People who have “survived suicide” (family, friends and close circle of the suicide) are a risk group for suicide (including passive). They need support and, in almost all cases, personal psychotherapy.
They experience the same feelings of loss, heartache, grief and grief as any other person who has lost a loved one. And, as after any trauma, those around suicides may have:
- weakening of attention and impaired concentration (including deteriorating ability to navigate);
- uncontrollable and overtaking influxes of memories of the experience;
- sleep and dream disorders related to trauma;
- an irrational feeling that what happened could happen again (with the same person, if he is still alive, or with someone else close). Any situation seems suicidal;
- weakening connections with the world: communication problems, reluctance to ask for help (as it seems that no one will understand you);
- previously unusual timidity and indecisiveness even about the simplest cases (“should I wear shoes or sneakers?”);
- avoidance of any situations reminiscent of the traumatic one (because of this, the environment often completely changes).
But besides this, people who were close to the suicide come into contact with some specific feelings.
For example, shame. Because suicide is considered a shameful and condemned death, friends and relatives of suicide victims are often forced to keep the incident under wraps, and they are often deprived of even the opportunities to discuss and openly grieve the death of a loved one that other people experiencing mourning have. Even with a priest, such a conversation can turn out to be traumatic if he prefers a harsh sermon about hellfire, unforgiveness and eternal suffering of a forever condemned suicide to consolation.
A feeling of rejection and isolation is inherent in most people who experience (or have experienced in the past) any severe psychological trauma, but especially those around a suicide.
Families of suicides are ashamed not only because suicide is a socially disapproved act. Admitting that your relative committed suicide (or tried to do so) is often perceived as a verdict on oneself: “I am such a monster that my son/brother/husband chose to die.” A person is afraid of someone else’s opinion of himself, and often deep down he thinks so himself. This in turn often gives rise to irrational fear, developing into panic.
The suicidal environment feels guilt And confusion, especially when we are talking about mentally healthy suicides, and not about the mentally ill. People worry that they didn’t notice the warning signs of suicide, didn’t come home in time to prevent the suicide itself (“if only I had come back thirty minutes earlier!”), and didn’t understand how bad the person was when he tried to hint at it or directly complain. Or maybe they understood, but were unable to support and dissuade. They painfully analyze their behavior and the behavior of others. They are trying to understand, “suddenly my behavior has become the last straw"and suffer from the fact that they cannot check it. Guilt before a suicide can be either real or completely far-fetched - it all depends on each specific case.
To answer the most difficult questions: “Why did the person do this?” and “What could have stopped him?” there are no universal answers. It is necessary to talk only about each specific case, because even between seemingly similar suicidal stories there can be (with careful analysis) a huge difference.
Of course, we can talk about the undoubted callousness, indifference and even cruelty of family and friends towards a person who finds himself on the edge of his ability to survive. But often those around them are not at all to blame: either because they did not know about the impending suicide, or because they did everything possible to prevent it, but did not succeed.
I will specifically give two examples that are not related to the closest people:
The girl comes to her friends all in tears. She had been in regular contact with them until the last few weeks, and then disappeared without explanation. Continuing to sob, she, without saying a word, puts the toaster on the table, which she borrowed from them, and silently leaves. The girl is mentally normal, such behavior is completely out of character for her. However, none of the several people who were in the house tried to stop her, ask what was wrong, support her and console her. On this day, the girl attempted suicide: she suffered from loneliness, from the fact that no one needed her and no one loved her. She had already tried to negotiate with her mother, who lived in another city, about coming home, but her mother refused. Friends didn't support me either.
Another example: a woman calls a good friend whom she has not seen for a couple of months, and in a completely calm, even cheerful voice asks if she would like to come visit. My friend is busy and refuses. In the evening, the woman attempted suicide. It turns out that she was physically ill, was depressed, was going through a personal crisis and felt useless to anyone. At the same time, she did not show her condition in any way, did not hint that she needed not only a pleasant friendly visit, but also any support or at least physical assistance(it was difficult for her to go out to the store for groceries). The friend who refused to come feels terribly guilty and is very worried, although no one explained or showed her the real state of affairs.
The reaction to suicide usually develops in several waves:
At first there is confusion, shock, helplessness and a paradoxical feeling of relief (in cases where this was not the person’s first suicidal attempt) according to the principle “the swing is worse than the blow.” The suicide is accused (the same feeling is often felt towards a person who died a natural death or died in a car accident, but in the case of suicide it is more acute): “he deserted, left me,” “how could she not think about us?!” Then the anger intensifies, which is accompanied by guilt for the anger. After this, clinically defined depression often develops, accompanied (as a core symptom) by a decrease in self-esteem. In this state, suicidal thoughts, intentions and attempts often appear. If the problem is not recognized, if they do not work with it, then at this moment a psychosomatic response often begins: grief turns into the form of some kind of physical illness, often destructive.
Relatives of a suicide often have the feeling that they do not have the right to happiness or even just to life. In order to survive, they unconsciously resort to psychological tricks, which, on the one hand, seem to give the right to life, and on the other hand, this life significantly complicates and often destroys:

Finding someone to blame for the death of a suicide (instead of experiencing anger at oneself and an unbearable feeling of guilt): a psychologist, resuscitation doctors or psychiatrist, love partner, tough boss at work, etc. There are times when the whole life is subordinated to revenge; all resources are used for this.
Eternal farewell: urn with ashes, standing at home, a locked room in which everything remains as it was during the life of the deceased, life at the grave, etc.
Care in physical illness: such a person never recovers unless he undergoes personal therapy.
Self-restraint in different senses of the word. For example, to combine your life with a disabled person (I am, of course, not talking about those natural cases when a marriage is for love, but about those when this is done as self-punishment), an alcoholic, cruel person or someone who is actively unpleasant, even disgusting.
“Escape”: a person does not allow himself to have any deep experiences.
“Vow of silence”: a person does not discuss what happened with anyone. This complete failure from working on oneself, experiencing grief and healing, since it is impossible to silently respond to grief, which means there is no opportunity to live fully further.

I repeat, the best thing that can be done in relation to people from the close circle of a suicide is to send them to personal psychotherapy.
Children of Suicides
There is an opinion among ordinary people that talking to children about suicide is certainly harmful. In fact, just the opposite is harmful - silence and concealment of what happened. Firstly, because a situation that is accompanied by silence in the family is always disastrous for children. Family secrets are dangerous for a child. Secondly, keeping the situation silent deprives the child of the opportunity to figure out whether he is to blame for what happened and to express his feelings.
All children who have lost their parents suffer, regardless of whether they know what happened or not, since children's consciousness is magical. They believe that everything that happens around them has something to do with them and happens through their fault. In traumatic situations (illness, divorce of parents, death of one of their beloved relatives, experienced violence), the child, with his sense of guilt, protects himself from his natural helplessness in front of the world: it is more comfortable for the psyche to feel powerful and guilty than weak and helpless. Therefore, children of suicides often believe that their parents died because “I was angry with her/him,” “I behaved badly,” “I once thought: “It would be better if I didn’t have a mother.” They even remember specific incidents that supposedly caused everything to happen. An older child can explain what a burden he was to his parent.
Therefore, it is much easier for a child to find out that mom or dad did this for reasons that have nothing to do with him, than to carry a feeling of guilt in his soul for what happened.
The child of a suicide also experiences natural anger at being abandoned. This anger is usually not expressed because there are no words for it; the child does not yet know how to talk about it. And, in fact, he needs help with this! But anger is also not expressed because the child does not have many opportunities to speak out on this topic and be accepted with his feelings. After all, according to our social standards a child has no right to be angry. And even more so for mommy or daddy.
Very bad sign when the child of a suicide does not show grief. Often this indicates that he has gone into an illusory world, into compensatory dreams that no one has died. This is a significant step towards mental or psychosomatic illness.
The most correct way is to allow the child to participate in mourning. Recognize the child as having the right to grieve, to express his feelings for the deceased without choosing words. It is also necessary to discuss how the child feels about himself. If other relatives are unable to help the child survive the parent’s suicide, then it is better to contact a child or family psychologist.
To be continued
(On how to talk to a person who is contemplating suicide)

According to church canons, suicides (this also includes those killed in a duel, criminals killed during a robbery, people who insisted on euthanasia) and even those suspected of suicide (it is not customary to hold a funeral service for those who drowned under unknown circumstances) cannot be buried in church or commemorated in church prayer during the Liturgy and at funeral services. Suicides are not buried in cemeteries near churches. There are opinions that dead “lovers” of extreme “sports” can be classified as suicides, because they are really aware mortal danger Such activities, for the sake of empty joy, still risked their lives. In fact, drug addicts, substance abusers and alcoholics are suicides.

However, in the well-known pre-revolutionary manual for clergy S.V. Bulgakov, with reference to the resolution of the Holy Synod of July 10, 1881, states that those who died from heavy drinking (unless it is proven that they drank with the aim of poisoning themselves with alcohol) are not considered suicides, on the basis that "...for death from heavy drinking is preceded by a clouding of reason, which does not happen when using other means of conscious suicide...". Although, obviously, almost all drunkards realize that overuse alcohol is fatal to health. Not everything is simple in cases of death of drug addicts from an overdose, since immediately before taking the drug the drug addict is conscious, unlike a binge alcoholic who takes the last already fatal portions of alcohol in a clearly insane state.

Exception done only for suicides suffering from obvious mental pathology, and are on official psychiatric registration. In such cases, it is necessary to provide the ruling bishop of your diocese with a certificate from psychiatric institution, who once supervised this unfortunate person, and write a corresponding petition asking to bless the church commemoration of such a person. Almost always such a blessing is given...

Who are we deceiving, ourselves or God?

However, as practice shows, our people, especially those of little faith and church “goers,” attach excessive and false importance to the church funeral service, as to some kind of magical action, after which the deceased automatically goes to heaven.

Meanwhile, according to the teachings of the Church, the human soul goes through terrible ordeals on the third day after death. At this time, the soul of the deceased has a great need for the prayerful help of relatives and the Church. To facilitate the transition of the soul to another life, the canon and psalter are read over the coffin by the relatives, and the funeral service is performed in the church. The primary importance of this service is comfort of the soul of the deceased, and only then asking the Lord for mercy for the soul, asking for sins, which, alas, are not automatically forgiven in absolutely all cases.

It’s hard to see with what simply maniacal persistence parents almost extort from the clergy a blessing for the funeral service of their suicidal children, who have never suffered from mental disorders. Who are we deceiving? The priest, turning to the Lord, sings: “...rest with the saints...”. Who will you rest with the saints?! Suicide?! Who, moreover, despised the Church of Christ for years, just like his parents, who began to be baptized only when a terrible thunder struck?

Saint Innocent of Irkutsk, according to, among other things, apostolic rules, asked relatives who brought the dead to the church for the funeral service: "When was the last time he was on duty?" - “About six months ago.” - “Take the coffin. We have no right to perform a funeral service for such people.”

The Church prays only for its members, but almost always people who have long ago arbitrarily cut themselves off from the body of the Church end up committing suicide. The Lord said: “I am the vine, and you are the branches; whoever abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in Me will be cast out like a branch and wither; and such branches They are collected and thrown into the fire, and they are burned."(John 15:5-6) - they contain both great consolation for faithful Christians and a terrible warning for those of little faith and apostates.

Here are two letters from Archimandrite John Krestyankin, confessor of the Pskov-Pechersk Monastery:

“Dear A. in the Lord! You cannot remember and pray for your mother in church, because there are canons that cannot be disobeyed. Disobedience will entail terrible consequences for the disobedient. He will give himself over to the power of the enemy. But what is possible - he writes about this Bishop Benjamin. And we send you the Canon about someone who died without permission. Read this canon at home for 40 days every day, and read the prayer of Leo of Optina for your mother all your life. Also give alms for your mother to those in need. Nothing more can be done. Even if someone gives you permission to pray in church, it will be to the detriment of both your mother and you., for no one can cancel the canons of the Church. And obedience to them will bend the Lord to mercy on you and your mother. God bless you!".

“Servant of God V.! You cannot violate church canons with impunity. You cannot pray for your brother in church. You were fussing about his funeral service, now at least stop collecting the wrath of God on your head. You can only pray for suicides at home, and not at all report them in church, neither at the Liturgy nor at the memorial service. The Lord is their judge, and you suffer for disobedience."

The manic persistence of relatives of suicides is often driven by a subconscious desire to shift all responsibility for future fate of his murdered child against the Church. Meanwhile, the greatest blame lies, first of all, with parents who live in unbelief and who did not give their child the proper faith from a young age, which he could easily rely on in difficult times.

Therefore, it is more correct to take responsibility ourselves, and privately (at home) to undertake the feat of prayer (but not arbitrarily, but blessings and under certain conditions), with faith that the Lord will give some relief to the soul of a suicide.

However, everything is not so simple here...

Pray, but carefully

During recent years Several brochures are in circulation, which contain a commemoration at home prayer about suicides with the canon “Oh, those who died without permission” and the prayer of St. Leo, the Elder of Optina. This is a publication of a certain Moscow parish (by the way, printed without the blessing of His Holiness the Patriarch); publication of the Holy Dormition Pskov-Pechersky Monastery (also without the archpastoral blessing); this canon and prayer were included in the book published by the Sretensky Monastery - “Prayers for the Dead” (I have not personally seen the publication, and I don’t know whether it was blessed by His Holiness the Patriarch). A small book, “How to Pray for Suicides,” which is a copy of the first two with a number of additions, was published in 2004 with the blessing of Archbishop Nikon of Ufa and Sterlitamak.

Despite the fact that the creator of the canon, Metropolitan Veniamin (Fedchenkov) was a remarkable ascetic of Orthodoxy of the 20th century, in the report of His Holiness Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Alexy II at the Council of Bishops in 1997 http://www.sedmitza.ru/index.html? sid=50&did=40 they say “More control is needed over the publication and introduction of new liturgical texts in order to avoid such misunderstandings as the publication by one Moscow parish of the theologically and canonically dubious “Canon of those who died without permission.” Indeed, it is noteworthy that all the prayers about suicides, which are now recommended, with certain reservations, for private (home) reading, relate only to the last century. In the detailed pre-revolutionary manual for clergy of the same S.V. Bulgakov, unfortunately, there is no explanation of how home commemoration of suicides should be carried out, except perhaps:

"...by the Samara spiritual consistory in 1894, the refusal of one of the clergy to bury according to the Orthodox rite a woman who hanged herself while drunk, was recognized as correct; and the local Eminence on this resolution of the consistory put forward the following resolution regarding the said woman: “I only allow perform commemoration, with alms in her memory, but I don’t dare allow her funeral service according to the Orthodox rite."

A single conciliar church opinion on PURPOSE prayer cell (home) commemoration of the souls of suicides,
to alleviate their condition in hell, or even save them from hellNO

One of the brochures, which discussed the possibility of commemorating suicides, cited one pre-revolutionary story.

“In the city of Buzuluki, near Orenburg, at one time there lived a rich man. He had a beloved son. At that time, they found him a bride, and she was not to his liking. They wanted to marry him, and he hanged himself out of resentment. For his parents, it was terrible blow. They are believers, they applied to many churches and monasteries - they asked to pray. And everyone refused. We went to the holy city of Jerusalem, and there they refused. Holy Mount Athos refused... They found one recluse who advised them to cast a bell at his own expense at a bell factory. the largest bell and donate it to the church. And so they did. When the bishop began to consecrate the bell, he struck it 12 times, as required, the sound came out heavy, mournful, and the bishop said: “You can’t ring them either on holidays or during fasting, but only when they take out the deceased." The walls of the bell tower often fogged up, from this moisture the floor in the bell tower constantly rotted and was often replaced. And then a letter came from the Holy Mountain, in which it was written: we tried to pray for the suicide, but the Lord does not accept our prayers, He does not even accept the ringing of a bell... The bell was taken down and buried in the ground.”

The young man who committed suicide was young, baptized, I think, like everyone else then, he attended divine services much more often than modern Christians of little faith, Holy Communion, fasted, confessed his sins to the priest, and, judging by the morals of that time, it is unlikely that he sinned seriously. And why was this young man pardoned? It is, alas, that now young people, by the age of twenty, go through all the circles of hell: unbelief, hatred of parents, adultery, abortion, envy, lies, drugs, foul language, passion for the occult... But from a human point of view, even such incredible zeal of parents - try In the 19th century, to travel all over Europe would seem to deserve the attention and condescension of God. However, the Lord will judge whatever he finds you doing...

On the other hand, Archimandrite John (Peasant), confessor of the Pskov-Pechersk monastery, wrote in one of his letters to a mother whose son committed suicide: “But you really cannot pray for your son in church - this is the definition of the Holy Councils of the Holy Fathers, this is the canon. Praying at home, with all your sorrowful and wounded soul facing God, is absolutely necessary. But the answer is the work of God, we cannot predict it and decide for We cannot God. Having maintained obedience to the Church, leave in your soul the hope of God’s mercy for your mother's prayer. Read the Canon for someone who arbitrarily interrupted his life(written by Metropolitan Benjamin - approx. MS),if possible and willingly. For the first time, try to read 40 days daily. And let the prayer that is in the canon console you every day, and it will help your son. It is good to give alms to those in need for your son. hope and faith are lamps in our life. And the Lord is mercy and love. That's what we hope for."

All these commemorations collected in this brochure are only the private opinion of individual members of the Church. Their righteousness and holiness, alas, is not a guarantee of the correctness of their advice or consistency with God's will. Unfortunately, we are now full of people who blindly identify the opinion of a pious elder or ascetic with the opinion of God himself, like “the words of the elder are the words of God.”

Hieronymus Bosch. Fragment of the triptych "The Last Judgment" - right wing "Hell", 1504

Not every black soul can be whitened by God's mercy and grace

The Holy Apostle John, the apostle of “love,” as he is sometimes called in the Church, commanded: “If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin that does not lead to death, let him pray, and God will give him life, that is, he who sins a sin that does not lead to death...” however, he warned immediately "...there is a sin leading to death: I do not mean that he should pray"(1 John 5:16), that is, people who are in such a fallen state that any prayer for their salvation futile.

Or here - "Whoever does not love the Lord Jesus Christ is anathema, maran-afa"(1 Cor. 16:22). Terrible words!

The Gospel Scriptures and the Apostolic Epistles do not give reason to believe that Christ can save people by force, and the soul of a person who did not take care to cleanse it himself during his life through repentance and faith in Christ is unlikely to be cleansed by the Lord, even if relatives fervently pray for it.

Archimandrite Ambrose (Yurasov) gives this story:

“The Lord does not want the sinner to die, and whoever turns to Him is saved. He calls everyone to repentance, He loves everyone and wants not a single soul to perish. It is not for nothing that the Lord Himself took on human flesh, came down to earth and suffered for us. This means that He suffered for everyone, no matter how many people there were, are and will be in the world.

But man is given free will - to repent, to accept the living Christ, or to reject Him.

When I served in the Transfiguration Cathedral, I often had to go to services around the city. One day I went on a call; I enter the apartment, they greet me and say: “Father, there is a man here - he is 51 years old, his name is Anatoly - he should be given unction and communion.” I went in and looked: after the operation, there was a patient lying there; his intestines had been removed into his stomach. Next to it is a bottle of water with a pacifier on it. His lips are constantly dry, he keeps this pacifier in his mouth. I ask:

-Anatoly, when did you confess?

- Never.

- Do you want to confess and receive communion?

- But I have nothing to repent of!

- Well, how about it? You never went to church in your life, you didn’t pray to God, you cursed, you drank, you smoked, you fought, you lived unmarried with your wife. All life is pure sin.

- I don’t want to repent of this!

And the women standing nearby said:

- Anatoly, how?! After all, you agreed to call the priest. You need to repent - your soul will immediately feel good.

- I don’t want to repent.

I talked to him, spent 20 minutes, and said:

- Now - imagine - Christ Himself has come to you in the Holy Mysteries, waiting for your repentance. If you do not repent and take communion, you die and your soul will be taken away evil spirits. And I would be glad to repent later, I would be glad to improve - but you will no longer have such an opportunity. We must repent while we are alive.

- I’ll get what I deserve! - speaks.

I finished talking and started getting dressed. And the women (neighbors) began to convince him, saying: “Anatoly, come to your senses - what are you saying! After all, it is so important for every person (especially the sick) to repent before death!” And he tells them:

- Don't try to persuade me.

I got dressed:

- Well, goodbye. If he wants to confess, let him know, we will come.

And one of them is suitable:

- Father, talk to him for the last time: maybe he will agree. I walked up and sat down next to him:

- Well, Anatoly, do you want to repent or not?

He is silent. I look, and his eyes glaze over. I speak:

- Yes, he is dying.

Women:

- How? He felt good!

“He’s dying,” I see: he sighed three times - and his soul came out. Of course, demons took this unrepentant soul. That's where the fear, horror is! After all, man has left this world for Eternity. Billions years will pass suffering in the fire is just the beginning, there will never be an end. And this was such a wonderful opportunity to repent! Not all people are worthy to have a priest come to them and bring the Holy Mysteries - the Body and Blood of Christ... These are the terrible deaths that happen.”

Can God save such a person who does not want to be saved? And who can guarantee that the suicide at the time of death did not have the same attitude towards God and His Church?

Some may reasonably note that there is demagoguery here - whether it is useful or not useful to pray with home prayer for suicides; according to Christian mercy and compassion, it is imperative to pray for such, and the Lord will judge. At first impression, such judgments seem justified. However...

When praying, prepare for serious temptations

Real prayer is not ecstatic meditation, it is work, but prayer for suicides, unbaptized people and great sinners is hard work! During which you will encounter strong spiritual temptations and deteriorating health of not only the prayer booker himself, but possibly all members of his family.

There is reason to believe that, perceiving the memory of the soul of the deceased, the person praying at the same time becomes, as it were, a companion of his spiritual state, enters the area of his spiritual yearnings, comes into contact with his sins, unpurified by repentance.

If the deceased was an Orthodox Christian and once in earthly life turned to God with a prayer request for mercy and forgiveness, then the one praying for him with the same prayers bows to him God's mercy and forgiveness. What if the soul passed into another world in a mood hostile to the Church? How can one, praying for an unbaptized person or a baptized person who has departed from the faith, allow oneself to come into some contact with that atheistic mood with which their soul was infected? How to accept into your soul all those ridicule, blasphemy, crazy speeches and thoughts with which their souls were full? Doesn't this mean exposing your soul to the danger of being infected by such sentiments? Those who reproach the Church for lack of mercy should think about all this.

An indicative case is from the life of the holy Venerable Seraphim of Sarov, he said that he managed to beg some great sinner, and after that, he, a great righteous man, a monk, was seriously ill for several months.

What awaits Christians who are not as righteous as St. Seraphim of Sarov, who undertook with his prayers to “save” a dear relative who killed himself?! Great temptations and health problems.

Experience shows that with the beginning of a private prayer commemoration not even about a suicide, but about an unbaptized parent who died, alas, in unbelief, almost immediately the disease almost immediately spread to the person praying, then to the wife (husband), and then to the children. Lord have mercy! I know a woman who prayed earnestly for her unbaptized father during pregnancy - it ended in a miscarriage.

One of the Ufa priests told me a case when, in the already distant Soviet years a young man who began to zealously become a church member, due to his excessive zeal, decided to save the souls of the dead, whose bodies lie in the Demskoye cemetery near the city of Ufa. There he made up big list with the names of the deceased, and prayed for the repose of everyone. Wild scandals began in the family between him and his wife, it came to divorce, his already adult children committed all serious sins; Of course, diseases appeared, not in better side The spiritual life of this person has changed. The holy venerable Moses of Ufa, to whom this Christian then turned for advice, first of all asked him for whom he was praying. When he spoke about his prayerful “feat”, the first words of the monk were not at all biblical: “Are you a fool?!”, and then strictly forbade him to do this, pointing out that there were many serious sinners there: suicides, atheists, drunkards and etc.

Praying for relatives who have not been baptized in Orthodoxy is also not easy.

The conversation about unbaptized people was not started by chance. In practice, it turns out that a person is not only a suicide, but also a non-Christian.

The canon to St. is well known. Martyr Uar for unbaptized people. However, few people carefully read the story accompanying this canon about how, through the prayers of this righteous man, one unbaptized young man was pardoned, and interpreted what was told into life.

This young man, firstly, was a young man, pardon the pun, which means that, due to his age, he did not have time to sin many and seriously; secondly, apparently, he was pious; thirdly, he had a very pious Christian mother (you agree, this is important); fourthly, he knew about Christ, and, apparently, was preparing to receive Holy Baptism, but did not have time (before, Christians went to the catechumens not for a week or two, but for months, or even years); fifthly, those who were catechumens in those days necessarily sincerely repented of their sins, even without a priest’s confession, so who can object to me that such sincere repentance of sins is not spiritually beneficial and useless? What exactly am I leading to? Such a pious young man, the son of a pious Christian mother, already well-disposed towards Christ, was not worth the trouble of begging Saint Huar before God.

Now let’s imagine, for example, a woman who died at an advanced age, who lived in unbelief, blasphemed, fornicated, had abortions, stole (who didn’t steal in Soviet times?), etc., in short, with a great variety of all kinds of unrepentant sins. What can one hope for when trying to pray for her salvation to the holy intercessor Uar?!

However, the souls of relatives are still troubled in despair; is it really impossible to save or improve the situation of suicides, as well as unbaptized relatives?

If your spouse is pregnant, if there are infants and small children in the family, STRICTLY REFRAIN from praying at home for suicides and unbaptized people, especially for unbaptized suicides, in order to avoid health problems for children family members, pregnant and lactating women.

If everything is higher specified conditions They don’t apply to you, of course, you can try to dare this home prayer feat. However NECESSARILY take a blessing from the priest, and if he refuses, do not act outrageously - this will not end well, and remember “obedience is greater than fasting and prayer.”

It is better to begin your prayer feat by imposing a fast on yourself (necessarily with a blessing!) or during multi-day fasts, if forty days after death no one privately prayed for such dead people. The Monk Nektary of Optina advised at least three Christians to pray together at once. Before and while you pray, confess and receive Holy Communion often, preferably even weekly (again, with blessing). Eat a piece of prosphora and holy water every day. Order a magpie about the health of yourself and close family members. Remember, prayer for suicides and great sinners is a great spiritual feat, do not do it casually, from time to time. I repeat, it is quite possible that, perceiving the memory of the soul of the deceased, the person praying at the same time becomes, as it were, a companion of his spiritual state, enters the area of his spiritual yearnings, comes into contact with his sins, unpurified by repentance. Naturally, nothing good can be expected from this. Even such a great ascetic as Seraphim of Sarov found it difficult to pray for some grave sinner.

There is another one, I think, very pious and The right way receiving mercy from God for any person. Read, along with prayers, the Gospel for the salvation of his soul, one or two chapters a day - “Faith therefore comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”(Rom. 10:17). Where will saving faith in Christ come from for a deceased unbaptized and suicide suicider of little faith if he does not know "words of God"? Alas, this is our common misfortune - many Orthodox Christians, even grandmothers who participate in divine services almost every day, do not read, or read little of the Holy Scriptures.

If you started to pray, and you, your loved ones, children began to serious problems with health, immediately abandon your efforts and simply resign yourself, trusting in God’s mercy about the fate of this person’s soul.

“The justice of God will not make mistakes, and with this, reassure yourself, as much as possible.” - the already mentioned archimandrite wisely wrote John (Peasant).

Resigned with the fact of the suicide of a person close to you, live a worthy, righteous Christian life with faith in Christ the Savior, so that your soul is reunited with the Lord after death in paradise, and there directly from Him Himself find out the Divine will for this case. If there is a certain benefit from your prayers to a suicide, pray fervently while already in the Kingdom of God. Christians ask for righteous prayers from the saints of God, now standing before Him in paradise, for themselves and their deceased relatives. So what prevents a Christian who finds himself in heaven from praying for his relatives who are in hell?

Save yourself, and thousands around you will be saved - do not forget these words of St. Seraphim of Sarov.

Lord, have mercy and save us!

Maxim Stepanenko, supervisor

Missionary Department of the Ufa Diocese

Russian Orthodox Church

Ufa Diocesan Gazette, No. 2-3, 2006. –P. 8-9.

Choose life with Christ!

"For I have so loved God peace,

that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16)

"Choose life, that you and your descendants may live and love the Lord your God, listened to His voice and clung to Him; for this is your life and the length of your days...” (Deut. 30:19-20)

30 July 2011, 21:29 | question
M.Alexandra!
My father committed suicide. My mother and I were not married.
What should I do?
Will this affect my life, the lives of my children?
Alexandra answers
Have you gone to your metropolis to get permission for an absentee funeral?
This is a must do.
Only you can ease his fate in the next world. Then the Lord will not leave your children without help.
One day, a student turned to the Optina Elder Leonid (in the schema Leo, who died in 1841) in inconsolable grief over his deceased suicidal father, asking whether and how he could pray for him. To which the elder replied: Submit both yourself and the fate of your parent to the will of the Lord, wise and almighty. Pray to the Most Good Creator, thereby fulfilling the duty of love and filial duties, according to the spirit of the virtuous and wise:
Seek, O Lord, the lost soul of my father: if possible, have mercy! Your destinies are unsearchable. Do not make this my prayer a sin for me. But Thy holy will be done.
You can pray with this prayer at home for relatives who have taken their own lives without permission, but given the certain spiritual danger described earlier, to perform prayer at home you must definitely take a blessing from the priest.
From the patristic heritage there are known cases when, through the intense prayer of loved ones, the fate of the souls of suicides was alleviated, but in order to achieve this, one must perform a feat of prayer.
In this instruction for every Christian who is in a similar position, there is a lot of comfort, calming the soul in surrendering oneself and the deceased to the will of God, always good and wise
They also pray for suicides (daily, privately, i.e. at home, with the blessing of the priest) to the holy martyr Uar.Prayer to the holy martyr Huar
Oh, venerable saint of the martyr Uara, we kindle with zeal for the Lord Christ, you confessed the Heavenly King before the tormentor, and you suffered earnestly for Him, and now the Church honors you, as you are glorified by the Lord Christ with the glory of Heaven, Who has given you the grace of great boldness towards Him, and now you stand before Him with the Angels, and in the Highest Face of Uesha, and see clearly the Holy Trinity, and enjoy the light of the Beginning Radiance, remember also our relatives' yearning, who died in wickedness, accept our petition, and like Cleopatrine, the unfaithful race was freed by Your prayers from eternal torment You, therefore, remember those who were buried against God, who died unbaptized, striving to ask for deliverance from eternal darkness, so that with one mouth and one heart we may all praise the Most Merciful Creator forever and ever. Amen.
Instructions on how to pray for suicides
The Optina elders allowed even suicides to be remembered at cell prayer, for whom, according to the 14th rule of Timothy of Alexandria, there could be no offering in the Church.
The Monk Ambrose of Optina wrote to one nun: “According to church rules You shouldn’t remember a suicide in church, but your sister and relatives can pray for him privately, just as Elder Leonid allowed Pavel Tambovtsev to pray for his parent. Write out this prayer... and give it to the family of the unfortunate person. We know many examples that the prayer conveyed by Elder Leonid calmed and consoled many and turned out to be valid before the Lord.”
About our domestic ascetic Schema nun Afanasia, it is said that she, on the advice of Blessed Pelageya Ivanovna of Diveyevo, fasted and prayed three times for 40 days, reading the prayer “Virgin Mother of God, rejoice” 150 times daily for her brother who hanged himself while drunk, and received a revelation that Through her prayer, her brother was freed from torment.
The commemoration of the departed, out of humility and for obedience to the Holy Church, transferred to our home and cell prayer, will be more valuable in the eyes of God and more gratifying for the departed than done in church, but with violation and neglect of church statutes.
Particular attention should be paid to performing alms in memory of the departed, which, according to the words of the righteous Tobit, delivers from death and does not allow one to descend into darkness...
St. Fyodor the Studite advises to give alms for heretics, and the Optina elders command to do the same for suicides.
Pray, fear no one but God.
It is better not to tell children that their grandfather took his own life.
God's grace to you.

Of course, it is difficult to give any advice to people who have experienced such grief, because none of our words, no matter how affectionate, warm, and heartfelt they may be, can make up for this terrible loss. It's grief when your loved one passes away. The worst thing is if this happens to a child. And it is probably impossible to survive to the end, to understand, to accept this. This is pain that a person will have to live with for the rest of his life.

Often those around us try to avoid this topic. And not at all because they are afraid of shaking their mental balance or spoiling their mood, but out of fear once again touch and open the wound.

I am sure that a person should never be left alone, without attention, if he himself does not seek loneliness. Most of the main problems modern life- just from a lack of communication and attention to each other. We turned out to be completely unable to pay attention to each other and live with the pain and misfortune of another person. And this is our sadness. We have completely forgotten one of the main principles of the first Christian community, where there were no strangers, where everyone was relatives to each other and the pain and joy of everyone was the pain and joy of the entire community. Nowadays we sometimes don’t even know the name of the person who stands and prays next to us in the temple (the only thing we know about him is that he has a red jacket, which is annoying).

People who have experienced the grief and pain of losing a loved one need to be shown ten times more love, attention, and care than anyone else. This will help, God willing, to smooth out the pain at least a little.

And, of course, we must pray for each other. If this happened to loved ones, you need to pray for them! If the person with whom this misfortune happened is not a stranger to you, you need to pray for him! Because prayer is what connects us with each other. If we refuse to pray for a person, then we are thereby saying that he is a stranger to us, that we do not love him. Then all our expressions of sympathy are hypocrisy. No one and nothing can stop us from praying.

Of course, there may be some guidelines - traditions, established practices, prohibitions from the clergy - that limit one or another type of liturgical commemoration. But it's not that simple. Thank God, there is now a discussion on this issue. In principle, there cannot be any cliches here. There can be no final laws or dogmas regulating human prayer.

During a disaster, those who cannot help themselves are rescued first of all: children, the elderly, and the disabled. But in the Church it turns out that funeral services are held for Christians, but suicides are left without church commemoration.

I will express my personal point of view, as a priest, as a Christian: in my firm conviction, the tradition that has developed in the Russian Orthodox Church, refusing funeral services and limiting church commemoration in the event a person has committed suicide, is a practice that has evolved in the pre-revolutionary period and was determined solely by pedagogical considerations. At that time, the man knew that if he committed suicide, he would be deprived of a church funeral service, would be buried behind the fence of the cemetery, and his loved ones would never be able to pray for him.

All these factors had a very strong psychological impact, which stopped, if not all, then most people who thought about or started this step. It was a powerful pedagogical argument that did its job.

Today, I must say honestly, all this stops few people. People in such a state are not primarily concerned with church commemoration. Therefore, I believe that we should perform funeral services for suicides if relatives request it and if the person was a Christian.

Formally, we refer to the 14th rule of Timothy of Alexandria, which says that suicides cannot have a funeral service. I must say that nowadays we treat the canons very loosely, we leave some things, we don’t leave others. And we can easily find a canon to justify or confirm this or that judgment or action. We often say that in canon law there are the concepts of “oikonomia” and “akrivia”. I believe that allowing funeral services for suicides is exactly the path of mercy and economy that we should follow. There are many examples when we perform funeral services for people who were only formally Christians, who died a natural death, but who during their lifetime were blasphemers and atheists. Their moral and moral life is in big question, but we sing “rest with the saints,” and nothing torments our soul. This is also completely wrong.

There are many known cases when people committed suicide, committed this terrible sin, a terrible crime towards their soul and, of course, towards those around them too - but at the same time they were Christians. We don’t know what’s going on in the soul of every person who decides to do this. It's a secret. In the burial order there are wonderful words: death is a sacrament. The Lord alone will judge the soul of man.

Paradox: on the other hand, we perform funeral services for a lot of people who, perhaps, do not want to have funeral services at all...

I believe that this is a matter within the sphere of pastoral responsibility, which cannot be approached simply in a formal way. If you bring proof mental illness suicides, then the funeral service will be allowed. “Allow me to perform the funeral service for my son who committed suicide.” - “Bring us a certificate from the psychiatric hospital that he was sick, then we will give him a drink.” This happens very often.

Recently a man came to see me whose son had committed suicide. He couldn’t find a place for himself, he followed me day and night. He turned to the clergy. They told him: bring a certificate from the psychiatric hospital. And he refused to bring a certificate because his son was mentally healthy. He considered that this lie would also be a betrayal - like everything that happened to his son, he considered it to be a consequence of betrayal towards him. I think this is correct.

They held the funeral service for Marina Tsvetaeva, and they also held the funeral service for many other people. This means we can hold a funeral service for someone. If you intercede for someone, it is no longer considered a sin to them. If a high-ranking person, either bring a certificate from a psychiatrist, or come to an agreement with the bishop... But if you can’t get through to the bishop, if you live in Siberia and in general in the countryside and don’t know what to do, then your son or daughter will not be punished...

Each case must be looked at separately, because sudden death does not fall under any rules. It is important that the priest takes the death of each person very personally. If he wants to enter into the pain of the person who came to him, I think he will be able to make the right decision.

Thank God that we now have the “Rite of prayerful consolation for relatives of those who have died without permission.” In my opinion, it is short, not fully understandable, leaving a slightly strange impression, but thank God that it exists as a kind of beginning. This is already some kind of consolation for relatives, because prayer for repose is needed both by the soul of the person who committed suicide and, above all, by relatives. Because when your child leaves, there is nothing left in life that could make up for this loss. And prayer can support, can prevent other suicides. She is able to heal the souls of these people, turn them to God, and encourage them to rethink their lives.

If earlier suicides were not held funeral services for pedagogical reasons, now it would be necessary to hold funeral services - also for pedagogical reasons (in relation to their relatives). I repeat once again that this is my personal opinion.

Where should relatives look for hope and consolation if they were not given permission for a church commemoration?

I believe that every effort must be made to ensure that the funeral service takes place. This is within the power of the relatives. You need to pester the priest and the hierarchy with requests, not give up, never despair. When we need something, we can move mountains. And if we need something, we have to talk about it day and night, shout, ask, demand, walk, something else. And if we don’t pray, if we don’t ask, then we don’t need it.

If the funeral service does not happen for some reason (or, on the contrary, it happens), then again you need to understand that the funeral service itself is not an amnesty, just as its absence is not a sentence. This is not the only thing that can change a person’s life in the future, it is not the final verdict. There are a million examples of desert monks who were not inveterate. There are many saints whose bodies were treated very blasphemously after death. I am not comparing suicides with ascetic monks, but I am saying that the funeral service does not decide a person’s life in eternity.

Ultimately, what is a funeral service? In this case, the priest himself does not perform any sacred action. On behalf of the gathered community, he pronounces the words of prayer to God out loud. And if he didn’t say them out loud, let’s all get together and say these words ourselves. Yes, of course, I do not equate cell prayer with church services, not at all. But there is no need to shift everything to the priest, thereby solving the problem. You must pray yourself. You must remember this all your life. It’s not that my soul was sick, then they finally performed the funeral service, blessed the land, took it to the cemetery, poured it out there, and the stone was lifted from my soul. Nothing like this. You will need to pray for a person all your life.

But no one can forbid us to pray personally. Prayer is something for which there is no time, no space, or any other boundaries. If we feel a connection with a loved one, then we should pray for him every day and hour. Pray that the Lord would forgive him everything for which he himself did not have time to ask for forgiveness in this life. To pray that the Lord would forgive him this sin, that He would have mercy on him, that the Lord would make us wise, how to act so that we could somehow help the people whom the Lord placed on this earth next to us. Human strength lies only in prayer. Prayer is what connects people with each other. Nothing else can restore this connection.

Of course we cry. Because we feel sorry... first of all for ourselves. This is a natural human quality. But if we are not indifferent to the fate of the soul of a departed person, then we must pray for him.

We believe that through the prayers of the living, the Lord changes the fate of the dead. The Church speaks very clearly about this in its worship. On the day of Holy Pentecost, Trinity, in our kneeling prayers we pray “for those who are kept in hell.” This means that we have firm confidence that through the prayers of the community the Lord is able to change the fate of these people. So why do we anticipate God's judgment by saying that this is impossible? Moreover, we must pray for suicides, submitting their soul, like the soul of every person, to the judgment of God.

There is a common belief that praying for suicides means possibly harming yourself. It is a myth?

Of course this is a myth. To get into the water and save a person is also to harm yourself. People who saved others in Krymsk harmed themselves. At best, it’s pneumonia, and at worst, we know examples of people dying while saving others. You can harm yourself with anything if you treat yourself very carefully. We often carry ourselves very carefully, we are afraid to “spill ourselves”. If you take an ink pen, you’ll put a stain on your pants, and you’ll also harm yourself. Therefore, what can we say about prayer... Praying for people means shedding blood, as the Monk Silouan said. If it’s hard to burden yourself with anything, including prayer, then forget it and don’t think about it, take care of your health.

What is prayer? First of all, a conversation with God. How can you do harm by talking to God?

Bring something on yourself...

If only we consider God as some kind of formidable judge who will give us a slap on the head for what we asked for someone. How can you harm yourself if you ask God for forgiveness for another person? Not for yourself - this is very important. We ask for ourselves too often. If we ask for another, how can we harm ourselves? This is what God is waiting for. This prayer is ten times closer to God than prayer for ourselves. Because she is selfless, because she is for those who can no longer ask for themselves. Maybe the Lord tolerates us on earth just so that we can pray for another person.

Elder Zosima in The Brothers Karamazov says: “Every day, and whenever you can, repeat to yourself: “Lord, have mercy on all who stand before you today.” For at every hour and every moment, thousands of people leave their life on this earth and their souls stand before the Lord - and how many of them parted with the earth in isolation, no one knows, in sadness and anguish, that no one will regret them and doesn’t even know about them at all: whether they lived or not.”

We should all remember this commandment. Every day and hour, pray for the one whom the Lord called from the earth.

What were the reasons for leaving - let's leave it in God's hands. There are a lot of surprises awaiting us in the next world. We will meet there someone whom we absolutely do not expect to meet, and we will not meet, perhaps, someone whose afterlife fate we had no doubt about. Therefore, we will leave this to God’s judgment. And the Lord judges with love.

We don't have enough love. We talk too often about justice and truth. Justice and truth are empty words without love. Moreover, our understanding of both justice and truth is distorted without love. God's judgment is very different from human judgment.

We have heard stories many times when the Lord last minute saved a suicide - the rope broke or suddenly someone came to visit. And the relatives of those who did commit suicide are perplexed: why does the Lord save some, but not others?

There can be no answer why the Lord acts this way and not otherwise. Why does the Lord take people at a certain moment, some earlier, some later. Why does the Lord allow pain and suffering on this earth. We can, of course, say: this probably happened to us, because this is how it is. I probably slipped and fell today, because I was rushing to work this morning and didn’t get the old lady across the street. We can find some explanations, although they will all be very, very far-fetched. Of course, thank God that we are starting to delve into ourselves and look for answers...

The only correct answer to everything that happens is the will of God. If we could explain God’s decisions, we ourselves would stand on the same level with God - “I know everything, I can interpret the will of God.” We can't know her.

In a completely incomprehensible, inexplicable way for the human mind and understanding, and sometimes difficult for the heart to accept, the Lord leads people to salvation and arranges it so that everything is for the good of the soul. And we need to trust God, entrust our lives to God: “Lord, I can’t understand, I can’t understand, I don’t understand, it’s very hard to come to terms with, but I believe You, I trust You.” You need to trust God and accept everything that happens with trust in God. With gratitude if we can offer it, but above all with trust.

It is inexplicable why the Lord does this. We understand some things after some time, some things we don’t understand on earth, but we will understand in eternal life, but such is God’s providence for each of us. You don’t always need to delve into the mechanics of life. All our falls come from the fact that we do not trust God.

What does “we don’t trust” mean?

We always want to correct Him; we do not accept in our hearts what is happening to us.

Trust does not mean going with the flow. It often happens that we Orthodox say: “This is the will of God. So, God blessed it this way,” and we happily wash our hands. Especially if it affects our ideas about how we should have acted.

But you need, without giving up participation in your life, to accept everything that happens - both sorrow and joy - firmly believing that it is from God. “I accept it, Lord. I accept without complaint. I ask, please help me to survive this, to live with it, to act within the framework, in the direction that You have outlined.” This is trust in God.

Many relatives of suicides are gnawing at the feeling of guilt that they did not manage to stop it in time, did not see that something terrible was happening to the person. How can you get rid of this feeling of guilt?

No way. And there is no need to seek relief from feelings of guilt. Or forget this person, erase him from your heart. If we feel guilty, it is our fault, and there is no need to brush it off. The Lord himself will heal and soften this pain. Somehow the wound will heal, the Lord will give consolation. But trying to figure out how we can forget this is wrong, because if this happened to a person, then it is the fault of each of us.

Nothing happens for nothing. It's not someone else's fault. We are to blame - those who lived next to this man. At the root of the tragedy of suicide there is always a betrayal committed by loved ones. We didn’t hear it, we didn’t want to hear it, we didn’t see it, we didn’t want to see it, we didn’t look back, we didn’t look, we didn’t ask, we weren’t there, we didn’t ask again, we refused love, we refused attention. Any refusal of attention to a loved one is a betrayal towards him. Because we are all called to give each other love, to take care of each other. The Lord came to earth in the form of a man, He always answers through a man and comes to us through a man.

We betray each other very often. Everyone experiences betrayal differently. Sometimes we wiped it off and forgot, sometimes we didn’t pay attention, sometimes our heart ached and the relationship was restored. And sometimes something happens that cannot be changed. Life, unfortunately, cannot be written down as a draft and then rewritten completely. There are things - if we did them today, we will not be able to undo them tomorrow. Or vice versa - if we haven’t done something today, we will never be able to do it again.

Therefore, you will have to live with guilt all your life. And we must live and ask God for forgiveness for ourselves and for the departed person all our lives. It is very important to remember this responsibility.

What else can relatives of a suicide do for their loved one who committed suicide?

Definitely good deeds. The Lord took some of us, but left us on earth. This is also not just for us to walk around and smoke the sky. What is the purpose of man? And our purpose is to love and give our love to other people. Therefore, we must give love to those who remain with us in this world. Help those we can help. And very often our help, completely insignificant, meaning nothing to us, can make it easier, and sometimes radically change the life of another person. For us some sum of money- a trifle, but this money will save someone’s life today.

Unfortunately, not everything can be solved with money. You need to give something global of yourself, both materially and morally. In moral and physical. My personal opinion is that the Lord will have mercy on the deceased all the more, seeing our good deeds and our help. It’s not for nothing that we hold funeral services, invite the poor and sick, and feed them in memory of the departed. This mercy of ours is not needed by God, it is by the human soul. The Lord accepts this sacrifice.

Let us remember the feat of Saint Blessed Xenia of Petersburg, how she took upon herself foolishness after the death of her husband. For what? In order to facilitate posthumous fate a spouse who suddenly died without repentance. And she achieved this goal through acts of mercy, acts of prayer, and dedicating herself entirely to God.

Sometimes it is advised to give alms and mentally tell God what kind of person this is.

The Lord himself will sort it out. Alms should be given not for someone, but to someone, because this person is in need. You need to give it to him, and the Lord will count it. He will put it into our account, into the account of the deceased - God has his own accounts. If you see someone in need, take it out and give it.

Without thinking about whether this is a real needy person?

Very complex issue, to which I do not have my own definitive answer. We have a lot of scammers who also take advantage of children. Of course, you need to have some reasoning. It’s not easy to give a ruble and thereby pay off, to remove sin from your soul. Of course, you need to somehow give to those who really need it.

But it’s better to make a mistake in the other direction than not to give at all. You know, we give and give so rarely that our understanding that we have given to the wrong person is such deceit, such a lie! We have gone through a hundred times and have not given to someone we know exactly needs.

It’s not for nothing that in our cities - at the walls of churches, at escalators, at metro stations - there is such a large number of the needy, the poor, the wretched, the crippled. This is one of the signs of our life. The Lord knocks on our heart like this.

2 weeks ago my father committed suicide. He was only 56 years old. Despite the fact that he has a large family (2 adult sons, a wife, his mother is still alive, 3 granddaughters), he committed this act. We all loved him very much and he often said that he loved us all. But Lately he began to drink a lot and combine alcohol with medications (he was being treated for hypertension). During his sober hours he was normal person and made plans for life with his mother, but when he was drunk, talking to him, much less expecting any revelations from him, was useless. We tried to convince him that he was only making things worse for himself. On that fateful evening, there was no one next to him who could stop him. He got dressed and left the house. In the evening he called his mother, said goodbye and hung up. We found him about 25-30 minutes later in the garage... Usually I cry very rarely, but since his death not a day has passed without tears. I’m very sorry for his mother and brother who were the first to find him, very sorry for his mother (my grandmother), who outlived her children, very sorry for his granddaughters, for whom he will never come to kindergarten or school again. Mom can’t imagine her life further without him. They have been together since childhood. A lot of people knew and loved him, but that didn’t save him. PEOPLE! TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF AND YOUR LIFE IN ANY SITUATION! MANY OTHERS CAN DEPEND ON YOUR ONE LIFE...
Support the site:

Son, age: 31 / 03/06/2012

Responses:

Son, let me express my condolences to you. Your whole family is now incredibly sad and painful. Follow the link http://www.memoriam.ru/, read the materials on the site. Go to the forum there http://www.memoriam.ru/forum/, read the materials and topics of those grieving. Perhaps some of you will want to open your own topic there.
God's help in overcoming terrible grief.

Elena, age: 55 / 03/06/2012

I sincerely sympathize with you. God help you! Courage to you!

Aikosha, age: 34 / 03/06/2012

My condolences...

Aleana, age: 41 / 03/06/2012

I express my regret and sympathy to you...
Your dad made a mistake... I don't think he realized how much pain he would cause you. A person who uses anything sooner or later loses touch with real life, his eyes and heart stop seeing the most important, simplest things.
Now you can't get anything back. Try to move on with your life and never repeat your father's mistake. All addictions change a person’s personality, so that he ceases to understand what is really happening. And it becomes more and more difficult to control himself, he no longer controls himself. Someone else owns it..(
God can only ease this pain, try to go to church more often. So that the evil one avoids your family. God bless you.

Rita, age: 27 / 03/06/2012

I sympathize with you, it is very difficult to lose a loved one.
person.Hold on.

Quiet horror!!! , age: 21 / 03/06/2012

You are great for writing your story on this site. Many who read it will understand what it means to “commit suicide.”
Son, how can I console you? Maybe because each of us has our own path, that perhaps your father had a hard time living... for some reason, I don’t know. Yes, I couldn't stand it. Yes, it's broken. But nothing can be changed...
The only thing you and your family can do for him is to remember and pray for his soul. No matter how painful it is now, over time it will probably become a little easier... You have to get through this.
My grandfather died. For a long time, from illness. He had a beloved wife, children, and granddaughter. And it was incredibly difficult for everyone, but now everything has passed. The pain is gone, the memory remains. And this is the most important thing.
Pray for your father and family. Good luck to you.

Tina, age: 18 / 03/06/2012

My condolences. Be strong! You understand that now you need to help your family, because there are only two of you men! Now he needs prayer support, pray for him!

Vadim, age: 55 / 03/06/2012

Sorry, you didn't write your name. My condolences to your entire family! This is a huge grief. I just want to be silent next to you! Nothing is
I want to talk. Just hang in there. You are now the support of your entire family. I also lost my dad. It’s very difficult for me without him. He's been gone for exactly a year. But I often remember him and smile. Of course he will always be in my heart. And for you, dad will always be in your hearts. Forgive him for his departure. Sorry for the many words. Once again, my condolences to you. May the Lord God bless your entire family!

Eleanor, age: 46 / 03/06/2012

Hello (unfortunately I didn’t see your name). I understand your grief... our dad also passed away, but he didn’t say goodbye to us, and there were no conflicts in the family, and there were no problems with alcohol, he just disappeared at work all the time... I understand your feelings: guilt, resentment, anger, bewilderment... but all this is normal for such a situation. And mom will gradually learn to live without him - don’t leave her, it’s good that there are granddaughters - it becomes easier with children. In your letter you seem to accuse him...there is no need - I think he loved you all, he was just confused. You will survive grief, the main thing is to keep a good memory of him - he probably did a lot of good in his life, and one act - even such a terrible one cannot erase all the good. And be prepared to become the center of gossip... unfortunately this will get you nowhere... remember - you are not obliged to explain anything to anyone, and no one has the right to judge the actions of others... strength and wisdom to you...

Julia, age: 31 / 03/07/2012

God bless you, Son. I believe that with your letter you will save the lives of those who decided to leave it...
People, live. Live no matter what. Even if the pain tears your soul apart, remember: Your pain will go away. And the pain for you will forever remain in the hearts of your family and friends. Live...

Jane Eyre, age: 15 / 03/07/2012

Save and preserve... be strong... I sympathize.

Olga Petrovna, age: 49 / 03/07/2012

Please accept my most sincere condolences! Words of consolation will not help, I know from myself. What can I say...let your story serve as a lesson to those who are going to do something similar...I sincerely sympathize with you.