Spirituality is always eventually about what you do with your pain. It seems our culture has lost its own spiritual foundation and center, and as a result we no longer know what to do with universal pain. If we do not transform our pain, we will always transmit it–to our partner, our spouse, our children, our friends, our coworkers, our “enemies.” Usually we project it outward and blame someone else for causing our pain. In
Every culture has its spiritual origin in a cult, from which little by little it becomes detached, until it is entirely cut off and self-contained, even perhaps the preserve of an elite. This ‘decadent’ phase of its history is often the time of its highest refinement, subtlety and consciousness. Wholeness and spontaneity give place to a nuanced awareness, a degree of scepticism, a tolerance of diversity, a dislike of sharp distinctions, a readiness to see
By Father Vasile Tudora There are many places in the world where the fear of not being able to make ends meet, leaving your family without food, shelter, and other means of subsistence, or the fear of a ravaging war, is intensely present. With the golden era of prosperity, in the Western world at least, these great survival fears have almost disappeared, morphing into new and shallow anxieties: not being able to land the most
By Father Brendan Pelphrey This raises the question how we understand ourselves as American Orthodox. Many Orthodox Christians in America today want to see a self-ruling, or autonomous, American Orthodox Church. Others, however have consistently referred to Orthodox churches in America as “diaspora”—not an American Church, but a collection of missions sent out from “mother” churches overseas. When American converts to Orthodoxy hear the language of “diaspora,” it can seem very strange. Those of us
Attending liturgical services, fasting, and even praying at regular intervals do not exhaust the lenten effort. Or rather, in order to be effective and meaningful, they need the support of our whole life. They need, in other terms, a “style of life” which would not be in contradiction with them, would not lead to a “split” existence. In the past, in Orthodox countries, such support was given by society itself: it was that complex of
We have [spoken] of the Church’s teaching about Lent as conveyed to us primarily by Lenten worship. Now these questions must be asked: How can we apply this teaching to our lives? What could be not only a nominal but a real impact of Lent on our existence? This existence (do we need to recall it) is very different from the one people led when all these services, hymns, canons, and prescriptions were composed and
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