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Church New Year. Beginning of the Indiction: Ecclesiastical New Year

Commemorated on September 1 The first day of the Church New Year is also called the beginning of the Indiction. The term Indiction comes from a Latin word meaning, “to impose.” It was originally applied to the imposition of taxes in Egypt. The first worldwide Indiction was in 312 when the Emperor Constantine (May 21) saw a miraculous vision of the Cross in the sky. Before the introduction of the Julian calendar, Rome began the

The Beheading of the Holy Glorious Prophet, Forerunner, and Baptist John

The Beheading of the Prophet, Forerunner of the Lord, John the Baptist: The Evangelists Matthew (Mt.14:1-12) and Mark (Mark 6:14-29) provide accounts about the martyric end of John the Baptist in the year 32 after the Birth of Christ. Following the Baptism of the Lord, Saint John the Baptist was locked up in prison by Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch (ruler of one fourth of the Holy Land) and governor of Galilee. (After the death of

Listening to God’s Voice

~Sermon preached by Fr. Antony Hughes on Sunday, November 8, 2020 Today, once again, Jesus, through his compassionate words and actions, tells us the truth. People are what matters, not the Law, not ideology. People. The welfare of human beings in the eyes of our Lord trumps everything. That is the meaning of the Lord’s words, “The Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath.” Did Jesus condemn the Woman with the Issue

Saint Martyr Fanourios

W.J. Lillie We have nothing to say with certainty about the famous martyr of Christ, Fanourios, as regards where he came from, who his parents were and when his martyrdom occurred, because all information has been lost to the depredations of time and covered by the tombstone of oblivion. So everything related to the saint was unrevealed and unknown. But the following things have been made known concerning the glorious martyr Fanourios. During the 14th

On Sudden Death

Archimandrite Ephraim, Abbot of the Vatopaidi Monastery Nowadays when science and technology are flying, when cultures converge and there is a crisis in values, even the word ‘death’ is avoided and anything reminiscent of it is ignored and discarded. Modern man views death as something negative and as a loss; we usually say for the departed: ‘We’ve lost him’. Whoever does not have the proper knowledge about this issue of death, he is trying to

Love and Freedom

~By Father Stephen Freeman, August 29, 2018 The most difficult aspect of love is the freedom it inherently requires. Love, in its ultimate and proper form, only exists between equals. There can be a sort of benevolence and nobility towards another who is not equal, but never love. This makes it difficult to understand the God-who-is-love. It will quickly be said by most that God is not our equal, and that we can never be

Irony and Belief

~By Stephen Freeman, August 24, 2018 Irony is probably too much to ask of youth. If I can remember myself in my college years, the most I could muster was sarcasm. Irony required more insight. There is a deep need for the appreciation of irony to sustain a Christian life. Our world is filled with contradiction. Hypocrisy is ever present even within our own heart. The failures of Church and those who are most closely

The Invisible Life of the Soul

Fr. Andreas Agathokleous We live among people who are imperfect, with lots of passions and faults which are likely to irritate us enormously and make us upset. But we can’t change the way they behave, particularly their negative attitude towards us. Nobody changes their own disposition unless they want to. We can see this from ourselves. We might not express our anger, our discontent, our ill-will, our rejection and any other negativity we feel towards

Simply Not Conventional

Sermon preached by Fr. Antony Hughes on Sunday, November 22, 2020 Jesus brought to us a unique Gospel. A new way of seeing. A new way of living. It is not the way we are used to. Not the way we are taught to think, see and live in our culture. It is a mistake to believe that Christ confirms the way we live as his own. When we do find ourselves in a dead-end.

Knowledge by Itself is Dangerous

Archimandrite Iakovos Kanakis Knowledge is power and love is the aim; when they go hand in hand we have a wonderful result. ‘Knowledge puffs up whereas love builds up’ (1 Cor. 8, 1) and Saint Maximos the Confessor urges us to: ‘yoke together knowledge and love and you’ll become humble in outlook, a spiritual constructor, building up both yourself and all those you are in touch with’ (ΕΠΕ 14, Thessaloniki 2006). The holy Father analyzes the