SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week: Why Does the Lord Allow Evil? “When the same Abba Anthony thought about the depth of the judgments of God, he asked, Lord, how is that some die when they are young, while others drag on to extreme old age? Why are there those who are poor and those who are rich? Why do wicked men prosper and why are the

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – “The demons wage a furious war against him who struggles with all his strength,  whereas they are uninterested in the negligent, since they have them at their beck and call; those who want the good find God to be their ally, Who permits wars for our spiritual profit.” The Evergetinos, Book 1, p246 Adults/Family:  ” ‘The Holy Fathers say (this is how Fr.

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – Virtue in Sickness On the Purpose of Illness and Its Potential to Protect Us – “If we come to understand the nature of fallen man, we shall be able to learn about ourselves; and we shall be able to know God and worship Him as Creator…” [Our “golden mouth” Saint reminds us that it is our lack of faith in God that causes harm to our souls

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – An Orthodox Christian Understanding of Things ‘Not of This World’ With the recent media attention being given to extraterrestrial sightings, what is the Orthodox teaching from a Christ-centered perspective regarding this phenomena? “…We live near the end of this fearful age of demonic triumph and rejoicing, when the eerie ‘humanoids’ (another of the masks of the demons) have become visible to thousands of

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – The Presence of Angels in Our Lives “…Angels are figures of the church…and about whom I feel we haven’t paid the necessary attention. When I became aware of this… I realized that we made a huge mistake and these beings that God created before man… are not fictional but realities of heaven who have a continuous relationship with the earth and with people

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – “Behold I Make All Things New” “And so, the Feast of Feasts has passed by us: and the Royal Gates in the Lord’s temples are shut; and the service is no longer as triumphant as it was during Bright Week. What, then, brethren, has this feast left in our souls? Christian holidays, you see, do not pass before us, one after another, just

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – Beyond Pascha “Forty days of Great Lent having been completed, along with Holy Week, and the Great Feast of Feasts, Pascha, having been marked in the Church, it is very easy to take a deep breath and say, “Now, that’s done!” And with the exhalation we take our leave of a liturgical feast and return to our daily routine and schedule. Just

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – Thoughts for Palm Sunday and Holy Week “We have already arrived at the last week of Great Lent. The piety of our people has named it “Silent” or “Deaf”, because during it there are no Salutations to the Theotokos. But there is another reason that such a week exists. The nickname is not at all by accident. It is a time

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week – Confessing and Passing Down the Orthodox Faith   “We are all responsible for the Church, and not only the bishops, for the Church is not someone else’s private property… and the faithful people have for centuries been generally recognized as the guardians of Orthodoxy.” Archpriest Theodore Zisis How are we, the faithful, as the guardians of Orthodoxy, responsible for the Church? “…We stand

SSCORRE! Saint Sophia Cathedral Online Resources for our Religious Edification Topic of the Week –  Persevering Through Temptations During Lent   “Entering the second week of Lent, have you noticed temptations increasing?… The Evangelist Matthew writes: “Christ fasted forty days and forty nights and then was hungry. And the tempter came to Him….” The tempter came to Christ when He was hungry. Thus, hunger attracts him, but hunger is eventually what defeats him, when, of course,