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St amma syncletica4/15/2024 Hate sickness but not the sick person.” She also said, “Just as one cannot build a ship unless one has some nails, so it is impossible to be saved without humility. 4.25) Will you wait till all your time is ended? Why hate the man who has grieved you? It is not he who has done the wrong, but the devil. Choose the meekness of Moses and you will find your heart which is a rock changed into a spring of water.” She also said, “It is good not to get angry, but if this should happen, the Apostle does not allow you a whole day for this passion, for he says: Let not the sun go down. There was an anchorite who was able to banish the demons and he asked them, “What makes you go away? Is it fasting?” They replied, “We do not eat or drink.” “Is it vigils?” They replied, “We do not sleep.” “Is it separation from the world?” “We live in the deserts.” “What power sends you away then?” They said, “Nothing can overcome us, but only humility.” Do you see how humility is victorious over the demons? Amma Syncletica said, “Imitate the publican, and you will not be condemned with the Pharisee. Just as the trees, if they have not stood before the winter’s storms cannot bear fruit, so it is with us this present age is a storm and it is only through many trials and temptations that we can obtain an inheritance in the kingdom of heaven.” She also said that neither asceticism, nor vigils nor any kind of suffering are able to save, only true humility can do that. Amma Theodora said, “Let us strive to enter by the narrow gate. Here are five sayings of these spiritual “Mothers” that can be your #MondayMotivation. I have always thought of humility as simpering and self-effacing silent because of fear or weakness. It features an immense treasury of bite-sized quotes that pack a large spiritual punch. Amma Syncletica: The fiery nature of humility. The close disciples of these holy nuns wrote down their profound wisdom and by the 5th century had compiled it into a volume that was put together with the words of the Desert Fathers into what was called the Sayings of the Fathers. Their wisdom is very potent and perfect for those seeking spiritual nourishment. Anthony the Abbot, led a life of seclusion in the desert. Desire can consume us just as much as the fear of loss can.These holy women from the 4th century have much to teach us today.īesides the many Desert Fathers who lived in 4th century, there were also a good number of women who, inspired by the life of St. At the same time, she warned that greed is a terrible sickness, because once we want a little bit of something, our desire grows and grows, so that we always want more. Those who have given up everything, who have no attachments to things, can’t be threatened with the loss of anything. Saint Syncletica recognized that poverty is a strong defense against the devil and his temptations, because the devil’s great weapon is to make us fear the loss of something we value. It was Christ who said that poverty was to come last. Only when He was sure that the young man had been seriously observing those did He say that the one thing lacking, the next thing to be done, was to become poor. She pointed out that Our Lord, in talking to the rich young man (Mark 10:21), did not ask him to take on poverty first, but instead recounted the commandments. They would prepare a woman for the hard discipline of poverty, which should come last of all. Among her sayings: There are many who live in the mountains and behave as if they were in the town they are wasting their time. She lived as a hermit outside of Alexandria, at first alone with her blind sister and later with the community of women ascetics that formed around her. What were the “proper prerequisites” that Syncletica considered to be so important? They were things such as fasting, sleeping on the ground and other bodily hardships. Let’s hear Amma Syncletica on this theme. Syncletica knew that if they simply threw away their possessions without taking the “proper prerequisites” they would “be like one who squanders her goods without careful deliberation, only to repent of her rashness.” They had been comfortable and not at all deprived in their lives. Because she had the gift of discernment she perceived that some of them, though they were full of enthusiasm, were not ready to take on the rigorous discipline of poverty. Syncletica was approached by great numbers of women who hoped to become monastics. Many, like Saint Syncletica, received spiritual gifts of discernment and healing. Though such women were few in number, they faithfully followed the example of Abba Anthony (Saint Anthony the Great) and others in fasting strictly, praying intensely, and inspiring those who came to them for counsel or to join them in asceticism. “Saint Syncletica (called “Amma” just as the desert fathers were called “Abba”) was born to a prominent family in Alexandria in the fourth century, and was one of the women who went to the desert to live a life free from distractions and close to God.
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