The essence of Christianity

Unfortunately, no one taught us how to love people—the entire concept of love was reduced to self-sacrifice, care, self-degradation for the sake of another, and conflict avoidance. People tried to devoutly follow these recommendations, but for some reason, society did not become better because of it. The main ingredient was missing.

Love for another implies not only one-sided sacrifice and care—both individuals must change, both must educate each other, and both must maintain love in both pain and joy.

Love not only does not exclude conflicts—it demands them. And it also resolves them. The larger the conflict, the more love is required to resolve it, to find a compromise. The more aggressive a person is, the harder it is for them to resolve conflicts with others. Internal aggression accumulates when we do not know how to forgive.

Why, after two thousand years, do religions call for forgiveness, yet people still haven't learned it?

The reason lies in the peculiarities of our consciousness. As long as I consider someone guilty, I cannot forgive them—the aggression will still seep through.

If I do try to fully forgive them, then the aggression turns toward myself, and such «forgiveness» becomes self-degradation and self-destruction.

A person who forgives in such a way will inevitably come to suppress all their life functions, leading to passivity, weakness, depression, alcoholism, etc. Eventually, to survive, they will stop forgiving and return to the old scheme of «an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,» which isn't all that bad.

Christ spoke about this: if the sinner does not want to change and continues to behave unworthily, then he should be helped not with gentleness and forgiveness but with harsh, adequate actions.

If a person does not change, they will repeat their offense. If a person does not wish to repent for their deeds, then they must atone for their guilt, sacrifice, be punished. A word to the wise, and a stick for the fool. Forgiving a person implies their readiness to change, at least to avoid punishment. Forgiveness occurs on two levels.

The divine aspect implies the absoluteness of the higher will in everything that happens. I cannot forgive a person if I consider them guilty.

But if I understand that Divine will is absolute, that not even a hair can fall from a person's head without the higher will, then I must acknowledge that anyone who offends me, from a higher perspective, is not guilty.

And if they are not guilty, then there's no sense in talking about offense and punishment. At the divine level, there are no right or guilty parties, only the Creator's plan, which is unknown to us.

Therefore, whatever any person does, we have no right to be offended or seek revenge.

On the external plane (where there is our body, our thoughts, and superficial feelings), offense and hatred are attempts to educate another person. However, this is the most primitive form.

An offense usually passes when a person internally changes, sacrifices (for instance, gives us some gift), starts behaving differently.

Simultaneously, we try to change as well, understanding that it takes two to tango, that we ourselves (our internal state and behavior) are the cause of being offended or oppressed.

In Christianity, love for one's neighbor was always considered to be gentleness, conflict avoidance.

This inevitably led to hypocrisy. Outwardly everyone was gentle, but inside, hardness accumulated.

During the times of the Inquisition, everyone spoke of brotherly love for one's neighbor, yet when someone was burned at the stake on the slightest suspicion, the verdict was: «Execute mercifully, without shedding blood.»

In the post-Christian world, pseudo-love and pseudo-warmth have become customary.

We are currently astonished by the hypocrisy of the Western world, but it is quite logical, stemming from the one-sided perception of the world and the distorted principles that the followers of Christ established at the Ecumenical Councils.

Regarding the theme of the end of the world, Jesus Christ referred to this period as the approaching of the Kingdom of God.

Interestingly, the definition given by Christ encourages love, whereas the definition given by his followers induces despair, depression, and essentially kills the love in our souls.

This further testifies to the ongoing lack of understanding of the essence of Christian teaching.

A cursory reading of the New Testament is enough to understand that only loving people will enter the Kingdom of God. To become such, one must, on one hand, pray, connecting with God, and on the other hand, restrain one's instincts.

Those who fail to cope with their instincts and cling to them, that is, to life, wealth, and pleasures, will lose all these upon touching love.

One will lose wealth, another will lose health, a third will lose life.

The degree to which slavish dependence on instincts is entrenched in a person's behavior, the more painful the detachment will be. Many will go mad, as the losses will be not only physical but also spiritual.

It is no coincidence that in the era of Christ, there was a vast number of demon-possessed individuals. He taught how this ailment is overcome: through fasting and prayer, that is, detachment from instincts and focusing on love for God.

As the Kingdom of Heaven approaches, the soul begins to purify unnoticed—judgment, hatred, offense, and despair are all extracted. Initially, a person may not even suspect this.

If he prays in the morning and evening, accepting any future pain as God-given purification, if he understands that everything happening is given to us to strengthen love, if he feels that the meaning of life is love for God, if he cares about preserving love in any moment of pain, loss, or gain, then aggression, barely emerging, begins to melt away.

Then the dependence on instincts weakens. Future diseases and misfortunes, unable to form and gather strength, disappear without manifesting.

A person may not even realize that through habitual sincere prayer, which reveals love in the soul, he has saved himself and his children from misfortunes, diseases, and death.

S. N. Lazarev, «Experience of Survival, Part 5»