"It is by inspiration of divine love that in our day there is a reawakening of the desire for mystical theology and the teaching of the Fathers, for asceticism, watchfulness, and unceasing noetic prayer of the heart.
How is it that in the high tide of man-centered, materialistic, and this-worldly understanding, there emerge souls desiring the true life in Christ - seeking perfection, union with God; who want to live according to the tradition of our Church and the holy Fathers? 'This change is by the right hand of the Most High.' This is the work of the Holy Spirit, Who lives eternally, and Who sets apart and makes holy the souls in the Body of Christ, our holy Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church.
After many ordeals, it is becoming increasingly clear today that the Tradition of the holy Fathers is not a luxury, but a prerequisite for a truly genuine Orthodox way of life. And it is a great blessing that the most merciful Lord planted in the midst of the Church the paradise of the garden of the Theotokos - the Holy Mountain - to revive the Church through the gift of the grace of God, which dwells in His saints, ancient and new, in His sacred dwelling-places where the Mother of God has trod, and which comes down to us today through the living Tradition of the holy Fathers, uninterruptedly.
The author of this present book yearns for this Tradition. He lives and works in the world, but his abiding city 'is in heaven', the heaven of the Holy Mountain, which is the foretaste of the Kingdom to come." - Excerpt from the Preface, by Archimandrite George, Abbot of the Monastery of Grigoriou on the Holy Mountain.
