“Thoughts in Christ”

Many Orthodox Christians here in North America will live out their lives never having visited a monastery, and yet they are influenced by monastic worship and life styles without being aware of it. They keep rules of fasting two days of the week and whole periods of time four times each year. They pray in worship structures fashioned and chanted in…

The priest intellectual Fr. Pavel Florensky who perished in a Soviet labor camp wrote the above comment about our faith. He meant that learning the Orthodox Christian religion is a matter of the heart discovered in the soul of a seeker. It’s not found in the mind alone. One doesn’t come to know God; he or she experiences Him. The one who insists on…

We express the self-evident meaning of that pinnacle of prayer at each Divine Liturgy. As the deacon or celebrant crosses his arms and raises the sacred gifts to the Lord, we realize that the consecrated bread and wine are symbols of the contributions that the people of God are presenting to the Lord they love. The gifts represent the income from…

When we do as the apostles, taking their clue in giving our lives meaning by accepting the invitation of Jesus to “Follow Me,” we learn why the early church’s first title was “The Way” (Acts 9:19, 24). Learning is a process, not just a goal. We measure our intelligence and wisdom not by a diploma or degree, but what we’ve been discovering and…

Here is a meditation for us all. It would do well for us to call this question to mind every time we say, “Lord, have mercy,” or hear it sung in church. Unfortunately, we all know the reasons why it tends to be a title without having the implications of obedience.

A. It’s a word that’s not used much in our culture. We are proud Americans. We know…

Odd but true. So many people I’ve known have found their way to Orthodox Christianity by fascination. Bp. Kallistos Ware is one of the many who tell their tale of having visited an Orthodox church and been caught up in the rituals and ways of worship. It seems like a feminine method of garnering devotees, but the word for the Church is feminine, and…

How long was He standing there? How long do you wait for a woman to go on weeping? It’s not an easy question to answer. Crying is therapeutic. As the fathers say, tears wash the windows of the soul. But they were talking about weeping for one’s sins. This was not the case. It’s odd about life. When we are born, we cry because we were slapped. Then…

There are not many in western civilization who have not seen replicas of the famous scene painted on the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel, where the Almighty Creator high and powerful swooshes down to the languid human being, just awakening, a body hardly able to rise on one elbow, the other elbow on a flexed knee, about to feel a powerful shock coursing…

Guilt, shame, fear, and flight: Every parent knows the sequence of misbehavior. Eyes lowered, head down, hiding from exposure. In most of the art displaying the expulsion of our ancestors from Eden, they are being chased out by the angel with a flaming sword, running in terror, looking backward over their shoulders. But from the Bible record we find…

“The baseball season’s opening game falls on Good Friday. Is it alright to go there and have a hot dog? May we have a dispensation?” If I’m asked, I must say that I have no answer. In fact, it’s not the place of a priest, bishop or patriarch of the Orthodox Church to respond with a yes or no. The proper response is: “What do you think?”

We are a…

Three women, the first separated by centuries from the other two, the latter two a generation apart. They share promiscuity, the primeval manner of selling their bodies to get what they want from a world controlled by men. Each became notorious for her beauty and fame: St. Mary in Alexandria, the Las Vegas of her era; our two contemporaries in…

The host of the dinner who had treated Jesus with disrespect couldn’t understand why the Lord permitted the woman to act in such an outlandish way. To be that carried away with ardor for Christ transcended all standards of decorum and propriety, even for a known prostitute. Such a bizarre act of affection was hardly appropriate, as Simon the host…

If I could speak just a single sentence to comfort the hearts of my spiritual children, it would be: “You are never alone, because your guardian angel is always close by.” Each of us at birth has an angel assigned to our spiritual care by our heavenly Father. It is also our misfortune that from that time the devil is out to separate us from God and…

Let’s begin by understanding the meaning of the word “temple.” It’s a place set apart for prayer, a place where God abides in a special way. Everywhere else may be secular and profane, but a temple is holy, because it is filled with the Holy Spirit. You go to a temple to find and worship God, and you come away from the temple; however, in a sense…

Why does He make it so difficult for us? Doesn’t the Lord Jesus see and understand what our enemies have done to us? A church in the South was recently ordered to remove from their marquee the phrase: “Jesus Loves Osama bin Laden.” Tell me, my Orthodox Christian sisters and brothers: Do you agree with that pastor or with the ordinance?

You may ask:…

Our church group was in the Holy Land. It was years ago, before the political climate made travel to that precious region dangerous and foreboding for tourists. In Jerusalem Ari, our Arab guide, cautioned us, “We are now going through the crowded, narrow streets of the city. Many groups of people, tourists and others will make up a throng weaving in…

High and prominent on the icon screen you will often notice an icon of our Lord, God and Savior, Jesus Christ enthroned on the Judgment Seat in the Kingdom of Heaven. On His one side is the Mother of God and on the other side is St. John the Baptist. Both are looking in to Him and bending their bodies towards His throne. This is the Deesis icon, a…

Hard words for a soft society. The Lord Jesus puts us to the test. He challenges us to question our values. What are we living for, and what would we die for? We go to Him with our worries and we may wonder why we don’t feel that we are getting the answers we expected, needed or wanted. Silence is the response, and we lose faith. Prayer “doesn’t…

When a woman and a man fall in love and marry, they unite their families as well. They must consider at holidays such as Christmas, birthdays and special anniversaries what gifts they offer their extended family members. So it is when a person is initiated into the family of the Holy Trinity. The greatest gift is the Person of the Holy Spirit, and…

Oh, what beautiful words! And what a glorious affirmation—if indeed it is true. Our priests when celebrating together kiss one another three times just before the Creed is sung, saying: “Christ is here in our midst.” And of course we mean it. The Teacher of love is among us. We feel His presence in one another.

The celebrant turns at the Divine…