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Submitted November 18, 2004

Something about the Guardian Angel

Father George Calciu

When God created the celestial hosts – seraphim, cherubim, thrones, dominions, principalities, powers, archangels and angels, He established that the angels must be in an uninterrupted relationship with mankind. Among those angels, the guardian angels are the most kind and loving, because they begin their mission in the world with taking care of children. They are sweet like children; they are gentle like children; and they are vulnerable and shy, just like children.

As the Akathist to the Guardian Angels states, they keep unceasing watch over one’s life. Their activity with children grows and they never cease to love them, despite the bad behavior of those children who become adults and no longer listen to the voice of their guardian angel. The Angels never abandon the children during their life on earth; they never stop teaching their children nor stop praying to God for their salvation to the end of their earthly life.

I will tell you a short story about a guardian angel and the child given into his care. I read it in The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevski.

A girl was entrusted to her guardian angel. When the girl became an adult, she began to love money and riches and was such a miser that she never gave anything to the poor who begged at her gate.

After a miserable life full of sins and wickedness, the girl, now an old woman, died. She was sent into hell, and because of her sins, her punishment was to remain in a pit of tar. Her guardian angel was very sad. He went up and down along the edge of the tar pit trying to remember if the old lady had done anything good in her life. Finally, the good angel remembered the woman had once given an onion to a beggar. He went up into heaven and fell down in front of the throne of God .

He said: Lord, this woman did a good deed in her life. She gave an onion to a needy person.

Alright, answered God, here is the onion. Take it, go to the pool and tell the woman to grab hold of the onion and pull her out of the tar. Be very careful, the onion is fragile.

The happy angel took the onion, went to the tar pit and called the soul of the bad woman. Look soul, said the angel, this is the onion you gave to a beggar. Grab it, and I will carefully pull you out of the pond.

The woman took hold of the onion, and the angel started to pull her out very slowly. The other souls, seeing that the angel was pulling the woman out, grabbed hold of the hem of her robe, hoping they would also be pulled out of the tar. When the woman felt the other souls grabbing her hem, she started to curse kick them with her legs, screaming: Let me alone, sinners, I am the one who gave the onion, not you. Go into the deep tar, you accursed ones!

At that moment, the onion broke and the woman fell back into the pool of tar. And the angel began to cry in pain.

I have related this story to you to show that our guardian angel never abandons us. He is faithful to his mission; he loves the soul entrusted to him; he prays to God and whispers good counsels into our ear; he is the good conscience which teaches us the way to salvation. He exults with joy when we follow his advice and cries when we turn a deaf ear to his voice.

Each person, good or bad, has a guardian angel. When a baby is born, God sends a guardian angel to teach him and to defend him against all dangers, against temptation, against bad influences. When you are ready to commit a sin, an interior voice whispers in your heart: Don’t do this! When a danger threatens you, the same angelic voice prevents you: Don’t go there! or: Avoid this person, or this group, or this intention! If you preserve at least a small part of your child-like purity, a small part of your innocence, you will always hear the voice of your angel guiding you through the vicissitudes of this life to a better place in Christian society, to a better community of people. You will feel the protection of God, and your soul will be free from fear, uncertainty and doubt, and you will have the courage to face injustice, to love your neighbor and even your enemy. You will walk in the light of God.

Sometimes you can see your guardian angel. On your right side of your head you can see a light, a special light which is not like the sun’s light or the light of a lamp. It is a sweet light, something spiritual, coming from above and bringing you spiritual joy. You must understand by this that your angel is there and tries to communicate with you. Say a prayer, purify your heart and mind, and remember you have a friend who will never abandon you, even during those times when you are sinning.

Remember and be glad that a messenger of heaven visits you and sing to him: “I proclaim aloud your constant care for me, a sinner, O my angel guardian; for amid the tribulations and temptations which trouble the peace of my soul in this most tumultuous world, you show yourself to be a speedy comforter for me” (Kontakion).

Your guardian angel will assist you in your last days. He will take your soul, defending it against the attacks of the demons who will claim your soul because of the sins you committed during your life. Your angel will then proclaim that as long as you are not sentenced, you still belong to God. He will take you in a three-day journey to visit all the places on earth you have inhabited – whether briefly or for a long time - and he will remind you of all the good or bad deeds you committed.

He will tell you: Here you prayed, here you helped a sick person, there you refused to help somebody,” and you will thus have in your mind all the bad and the good deeds of your life.

Guided by the angel, you’ll visit the realm of happiness occupied by good souls and the unhappy realm of the bad ones – so as to understand that God is just, but that He is also good and merciful. You will discover on this journey if you have given away “an onion” to a beggar, and thus your guardian angel will plead for you in front of the Supreme Judge.

And if the judgment be against you because of your to many sins, do not forget that your guardian angel will not abandon you, even if you are in “the pool of tar”; and, he will sustain a hope for your salvation until the last Judgment when the mercy of God may shower upon you and you may be called into the Kingdom of our Father, through the prayers of the guardian angel. Amen.



Volume 6 Number 48 - Tuesday, November 30th, 2004	A Publication of the ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN LAITY