TEHRAN - Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei received on Saturday a gathering of managers, instructors, and clergymen of Tehran-based seminaries, outlining “intellectual and religious guidance,” “political guidance and insight-strengthening,” and “guidance and participation in the field of social services” as three main missions of clerics.  

“Clerics should prepare themselves for shouldering sensitive responsibilities in the society through acquiring necessary qualifications and awareness in today’s different world,” the Leader remarked. 

Recommending clerics to cherish values and responsibilities associated with being a cleric, Ayatollah Khamenei noted an unreligious society will face serious problems in this world and the hereafter. 

“If all specializations demanded by a society are available in the best way possible, but the society is not religious, that nation will suffer losses in this world and the hereafter, and it behooves Ulema and clerics to turn the society into a religious one.” 

The Leader said clerics in their “religious guidance” role should explain “pure Islamic thoughts”. 

He also pointed to the role of the virtual world in fueling religious ambiguities and their underlying political motives, saying, “The field is a real battlefield and equipped and prepared clergymen and seminary students should enter the scene of countering false and deviant thoughts and ambiguities.” 

The Supreme Leader gave “the reactionary, bigoted Islam without understanding spiritual realities and superficial inanition” as a real manifestation of deviant thoughts, noting, “At the other blade of the scissor, the eclectic Islam and American Islam are battling the pure Islam.”

Understanding pure Islam based on Holy Qoran and tradition is clergymen’s important mission 

Elsewhere in his remarks, the Leader referred to “understanding the pure Islam based on the Qoran and tradition” as an important duty of clergymen via Islamic logic and thoughts, saying practical guidance of people is complementary to their intellectual guidance. 

Pointing to strengthening inherited beliefs of people, Ayatollah Khamenei called for rectifying the beliefs which may have atrophied over the course of time through “correct reasoning.” 

On political guidance as another key responsibility of clergymen, Ayatollah Khamenei highlighted the significant role of “revolutionary seminaries” as it guarantees the continuity of the revolution in the right path. 

Referring to Americans’ attempts to purge clergymen from the very beginning of the 1979 revolution, he stated that by doing this they aimed to abort the revolution. 

As the third main duty of clergymen, the Leader cited participation in the field of social services, underscoring clergymen’s presence in providing people with social services, school- and hospital-building, emergency situations, and other areas will involve people.