually do not breath; we do not pray!

Well, it is totally justifiable that people have stress; absolutely. Not only stress, but something even worse: suffocation! We feel everyone around us is to blame, everything that happens to us is a misfortune. Poor us… If anybody was supposed to close our nose and mouth, we would easily understand that we cannot bear even 2 minutes without breathing air into our lungs.

You know what’s happening? When we start praying properly, when we start praying the noetic (Jesus) prayer, we will not be wondering anymore whether we can stand it or not. On the contrary, we will not be able to stand a minute without praying!