Sermon preached by Fr. Antony Hughes on Sunday, August 10, 2014 The Reading is from the Gospel of St. Matthew. (14:22-34) The month of August is a month of theophanies. A theophany, from the Greek, literally means a “revelation of God”, not “from God”, but “of God.” The Transfiguration of Jesus is a theophany. God reveals himself present in Jesus Christ in this world. He shares his light and energy with us and with all
Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America “I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors and her ample rivers – and it was not there . . . in her fertile fields and boundless forests and it was not there . . . in her rich mines and her vast world commerce – and it was not there . . . in her democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution – and
Christ’s resurrection paves the way for transformation Abbot Tryphon, December 23, 2016 The fact that we Orthodox do not accept the doctrine of original sin as espoused in the West, does in no way suggest that we do not need to be born again (born anew). We believe, as did the Early Church Fathers, that we inherit only the results of Adams sin, not his guilt. This is known as ancestral sin because the sin
By Fr. Stephen Freeman, October 26, 2015 Einstein was famous for his “thought experiments.” He worked his way into radical new insights, not through careful research in a laboratory, but through careful work in the imagination. The same is true for almost all work in cosmology. You cannot simply observe the data generated from particle experiments and announce a conclusion. What is required is a work of imagination to describe a universe in which what
By Fr. Stephen Freeman, August 5, 2015 There are very few categories more basic than life and death. For Classical Christian thinking, they are essential. There has also been a tendency in both theology and philosophy, however, to move away from these fundamental categories and become lost in the complexities of other language. Thinking about the moral life is a prime example. A word like “sin” becomes an obscure subset of legal wrangling and tortured
Godly Meditations from America’s Founding Fathers John Adams: “The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal code as well as a moral and religious code. These are laws essential to the existence of men in society and most of which have been enacted by every Nation which ever professed any code of laws. Vain indeed would be the search among the writings of secular history to find so broad, so complete and so
God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness.” —Genesis 1:26 My dear people, we are already children of God; what we will be in the future has not yet been fully revealed, and all I do know is that we shall be like God. —1 John 3:2 The Judeo-Christian creation story says that we were created in the very “image and likeness” of God—who is Infinite Love flowing between Three, making unity out of clear diversity. (Picture
God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness.” —Genesis 1:26 Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life. —Revelation 22:17 Centuries of Christian theology confirm that the “image” described in Genesis refers to our eternal essence in God which cannot be increased or decreased. It is the soul’s objective union with God. You (and every other created thing) begin with
By Abbot Tryphon, April 12, 2020 Let us use this pandemic as the time to rediscover the beauty of our faith This COVID-19 pandemic has afforded me the time to sit in silence, enjoying the beauty of the surrounding forest, like nothing I’ve experienced in years. The forest is so quiet, now that I don’t hear traffic sounds off in the distance, and airlines flying overhead, and the return of our bird population has afforded
By Fr. Stavros Akrotirianakis, March 9, 2019 Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed; the night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day, not
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