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A theatrical trailer for Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life, the title of which was taken from this passage of George Eliot's Middlemarch: 

“The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.”

About Franz Jägerstätter

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About the movie The Perfect Storm

"Eternal Father, Strong to Save"

One of the central tensions faced by a pastoral leader is shown in the life of Saint Abraamius, Bishop of Cratea, also commemorated on December 6th. This is the tension between service and silence, the active life and the contemplative. After being elected to the leadership of his monastery, he fled, longing for solitude and eager to escape the praise of men. He then returned when the local bishop excommunicated him for disobedience and the saint was unable to obtain restoration to communion from any other bishop. When the excommunicating bishop died, Abraamius was unanimously chosen to succeed him and, despite his love of solitude, for more than 15 years he was renowned for his love of neighbor and for his charitable works. He founded orphanages, hostels and hospitals; he drove that demons, gave arms and wrought miracles of all kinds. But love of God and longing for the quiet of the desert grew ever stronger within him. In response to his prayers, God revealed to him in a dream His blessing to return to the calm of the desert, where he finished his earthly life.

Elder Aimilianos on prayer by night, from Psalms and the Life of Faith: "During moments of quiet and isolation, especially during the night, the conscience is wonderfully able to examine itself. The night is by far the most beneficial time to be face-to-face with God and hear His voice. The night is rich with possibilities, for it is then that the all-powerful Word of God Himself comes to us (Wis. 18.14-15), provided, of course, that there is silence within us and our conscience does not accuse us of anything."

Elder Aimilianos also teaches us that the word for the morning worship service of the Church, όρθρος (orthros), was the name given to the second-to-last shift of the night watch kept by the ancient Israelites. When it is done at the proper time, as it is in monasteries, its conclusion often coincides with the rising of the sun.

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