From St. Nilus the Myrrhgusher of Mount Athos (c1651)

     “After the year 1900, toward the middle of the 20th century, the people of that time will become unrecognizable. When the time for the advent of the Antichrist approaches, people’s minds will grow cloudy from carnal passions, and dishonor and lawlessness will grow stronger. Then the world will become unrecognizable. People’s appearances will change, and it will be impossible to distinguish men from women due to their shamelessness in dress and style of hair. These people will be cruel and will be like wild animals because of the deceptions of the Antichrist. There will be no respect for parents and elders, love will disappear, and Christian pastors, bishops and priests, will become vain men, completely failing to distinguish the right-hand way from the left. At that time the morals and traditions of Christians and of the Church will change. People will abandon modesty, and dissipation will reign. Falsehood and greed will attain great proportions, and woe to those who amass treasures. Lust, adultery, homosexuality, secret deeds, and murder will come to rule in society.

     “At that future time, due to the power of such great crimes and licentiousness, people will be deprived of the grace of the Holy Spirit, which they received in Holy Baptism, and no longer will they hear the voice of their Conscience.

     “The churches of God will be deprived of God-fearing and pious pastors, and woe to the Christians remaining in the world at that time; they will completely lose their faith because they will have no way of receiving the light of knowledge from anyone at all. Then they will withdraw from the world into holy refuges in search of easing their spiritual sufferings, but everywhere they will meet obstacles and hindrances. And all this will result from the fact that the Antichrist desires to rule over everyone and to govern the whole world, and he will work miracles and fantastic signs. Likewise, he will give depraved wisdom to man so that he will discover the means by which one man can carry on a conversation with another from one end of the earth to the other. At that time men will also fly through the air like birds and descend to the bottom of the sea like fish.

And when they have achieved all this, these unfortunate people will spend their lives in comfort without knowing, poor souls, that it is the deceit of the Antichrist. And, the impious one! he will crown science .with such vanity that it will lead people to abandon the right path and to lose faith in the existence of God in Three Hypostases.

    “Then the All-good God, seeing the downfall of the human race, will shorten the days for the sake of those few who are being saved, because the enemy wants to lead even the chosen into temptation, if that is possible then the sword of chastisement will suddenly appear and kill the perverter and his servants.”

A Conversation between a Disciple and His Spiritual Father

(From the Evergetinos)

    “And the brother said to him: ‘What then? Shall the customs and Traditions of the Christians change, and shall there be no priests in the Church so that such things happen?’ And the elder said: ‘In times such as those, the love of many shall grow cold, and there shall be not a little tribulation: overrunning of nations and movement of peoples, apostasy of kings, prodigality of priests, negligence of those in monastic life; and there shall be superiors disdaining their own salvation and that of their flocks; all of them eager and outstanding at banquets, contentious, indolent in prayers, and eager to slander, ready to condemn the lives of the Elders and their sayings, neither imitating nor hearing them, but rather reviling them and saying: ‘If we had lived in those days, we too would have struggled.’ And the bishops in those days shall be respecters of powerful persons, making decisions according to gifts, not defending the poor under judgment, oppressing widows, abusing orphans; and unbelief shall enter into the people, depravity, hatred, enmity, jealousy, rivalries, thievery, drunkenness.’ And the brother said: ‘What then is one to do in those times and years?’ And the elder said: ‘Child, in such days as these, he who can, let him save his own soul, and he shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.'”

    From these prophecies which in great part have already been fulfilled, one can easily come to a conclusion about where mankind is headed. Its future is spiritual bankruptcy, where love for God and neighbor will have grown cold, and men will have become–to the extreme limit–egotists, covetous, boasters, blasphemers, lovers of pleasure.

    But that spiritual bankruptcy will not appear bare and monstrous as it is, but will be covered by an amazing appearance of religiosity. These people with their many spiritual ulcers will have nonetheless an appearance of piety. There will be many who will preach in Christ’s name and will deceive with their false piety and religiosity those “who perish,” all those who do not have in their hearts the love of the Truth in order to be able to discern the wolves in sheep’s clothing. False prophets will accompany their message with signs and wonders which they will effect through the power of Satan (spiritualism, magic’, fakirism, etc.)

(From the Printing Press of Blessed Xenia; reprinted from “Orthodox Australia,” May, 1985)