The life, trials and teaching of the great Romanian elder ascetic Arsenius (Papaciok)
Many times in his life the Elder told the following parable. They once asked a leaf: "Are you a rose"? "No, I'm not," said the leaf. "Then why do you smell like a rose"? "I'm just a leaf, but I once stood next to a rose." All those people, whom the Elder mentioned so much in his prayers, were to preserve and transmit his "fragrance", because they too at some point, like the leaf, stood by the grace of God next to a rose.
We don't need a formal prayer. We need constant presence of the heart, this perpetual state of love, of relationship with God, this is the essence of prayer. Because even a deep silence means a deep prayer. And deep prayer means deep silence. Every moment can be useful time and every sigh can become a prayer. A sigh is not: Ugh!, but a breath that springs from the depths of the heart and is directed towards God. This is how it will appear to us. Because He does not appear in a sharpened mind, but only in the one who has a pure heart, in the one whose heart is constantly turned towards Him...
