The Idol of Self

BY: Archiman­drite Archimandrite Ioannikios

Paperback: 222 pages

This is a book that challenges the reader to seriously contemplate the path of their spiritual life.

The ideas of the Fathers mentioned in this book become the guiding lights that illuminate the spiritual darkness that surrounds us. The symptoms of our spiritual ailments help us realize that we can all relate to this at a personal level.

Father Ioannikios presents a spiritual radiography of man, as it emerges from the teachings of the Holy Fathers of our Church. The source of all sins lies in our egoism, in our idol of self. It becomes the reason for the absence of true happiness in our lives. It gives rise to the bitterness we all taste. It condemns us, the eagle-like beings destined to roam at glorious heights, to swim like ducks and bathe in murky waters, to crawl like serpents, eating dirt, imprisoned in the cage of our ego.

Fortunately, the book goes beyond the diagnosis and presents the treatment and the way leading to liberation from this form of idolatry, which is truly of the worst kind.

In the pages of this book, the reader will find the path and the method, the way and the solution to this tragic problem, which is none other than voluntary and conscious humility. Yes, let us all understand what being a zero is like: “I am but nothing”. Only then we will anxiously seek to find the One, the Christ, and place Him before our zeroes, and thus acquire divine value.

Antonios Vasiliadis – Theologian former Mayor of Giannitsa