Elder Cleopa always counseled people, "When your mother, your child, your husband, anyone, is sick, first call the priest, not the doctor! The Church has prayers for everything imaginable, and those prayers are very effectual. Turn to those prayers first, then proceed. If you are building a house there is a prayer for beginning this project; traveling — there are prayers; studying — there are prayers...." One way in which we witness the benefit of those prayers right here at the Monastery involves our flock of free-range chickens: many of the people who live nearby ask us why the chickens have not fallen prey to these the many predators that roam the surrounding forest. The answer: every year, on the feast of St. Blaise (Feb. 11), protector of domestic animals, we process to the henhouse with the priest, singing the troparion of the hieromartyr, and the flock is blessed. If, at some point a hen or two disappear (which has happened about three times in six years), we keep the rest of the flock locked in their pen for a few weeks, while we continue to pray to St. Blaise to again protect them.
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