“Life in Christ”

by Fr. John Breck

The Eternal Mystery

I’m sorry this column can’t be accompanied by sound. One of the most precious components of Orthodox Christianity, perhaps especially in the Russian tradition, is its store of melodies to liturgical hymns that are heartbreakingly beautiful. I just came across a fine example, tucked away in the iTunes folder of this laptop. It’s a contemporary…

The Stone Mason

A bearded man in blue coveralls is building a wall around the garden outside my window. It’s a low wall, about a meter high, miraculously taking shape as one rough stone is laid upon another. The man seems oblivious to his surroundings: a bucolic valley in the Vercors region of south-central France, where the tall green hills rising around us flow…

Abortion Pain

Norma McCorvey’s (Jane Roe’s) hope of reversing Roe v. Wade by appealing the original Supreme Court decision, was denied in federal court this week. But certain new realities have been made their way into the mind of at least one federal judge and emerged in the written decision. This excerpt from a recent “National Review” article describes…

Divine Symmetry

Beauty is often expressed by symmetry or balanced proportions. Musical compositions and graphic art usually strive for some measure of symmetry, in order to appeal to our esthetic tastes. They provide us with a sense of harmony, stability and peace—even a sense of sanity, within an often chaotic and crazy world. Major theological themes do the…

The Concept of Longing

Nostalgia is universal. Rumors abound that it afflicted even the likes of Stalin and Hitler. The term is generally defined as a sentimental yearning for some irretrievable experience or condition, such as bouncing playfully on the knee of our long-deceased grandfather, or singing bawdy ballads in the old fraternity bar, or going home again.

There…

Medically Assisted Procreation: Second Thoughts

Not long ago, the American press reported, with a combination of shock and amusement, some fantastic developments Italian scientists had achieved in the domain of procreative medicine. Given the relative ease with which embryos can be created these days in vitro, Italian specialists in the field of MAP (medically assisted procreation) were enabling…

Christological Correction

In late August this site ran the second half of a parish brochure I had prepared as a simple introduction to Orthodox history and doctrine. In it I gave a very brief summary of key elements of the Nicene Creed. One sentence read: “It [the Creed] declares God to be the Father and Creator of all things. It stresses the true ‘incarnation’ of the…

PVS Revisited

A few months ago in this space we raised the issue of “Care for Patients in ‘PVS’,” or “persistent vegetative state.” With the continuing storm of controversy surrounding the case of Terri Schiavo, it seems worthwhile to return to the question.

Terri has been diagnosed by her physicians as being in a persistent vegetative state, a diagnosis…

Hurricanes and Humming Birds

Hurricane Charley just came barreling through, lickety split, hell-bent on more destruction up the Carolina coast. It already devastated a large swath of Florida, laying waste to the region around Port Charlotte. Several people were killed when their mobile homes went airborne, others were lost in the ruins of stores and office buildings, and the…

The Orthodox Church: A Parish Brochure (Part II)

WHAT IS THE ORTHODOX CHURCH ? (II)

FOUNDATIONS OF ORTHODOX FAITH

Orthodox Christians accept the Bible as the Word of God and the ground of their faith and practice. The Bible, however, took shape within Holy Tradition: the oral and written “memory” of Israel and the early Church. To Jesus and the apostles, Holy Scripture consisted of what we call…

The Orthodox Church: A Parish Brochure

WHAT IS THE ORTHODOX CHURCH ? (I)

A BRIEF HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

The Orthodox Church is the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, founded by Jesus Christ and His apostles. It is organically and historically the same Church that came fully into being at Pentecost (Acts 2). Today, the Orthodox constitute the second largest Christian body in the…

The “Lack in Christ’s Suffering”

In his letter to the Christian community in Colossae, St Paul makes a startling and, at first glance, troubling assertion. “Now I rejoice in [my] sufferings [endured] for your sake,” he declares, ” and I complete in my flesh what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of His Body, which is the Church” (Col 1:24). In what sense can the…

Torture in the Womb

Torture evokes for most of us feelings of dread, anger and loathing, responses based at least in part on the fear that it could happen to us or to someone dear to us. Because of today’s headlines, the word “torture” itself calls up images of an Abu Ghraib prison, or the beheading of a Nick Berg, or the “necklacing” of some unnamed victim of Africa’s…

Prayer in the Spirit

As we settle back into the “ordinary time” of our liturgical year, it’s important to recall the special value and importance of this season. “Ordinary” should be understood as a technical term, which refers to a specific period in our yearly celebration. In the conventional sense, there is nothing “ordinary” about it at all. From feasts dedicated to…

SEEING IS BELIEVING

Jesus urged His disciples to open their eyes to the world around them and behold the hand of God. In the seasons of the year, in the gathering of storms, in the birds of the air and flowers of the field, signs are offered that reveal God’s presence and purpose. Those who have eyes that perceive deeper things can discover that divine presence in…

CARE FOR PATIENTS IN “PVS”

On March 20 of this year Pope John-Paul II addressed a gathering of physicians and theologians on the issue of care for patients in a chronic or persistent “vegetative state” (pVS). This is a condition, often referred to as “brain death,” brought on by severe damage to the cerebral hemispheres. It leaves the patient with no capacity for…

Ecstatic Wonder

Fr John Breck On the eve of the Sunday of the Holy Myrrhbearing Women, the Matins service includes Christ’s resurrection appearances as they are recounted at the close of St Mark’s Gospel. If Biblical scholars are correct, these last verses, Mark 16:9-20, did not originally belong to the Gospel narrative. This series of appearances of the risen Lord…

“But Some Doubted…”

The “living tradition” of Orthodox Christianity teaches us that nothing is fortuitous, nothing occurs by chance. God is present and acting at every moment and through all things, in order to guide human life and the whole of creation toward fulfillment of His will. This means that He takes upon Himself our struggles and pain, just as He bestows upon…

POKER, R.I.P.

The other day we had one of our dogs “put down,” that is, euthanized. Actually he wasn’t even our dog. The neighbor had received him as a gift from his sister, had no interest in him, and neglected him completely, other than to toss a little food out to him in the evening. He was a beautiful animal, despite the matted hair, myriad ticks, and mud up…

Archbishop Anastasios on Prayer

His Eminence Archbishop Anastasios (Yannoulatos) arrived in Albania in 1991, to assume archpastoral duties in this impoverished country, which during the Communist period had been militantly atheistic. Since that date, under his guidance and through his prayer, the Orthodox Church in Albania has experienced what has rightly been proclaimed a…