I was reading through the canons of St. John the Faster and was surprised at how difficult a lot of the penances seem, typically hundreds of prostrations a day, eating only dry foods during the day, and being barred from Communion for at least a month if not years in most cases. If the penitent won't do the prostrations and fasting, then the period of excommunication is extended to an extremely long time, ranging from years to decades, or even a lifetime.
It also struck me that St. John wrote that these are relaxations of older canons, and that he didn't include certain penalties like having to remain outside the physical church which had previously been imposed. I know priests are able to exercise economy or strictness and adjust these canonical penances as they deem appropriate, and even St. John says that his prescribed penances can be reduced depending on the disposition of the penitent, but I still don't understand how the average layman, who already has work and family placing demands on his time, could spend 30-45 minutes a day doing 300 prostrations, and that could be for just one sin among many. Even for a fit, young, single man with no family obligations, it would seem extraordinary for him to sustain a daily practice of hundreds of prostrations and rigorous fasting for over a year, even if he has the time to do them. At the same time, these penalties can't be only for monastics, because some of the canons relate to events monastics wouldn't experience, like having a miscarriage.
I remember reading in one book, I think it was the biography of St. Nektarios, that as a priest, the saint initially gave out canonical penalties for sins. He stopped that practice when he realized people were regularly coming back having given up their penances and fallen into the same sins because they couldn't do all the prostration and fasting that was required of them, and due to the length of time they were unable to take Holy Communion, they felt like it was impossible for them to avoid their sins for all that time.
It makes me wonder, was there ever a time where people could reliably bear these penances? I've heard it said in multiple places that people back then were just more devout than people today are, which I don't doubt, but I do wonder if the gulf between us and them is so wide that that's all there is to it.
I’m not personally aware of any priest whose applies those canons with akrivia (which by the way, are not canon law but rather are penitential canons which St. Joseph the Faster wrote in an attempt to reduce by half the normal penances that were being given out at the time), except perhaps in the most severe cases like murder; I’ve been a member of the Orthodox church for over a decade and I’ve never been hit with a canonical penalty although I have confessed to some sins that would have gotten one via St. John the Faster.
It’s important to bear in mind that the ancient canonical penalties were written for a different time, with very different conditions. This does not mean they are in all cases inapplicable, but I really wouldn’t worry about them. When we consider that St. John the Faster was actually moderating the default penances by half, and how much things have changed since then, it’s actually a sign of a decline of spiritual health caused by the encroachment of the world; recall the vision one of the Desert Fathers had where the first monastics flew through the air effortlessly and at high speed, but a later monastic flew slowly and with great difficulty.
Now while I’ve yet to receive a canonical penalty or penance, here is what has happened with the Orthodox Sacrament of Reconciliation:
- I was greatly eased in my grief for the repose of my father, by a Russian priest of ROCOR, to the extent that it took away the pain for two years.
- A retired OCA priest concelebrating a liturgy helmed me overcome my lifelong fear of hearses.
- I was taught how to avoid the terrible nightmares that hit me the first time I visited a monastery (which is to say the Jesus Prayer until you fall asleep; the devil really doesn’t want people being in monasteries and will cause distress even to some pilgrims.
- Many other benefits which are too numerous to mention here.
I really like the Russian model of reconciliation every Sunday.
Also, you have read the canons of St. John the Faster, but don’t forget St. John of Kronstadt, who, recognizing that Russians were not attending Reconciliation or the Eucharist frequently enough, made his church, which if I recall was initially primarily one which served non-military sailors, into a pilgrimage center for Christians all over the country. He had everyone confess their sins simultaneously by shouting them simultaneously, so whatever they were afraid to confess that might be inhibiting them elsewhere in Russia, he could loose, and then applying oikonomia he loosed the sins of all the people present without penance and gave them all the Eucharist, thus helping to restore the traditional Slavonic practice of high frequency communion and confession.
I feel we should consider setting up more churches following that pattern where the faithful could go to get “unstuck.” Some monasteries are very good at this - in GoArch, where high frequency confession is not the norm, since it is not required at least once a month in order to receive the Eucharist (and indeed high frequency partaking of the Eucharist is also not as common as in some OCA and ROCOR churches where everyone confesses and partakes each time), Elder Ephraim, memory eternal, heard a great many confessions; I had a blessed encounter with him, and my mother had a blessed encounter with his English speaking deputy Elder Paisios (not to be confused with St. Paisios of Mount Athos, who like St. Joseph the Hesychast, the spiritual father of Elder Ephraim, is often called Elder).
The best approach for maximum spiritual health I believe is the Slavonic one, with high frequency confession and communion.
I would also note that some people want penances, and good confessors in the Orthodox Church will apply the correct medicine based on their assessment. Finding a good confessor is important. In ROCOR I can’t remember the name of the priest who heard my confession and helped me so much with bereavement; he was Russian or Ukrainian and spoke English as a second language, an archpriest or archimandrite and it was in Las Vegas on All Saints Day in 2018, with the retired bishop Vladyka Nikolai celebrating the liturgy. Perhaps someone might know how to look him up.
In the OCA I really like the Romanian heiromonks who serve in Southern California and have a small monastery that doesn’t receive many pilgrims but serves as their residence, and I really like Fr. Michael Rozdilski who was for a time the priest at St. George the Great Martyr in the Inland Empire area. I also really love Fr. John Whiteford of ROCOR and Fr. Josiah Trenham of AOCNA but I’ve never had either as a confessor. I would also stress what Metropolian Kallistos Ware said about elders and elderesses (who can be confessors also if they happen to be priests, but there are lay elders as well as elderesses who are schemanuns or stavrophore nuns who do most of the work of preparing their spiritual children, so that the priest is merely administering the sacrament), that being that while we might be tempted to say our elder or confessor is the best, what we should say is that they are the best for us personally, since everyone has different spiritual needs, and the Orthodox Church is not legalistic but focuses on accomodating those.
By the way there are some people who discourage laity from reading the Pedalion, where I assume you found those; but I think this is misguided; even worse was Metropolitan Anthony Bloom advising against reading the Philokalia. Rather people should simply have a confessor in church and read these things in context and not misinterpret the Pedalion as being the Orthodox equivalent of the Code of Canon Law of the Roman Catholic Church, which it is not. The word canon itself can almost literally be interpreted as “guideline” since it refers to, essentially, a straight edge. A part of me feels because of the discretion, especially of bishops to apply canons with exactness (akrivia) or loosely (with oikonomia) or to set them aside where the spiritual good of someone requires it, that hte phrase “canon law” is almost an oxymoron, except for the fact that there are some canons that pertain to church administration, such as those prohibiting one bishop from intruding into another’s territory, which is routinely violated by a certain patriarchate which shall go unnamed, are essential to maintaining order; they are the law unless the bishop whose rights would be violated grants economy, for example, if he is unable for some reason to visit some of his parishes, but a brother bishop can (at the level of autocephalous bishop ; bishops who are not autocephalous should seek the permission of their superior).
