“If those who are poor, in need and are starving do not grumble or murmur, they will receive the same reward as hermits who struggle in asceticism on the slopes of Mt. Athos. Monks abstain from food voluntarily, which greatly eases their ascetic labors. If I do something, for example, then I do it of my own free will, and as a result I barely feel the burden of asceticism. But these poor people hunger involuntarily and thus suffer much, much more. God can reward these people with even greater rewards than the ascetics living in solitude.”
(Elder St. Paisios in ‘St. Paisios the Hagiorite’)
vcc