Repere pastorale pentru o apologetică creştină
Pastoral Elements for a Christian Apologetic

Summary/Abstract: The Gospel brought by our Lord, Jesus Christ, has been persecuted since the beginning, both by Jews and Roman Emperors. Those who preached Jesus Christ had some means of conversion to Christianity and some means to defend their faith. The gift they have from the Lord helps them to fulfill their pastoral duties. The apologetic work implies knowledge, wisdom, pastoral tact and love for the fellow man and for those who are diverted from the true faith. His social, cultural and especially pastoral work has to be fruitful, in order to promote and to maintain the spiritual life and, by this, the communion with the Lord. To these approaches for defending the orthodox teachings we must add the prayer, the personal life of the “pastor” and of the Christians, i.e. the life which is lived at the level of the preached teachings: “And now, Lord, seek towards their menaces and give Your servants to utter Your word with boldness. And, while they were praying like this, the place were they were has shaken and they were filled with the Holy Ghost and they were boldly uttering the word of God” ( Acts 4,29 and 31), because now and every day it’s the time for us to strengthen and to defend our faith, with all the power and wisdom we have, from those trying to change it. We can say that synaxaries are guiding marks of the Romanian Christian Orthodox apologetics, that made the foundation of the faith of our clergy and believers, among which many chose to die rather than leave their orthodox faith that was left as a sacred inheritance from their ancestors. The pastoral advice of Saint Paul the Apostle is “to pay attention” to the example of their life and to “the way they ended their life” and to follow their faith.

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