One Young Serb was a seminary student in an Orthodox seminary in Paris. He was faced with a dilemma: Should he get married, or become a monk? He went to Versailles, where Archbishop John was living at that time, and asked him: "Should I become a monk?" Vladika John had lived for a long time in Serbia, and was well acquainted with the mores and character of young Serbs. He knew they could be stubborn and impulsive, and he emphatically told the young Serb, "No."
This Serb became a monk anyway. When this Serbian monk had the good fortune to meet Vladika John once again, this time in America, Vladika blessed him with the beaming face of one who knows Serbs through and through. Vladika knew that if you told a Serb, "Yes, you should become a monk," that he wouldn't do it…
Bishop Daniel of the Serbian Orthodox Church