Me, too, it's so long since I read the series on Optina Elders that many details have faded away. But maybe it's time
to go back through them !
I know for sure, though, that the Elder Sebastian book was just waiting for this exact moment.
Maybe the same way, it's time to reread some of these and different things which are relevant this time will leap out
to delight the reader.
Speaking of the departure of Elder Leonid, did you ever eat the pancakes -?? I suppose they are called blini in Russian.
Somehow that sounds like a different dish - like sour cream or something - than the pancake mix type we all grew up with in America.
I feel so sorry for him, though, and all the Elders who were tragically persecuted by the rest of Optina Pustyn - not Bolsheviks at that stage,
but monks, abbots, etc ! It is staggering that the regular monastics were so unforgiving and unappreciative of the clairvoyance of the Elders.
No wonder the Elders all resided in a separate area, the St John the Baptist Skete. I saw their cells, of course, when visiting.