Most people neither hear nor understand God speaking in their hearts: they listen to the urging of passion, which inhabits the soul and with its clam… - Sophrony Sakharov

In my young days ... I had been attracted to the idea of pure creativity, taking the form of abstract art. ... I derived ideas for my abstract studies from life around me. I would look at a man, a house, a plant, at intricate machinery, extravagant shadowscapes on walls or ceilings, at quivering bonfire flames, and would compose them into abstract pictures, creating in my imagination visions that were not like actual reality. ... Fortunately I soon realised that it was not given to me, a human being, to create from 'nothing', in the way only God can create. I realised that everything that I created was conditioned by what was already in existence. I could not invent a new colour or line that had never existed anywhere before. An abstract picture is like a string of words, beautiful and sonorous in themselves, perhaps, but never expressing a complete thought ...

Stand on the edge of the abyss and when you feel that it is beyond your strength, break off and have a cup of tea."

No sin is unforgivable except the sin that is not repented of.