~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
~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
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
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.
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
~By Father Stephen Freeman, August 20, 2018 For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, (1 Tim. 2:5) There is no way to adequately explain priesthood without reference to mediation. A priest is a mediator between God and Man. From time to time over the years, I have had the verse from 1 Timothy pointed out to me with the argument that there cannot be any mediator
Saint Gregory Palamas If ‘the death of the saints is precious and the memory of the righteous is blessed’, with how much greater praise should we keep the memory of the ‘saint of the saints’ through whom the whole of sanctity came to them, that is the memory of the Ever-Virgin Mother of God? This is what we do when we celebrate the anniversary of her holy Dormition or transferal, in which, even though she
By Fr. Stephen Freeman, August 7, 2019 In my childhood, it was not unusual to hear someone ask, “Who are your people?” It was a semi-polite, Southernism designed to elicit essential information about a person’s social background. The assumption was that you, at best, could only be an example of your “people.” It ignored the common individualism of the wider culture, preferring the more family or clan-centered existence of an older time. It was possible
Elder Ephraim of Arizona † Every time we celebrate the Dormition of the Mother of God, it’s as if we’re having Easter – the Easter of the summer. Our Lady the Mother of God prepares Easter for us. A glorious crossing “from death to life”. A second Easter, holy spotless, life-giving for the human race, because today “the laws of nature are overcome”. “How the source of life goes towards life, passing through death”, says
Sermon preached by Fr. Antony Hughes on Sunday, August 15, 2021 In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, One God Amen. Glory to Jesus Christ. The scripture readings today are extremely significant and apropos to the day. Saint Paul’s talking about self-emptying: The Kenosis of Jesus Christ, who came to the world, giving up all His divine prerogative to become one of us and save us in
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