Părintele Teofil de la Sâmbăta sau bucuria ca mod de a fi al creștinului
Father Teofil of Sâmbăta, or Joy as a Way of Life for Christians

Summary/Abstract: Few figures of twentieth-century Romanian monasticism have shaped post-1989 religious consciousness as decisively as Archimandrite Teofil Părăian (1929–2009) of Brâncoveanu Monastery at Sâmbăta de Sus. This study argues that the constant emphasis on joy running through his preaching is not a homiletic mannerism but a coherent theological thesis, in which joy functions as a criterion for verifying the authenticity of spiritual life- a role analogous to that of dispassion (apatheia) in the Philokalic tradition. The study concludes that Fr. Teofil’s principal contribution lies in giving a cataphatic, universally verifiable content - joy -to a goal that the ascetic tradition had described in predominantly apophatic terms, thereby making accessible to the layman a category long reserved for the advanced monk, consistent with his conviction that the divine services are „a Philokalia for everyone.”

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