By Father William Rettig
Church, ever since its reception of the Holy Spirit at the day of Pentecost, has at various times sought the unambiguous voice and specific guidance of that Spirit in a more concentrated way, in order to more fully live into its vocation as the Spirit-anointed ‘Body of Christ’ in this world.
This is, no doubt, part of…
A Conversation with Benedict Sheehan and Harrison Russin
(The following conversation is a continuation of the OCA’s series on vocations. Previous installments have included “Vocation as Church-wide endeavor” and “A Call for Monastic Vocations”.)
In his 2018 encyclical Of What Life Do We Speak?, His Beatitude Metropolitan Tikhon articulates the…
During the Twelfth All-American Council (Sobor) held in Pittsburgh, July 25-30, 1999, Archpriest Sergei Glagolev asked His Beatitude Metropolitan Theodosius if he could address the brother clergy at a special clergy breakfast following liturgy. At the time, Father Sergei didn’t know that God would continue to bless him with so many years after,…
During the pandemic, I have often heard people refer to this as “a crazy time.” Or they say that we are living in “a crazy world” now. Others refer to the pandemic in general as “all this craziness.”
I have never felt comfortable with that word or description. I wanted to say that…
Enter eagerly into the treasure-house that lies within you, and so you will see the treasure-house of heaven; for the two are the same, and there is but one single entry to them both. — Saint Isaac the Syrian
Today on April 7th, the…
In a letter dated June 5, 2020 to his clergy and monastics, His Eminence Archbishop Alexander of Dallas made available to his faithful the following reflection written by a “wise priest in the diocese”.
I have waited a long time before writing anything specifically about our current situation because I am a simple parish priest, not an…
The Orthodox Church is a singing church. We express our faith through song. For weeks or months now, many of us have been unable to attend services because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We miss hearing our hymns, and singing them—praying them—together. We yearn to enter our churches once again and lift our voices in song. But…
There once was a man who had a mouse in his house. He had a mousetrap, but no cheese to use as bait. As the man sat in his kitchen reading a magazine, he noticed an advertisement with a picture of cheese. Chuckling to himself, he cut out the cheese and placed it in the mousetrap under the sink hoping that the mouse might…
In 1996 the Orthodox Church in America was invited to send representatives to a symposium marking the 400th anniversary of the Union of Brest. Representing the Orthodox Church in America was Archpriest John Matusiak, and Priest Joseph Kopka. The symposium focused on the Orthodox perspective of the Union of Brest, and…
It has been repeatedly stated that we are in an unprecedented situation. While parallels have been drawn to the Spanish Flu Pandemic, there is no living memory of those days and we must use the historical record as a guide. Naturally, there has been debate on how to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak.…
Retired Navy Chaplain Archpriest Jerome Cwiklinski, CPT CHC USN, is one of the longest-serving military chaplains in the Orthodox Church in America. In retirement Father Jerome, together with his wife Matushka Wendy, continue to serve the pastoral and spiritual needs of the Orthodox Marines at Camp Pendleton, CA. through…
As we find innovative and temporary ways to be the Church, including new ways to participate in worship, new ways to provide pastoral ministry, and new ways to keep community we must also find new ways of evangelizing, of sharing the Gospel, and of ministering to the larger communities in which…
This evening as we witness the betrayal, judgment, crucifixion, death and burial of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and listen to the hymns of Matins of Holy Friday and contemplate the meaning of these events for our life, we can’t help but think of the suffering that we see in the world now. To help us understand this suffering…
As we continue to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the autocephaly of the Orthodox Church in America, we also remember those saints, bishops, clergy, and laymen who worked so diligently and with immense faith to establish Christ’s Holy Church here in North America. In this reflection, Archpriest Andrew Morbey, Dean of the…
True leadership brings people where they need to be but don’t want to go.
No Christian worth their salt believes Christ went to His crucifixion subservient to the Jewish leaders and Roman state. Even though the Jewish high priest, Caiaphas, gave voice to the common plot to put Jesus to death when he said “it would be…
At the direction of our Archbishop Alexander, I served the Divine Liturgy Sunday with only four people present: the choir director, one singer, one altar server, and myself. I found it to be a very sad experience: what is usually a joyful gathering of the faithful now a handful.
In his letter Archbishop Alexander calls our…
“Rejoice in the Lord; rejoice in the Lord; rejoice in the Lord. May the Lord guard your soul and body and spirit from every evil, as well as from every opposition of the devil and every troubling imagination. The Lord will be your light, your protection, your way, your strength, your crown of gladness and eternal help.”…
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another (John 13:34-35)
Our primary…
Church closed.
Community members scattered widely.
Weeks without normal daily and weekly routine, without spiritual instruction, without icons to venerate, without Sunday eucharist, without community agape meals.
This was the deliberate practice of the monastery of Abba Zosima in the sixth century Palestinian desert,…
We have completed the first week of the Great Fast! We began it one week ago by receiving the universal impetus gathered as the Church in worship to surrender our hearts to the direction given at the service of vespers, ‘to cleanse our soul as we cleanse our flesh,’ and ‘to abstain from passion as we abstain from food.’ We do this…